Bulk Extract of Data from SIMS - Moving to ISAMS

[ddevey]

Hi,

 

We have taken the decision to move from SIMS to ISAMS. I won't go into the reasoning here (wouldn't want to start a debate!), but I was wondering if anyone can offer any advice.

 

We have the SQL scripts provided by ISAMS that can be run on the system to extract the bulk of the student and staff data and this works (moderately) well, but this doesn't account for anywhere near all the data in the system. File paths to linked documents, SEN, medical, behaviour and achievement, previous schools etc all awol.

 

Can anyone advise me on the best way to get this data out (bearing in mind that this has to be done twice in the transition process so it has to be repeatable - A single bulk export/import at the start, followed by an update export/import just before going live).

 

Did anyone do this by modifying the SQL scripts or through generating reports? SQL scripts are fine, but without a database schema to review it's hard to know which information is stored in which field. Which is the best way to do it? SQL or Reports? Or a combination of both?

 

If anyone has any modified SQL scripts that I could take a look at that do more than the ones provided by ISAMS that would really help.

 

Alternatively I saw in a previous thread someone who offers data extraction services, but I can't find the thread. I'd throw money at this problem if I knew it was going to get done properly.

 

Any help would be very much appreciated.

[2ilent8cho]

I'm doing the exact same thing at the moment, i'm just using their provided scripts and then anything else manually. Just got the SEN Data, and Medical Data to do. Daunting task but i will be so glad to see the back of SIMS so its worth it.

[ddevey]

I'm doing the exact same thing at the moment, i'm just using their provided scripts and then anything else manually. Just got the SEN Data, and Medical Data to do. Daunting task but i will be so glad to see the back of SIMS so its worth it.

Can I ask how you got on? We have pretty much extracted everything, through a combination of reports and SQL as you originally suggested. How did you get on with extracting linked documents? There doesn't seem to be a concrete answer as to whether it is even possible??

[vikpaw]

There are probably a number of companies that can help. I'd check in with Salamander Software, they offer a bespoke service.

When we moved to Double First Engage, I helped their developer modify the extraction routines. I definitely had something for medical / first aid incidents.

It wouldn't be right to share SQL extraction code here as it could get into nefarious hands, but happy to advise privately.

Edit: Linked Docs can defo be done by Salamander

[2ilent8cho]

Can I ask how you got on? We have pretty much extracted everything, through a combination of reports and SQL as you originally suggested. How did you get on with extracting linked documents? There doesn't seem to be a concrete answer as to whether it is even possible??

Practically all data over now that we need. We will leave the SIMS server running and access it for historical data we have not been able to port over such as linked documents. We go live start of our Summer term so 24th April for us, so got a few more weeks to double check and triple check our data.

[vikpaw]

... We will leave the SIMS server running and access it for historical data we have not been able to port over such as linked documents...

The luxury of the perpetual license. That won't be available in the future. The other suppliers are going to have to up their game in terms of extracting data.

[pcstru]

Perhaps the new GDPR could be used to motivate suppliers (or users) to develop and share a way to easily report on ALL data held against an entity - which might also be useful in these data conversion exercises.

[vikpaw]

^ We can but hope.