SIMS - How to contact support (URGENT)

[36Degrees]

35 minutes ago, AnglianEdu said:

This problem is back again for us this morning, anyone else?

 

Yup...

[JRA]

Same here.

[Ratcliffepg]

Same here.... Shocking.... all the more reason to move away....

[Sonic007]

I have enough to do without this Sims rubbish.

[SIMS_Customer_Support]

Hi all, apologies for the issue with eligibility checker this morning, we're working to get this resolved as the highest priority.

In the meantime you will be able to access the majority of functions inside of SIMS if you select the Remind Me Later button in the prompt, with only access to the Census-related menu items being affected.

If you're an FMS user, access to the CFR, VAT Reports and the Central Authorisation process for non-bank account schools will be limited, however all other menu items continue to work normally. 

We'll keep you updated on this as soon as we have more information.

[JRA]

From their renewal email:

 

Quote

Our Adaptive Packages are all about delivering EdTech that makes an impact – we’ve already invested £50m in new product development, cloud infrastructure and cyber security with an additional £30m planned for the next two years. All this investment means you can be confident that you will benefit from EdTech solutions that meet your needs both now and in the future.

 

Yeah maybe not huh.

 

Fifty.

 

MILLION.

 

And we're getting this (again.)

[Boredguy]

Almost as if a server or service goes wonky after 6am on a Thursday since last week our Cover Supervisor was logged in fine to SIMS at 5:45 but others got the warning after 8:00 from what I can see via the Impero window title logs this morning

[Sonic007]

16 minutes ago, SIMS_Customer_Support said:

Hi all, apologies for the issue with eligibility checker this morning, we're working to get this resolved as the highest priority.

In the meantime you will be able to access the majority of functions inside of SIMS if you select the Remind Me Later button in the prompt, with only access to the Census-related menu items being affected.

If you're an FMS user, access to the CFR, VAT Reports and the Central Authorisation process for non-bank account schools will be limited, however all other menu items continue to work normally. 

We'll keep you updated on this as soon as we have more information.

 

Appreciate you giving us an update, But we shouldnt have to be using workarounds and getting staff to click "Remind me later" should we?
Many users who are not tech savvy see the error and then panic, causing us tech's to then have to rush around everywhere.
Having got many schools to spend thousands on new contracts, this is not good enough.

Edited May 22, 2025 by Sonic007

[OkayiDave]

15 minutes ago, Boredguy said:

Almost as if a server or service goes wonky after 6am on a Thursday since last week our Cover Supervisor was logged in fine to SIMS at 5:45 but others got the warning after 8:00 from what I can see via the Impero window title logs this morning

Im guessing what they did was just push back the check in date by a week to get it running for Census.

[Ratcliffepg]

yes another patch coming..... and off course should only be installed went no one is using sims......

[SIMS_Customer_Support]

Hi @Sonic007 apologies this is causing concern and additional workload, we're doing everything we can do get this resolved as quickly as possible. 

[ThrowawaySims]

I know it's "just a popup" for most users but it's indicative of the quality of the application and its updates, which were questionable (and I'm being generous) already anyway.

 

TEMPORARY FIX - run at your own risk

• Tested and working at: 5 primary schools, 1 large secondary
• @wobert has provided an SQL script to apply this fix automatically

If you're as cowboy brave as I am and want to try this, please report back to confirm if it works or not

Here's a quick fix - you don't need anyone to log out of sims to apply this UNOFFICIAL workaround:

1. Make sure you have a backup! This isn't an official fix, there's a risk here that something will go wrong, or you'll do something wrong, and break sims, which is much worse than having an annoying popup!
2. On the sims server, open Microsoft SQL Server Manager and connect to the Sims server (you can find out what it is from 'C:\Program Files (x86)\SIMS\SIMS .net\connect.ini' on a workstation with Sims installed. Look for the 'ServerName=' line. eg: "ServerName=SimsServer.county.sch.uk\Sims2022")
3. On the left, expand Databases, Sims, Tables - note that your database name might not be "Sims" exactly
4. Find the 'db_annual_entitlement_service_details' table
5. Right click > Edit top 200 rows
6. On the 'date_last_checked' column, change the DAY in the date to be '20' instead of '22' (eg: "2025-05-22 07:00:00.000" becomes "2025-05-20 07:00:00.000") - btw @Boredguythis 7am is hardcoded and doesn't change which is why it worked prior to 7am this morning but started to fail after!)
7. Click into another field - this applies the change to the date_last_checked column you've just made
   1. if someone logs into sims between step 5 & 7 you'll end up with a red icon on the field you edited, that's okay, it just means your change didn't write, you may need to repeat these two steps for this fix to apply)

Once you've clicked away from this (so the change applies to the DB), log into sims on the server or a client. The eligibility check will be redone and will allow you to access census stuff normally without a login poopup either... At least, in testing this is the result, though I suspect it will recur unless the Sims crew can actually fix this problem.

