MartinT

Somehow I had missed that SOLUS update. Just deployed it and my agent has updated fine.

My impression of just having moved to OneDrive - School from offline files is that it's a lot better. The sync problem with quick logoff doesn't seem to happen to staff as they leave their machines running all day. Students have suffered from it but we have asked them to look at the OneDrive icon and ensure that it has finished syncing before logging off. I've sent them all an advisory and we are telling the photography teachers who have been most affected. I do hope for a setting that forces wait until OneDrive sync has completed before logoff. Then it'll be perfect. The benefits of everyone's files being available everywhere far outweighs the issues we've seen to date.

Storage Sense is handy. Thanks for that, now setup here.

Not if you want a cogent, joined-up and usable vision. It's perfectly fine to create and maintain the IT strategy, with user input. I do and I wouldn't want anyone else doing it.

We activated OneDrive (for Business) by Group Policy, migrated every users' files to their OneDrive and then disabled their old file share. It took about two months to get each user done and then I shut down the file server over Christmas. It really helps if you have AD Sync or AD FS in place.

I also found that 'pushing' a VM from the host containing it currently works while 'pulling' from the new host doesn't. Worth trying it the other way.

Done. Obsolete server now shut down.

Update of SIMS, FMS & Discover went fine.

Our BackupAssist crypto ransomware detector constantly picks up SIMS .enc files as ransomware when they're not!

I've preferred Edge for many years now, but we install Chrome on all machines too, giving staff a choice. I don't see that changing as Edge has the, err, edge when it comes to AD FS, O365 & SharePoint management.

I haven't found a way and still eyeball all the marksheets for missing marks before running the reports.

We use Xibo and that's a great idea. I shall look at the system health monitoring page.

If their permissions are locked down they shouldn't be able to see anything anyway?

Yep, I see that now.

They can take a while, depending on the Azure workload. Even adding myself as an owner to a Team so that I can bulk move files can take 1-2 hours.

Here is our order confirmation from Microsoft detailing the order for an additional number of A1 student and faculty licences, ordered through Insight at zero cost. They are called ProPlus here but they come through as A1 (the real ProPlus having been already ordered, this was just a top-up). Even when I look at it, it's mad!

They come through our Admin Center licensing panel showing as Office 365 Pro Plus for students and Office 365 A1 for students, so the combination (we allocate both to each student) does the right thing with Teams etc.

You can also do it through your Microsoft reseller. I 'purchase' Office 365 ProPlus for Students and for Faculty (200 + 100) for zero cost on our Open Value agreement and receive an invoice for zero cost! We use Insight.

Interesting. Care to name one or two MIS that have impressed you?

We have 2 staff left to move data to the cloud and then we're done. File server on target for decommissioning!

Before the SIMS bashing becomes too loud, just stop and think about what it does, not how old it is or whether the UI was designed by committee. Ours is astoundingly stable and reliable. We use it heavily every day, almost all of the modules from Admissions to Lesson Monitor, Exams, Timetabling, Behaviour, InTouch, Fees etc. It's being hammered by the staff all the time and we very rarely, if ever, have to restart the server. We also have a pile of connectors sending info out to MyConcern, RoomBooking, SOCS, GCSEPod, Schoolcomms etc. I don't know of many other school MIS systems that do all this, they usually miss out one or other major piece of functionality. Every time we do a review we come to the rapid realisation that SIMS may be ugly but it gets the job done. Yes, I want Next Gen just as soon as everyone else, but I'd rather they do it right.

I've just checked my OneNote notes for SIMS conferences. It was first demo'd at the SIMS Conference in 2017. At the user group meeting last week, Capita confirmed that it's now slated for Q2 2021.

We work until 24th so no rush, we'll get it done ready for the delightful census requests in January.

If you want a really good SF adaptation, try The Expanse based on the James SA Corey books (the first of which is Leviathan Wakes). Very nice depiction of the worlds with detail aplenty and mostly believable characters. Excellent production quality.

I have the Autumn update scheduled for after the staff leave (18th) and this is not filling me with hope.