altecsole

Yes, pretty good software. We installed it on the Librarians machine as a server install. Other network users could then browse the catalogue by using the search sofware and pointing at the server. You can set the backup to a network location or use a pen drive (as we did).

I've never used RIS (yet), just Ghost. If you want to re-image a full classroom is there anyway you can automatically set the machine names? At the moment, in my new school, they have to visit each machine to set the computer name. Also, to take account of different hardware. Can you manually add drivers for different graphics and sound cards etc. Thanks.

Ghost can image any drive/partition, I think RIPRep will only do the C: drive. Setting up a Ghost boot partition is fairly straightforward. I used to use Ghost because we had an NT 4 network. In my new job it's all W2k. If you've got W2k and can use RIS and RIPRep, I can't really see much reason for spending the money to use Ghost.

With Ghost Enterprise edition you can install a hidden Ghost boot partition which, when you image a workstation from the server, boots the pc using the boot partition, connects to the server and downloads the image. Once the imaging has taken place it hides the boot partition again and boots using the imaged partition. It works well.

Have a look at xampp it's really easy to install and setup.

How do they login to Nova-T? Do they have to do it manually in Nova-T itself? If you setup SIMS.net with Nova-T in mind it should be seamless. The problem with Nova-T is that it will only accept a username with a maximum of 8 letters. With this in mind, in SIMS System Manager set the same usernames as for Nova-T for your users, and make sure that they set the same passwords too. That way, when they logon to SIMS and click on the Nova-T link (which they get by making them a member of the correct group) they get straight in.

So they access Nova-T from a shortcut, not from with SIMS.net? Are you running a client/server or peer-to-peer setup?

To have access to Nova-T you need to give the user permission to access it. Whoever is your System Manager will need to assign the users to the correct group - not sure which one, probably something to do with timetabling. Once they are members of the correct group they will get the Nova-T icon on the left when they login to SIMS.net.

If you get them to login as Manager, rather than Admin, they have less permission to do things.

Censornet (free Linux based proxy designed for educational use) allows you to do this. You have to add all your machine MAC addresses to it for it to work. I used it at my last school and teachers could control individual or groups of computers very easily. You can schedule internet access too.