jbailey

Timely - MS just sent me a newsletter: Announcing Reduced Pricing on Storage - Windows Azure - Site Home - MSDN Blogs

I believe MS just announced a 50% reduction on Azure cloud storage in line with reductions from Amazon? we use rbuss\attix at 3 schools to backup SIMS and some SMT data, its around 300\400 per year, then local backups to DPM in separate locations - I think rbuss is a good \ reliable scheme but can get expensive when backing up user data. I had DPM to Azure storage running as a test a while back but it was more about testing the tech rather then the price, what worried me was the "faff" factor in how data is going to be resorted, if I have a onsite DPM server with security credentials to access my cloud backup, and that DPM server was just wiped out by a flood\fire\whatever then how quick\easy is it going to be for me to get something else running to access the cloud considering I am in the middle of a disaster. The other option If you have multiple locations is to backup DPM servers from one site to another, something I am also looking currently as possibly cheaper and quicker to access when needed than Azure. As I am generally rather suspicious - as is my business manager - of "pay as you go" data use. hope that helps.

got sent a link to this today, no comment on the content: http://www.tabletsforschools.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/2011-12-Final-Report.pdf

Have you looked at any 3rdparty applications that allow you to access different cloud storage services from the one control panel software, like: StorageMadeEasy :: Free Cloud File Manager Not played with any of those things myself yet but might be worth looking into. We have Office 365 and users can open their SkyDrive pro storage in explorer to drag old stuff into it to "archive" and free up space in their my docs but that's it. However, I wasn't expecting to be able to do what you are hoping to do - we are chuffed we can now do that there's a similar thread here: http://www.edugeek.net/forums/cloud-services/117148-skydrive-pro-syncing-folder-redirected-documents.html

Hello, Just wanted to try and get some feedback from anyone who is using\testing\playing with SSD drives in older servers. We have 2 x HP DL180 G6 servers with 8 x 15k SAS Drives we currently run Terminal Server VMS on for thin clients to access. Performance currently from the 15k sas drives on a Smart Array p410 with raid 50 is okay. Servers are out of warranty, was looking at replacing with new HP servers with SSD - but we are struggling to get a yes on the cost for this... I started looking at the possibility of adding ssd drives to them, thinking if we eventually ditched the servers in a year or so I could re-use the drives in a new server anyway. HP SSD drive prices made me weep, so started looking at other enterprise ssd drives, and it all seems rather grey on what may or may not work - and a expensive mistake to get it wrong. We don't need massive amounts of space, 8 x 200\300gb ish drives raided up on each server would be fine, new controllers if required. Has anyone done anything like this, is it worth the effort or should I just save myself a lot of grief and wait till I can replace them? Thanks in advance.

I have spent considerable time discussing and researching various options with SMT for similar schemes at this school. I am not convinced either way at present on any of these 1:1 schemes but the discussions are good as we (and SMT etc) had to look at a whole range of costs, infrastructure issues, management headaches, possible benefits, Governor and parent opinion etc etc. Re creating division amongst students, One of the key points of any schemes we have looked at is what percentage of parents have to take up a scheme for it to be viable and what is required for the school to support those parents that cannot afford it or simply do not want it. Creating a divide between students who have and have not is nothing new, when I went to school I had hand me down uniforms and I didn't go on the school trips. My parents happened to be poor and couldn't afford the fees. In a BYOD\1:1 situation, I would be the poor sod turning up to school with the beat up old hand me down device The whole tablets as consumptive devices thing I find interesting, What we do have here is a loan bank of ipads in use for nearly two years now and I would say I'm not sold on this idea of tablets or especially the Ipad as a consumption device only - things have moved on a lot with apps and services for content creation, but in general I don't even think web access is JUST "consumption". Do I consume a video on configuring a server on you tube for example? I'm not sure I do, I read\watch it and ask questions on the comments section and apply what I have learn from it - well hopefully! How is that different than reading a text book on sums with a teacher to ask questions to and then doing some sums, can you tell I'm not teaching staff yet I don't call that "consuming maths content" I call that a maths lesson? My current opinion is that I don't see tablets as a replacement to our desktop pc and mac machines, but they are a flexible IT tool and I can certainly see how having a standardised, personal 1:1 device per student for use as a IT supported diary, jotter, calculator, voice recorder, camera, textbook, homework, communication and research tool - in my opinion, would be a great benefit. However, this not necessarily something parents should pay for. I wouldn't want to stump up £20 quid a month for my 2 kids currently, we are skint! like I say I am still on the fence with 1:1. The cost in both cash and man hours is huge and I am not sure if its achievable in an "average school" like ours without additional funding from somewhere - Yeah right. currently I would prefer our school looks at a better BYOD\WIFI access policy (something I am doing currently) to enable students\staff who already own devices to have more use from them in school as a way of getting some real feedback on personal device benefits. Good thread, lots of food for thought for me - thank you for your time My 2 cents.

