mattgrimley

Office 365 SSO not working for our users since Friday. Admin login seems to work. They say they are "investigating" and to "try clearing your browser cache 'for all time' and try again" (which doesn't appear to make any difference). Time to start scoping out alternatives?

We use SIMS and the last successful sync was: 12/09/2023 01:46:33 This has obviously caused chaos in itself as bookings have been changed in SIMS and now we've get staff a work-around, we're double-book right left and central. What a mess.

It doesn't let the users reset their years old password because they are "managed". What I've done is switched to username/password and created a single new account with permission to book on behalf of other users. All staff can login using that account and book on behalf of their regular account and the admin interface is not exposed. "Having emailed out all staff, however, it appears it might only allow one session at a time, so still not really a good solution." Scratch that, it works fine, just the login page is occasionally a bit intermittent.

Hey there, I have no idea if it's still being used in lessons as i haven't heard much back since deploying it. It certainly did work find when i pushed it out. The developer did address a default save issue related to the way i installed it (as described in the post). It's entirely possible that this change has been reverted as i expect there has been significant work on it since i deployed it here. Launching it here on my Windows 11 machine, it is very slow to load, but when it loads, it works. It just creates local %appdata% dynamically if they dont exist and the default save for me is to my network home directory. I don't know what's the root of my speed issue, but given i'm on Windows 11 and running an old version, things have changed quite a bit since i last cracked it! If it doesnt work in the above way, the next way to approach it would be to create a simple launch script to check if it exists in the expected place and if not, install it: The following would work as a cmd launch script. Powershell, vbs or autoit would be preferable (as you might have cmd blocked for kids). @echo off SET gdevelopinstallpath={a server location with read access for all users}\GDevelop-5-Setup-5.0.128.exe IF NOT EXIST "C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Programs\Gdevelop\GDevelop.exe" %gdevelopinstallpath% C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Programs\Gdevelop\GDevelop.exe --disable-update-check

Sorry @Koldov - my last test was floored. It actually works regardless of the proxy setting. It just ran minimised and i didn't notice. Apologies for the confusion! Proxy settings might well be a red herring.

We've also rolled out the registry fix mentioned above (note, the reg path will be different if you run 32bit Office on a 64bit client). It seems to work well for us. SORRY, IGNORE THIS. It was launching fine, but minimised! With regard to the above potential issue, I've just tested a hyperlink to local word document inside Word and it opens fine when our proxy is assigned via a wpad script (i.e. "use automatic configuration script" is configured). When the proxy is issued as an explicit address, it doesn't seem to load the same link successfully (nothing happens). So, working for me, but others might hit issues and need to deploy a wpad.dat file to side-step it.

There is a thread open on Google's support site, but i have no idea if they actually pay attention to those or not. It might be worth adding voices to that thread: https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/150006763/your-browser-is-up-to-date?hl=en

Yep, Embedded Youtube videos in Powerpoint files open this page as of today. We're on Office2019 and the latest Edge browser, so no idea where the issue lies!

I came accross GDevelop after a request from our IT faculty to investigate deploying it. It looked really nice, but didn't seem to default save to our users' network drives for creating / saving projects. I reported it to the developer and a week later, there's an update and it's working perfectly. I was asked to investigate Clickteam Fusion Free Edition, GDevelop and AppInventor. It seems to me to be more intuitive than Clickteam Fusion (and manages not to have a theme called "Girly Pink") and AppInventor. Having spent several months communicating with the dev team on App Inventor several years ago and singularly failing to get them to remove the reliance on running batch files within the program, i'm not enthusiastic to look there again. When you first install GDevelop, it installs to "C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Programs\Gdevelop", which isn't ideal for a machine that might have 1000 different users. However, you can just grab that folder and pop it onto a read-only network share. Create and deploy your shortcut with the addition of --disable-update-check and it seems to run really nicely. Just wanted to drop a message on here as i don't think it's had much traction in the UK so far and it may have been down to the default save area issues (which have now been resolved, it saves to My Documents now instead of the local user profile. If you've looked into it in the past, but shelved it, try again with the latest beta74 release. https://gdevelop-app.com/ I'm in no way affiliated. Just quite chuffed with the speed and willingness with which the dev team accepted and addressed my issues!

I just want to add to this 8 year old thread (as this is still a problem now and again). I had this happening on my 2016 Terminal Server. The "PDOXUSRS.NET" was in my c:\programdata\FMS folder and permissions looked correct. Justin from Herts IT Support created a fresh empty folder at the root of C:\ called FMS and gave "everyone" Full Access. Then using the "BDE Administrator (32-Bit)" control panel applet, browse to Configuration / Drivers / Native / Paradox and browse to c:\fms for the NET DIR variable. This is pretty much exactly what you guys have already said above, but the applet and the existing file were enough to put me off, so figured i'd add my comments! (Sorry for resurrecting this after so long)

It's available now. The process of getting data from SIMS to Classroom should be fairly simple, but i wouldn't hold your breath for help from Capita. If they were all about adding value, we'd have had staff timetables in outlook years ago!

Sorry to quote myself at you @nickbro - but wondering if you have any thoughts on this? This specific issue for us manifests in users not receiving proper calendar invites to bookings. Is there any way i can generate more useful troubleshooting info? Cheers, Matt

Ahh, i "think" that makes sense.. Basically, when the admins are emailed a calendar item, the "from address" would be the user who booked it, so outlook wouldn't do anything silly. So, it appears that we either need a solution to stop outlook mishandling calendar invites from the mailboxes own account or we might need a code change to send all calendar invites from a pre-configured hap email account. I can find other people having the same issues with different software packages where the sender is "spoofed", but no solutions that avoid programming..

