rrichmond

What I meant to indicate was we use different networks for students to staff.. E.g Students are 10.6.X.X and Staff are 10.4.X.X for example.

Well! I am enjoying this site very much! It has a stack of great resources! I'm the IT Manager at a Private School in Brisbane Australia. I have been managing it for about a year now. Learning a lot in the process as well. My role entails being the manager of Operations, which essentially guides the IT departments direction. I have a great crew. A fantastic Network Administrator who can sort out pretty much any problem we throw at him. A superb PC Imager, who looks after all the schools PC images, and a great IT support Technician who looks after the the staff and student issues. We have around 475 PCs, Around 50 Macs, and around 25 servers, attached to three arrays. We have around 1200 students covering P-12. The best thing about my work is the people. I work at a Christian school, and the staff are really superb. We use a Novell Network and have integrated the Macs into this environment as well. Yes, they work differently, but overall I am impressed as to how they do work. We also use Suse Linux and Ubuntu. All Pcs are currently on XP and as yet we have no plans for Vista. We have started to use VMware's ESX Server, which works quite well. We run two servers so we can switch if we ever need to from one to the other. Most of the network has been duplicated, thanks to my predecessor. This makes things a lot more reliable and allows us to switch over to the other system if we ever have a problem,. Oh and we have around 120 staff.....

Either that or you have to live in the UK and be a geek.....

And furthermore, It looks like this post is set up so you can't edit.... I can edit on other posts.....

Not sure if this is exaclty related as it seems you are using a Microsoft network? We have student Machines on a different LAN to Teachers PCs, which is different again for Admin, Wireless, etc..... We use around 16 different LANS. It makes security alot easier.

We have 10 x 78" ACTIVboards. We have found they work very well. I was at first concerned about the Pens and cost as well, but we have had no teacher loose any of the pens, and each board comes with two pens...so we have a generous supply. We purchased 2 ACTIVslates as well. These seem to work well, The advantage of having a pen over touch (which I did not really think about until after we got the ACTIVboards) was related to the way it works. You see a lot of the younger grades tend to touch the board with their arm, or other hand when they are using it. This would cause all types of problems if it was a touch sensitive board. So I think we made the right choice. We have the software in a central location and it seems to work well for opur junior school. Next year we are looking into adding another 10 of these boards into the Middle school. My only suggestion is to look into a bracket setup top allow the boards height to be adjusted for the younger grades.

Noticed you image of the back of your amp. You don't need anything extra but some cables. 1. a) Connect the DVD player RED/White RCA Calbe to the DVD/LD L+R input on the AMP. b) Connect the video output on the DVD player to the video in on the DVD input on the AMP. c) Connect the Monitor Video Out to the Video in on your TV d) Connect the coaxial Digital in plug to the Coax Digital out on the DVD player. e) If you want sound on your TV without the amp, also connect the L+R MD/Tape Out to the Audio in on the TV (Mono tvs only have one plug on them for audio) f) Test using the DVD/LD button on the AMP to view/listen to DVD/CDs 2. XBOX - a) Connect the Red/White Audio plugs from the XBox into the Video's Audio L/R in plugs.on the AMP. b) Connect the Video plug (yellow) from the X Box into the Video in plug of the Video section on the back of the amp. c) Test using the Video option on the front of the AMP. 3) PC - a) Connect from the headphone socket on the back of your PC to a twin RCA cable in the CD l/R sockets. (Unless you have a special PC capable of surround sound - In wich case you can probaly use the multi channel in... this means sitching off the DVD plater however. Give it a go if you want. You should find Green, Blue and black(sometimes orange) plugs on your PC. You will need three headphone to dual RCA cables for this...In my opinion its not worth it, but you may like to try anyway). Thats is...Count the cables you need before you start.