Is setup the system described in the attachment to allow drivers to be installed by non admins on Win 7 machines. Funnily enough for these drivers originally, you may find this of use. I got it from the Experts Exchange site - search for "Automating Hardware Installation in Vista and Windows 7" on there to find original Automating Hardware Installation.docxcc

I worked on setting up Unify on a primary school site in the summer as part of a office 365 setup\email migration with RM. There's a second primary and a secondary I was looking to also use Unify with but after getting to grips with it for the one school I don't think I will use it at the secondary, all schools are on Office 365 and I am trying to convince the second primary to go with this, but have found that for providing user\password\group sync between onsite and office 365 that Azure Dir Sync provided by Microsoft works better for me at the secondary school. I was used to using the old FIM 2010 system for Live@Edu at the secondary and Azure Dir Sync gives me better functionality in what, where and when it is syncing - in my opinion. For the junior school I think it works well and have not had any issues when the part-time technician at the school creates accounts on site etc everything "just works". Obviously using something else like Azure Dir Sync doesn't provide all the integration with SSO to other sites etc but as others have said it mainly seems primary based sites at present. Also from the demos I have had of the site creator tool it does looks great, is it available as a stand alone tool without signing up for anything else I wonder? my 2 cents.

Hello, Have added the relevant application form and further details\spec on the role for anyone interested. The deadline is still the 28th. Thanks Application for a support staff post.doc Senior ICT Technician inf Nov.13.pdf Senior ICT Technician jd Nov.13.pdf

Hi, for what its worth.. A friend and I did some playing with editing word documents this evening (how very rock and roll) from an Ipad 2 via word web app in safari from home 1, from a desktop with office 2013 on a slow 10mb lan from home 2 and from a PC at a school site using office web app in ie9. Found responsiveness good between the two using web apps in the browsers, changes almost instant, a few glitches occasionally over an hour or so of use with longest wait of 2ish seconds to show a change - that's a long time when 2 people are working on one file! - but this may be related to me logging onto a site machine to test while my backups are hammering away on site I found Office 2013 annoying as had to refresh to submit a change and refresh to pick up a change. Im still struggling with getting decent workflow to show to teachers and students to be honest with Office 365\Skydrive Pro and Web Apps. For example, I had Office 2013 connected to a SharePoint My Site\SkyDrive page on office 365 and its fiddly to get to a file shared with me, if I click file > open > My Site on word 2013 I don't see files shared with me only those I have, so had to logon to SharePoint site, browse to SkyDrive tab, click on "shared with me" link and open the file - faff... anyway, that's my two cents spent.

This is what I have from my notes, hope this helps - but it may be woefully out of date... [TABLE=width: 568] [TR] [TD]Protocol(s) [/TD] [TD]Port e.g. 80 80 443 993 2195 2196 5223 5228 60000 TO 61000 [/TD] [TD]Protocol e.g. TCP TCP TCP TCP TCP TCP TCP TCP TCP [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]IP Addresses From [/TD] [TD=colspan: 2]INTERNAL [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]IP Addresses to [/TD] [TD=colspan: 2] 64.156.192.82 64.156.192.83 72.249.183.162 72.249.183.163 50.18.152.159 *.amazon.com [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE]

I'm not actively using it, but I did get it running to test through the LEA here, I seem to remember that I needed to also allow some service addresses not based on "whatever.meraki.com" They used to have a big list of ranges\addresses on their website that needed to be allowed but I cannot find it in the help, looks like it has changed since I was last there - pre Cisco. Looking for my notes on the firewalls settings...

Hello, We have the following vacancy going out this week due to a member of the team leaving to work at a University. Details not on the website yet but can request details are emailed out to anyone who sends an email via PM etc. Happy to take any questions in a PM. Thank you J Bailey ICT Manager Senior ICT Technician Single Status Grade 6 (£17820 - £18,923) 37 hours per week, 52 weeks per year. Willingdon Community School require an experienced ICT Technician to provide technical support for all Windows computers and associated ICT equipment, including server operating systems, throughout the school and to ensure the equipment is maintained to a high standard to support student learning. The willingness and ability to be a pro-active, enthusiastic team player, keen to develop their skills is essential to this role. For further details on the position and the application form see the school website redirect Deadline for applications 28/11/2013 Interviews to be held week commencing 02/12/2013

I use these in a bat file if its of any use. the msi files come out of the 32bit bonjour.exe download for windows msiexec.exe /i %setups%\Bonjour.msi /quiet /norestart msiexec.exe /i %setups%\BonjourPS.msi /quiet /norestart msiexec.exe /passive /i %SETUPS%\AirServer.msi /qn PIDKEY=******************* CHECKFORUPDATES=DISABLE PASSWORDTYPE=PASSWORD PASSWORD=whatever ALLOWNAMING=DISABLE RUNATSTARTUP=YES

we have adobe cs6 running on both mac and pc, more issues with the macs than the pcs to be honest... our art department had mac lust, we showed them the costs of how they could afford twice as many decent pcs and warranty for 3 years or half the amount of macs with a 1 yr warranty. they are buying pcs.