SteveB_NI

I worked on a website for a small primary school as part of a partnership with my previous secondary school - and this website has laid dormant pretty much since I got this new ICT support job. Now the primary school has approached me and asked would I consider doing work on the website, and they would pay me accordingly... This is very welcome & great that they want me involved again, but I'm at a loss as to how to charge / invoice them... do I need to register as self-employed? Given this is not going to be for much money, I'm not sure if it's worth my while or not - if I'm going to have to fill in tax returns / register as self employed etc. The school is education board controlled, so any expenses they have will have to go through the accounts team etc - it can't just be a number of cheques given across. Thanks for any advice!

Hi, I was asked by a HOD today to look into a company / service called Classroom Video. Is anyone using them at present within the school? In particular with regard to Science content I was wondering how useful this is, as the dept currently have a load of VHS tapes & this could benefit them. Or is it just a collection of "bookmarked" YouTube videos? Thanks

Thanks guys - Unfortunately setting the proxy setting that way didn't work - still no connection. Shame as it would be a perfect solution for us if it wasn't for the proxy problem. I could load the files on with it directly connected to the network but that would involve continually bringing the pi down each time for an update. I'm tempted to put up 2 x Acer Veriton ultra SFF units instead, and set up my own display board / signage system.

Hi bladedanny - yes I have managed to ssh into the pi running screenly but have no idea what to do from then. Can you help me how to access the etc/environment? Thanks & sorry complete novice here!

Thanks - unfortunately I can't find any way to get to the /etc/environment within Screenly... there is no menu displayed only the content uploaded. Have you any experience of this? Cant find anything online about it either.

I've got a Raspberry PI I'd love to use for a digital signage project but the software I'm attempting to use (Screenly) doesn't have the option to configure proxy settings for the Internet connection... I'm able to ping the Rasp PI & can connect into the interface of it, but can't send anything to it due to the requirement on our network for proxy server connection to the Internet. It will connect to the network via a RJ45 socket, but can be used over wifi if necessary... any ideas how to get a specific RJ45 port, or WAP to connect directly into the Internet without needing proxy? Thanks in advance

We've got a managed service over in N.Ireland which is linking the Fronter VLE to a users SIMS account... essentially a teaching staff member must have a record in SIMS before they get given access to Fronter. Our problem is this: a number of our teachers are temporary - or covering maternity etc. Our SIMS manager is reluctant to add them as "Employees" because that makes their records incorrect given they are temporary / paid elsewhere. Is there a way for a teacher to have a record in SIMS (just including name + teacher reference number) without being actually an "Employee"? Thanks

Just discussing this with ACER tech support now. I was having problems installing Windows 7 - in that when I booted from DVD / USB drive, it wouldn't let me install due to "a required CD / DVD device driver was missing". I read that to enable AHCI helps to resolves this issue. Before I go and brick any more of our units (we bought 16 of them) can I ask would changing to AHCI make any difference?

Just had a read at: Veriton N2620G - Changed to AHCI, now wont boot ev... - Acer Community - oh dear

It was set to the native IDE as default - it was only whenever I was having problems trying to clean install Win7 that I changed it to AHCI and it refused to post afterwards. Can't get back into the bios FN-GM to change it back - hopefully the removing the battery trick will help.

I've got a Acer N2620G desktop which was not allowing me to install Windows 7 on it, so I read on some forums to try enabling AHCI in the bios... big mistake, as now the desktop won't boot - it's not even getting to the post beep. Anyone got any solutions as to how to resolve this issue? Essentially - change the setting back off AHCI. Tried removing the battery / power drain - no success.

Posted this also in the How to do it section but hoping I'll get a response here in the proper place! The accounts dept here have asked would I have a solution for them to make their petty cash summary a bit easier to maintain. At present everything goes into 1 big Excel spreadsheet & this as you can imagine gets very big during the term. I was wondering if there was a way of taking 1 large Excel spreadsheet (essentially, where the data is inputted initially) which then splits it into other sheets based on the Dept / Category name ... ie. Art dept expenses are in a separate sheet from Admin dept etc. The only way I've found so far is to manually put the data into individual depts then have it referencing back to a summary sheet but they would rather put data into a summary page first. I'm considering designing a MySQL database with a PHP front end to make this work - as I know it's definitely possible within that. Thanks in advance!

The accounts dept here have asked would I have a solution for them to make their petty cash summary a bit easier to maintain. At present everything goes into 1 big Excel spreadsheet & this as you can imagine gets very big during the term. I was wondering if there was a way of taking 1 large Excel spreadsheet (essentially, where the data is inputted initially) which then splits it into other sheets based on the Dept / Category name ... ie. Art dept expenses are in a separate sheet from Admin dept etc. The only way I've found so far is to manually put the data into individual depts then have it referencing back to a summary sheet but they would rather put data into a summary page first. I'm considering designing a MySQL database with a PHP front end to make this work - as I know it's definitely possible within that. Thanks in advance!

I'm nearly certain they are 1.25 GHz PowerPC G4, 256MB RAM. Haven't actually booted one up for ages so can't remember exactly.

I've got a number of old e-macs that are being disposed of tomorrow morning via our required disposal contractors. But I'm feeling a last minute guilt about disposing of them even though they have laid unused for week over a year. So... Any ideas for uses of these e-macs to give them a last minute reprieve? Or is it time to buy Mac minis for any new Mac use?