The task you are asking to complete is very simple indeed. I worked in a Electronics store for over 10 years, and had wish I had a dollar for everytime I was asked this question. You will be best off to use an AV switchbox. e.g. http://www.videoguys.com.au/scripts/prodList.asp?idCategory=133 (I live in Australia...your Local electronics store will carry this..you may have a Radio Shack or Tandy there?) You plug the two RCA cables (Not called PHONO -. This type of plug indicates a record player as the signal is different..same plugs though) from your two or more sources into the back of the box. Then plug the box into your sound system/TV (If you want picture that is...if you don't just get an audio switchbox). Then just select which device you want to use by pressing the button. The guys are correct here however, It is not "true" dolby digital sound...just plain old stereo perhaps with some Dolby effects if your amp supports this. Some devices support optical, but I am guessing your Amp doesn't have this? (Optical carries all channels in one cable as well as the surround sound channels). The good thing about this suggestion is that you do not have to worry about feedback from any of your sources, or possibly damaging your equipment by connecting to outputs together (cause thats what your effectively doing when you don't use a switch.....)

Hey, We have iTalc running in multiple laboratories. I was wondering how you actually log on to multiple PCs using one PC? I would have liked a place where you could type one username and password in, and it sent the details to all the PCs... So how do you do this then?

I prefer Firefox. Hands down the winner everytime. (Except for those silly bank sites that make you use IE....hmmm). I REALLY like foxmarks. I use it between home and work all the time. I also like the Download Statusbar . Noticed someone else spoke of Adblock and FireFTP.... Going to try these out.

We call them Apples in Australia, Perhaps I should have said Macs!

That where I am. I work at Redlands College. Where were you from?

We have over 500 Desktop machines at our site and one Technical support number. WHY should we be expected to support phone calls that are a direct result of Microsoft changing their web browser? (Because thats what happens!) Use a real browser such as Firefox and bypass all this rubbish to start with! I see nothing wrong with advising users they can trust our site certificate. Is is our certificate, we provide it to them via email, where is the security problem? Besides, I have yet to find this "$20" certificate you speak of. Why should I have to pay someone else, to say that our site is fine for people to use..... Thats the most rediculous thing I can think of! For a bank or financial institution I can understand. But not for a web based email log on!!! It all comes down to trust. If they believe they can trust us, then I see no problem. It is their choice.

I agree with jcollings. We use a proxy at our school and we have selected to automatically detect network settings. Works well for staff with laptops. They automatically go to our staff proxy and then they are fine at home too,

Firstly, I'm in Australia, so this is a little different. But we do a full 6 monthly backup cyle, and can go back to the students work anywhere within this time frame. we generally remove the student files in January. ready for the new students accounts.

That is interesting to hear. We have just installed the 3COM WX4400 and have been testing it using different laptops. One laptop will connect just fine, but if you try to transfer and large amounts of data (e.g download a file) it disconnects and then reconnects. We have also noticed with the Apple Laptops that the signal strength is quite low compared with a Windows Laptop.

There are much cheaper ways of doing this. We had a similar problem at our work. You need to have the certificate imported into "Trusted Root Certification Authorities". Once you have imported your certificate here, your problems should go away! :-). Import it anywhere else and the warning will keep appearing.

Its a lot easier in Australia. We have a sales rep, who we contact via email or Landline, as well as a sales person who takes care of us. So one of them is usually available.

I think you may find my post useful. Stopping .EXE, .CMD and .BAT files Plus its free and works well. We use it at our school.

Pottsey, I found the solution to your problem about 6 moths ago.... We have had the same problem with Dell Laptops. This is what we sent to staff. It fixed the problem.... Hello All, If you have a Dell Laptop, please read on, otherwise you can ignore this message. We have been experiencing problems with many Dell Laptops with them slowing down due to the Windows Server Update Service. We have tried a solution on a Dell laptop and it seems to have worked successfully. If you wish to try to overcome this problem, please try the instructions found at: http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/blogs/mowgreen/index.php?showentry=1071 You may all need to use the x86 version. If it states that the update agent is installed look at the added instructions on the second quote where is talks about adding " /wuforce". Then continue and install http://support.microsoft.com/kb/927891 You'll want to reboot after this. Thanks. Robert

