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Yes it is true, MS are no longer developing Windows 7 However security updates will continue for another 5 years so no need to jump ship just yet

The Beeb have updates with a more detailed sub-articled linked: BBC News - What emergency data law means for you Of particular interest: also: and I'm still drawing parallels with my own Smoothwall installation and wondering what the fuss is about?... This is worrying but as little to do with this act. It's the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act that allows access without warrant or oversight. Maybe we should have paid more notice when that was being passed? Although glancing at Wikipedia's RIPA entry, the authorities legally allowed to access the data can't go on a fishing expedition and needs authorisation from a senior person. I assume by that there is some accountability if a search was authorised without reasonable probable cause.

Yeah, I saw that. Doesn't say how our right to privacy is being infringed, or how exactly this is blanket surveillance. Are ISP just required to keep the logs, or are they required to do nightly uploads to GCHQ? If this is what the emergency legislation is reinstating, and nothing else, I fail to see the problem. The problem isn't with this legislation, it's potentially with other pre-existing legislation that gives relevant authorities access to that data.

Here in is my problem, what I don't understand. What exactly has been made illegal by the EU? What exactly is too much power? Is it wrong to expect ISP's to maintain logs for a predetermined length of time? How many of us run Internet filters that keep just these kinds of logs? I do. Is that an invasion of our users privacy? The question isn't the logs, it's the access to the logs. Who can gain access, how and why? Do they need evidence or reasonable suspicion to gain a court order for a named suspect? Or can they go on random fishing expeditions? Given my meagre (in comparison) 30 day logs and 800 users - fishing expeditions are long, laborious, often fruitless and man power intensive. I'd be more worried about forcing all outgoing traffic through a great firewall of the UK were packet sniffing gets a lot easier than this - even with this needles and haystacks come to mind.

I refer the honourable gentleman to my previous reply...

Same as the licensing law for running MAME roms you do own the corresponding boards for - unless you extract the contents of the roms yourself and that rom extractions involves no reverse engineering or subverting in built security measures... I'd expect it not to come supplied with roms.

I haven't done an exhaustive web search so forgive me, but the Beeb article doesn't really give enough detail for me to hold an opinion on the emergency law itself. Statistically I fail to see what the problem is unless you are already waiting for the old bill to knock on your door for some reason. The only worrying sentence in the article was "Mr Cameron repeated his vow to push ahead with plans for a giant database of all websites visited by UK citizens" but that's only because it suggests our beloved leader fundamentally misunderstands how the Internet works. He might as well propose a UK Plc buyout of Google, and even then I doubt his database would be anywhere near complete. That article speaks more on EU democracy (a true oxymoron) and the politics of an in/out referendum than it does personal privacy. Just what are the powers being proposed? Who exactly can use them? What are the limitations of use on those powers? How exactly are they to be exercised. I suppose, given the quick one week turn around, the answers to those questions are likely to contain more holes than a good Swiss cheese. Maybe the real story is parliament being allowed to turn around any legislation in such a short space of time? I take it is going to be exempt from the usual three readings in each house - or are they really going to push through the entire system that quickly?

I'll tell you what - for the right price I'd snap one up!

I think, if a skip was a transformer!?! it's be something like this... Okay, maybe more yellow - but you still couldn't miss it usual. Total site reimage, replacing machine in one ict suite, sorting out the exams panic, upgrading SIMS, and maybe getting a week off. Oh, and we're completely rewriting our OU structure and GPO's - just for kicks!

The answer depends largely on the size of the apps. In theory the whole job would happen quicker as a whole because you take out the human element of starting each batch, but each individual iPad will get their apps a lot slower since they are contending with a larger number of simultaneous users. If the app being downloaded is a few mb then put all on at once they'd be done in a minute or so. If the app is a few gig then... The correct answer to the problem is caching. I'm not sure how products like Smoothwall handle caching of these types of files. In theory the proxy server should get the file once through the 8mb connection and the 100 iPads should only be talking to the proxy cache at local network speeds, the 8mb internet connection is then immaterial. If you don't have a local proxy cache, or it's not suitable/compatible with the Apple Store, then the other option would be to download the app once into iTunes on a PC/Mac then sync the iPads directly with that, again cutting out the need to download 100 copies of the same app at the same time on a highly contended slower connection.

I'd point out he's running max 62 clients in a primary school. He'd could half that RAM and still do virtualisation with Hyper-V and not notice. Not that I'd recommend that of course. As it stand he could have 2Gb for host, 3Gb each for DC and File Server. Actually if you do it at all, ESXi would be a better host OS choice. Bump each guest OS up to 3.5Gb, ESXi shouldn't need more than 1Gb (it shouldn't really need half that). DR is about the only compelling reason I can think of to consider it. I'm not sure it's a strong enough reason in this instance.