Edited May 22, 2025 by ThrowawaySims
Add note about having a backup and re-enforcing the risk of doing this. Also added some additional clarity, request for feedback from other cowboys like me, and a test count (which I will continue to update)

[SIMS_Customer_Support]

Hi all,

A fix for this issue has now been identified.
 

We've run this for all SIMS Connected schools. We do advise that you fully log out of SIMS/FMS, sign out of SIMS ID and log back in to launch a new session. 
 

For on-premise schools, this fix will automatically run overnight but if you need to access any of the affected menu routes, then patches 28955 (SIMS) and 30735 (FMS) can be run via SOLUS. Once you've applied these patches the message should clear.

We recommend that all users are logged out of SIMS/FMS for the duration of the patch application. 
 

[DarkMaster]

right see you all next Thursday for round three

[Boredguy]

4 minutes ago, DarkMaster said:

right see you all next Thursday for round three

At least with it being half term it won't be so much of an issue

[Jawloms]

49 minutes ago, SIMS_Customer_Support said:

Hi @Sonic007 apologies this is causing concern and additional workload, we're doing everything we can do get this resolved as quickly as possible. 

 

I'd rather it was fixed properly than quickly.

[sunny88]

34 minutes ago, SIMS_Customer_Support said:

Hi all,

A fix for this issue has now been identified.
 

We've run this for all SIMS Connected schools. We do advise that you fully log out of SIMS/FMS, sign out of SIMS ID and log back in to launch a new session. 
 

For on-premise schools, this fix will automatically run overnight but if you need to access any of the affected menu routes, then patches 28955 (SIMS) and 30735 (FMS) can be run via SOLUS. Once you've applied these patches the message should clear.

We recommend that all users are logged out of SIMS/FMS for the duration of the patch application. 
 

Are these the same patches as last week, or are you releasing new ones in solus3 to all 

[SIMS_Customer_Support]

Hi @sunny88, these are the same patches that were released last week, if you have any issues accessing do let me know. 

[cullingsh]

1 hour ago, ThrowawaySims said:

I know it's "just a popup" for most users but it's indicative of the quality of the application and its updates, which were questionable (and I'm being generous) already anyway.

 

TEMPORARY FIX - run at your own risk

• Tested and working at: 5 primary schools, 1 large secondary

If you're as cowboy brave as I am and want to try this, please report back to confirm if it works or not

Here's a quick fix - you don't need anyone to log out of sims to apply this UNOFFICIAL workaround:

1. Make sure you have a backup! This isn't an official fix, there's a risk here that something will go wrong, or you'll do something wrong, and break sims, which is much worse than having an annoying popup!
2. On the sims server, open Microsoft SQL Server Manager and connect to the Sims server (you can find out what it is from 'C:\Program Files (x86)\SIMS\SIMS .net\connect.ini' on a workstation with Sims installed. Look for the 'ServerName=' line. eg: "ServerName=SimsServer.county.sch.uk\Sims2022")
3. On the left, expand Databases, Sims, Tables - note that your database name might not be "Sims" exactly
4. Find the 'db_annual_entitlement_service_details' table
5. Right click > Edit top 200 rows
6. On the 'date_last_checked' column, change the DAY in the date to be '20' instead of '22' (eg: "2025-05-22 07:00:00.000" becomes "2025-05-20 07:00:00.000") - btw @Boredguythis 7am is hardcoded and doesn't change which is why it worked prior to 7am this morning but started to fail after!)
7. Click into another field - this applies the change to the date_last_checked column you've just made
   1. if someone logs into sims between step 5 & 7 you'll end up with a red icon on the field you edited, that's okay, it just means your change didn't write, you may need to repeat these two steps for this fix to apply)

 

This is what we did last week, rather than create huge, slow, backups, and kick everyone out of SIMS in all of our schools.

 

And how we are doing it this week. Again.

 

 

[wobert]

And if like me you have a number of sites you need to manage and keep updated (and hate Solus):

 

*if you break it, don't blame me.

 

Quote

--  Make sure you select your DB
USE Sims;
GO

-- Update all rows in the table 'db_annual_entitlement_service_details' by setting the 'date_last_checked' column to 2025-05-20 07:00:00.000
UPDATE db_annual_entitlement_service_details
SET date_last_checked = '2025-05-20 07:00:00.000';

 

 

[sunny88]

17 minutes ago, SIMS_Customer_Support said:

Hi @sunny88, these are the same patches that were released last week, if you have any issues accessing do let me know. 

So they are re deployable Mutiple times

[SIMS_Customer_Support]

Hi @sunny88, yes, fine to re-deploy

[Jawloms]

So we just run the same patch as we did last week? I assume something else has changed somewhere meaning we won't be re-running them again next week?

[TheTiredITTech]

22 minutes ago, Jawloms said:

So we just run the same patch as we did last week? I assume something else has changed somewhere meaning we won't be re-running them again next week?

Thats awfully optimistic 

[Sheridan]

We ran this patch last week and it seemed to fix the problem, now the same problem is back - are we supposed to just keep running this patch when this re-occurs as its obviously not a proper fix?