I've had some experience in the area you are discussing. You see I went to Uni after leaving school, and pursued a Science Degree, as I really was not to sure what I wanted to do. After completing this, I went to work for a electronics retailer, and it was here where I picked up my interest in IT. I went looking for a job, without ANY luck! So I decided at the time, the best thing to do was to increase my qualifications so I could get into IT. I did a Masters in IT and then again went looking for work. No luck! The qualification was not specific enough to persuade anyone to hire me. So I started working for PC retailer and then went and increased my qualifications further. This time I did an A+ in Hardware and Software, my Microsoft Certified Professional course, A Help Desk Analysis Certification and my Novell Netware certifications. One thing that REALLY helped me getting my job was the last course than ran. It was Job interview skills. The main point I got from it (which I hadn't been doing) was to ring the prospective employer and find out about the job, and then tell them what you have been doing. I always got a job interview out of this. After 2 weeks, I had 3 Job offers. I accepted one in a School, and after 9 months I became the IT Manager. I have never looked back. Its a great job, and it get even better throughout the holidays!! So my advice? If you've been offered a job, take it. Experience counts for a lot more than the qualification. If you can fit it in whilst doing your job, Increase your qualifications by doing a degree, so you can get better pay. Then do the extra qualifications if you want to branch out. Good luck!

Nice find!

Yes.. I Noticed that. Forgot to put it in my original post though

Actually, If you do it the way I suggested, It does ANY folder on the drive in question, not just the root of the drive. I tried this out before publishing the information. From: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/prodtech/windowsxp/secwinxp/xpsgch06.mspx The Path Rule A path rule specifies either a folder or a fully qualified path to a program. When a path rule specifies a folder, it matches any program that is contained in that folder and any programs that are contained in subfolders of that folder. Path rules support both local and UNC paths.

Preventing students running exe, cmd and bat files from their usb drive Note: The following information has been taken from http://www.kenji-d.com/technet/ and modified to suit our school situation. To do this you need to modify the Local Security Settings. 1. From the start menu, go to the RUN command window and enter secpol.msc 2. In the Local Security Settings window, select Software Restrictions Policies, you’ll notice on the right pane that there are no policies defined. 3. To create a policy, select Action from the toolbar, then select Create New Policies. 4. Once a policy is created, you’ll notice 5 new objects in the right pane. 5. Select the Additional Rules Folder, right click and select New Path Rule. 6. A New Path Rule window appears. Here enter the path of the drive or folder you’d like to enforce restrictions on. After entering a path, make sure the Security level option is set to disallow. 7. Do this on all drives you wish to prevent this type of action on. For example A:\ D:\ E:\ F:\ 8.Create a rule to prevent the user running executables in their home drive or the desktop. (We provide students with a mapped network drive H:\ Where they can be monitored from. They can run what they want from this drive.) a) C:\Documents and Settings\COMMON PART OF STUDENT CODE OR b) “%UserProfile%” matches C:\Documents and Settings\ and all subfolders under this directory. (Note: From : http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/prodtech/windowsxp/secwinxp/xpsgch06.mspx Using Wildcards in Path Rules A path rule can incorporate the "?" and "*" wildcards. The following examples show wildcards that are applied to different path rules: * \\DC – ??\login$ matches \\DC – 01\login$, \\DC – 02\login$, and so on. * \Windows matches C:\Windows, D:\Windows, E:\Windows, and all subfolders under each directory. * C:\win* matches C:\winnt, C:\windows, C:\windir, and all subfolders under each directory. * .vbs matches any application that has this extension in Windows XP Professional. * C:\Application Files\*.* matches all application files in the specific subdirectory. ) 9.Once the Paths are entered, the next thing to do is to set the enforcement properties. Select Software Restriction Policies and from the right side select Enforcement. There are two options: a) All software files except libraries (such as DLLs) and All Software (Best to select this). b) All users except local Administrators. It is recommend you leave it as All software files except Libraries. If you select All software files instead, the thumbdrives will NOT be recognized and installed. This may be a good idea if you want to disable access to USB thumbdrives all together. The second option is pretty straightforward, restrict everyone except local administrators or else you’ll be locked out too! 10.Next we go to the Designated File Types values, here we can specify which file extensions to restrict. This window permits you to add or delete file extensions to your need. Delete all except for: BAT, CMD, COM,EXE, REG, and VB. If there are other extentions you ned to add add themin the file extention box and click add. An example maybe for flash files? You have now completed the task. Test it as neccessary before deploying, You will then need to distribute this as per your situation.