IE9 and e-Portal

[Michael]

Hello all,

 

I've had it reported to me at two different sites with users experiencing problems with IE9 and e-Portal. Running Windows 7 SP1 x86 and IE9, fully patched.

 

Users can load up the e-Portal page, login and take the register without any problems. It's when submitting the register the problem happens. IE9 doesn't appear to hang (according to Task Manager), but just sits there. I believe a confirmation message is supposed to appear when complete.

 

Even worse, the problem is intermittent, so it'll work one morning, but not the afternoon or visa versa and it affects different teachers randomly too.

 

I've tried running in Compatibility Mode, but IE9 doesn't seem to do anything different. The compatibility icon doesn't display, so I can only speculate e-Portal is supposed to work with IE9.

 

Is anyone else seeing this?

[psydii]

Are the users connected directly to Tomcat or going via IIS?

 

Are there any other proxies in use?

 

When was the last time eportal was restarted?

 

What evidence is there that the problem really is limited to IE9?

[ChrisJ]

Birmingham schools are configured to load ePortal via IIS.

 

Might be worth seeing if doing it via Tomcat makes a difference.

 

Try http://schoolname.misportal.net:8080/ePortal and see what effect that has.

[Michael]

I have logged a call with Link2ICT and get them to look at it. There are no proxies involved as it's hosted internally, although a proxy is used to get to the world wide web. The portal is also listed as a proxy exception via GPO.

 

There is a possibility it is a bug with the latest e-Portal release. As above, it is loaded from IIS6 on a 2003 Server in my case. The server was restarted recently due to Windows Updates, but the problem was there before this (before someone asks)! The uptime is currently 11 days, so not long.

 

I don't wish to use Firefox or downgrade to IE8 as this is going to be a real pain! For the most part it works, just not all the time for some odd reason!

[psydii]

The eportal services (and for good measure IIS) should be restarted daily (over night). <--standard Serco advice.

 

Do you have a scheduled task on the server for this?

 

Is it possible that someone might be occasionally restarted the eportal services during the day - while people are usining it?

[mac_shinobi]

Did said GPO apply correctly ie the exception is being added.

 

Also when you say you added an exception ( can you post the exception or what you typed for the exception ) ie did you wild card it or is it the full path or what exactly ?

 

Just as a test, if you adjust the connection settings to use a direct connection and test the portal, does it work fine then or do you still have the same issue ?

[Michael]

I've not heard or been given that advice before. Is it really that necessary to do it so frequently?

 

I'll wait for Link2ICT's feedback and see if they're any wiser as to why this is happening and post back here.

[Michael]

Did said GPO apply correctly ie the exception is being added.

 

Also when you say you added an exception ( can you post the exception or what you typed for the exception ) ie did you wild card it or is it the full path or what exactly ?

 

Just as a test, if you adjust the connection settings to use a direct connection and test the portal, does it work fine then or do you still have the same issue ?

 

I use a wildcard - *.misportal.net and this is being applied correctly.

 

When I type:

 

http://schoolname.misportal.net:80/ePortal

 

it automatically redirects to:

 

https://schoolname.misportal.net/eportal/index.jsp

 

This is where users are directed to in the first place.

[psydii]

Yes. It improved our users' perception of eportal from 'unreliable piece of junk' to 'oh yeah... I suppose it has mostly worked for the last few months'

[Michael]

Could you post an example of the script you use? Certainly worth a try

[ChrisJ]

I've not heard or been given that advice before. Is it really that necessary to do it so frequently?

 

At Link I did put the daily restart of ePortal services in at quite a few schools, but we never made it standard practice to do so.

 

However, one of the first things I did when I started here was to put the scheduled tasks in place to restart the services

 

Worth doing.

[ToyHeartsFan]

Side note - Link2ict say that schools shouldn’t be using IE9 because the wonderful Birmingham HR Portal won’t work with it…

 

Still on XP and IE8 but once had one teacher / the admin office complain that when they marked the register the results were not recorded. It turned out the teacher was marking the register late. I don’t know if there is a time frame set some where or if it was because the office had the registers open to check attendance. Also if they logged into eportal and left the session open too long that caused problems.

 

I know you said you didn’t want to use firefox but there is an msi version with adm templates from these guys which I’ve used on a few admin machines in the past when we had problems with IE. I only used the basic template so it wasn’t really locked down so I had to be selective about whom I deployed it to. Trying an alternative browser is probably the only way you will confirm if it’s an IE issue or something else.

 

Download FrontMotion Firefox CE

 

 

I don't restart the services every night but I do run this scheduled task "run at system startup" because server reboots seem to upset eportal.

