Promissor ESM (EdExel testing) - urgent help!

[BJG]

Aaarrrrghhhh!

 

Been trying to get this working for weeks now, with the Head and the Exams Officer regularly emailing me "urgent" messages.

 

Problem is that EdExcel insist the issue is due to Norfolk County Council's firewall, and Norfolk County Council insist the problem is EdExcel.

 

So, if you have this infernal program working, I would be extremely grateful if you could try the following.

 

* * * * *

 

If you do a Google search for "microsoft portqryui", you'll find a port-testing program. It's pretty straightforward; just download it, unzip it, and run it.

 

In the "Destination IP" box, type "www.catglobal.com". Choose "Manually input query ports", and type 80 (TCP). Then click "Query". This will either say "Listening" (good) or "Filtered" (bad).

 

Repeat this for:

 

http://www.catglobal.com port 443

esm.catglobal.com port 80

esm.catglobal.com port 443

 

I can get "Listening" for all of these except the last one, and EdExcel say this is the problem. But NCC say they've already opened it, and if it's not responding properly then it's EdExcel's fault. (I get the same results trying from home.)

 

Who's right? Would love to hear what the results are when the software works.

Edited January 11, 2010 by BJG

[plexer]

Hi,

 

We run ESM Promissor tests with no problem here.

 

Ben

[jsnetman]

Listening on all adresses and ports you listed here and we are behind an LEA firewall.

[Guest TheLibrarian]

We've used our ESM server today, as far as I know all went fine.

 

 www.catglobal.com
Attempting to resolve name to IP address...
Name resolved to 159.182.112.210
querying...
TCP port 80 (http service): NOT LISTENING
TCP port 443 (https service): LISTENING

 

 esm.catglobal.com
Attempting to resolve name to IP address...
Name resolved to 159.182.112.240
querying...
TCP port 80 (http service): NOT LISTENING
TCP port 443 (https service): FILTERED

 

These results are from a Walsall LEA school going through the Walsall GfL / Netsweeper filtering.

 

Unfortunately, I know very little of this system beyond its existence.

[mjs_mjs]

Hi,

 

We run ESM Promissor tests with no problem here.

 

Ben

 

same - we're behind an LGFL firewall with all ports blocked coming into the school (other than other selected ones)

[BJG]

Thanks for the quick replies, though it's looking a bit inconclusive so far...

 

(One thing I should have added is that the port testing needs to be done on the computer running ESM Server!)

 

Chrz,

 

Ben

[Guest TheLibrarian]

(One thing I should have added is that the port testing needs to be done on the computer running ESM Server!)

 

The results I posted were from the ESM server.

 

HTH.

[mjs_mjs]

My boss mentioned today that within the ESM server there is an option for using the IP address rather than the domain name. Have you tried this? It could be a DNS error if using the IP address fixes it.

[glennda]

if using an isa give unauthenticated access to the websites mentioned above, worked for us

 

or an authenticated proxy

[BJG]

...finally got this working. For the record, esm.catglobal.com port 443 is still showing "filtered", so that was a red herring. Thanks again for the feedback.

[andrewb]

Hi BJG,

 

Do you have any pointers as to the solution you found? I'm having exactly the same problem - all required ports are open but the port scanner to esm.catglobal.com is coming up as 'FILTERED' on port 443.

 

Any help most appreciated!!

[BJG]

...what do you get for the other ports listed in the original post...? In the end I decided that EdExcel tech support were leading me up a blind alley with this. The system is working OK now and that port you mention is still showing Filtered, so it may not matter.

 

What's the problem that you're finding at the moment...? How far can you get...? (I previously tested connectivity between ESM Server and EdExcel by logging onto ESM and locking and unlocking tests. I think my undoing may have been that I hadn't installed the Administrator software along with ESM Server on the management workstation. I think you also need to make sure that cookies are enabled - I've added catglobal.com under Privacy...Sites...Allow in Internet Explorer).

Edited February 9, 2010 by BJG

[01hanstu]

How have you guys deployed this?

 

We have had to manually install it (we are on CC3 ) couldnt get the MSI to work.

 

Spoke to Edexcel and they said use the MSI and it will work, spoke to RM and they don't deal with third party applications, or not the ones we ask them about.

 

Thanks

- Stuart

[clareq]

We're on CC4 and their msi wouldn't even import into console - the errors I was getting implied a problem with the msi. I ended up using a script to push out the install to each machine.

[01hanstu]

Thanks for the reply.

 

Well at least I'm not alone.

 

Apparently the updates to promissor recently cause a few problems so I hope they will get it sorted soon.

 

Thanks

- Stuart

[RinSewand]

We've got a working CC3 MSI - took me several days on and off to get it to work, including much path setting in WinInstall LE and reg key fiddling.

 

RwD

[mjs_mjs]

We're on CC4 and their msi wouldn't even import into console - the errors I was getting implied a problem with the msi. I ended up using a script to push out the install to each machine.

 

We couldn't get a CC4 package ither, so just manually installed it on over 50 machines. wasn't too bad to do.

[01hanstu]

I had to install it manually, it couldn't find a dll but i could see the bugger

[Cache]

Not CC3/4 but I manually set it up on the workstations.

 

Out of interest, I changed all of the screen res's to 1024x768 because that's what it asked for. Do you all operate at 1024x768 or have you run the exams at higher res's without problem?

[mjs_mjs]

Not CC3/4 but I manually set it up on the workstations.

 

Out of interest, I changed all of the screen res's to 1024x768 because that's what it asked for. Do you all operate at 1024x768 or have you run the exams at higher res's without problem?

 

we have run at higher without issues.

[RinSewand]

Previous tests were run at 1280, this time round we switched to 1024 with a setres script, made no difference as far as I can tell.

[googlemad]

Help with ESM server please!

 

We have installed it on a clean XP SP3 laptop with all updates applied (Yes I know XP rather than Server but it is a low key deployment), and every time the laptop reboots it insists on performing some sort of configuration changes to the ESM MSI then comes up with a message saying the computer needs to be restarted for the changes to take effect!

 

Tried countless reinstalls and repairs but no luck, any ideas?

[mavhc]

How have you guys deployed this?

 

We have had to manually install it (we are on CC3 ) couldnt get the MSI to work.

 

Spoke to Edexcel and they said use the MSI and it will work, spoke to RM and they don't deal with third party applications, or not the ones we ask them about.

 

Thanks

- Stuart

 

MSI plus my MST to set the shared drive and add write permissions to a group I called ESMGG

 

mavhc For World President: Promissor Administrator MSI deployment

 

and http://www.edugeek.net/forums/educational-software/40486-edexcel-promissor-piece-junk-2.html#post426112