alexknight

Having been to the last conference it is was worthwhile. A small contribution of £10 would not break the bank. I'm sure though that if one and all were invited, i.e any educational personnel interested in I.T, sponsors would be forth coming. Promotors that atend the BETT conference pay a small fortune for a stand, so a couple of hundred squid is a drop in the preverbial ocean. Also teachers should be included as we need their feedback as to the service that we provide. i.e the popsitive feedback and negative feedback.

I'm Alex and I'm an ICT manager. Sounds like an AA meeting. '80' I lean more to the administration side of things but desperately try and conform to the Geek code. I work in a largish middle school in Somerset, Ooo argh, and cope with four servers, with up to 200 workstations. Thinking of diving into the qualificatio pool again to get a MCSE or equivalent.

Oh I forgot to ask, who pays for the subscribed journals, you or the school??

I am always interested in the freebies '' where do I go to get the free ones i.e it week (free) computing (free) coputer professional (free)

Looking at the PC Pro thread concerning not using Open Source software in Education I was just wondering what other IT magazines/publications others read or subscribed to? Also in your opinion would you re subscribe ? Alex

I think I will end end up keeping the Xantia. It is nice having that smug feeling knowing the money is in the bank, can park it any where and it can't lose any more value than it already has! '8)'

I have a dilema. My car is automatic, drives superbly, will travel at least 80 MPH comfortably on the motorway all day long, and it has done 106,000 miles, is a P reg, and has just passed it's MOT again with flying colours. I want to change it and have been looking at a two or three year old Porsche Boxster Tiptronic or Audi TT 3.2 DSG. The money has been in the bank now for the last six months. The dilema is that I am loathed to part with my lovley sexy French number, Citreon Xantia, unil it has died?? What can you do, voluntary Euthinasia??

Schools and LEA's should also look at the long term benefits and disadvantages of employing staff at a reasonable rate of pay that should be roughly in line with standard industry. OK, we will never get the same as industry, and to be honest there is a diference how we run and industry runs. BUT if we do not pay a reasonable rate three things happen. First schools become an apprentiship for budding technicians and network managers who will leave as soon as they can, once being trained, hence giving the schools a problem of employee retention. Second you only attract the 'less able' technicians or those that are not in it just for the money, (which is most of us), teachers included, and who the schools and LEA's take advantage of. Third you have a lot of demoralised and demotivated techincians. In my opinion it is quite simple really. There should be a standardised pay scale with a structured professional development path encompassing on the job training and certified training.

Thanks for all the feedback. In principal I have no problem with the concept, as it could be ideal as a portable ICT room. The down side being laptop battery times, repairs, setting and unpacking each time and ensuring they are recharged etc, and the bandwidth on Access Points. Oh and the cost! But costs are now coming down to a more reasonable level. Has anyone else actually had experience of deploying portable laptops and if so what was the genral satisfaction/dissatisfaction.

My Leader has come back from half term with an idea of buying and implementing a trolley of wireless laptops. Has anyone had experience of this and what are your thoughts?? Also any idea of costs. Thanks

I will be going on Thursday!

Nice, I like a lot.

I don't think you can fix that one as in my opinion it is a extraneous, intermittant systems warning. Hope this helps ''

Have you a link to the BOFH archives? What does BOFH stand for? Sorry for my denseness. Thanks Alex

Every so often you get asked a question concernng I.T. Sometimes either the answer is not an easy one to convey, or heaven forbid, you cannot think of a reasonable explanation! So it would be a good idea to compile a list of handy explanations that will at worst baffle and at best make you look very I.T superior? I'll start the ball rolling, but remember, the explanation has to be technically correct. Q. Why is the system/network running slowly today? A. SIMS is requesting information and hence the MSDE is denegrating the batch process on the server. Alex

Thyanks Russ very helpful. Alex

Has anyone got or heard of a 'Resource Management Policy'. I had an e-mail today along the lines of the bods from our county hall would not call to discuss networks at a particular school until the school could produce a Resource Management Policy? Thanks

I am in the process pf setting up a test network with 2003 enteprise edition of windows server 2003. I am doing this primarily as my knowledge on the subject of Active Directory and Group Policies is nil. Basically you might as well talk Greek. I find that hands on experiance is best and that instructing via e-mail can be tricky. Its nice to 'watch' someone do it first, if you know what I mean. With this in mind there any training material /manuals that walk you through the process of administering Windows server 2003. Possibly with some screen shots??

I don't think you can force people to post, as some people are happy just to read posts and gain knowledge from there. However a monthly e-mail reminder say, would be a good idea and the e-mail could have some content that encourages posting. This would give us a reminder and let us know that anyone can post. As to nusiance messages. You will always get this and it is best ignored. The only reason someone posts nusiance messages is to get atention. Take the attention away and they also go away.

Hi Rob I like the handbook. Easy to read and a good starting point for newcomers. In the handbook you mention; For minor problems, or requests for system changes/advice: Complete a Technical Support form What does the form look like, as have a basic one and would lke to improve it. Thanks Alex

Looking forward to the event and hope as many people as possible come along to support this inaugural event. Alex Knight

Is there a specific way of registering your intrest in this event and if so how? I was thinking of perhaps an e-mail link so we culd be notified when and where the conference was being held. Thanks Alex Knight

I have two workstations that have started to play up when someone tries to log on to the network. Sometimes the worksation logs on fine and other times it has problems logging on and runnng the log on scripts etc. Could it be something as simle as the NIC card? Alex

I have just recently joined this group, and am delighted to see a support techie specific forum. I am the IT manager at our school and to date have been very happy despite the usual gripes such as very little planning by some of the teachng staff which then reflects on your work as there is a percieved delay in getting any IT work done. I am the ony IT support bod in the school so this does make my role anxious at times. Luckily to date I have not had one day off sick since joining three years ago. If I was of sick what would happen, who knows, you decide? The money is OK now as I have had several pay rises and have gone from say 10K to now 15K+. Quite a bit is made up from ovetime as we cannot afford a second techie, so it is cheaper for me to have overtime. One important point for me is the school environment. I like it. The children can be a delight as well as a horror. Overall I am very happy, and this is mainly down to my colegues, both teaching staff and support staff. We have a really good team here and we all support each other. However it is now time that we all became a collective and started to network more and in this respect this forum is an excellent idea. We have just launched an area technicians forum with all the IT techies being invited to join and participate in. I am interested to hear any information on GrumbelDooks posting .....was just going to suggest a few nice ways of making life better for yourself ... and a few nasty ways of making his life a misery ........ It could be useful one day! Alex