Just remembered about the o/s deployment forum this is better placed in here. I'm hoping someone can help me with this problem - I'm sure it's simple but I'm beat at the mo! I installed Win7, entered audit mode & installed a few items of software. Then added an unattend.xml file to the SysPrep folder & SysPrepped the machine (OOBE / Generalise) etc. This image was captured to the WDS server no problems at all & can then be deployed. This is where the issue arises (I think!). When I attempt to deploy the image using a boot image on WDS called "Standard Deploy" it shows up the captured image ok & appears to install everything ok. Until it gets to the final stages & a Windows Package Manager error appears saying "Operation failed with 0x80070002 - the System cannot find the file specified". When I click ok I get an Install Windows error saying "Windows Could not apply unattend settings during pass (null)." This error message appears whether I have an unattend file present or not. Whenever I restart the machine I get a message saying BOOTMGR is missing press Ctrl + Alt + del to restart. Can anyone help me out with this please? I'm desperately wanting to upgrade our network workstations to Win7 from XP but this is causing a major stumbling block! Thanks

I'm hoping someone can help me with this problem - I'm sure it's simple but I'm beat at the mo! I installed Win7, entered audit mode & installed a few items of software. Then added an unattend.xml file to the SysPrep folder & SysPrepped the machine (OOBE / Generalise) etc. This image was captured to the WDS server no problems at all & can then be deployed. This is where the issue arises (I think!). When I attempt to deploy the image using a boot image on WDS called "Standard Deploy" it shows up the captured image ok & appears to install everything ok. Until it gets to the final stages & a Windows Package Manager error appears saying "Operation failed with 0x80070002 - the System cannot find the file specified". When I click ok I get an Install Windows error saying "Windows Could not apply unattend settings during pass (null)." This error message appears whether I have an unattend file present or not. Whenever I restart the machine I get a message saying BOOTMGR is missing press Ctrl + Alt + del to restart. Can anyone help me out with this please? I'm desperately wanting to upgrade our network workstations to Win7 from XP but this is causing a major stumbling block! Thanks Whene

I'm hoping someone can point me in the right direction here as it's probably something really simple that I'm missing! I have a number of new Netgear WAPS (WN802Tv2) and wish to add them onto my existing network in such a way that users still need to input their username + password to connect to the proxy server which requires authorisation. At present it's allowing traffic to connect to the proxy server with no authorisation required, although is transmitting the device name to the proxy server - i.e. my ipad is known as Steven_iPad for example, this is appearing on our proxy server, whereas it should ideally show the actual username of who's connected - based on the settings input to authorise the connection. Our other WAPs - Netgear WNAP210's are set up so as soon as a user connects to the Wifi network, and provided the proxy settings are correct they can get Internet connection whenever they input their Active Directory username + password. The new WAPS (WN802Tv2)'s are on the same LAN as the WNAP210s. I'm sure it's something obvious I'm missing but I can't figure it out! Thanks in advance

I have a number of Probook 4540s' and they are great laptops - lovely finish to them too! I bought them before Win 8 but I know we got them with Win 7 Professional licenses.

I was wondering if anyone can give me advice on how the charging / allocation of print credits is managed within their schools... Basically we have a number of teaching staff who works for several different depts - e.g. one is timetabled to 10 periods music, but the rest science etc. I've been given the ok to remove an allowance from each dept's budget to cover printing costs, but here's the issue - what do I do about the teachers who work between different depts? Ideally I plan to give each HOD a set allowance, and subject teachers another allowance, then if they need topped up it must go through the HOD. Unfortunately the managed service provider here only has a single figure for print credit allocation. On our internal network I am able to allocate it a bit flexibly, so they choose their department cost centre, but unfortunately not on the system the teaching staff use. Thanks for any help / ideas!

I needed to link my iPad to an Apple TV today for the purposes of displaying a Keynote presentation which included a large video stored locally on the iPad. Just noticed my data usage is crazy high already but can't be sure that it was caused by the iPad hotspot usage or something else. Can anyone confirm or deny that using a personal hotspot to simply show a Keynote presentation on an Apple TV would eat into my data allowance? Thanks!

Unfortunately our sound system in the main hall is not great quality & makes playing anything through it barely a pleasure! Although we still have to do assemblies through it & that's where this question arises! I'm playing a presentation including sound from an Apple TV (HDMI connection to the data projector). From the data projector the sound is coming out via 2 phono leads (red + white) via a variety of XLR cables, into a XLR jack. This obviously causes a distracting buzz at the best of times, not to mention an awful pop should anyone happen to even breathe near the jack connections. I was wondering if there was a better solution (a new sound system is due soon) in the meantime. I've got 2 options - at present, 1 is to play the video from a laptop directly connected to the XLR port & at the correct moment change the data projector source & play video as normal. The second one is to put the audio content from the projector into an amplifier then into the XLR wall socket. This amp can then be turned off when not required to minimise the buzzing noise... this solution already sounds a bit cleaner anyway. Argh - 3rd option is to go awol before assembly but I can't do that lol! Thanks for any advice!

I have just configured and enrolled this iPad onto Meraki and can see the details correctly in the system dashboard.... The problem comes when I attempt to push apps - free ones only at the mo to test things. I get an error on the dashboard "Error - The iTunes Store ID of the application could not be validated." Where do I go to rectify this error? Sorry for hijacking this thread! Thanks in advance!

The switch issue was resolved by 1. reconfiguring the ports and 2. unplugging / replugging the network cables - very bizarre situation!

No VLANS at all - I simply use the switch for the Fibre connections & some managed switches are daisy chained off the RJ45 ports... network only working on 1/4 capacity at the mo Need to wait till everyone leaves later before I can factory reset the switch but will try that- thanks