 

::------------------------------------------------------------------

:: This is just a trial startup script used to restart Eportal

:: The eportal service doesnt always populate the user login detail after a server reboot

:: Stopping then restarting the Eoptal services can fix this most times

 

 

:: -------------------------------------------------------------------------

:: note using "net start" on its own will list running services

::

:: Source of code MS-DOS/MSDOS Batch File Command Reference

:: crude way of adding a pause using ping command to ping the computers local ip

:: nul command stops the ping results being displayed (1 sec pasue between each ping)

::

:: Note that the Facility Eportal service is dependent upon the Facility Data Server service

::--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

@echo This will wait 4 mins for the server to load then stop and restart Eportal

 

:: Insert delay of (4min = 300 Seconds) 300 = 300(+1) seconds

ping -n 301 127.0.0.1 >NUL

 

Net stop "Facility Eportal"

Net stop "Facility Data Server"

 

:: Insert delay of 20 = 20(+1) seconds

ping -n 21 127.0.0.1 >NUL

 

Net start "Facility Data Server"

Net start "Facility Eportal"

::-------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Other thing to check - could the Eportal service be crashing?

[themightymrp]

According to the Sercofirstline website, under the hardware requirements PDF it doesn't specify IE9 as a fully supported browser. I am the only person in our school with IE9 installed and, seeing as I dont do much on ePortal personally, this has never been a problem.

[Michael]

I'll have a go restarting the services at 3am and see what happens the following day.

 

@ToyHeartsFan - You're right, but I get round this by deploying IE9 everywhere and just using IE8 on admin workstations. It is getting a little silly though - you must be using IE8 and must be using Adobe Reader 9 all because of one website. The amount of support requests it created, I'm not sure why it wasn't just properly fixed.

 

It's not directly Link2ICT's problem to be fair to them - it's not their site (to my knowledge) but they assist schools anyway.

[psydii]

Become an Academy - gets you out of having to have outdated services. (maybe)

Definately gives you the flexability to require new service partners keep their support current by specifiying they must support for the latest standard browsers on current operating systems...

 

But to hop back on topic...

I'd add 'iisreset' to the script above, just to clear out any caching it might be doing. And definately schedule it to run every night.

 

The guidance is in the 'enhancing eportal performance' document which I can't find for download anywhere. The script for restarting eportal is on sercofirstline->support downloads->eportal.

 

Finally, eportal logs people out after a few minutes (10 I think, but it might be 20). To the end user it is not usually obvious that this has happened, and has for us, in the past been a significant source of 'eportal just stopped working' reports.

Edited February 29, 2012 by psydii

[ToyHeartsFan]

It is getting a little silly though - you must be using IE8 and must be using Adobe Reader 9.

 

Tell me about it - lol

I had acrobat reader 10.1.1 deployed site wide and had to make a new package for 9.5 its like talking to a brick wall when you call them and tell them the problem is their end and they need to fix it...

 

At least they are saying IE8 is ok these days but if I was on W7 and couldnt use IE9 I wouldnt be a happy bunny; I remember having a conversation with them once and they said I should be using IE6...

 

Its the HR Portal and another one the bursar uses that cause the problems.

 

Just luck so far that an app / site hasnt needed the current version to run correctly because I dont know what we are supposed to do then.

You can see it coming cant you e.g. HR portal needs old obsolete version and progresso needs the current version...

[mac_shinobi]

Try using Firefox... works beautifully with windows 7 zimbra and eportal, and I'd recommend the daily reset restart cured about 90% of eportals niggles over night.

 

what about google chrome?

[Michael]

Thanks for all the replies guys.

 

I've created a schedule which will restart both Facility and e-Portal services at 5am. I'll report back in the next few days and see whether or not it has worked.

 

This is the easiest tweak to try first and I'll look at other options if I have to. Link2ICT haven't come back with anything to try 'yet'.

 

At least they are saying IE8 is ok these days but if I was on W7 and couldnt use IE9 I wouldnt be a happy bunny; I remember having a conversation with them once and they said I should be using IE6...

 

And I'd put money on it, that come the end of 2012, Windows 8 will be released and it'll come with IE10 pre-installed.

 

As for IE6 it is still unbelievably supported by Microsoft, but they just encourage you to use IE8 (if you're on XP). I had a look at an in-house council laptop recently and it was still running IE6. I just find it so ironic that one minute we have to be super secure behind proxies and firewalls, but we'll still use IE6. There's no logic to this and I dispute the old argument it's down to compatibility. Developers are well aware of Microsoft's browser development schedule.

[Michael]

Initial feedback - extremely good. One problem still at one site and none at the other for morning registers.

 

Will be interesting to see how this afternoon turns out.

[Michael]

This afternoon, zero problems reported at both sites. It is strange how a simple fix can make all the difference!

[ToyHeartsFan]

And I'd put money on it, that come the end of 2012, Windows 8 will be released and it'll come with IE10 pre-installed.

 

Ive just installed the W8 Consumer Preview and it does indeed have IE10 preinstalled...

[Michael]

Maybe worth mentioning this to the HR Portal team. Adobe Reader 11 will probably be out by Q4 2012 too. Let the games begin!

[ToyHeartsFan]

Maybe worth mentioning this to the HR Portal team. Adobe Reader 11 will probably be out by Q4 2012 too. Let the games begin!

 

W8, IE10 and Adobe Reader 11 it appears the mere thought of it has caused the HR portal to have a breakdown today – lol