I'd admit that it's been some time since I last tried Solus 3. It was gawd awful. No doubt it's improved a lot since then. I'm now of a mind - if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Solus 2 works for us. I'll stick with that now until a change is forced.

What do you hope to gain from virtualisation? What other roles does the server provide? In all honesty I'd probably go for a single multi-role physical server in this instance, unless there is a compelling reason otherwise?

Great news on Solus 2, I can dodge the Solus 3 bullet a while longer

I don't know but that might just be the first time that innocent old me has seen something on the Interweb that has left me truly shocked and bewildered. I think I know need to go and seek some therapy...

They're asking for your DFE number.

I was thinking of making an offer, now I've made up my mind. I'll gladly pay you tomorrow, I'll probably have to return it yesterday mind, if you let me have it today !?!

We use Software Asset Management | Software Licensing | Infrastructure Solutions | Phoenix Software for most our SM licensing. I'd have thought a straight educational select+ license would be your best bet unless you plan to upgrade to whatever comes after 2014 immediately. Unfortunately I don't have the last price I paid for Standard to hand. Phoenix do have an online education price catalogue, you might find an answer in there.

@Net-Ctrl, for what it's worth your number is still in my address book. You're certainly one of the suppliers we'd be contacting to survey and quote much as you've suggested. It's gauging each suppliers response to different problem areas and differences in vendors recommended that we'd like an independent eye on prior to going out to tender. I'm beginning to think I have to trust my own knowledge of this school and networking in general to fill that role.

So how do you choose or evaluate vendors? Surely the right vendor would be different for different buildings and then recommendation of vendor should come from the respective suppliers based on the results of a survey not because Marakai are offering more commission this month? The problem with floor plans is they take no account of building structure. It may be there is no one independent that can do this. If that's the case I'll just have to use my own expertise to evaluate the tenders.

No. The plan is to ask independent retailers/installers to do their own surveys and make recommendations based on their finding and their experience. The problem comes in evaluating the tenders. Comparing a supplier who like Ruckus against a supplier recommending Muru, for instance. I suppose what I'm after is more of a buildings survey than an outright wireless survey. This is going to be around a £35k tender so we are very keen we get the right solution for us, and that it works as expected when installed. I understand the technical difference between Ruckus, Muru, and other managed AP's well enough. It understanding, other than price difference, why one particular solution may be better for our building than another without supplier bias interfering with the decision.

Yeah, the problem is it wouldn't be independent. They'll then be asked to tender for the quote based on that information, and other suppliers will be compared against it. If they then won the tender I think there'd be grounds for other bidders to complain. Not exactly and open transparent process. I could probably evaluate the tenders without it but would prefer a professional eye to have a look over the building and pre-warn me about stuff outside of my expertise. EDIT: I would actually expect any company wanting to submit a tender to do their own surveys. This really is just a basis point for me to compare their work against.

I need to pull together a tender document in September for a new managed wireless solution. I need someone to come in during the summer break, survey our buildings and provide a report/recommendations on access point coverage and layout, details on potential trouble spots, etc. Something I can evaluate the tenders against. Obviously I don't want to use a potential supplier who might be interesting in bidding on the contract. Likewise I don't want to approach a supplier for this work and tell them they won't be asked to submit a tender proposal. So I need an independent contractor who doesn't sell or install wireless solutions but is qualified to do a survey. Does such a person even exist? Anyone have any recommendations or a go-to guy who'll be suitable for this work? Thanks

Silly question, but instead of blocking the actual signal, is there anything that can be done with a MDM to instruct connected phones to turn off the 2/3/4G antennae and force them into a WiFi only mode until they disconnect from your network?

I think you should go in with a practical spreadsheet that needs creating and have them follow along, create it with you. You can cover off the basic formatting at the same time as introducing useful formula and functions on the way to the finished article. Create a list of students. Add in a column for gender. Add filters. Count number of boys/girls. Sort by surname alphabetically. Add column for grades. Add column for targets. Add column to compare grades to targets. Count students who are below target. etc. I'm sure there are other examples depending on what functions you want to show off. Personal finance spreadsheets can be some of the best to cover formatting, multiple inter-linked calculations, possibly over a couple of sheets. And yet be surprisingly simple to demonstrate and for the audience to grasp because the subject matter is relevant to them.