That's interesting.. we also use a group email address for admin emails, but i had to set up a service account for use by HAP and then add "SENDAS" to every mailbox to get things like helpdesk tickets working.. It seems like yours might be working a bit better in that respect!

I'm having all manner of hell with Office 365 to be honest. Nothing works properly and HAP throws up quite a lot of exceptions. We got some stuff going with an SMTP gateway (which in itself keeps crashing). I've had to write a script to add impersonation individually on every account on the office 365 server When our users book a resource, the calendar invite is recieved at the client, but Outlook deletes it (it should be in the recycle bin with a message "As the meeting organizer, you do not need to respond to the meeting". Basically, it appears that because the from address is you, Outlook presumes the event has already been created. Why Office 365 acts differently to Exchange in regard to this i don't know. I'd be interested to hear if that is the same for you? The mail settings i've wound up using are: SMTP Server Address: Port:25 SSL:Off From name: "School Portal" From Email: [email protected] Exchange Support:"" all of this stuff is blank. I basically can't get it working consistently with anything in there. Some emails seem to go out, such as helpdesk tickets since i set the SMTP relay to use one nominated service account and configured all of the office365 accounts with "sendAs" on that service account. Even with that config and Exchange support blank, we still get: "Invalid URI: The hostname could not be parsed" every time someone logs on.

Are you sure it doesn't come back as soon as you put the updates back on? It does for us consistently. The issue certainly seems to be an incompatibility with video drivers. Some machines have newer ones available and appear to work after a full clean install. Others not so. Capita are apparently saying Autumn for support of Office 2016 (though why it should take them a year all of sudden, who knows), but we appear have no choice unless an MS fix or a raft of updated video drivers suddenly arrive.

Well, so far every machine type that i've updated the graphics drivers on has worked consistently afterwards. Christmas break now, but i'm hoping to have left this behind and to get back to a planned roll-out of Office 2016 and Windows 10! Thanks for the advice and merry christmas, one and all!

Hmm, one of my presumtions above was incorrect. I can't impersonate unless "sendas" is explicitly set on the user account.. which i can find no way of doing "en masse".. I kinda thought the SMTP relay would handle that for me

Hey Nick, I'm really sorry to be needy, but I think i'm possibly over-complicating things and rapidly getting nowhere! We have an SMTP relay server configured internally which can relay mail without authentication for the relevant clients. I can telnet from the HAP server to the SMTP server and i can generate emails from whoever to whoever at the organisation and they work fine. Ignoring all of the EWS stuff (which i suspect won't work nicely for us anyway as we don't have SSO implemented), i can't get helpdesk emails working at all.. Booking notifications seem to be working however. the relevent line from my hapconfig.xml file is: but even that generates a "Invalid URI: The hostname could not be parsed." on login. (i guess that is just the exchange tile trying to do its thing?) Is it logical for me to ignore the exchange support at the moment and just try to get helpdesk mails flowing again or are they inextricably linked? Thanks again, Matt (P.S. I am concious that i'm possibly leading the thread away from its original focus, so if you'd prefer me to start a new one, i can move this!)

Well, i got nowhere testing individual updates.. I also tried disabling hardware acceleration, but that had no effect. Finally, i'm in the process of trying video driver updates. That seems more positive. I tried one machine which had a consistent crash. Upon updating the graphics driver (intel) and rebooting, i wouldnt crash. I've updated the driver in WDS and send a command for 10 machines to rebuild. Thanks for for the input @danielvw and i'll post back with findings! Matt

Ahh, a different process. i have just confirmed (via rebuilding again) that a clean built machine with all non Office updates assigned works fine. Time to start installing office updates one by one....

Hey @stgoodyeara - can you clarify the steps you took there.. did you re-image without the updates or just unassign / uninstall them? I removed all Office updates from WSUS and my machines stopped crashing (but now you have me worried, so i'm redoing that step). Obviously that's not satisfactory as i am running a totally unpatched office on those clients then. Office 2016 seems to work fine, but don't forget it isn't supported by Capita, so don't expect them to be to helpful if you have issues in SIMS. Matt

Yep, i'm still working on narrowing it down. I now have a list of 19 updates which when assigned are the difference between a crashing Office and a stable Office. Still narrowing down, but will update this thread if i get a clear winner! Matt

It's taken me too long to find this thread. "me too". FIY, there are no issues on Windows 10 with Office 2016 (which has been my only recourse for the last month, but of course Capita aren't ready to support that yet). For me, this problem applies to Windows 8.1 clients running Office 2013 (x86) and started during the second week of November. Steps i've taken so far: I've replaced my Windows 8.1 images with completely clean (latest available build). Replaced my Office 2013 (x86) admin install. Rebuild machines with very limited application assignments to eliminate as much as possible. Finally, when I stripped all of the office updates out of WSUS and rebuilt 7 machines; No crashes in 2 days. Last night, i told WSUS to go and get all of the updates again and 2 of the seven crashed today twice each. I have about 58 Office related updates on those machines from approximately 1200 on the WSUS server, so i'm not gonna spend some time setting up different test groups in an attempt to narrow it down some. I'll update if i find anything, but i've thought i've solved this so many times over the last month.. i'll need a few days testing before i have any confidence. Matt p.s. FYI, we use "Microsoft System Center Endpoint Protection 2012 R2" for av purposes.

Thanks Nick, but that's not working for me.. though to be fair, i can't even get the impersonation stuff working through Office 365. I've created the management role and assigned everything out, but i'm just getting "5.7.60 SMTP Client does not have permissions to send as this sender". With regard to your suggestion above, i guess i might have some autodiscover rules which might stop that from working as we are currently operating in hybrid mode.. I'll get back in to this tomorrow and see if i cant make progress on some of it! Matt