BatchFile

What exactly is BETT? My understanding is that it's an exhibition where alsorts of educational providers show off their stuff - like the motor show but for educational stuff... have I got this right and what's a good argument to get the SLT to let me go next year?

Here too, despite the flooding! (though it does arrive dripping wet)

After using a variety of imaging methods (from taking-the-hard-drive-out-and-sticking-it-in-another-PC up) including Ghost, I've just started using Windows PE and Imagex... it's basically like DOS but with network support and boots from a USB pen or CD - I create a batch file to format c:, map the drive and then deploy the image - works really well and you don't have to go digging for DOS drivers:)

%systemroot%\sims.ini ??? IIRC

3 cheers for global warming!! Hip Hip...

D'oh! It's non-uniform days I usually forget, then I'm the only one in school in a shirt and tie:o

I can clear that one up: The "Security" tab tells the server who to allow to do what to the printer. If you leave it at the default setting everyone *could* print to the printer. BUT this DOESN'T mean it will be visible to them straight away, they'd have to go browsing accross the network for it if they wanted to use it. To make life easier for your users you'll want to give them a printer or two when they log in so they don't need to go a hunting, for that the PrintUI method above works fine for me. I just have a heap of batch files in a folder that users can run to connect to an appropriate printer. in the example below, the first line connects them to the printer and the second one sets it as their default printer. RUNDLL32 PRINTUI.DLL,PrintUIEntry /in /n "\\Cpsappsrv1\room2_colour" RUNDLL32 PRINTUI.DLL,PrintUIEntry /y /n "\\Cpsappsrv1\room2_colour" [edit] Oh by the way - if you're going to do it this way just watch out as bits of "PRINTUI.DLL,PrintUIEntry" are, unusually for Microsoft, CaSe SeNsItIvE!

Reminds me of a school around here a couple of years ago... they were late downloading their exam results because the sheep had chewed throught their broadband cable... Ahh the joys of rural life... and the electricity comes with lumps in it so I have UPSs on the UPSs:bowl:

There's little in the S: drive these days that staff would need full access to... SNOVA folder for nova users (that don't log in to T4 as "default user"(?)) could be one, but I don't really see the need for anywhere else as everything else goes straight into SQL these days. Having said that, or looking at the same point from a different direction I suppose, so long as you've got a backup of the SNOVA folder since the last timetable change and the S: drive since the last upgrade, nothing much else should change day to day

That could be arranged... anyone got a spare junction box and a pair of wire strippers?

I guess Cartmel (Cumbria) would be too... but I could use a bit of techie help!

Attaching your existing database is definately the way to go... I actually have a dummy server for trying stuff out on (including upgrades sometimes) without clogging up the main SIMS system. If you do attach NewSimsDatabase.mdf, if I remember, the login should be sysman/password, but you'll then need to run SIMSConfig and apply a couple of patches before you can log in to it.

going to add rd /q /s c:\users\%username%\My Settings\Application Data\Adobe to the end of the login script to see if that works.... will post the results here. I guess the $64,000 question... how does a company the size of Adobe produce software that doesn't work properly on a standard network with standard users and standard roaming profiles?! It's not like we're talking about some tiny cottage industry producing educational software is it?

I use 9 too, rolled via a GPO... and I've got the same trouble too it seems to break occasionally, and deleting the user's roaming profile (and the local copy thereof) seems to be the only resolution at the moment

I'm Tony, "ICT Strategy and Resources Manager" in a small secondary school (NOR 380) in the southern Lake District. I started here as "ICT Technician" in 2000, worked here for 4 years (during which time I also qualified as a teacher) then left to join the Cumbria Capita SIMS support team where I was for a couple of years until the helpdesk was centralised which made working there unbearable. I left them to come back here into my current more senior roll in August 2007. My roll is a mixture of Technician and ICT Coordinator work, with SIMS, VLE development and a bit of teaching and covering of lessons thrown in for good measure. Anyone got a brush:p Nah, actually I love it - great little school and friendly staff, and the views...

Is this a print server too? if so that can do it... it must be something like that as it is the "system" that is eating up the resources. Otherwise, any clues in the event log?

I'm waiting for Grand Theft Auto for the Wii:D:D Punch, kick, shoot then slot on the wheel and drive!!

I used to work for a certain company whose name begins with C, supporting and training on MIS software beginning with S, including Attendance. (before I came back to work in a school again, but that's another story!) The advice we were always given to pass on when this question came up was that if there were potentially more than 30 people in a building then a list of who they are was not required as the fire brigade would search the entire site anyway, so the fact that registers were not readily available for fire drills was not in fact a problem. I make no claim as to whether this is in fact true, but it may be worth checking out with your local fire service as you may be worrying over nothing. HOWEVER I can well see that for peace of mind of those involved it may well be beneficial to have a list of who should be in school and given the above, any of the suggestions already mentioned would fit the bill. In our case we print off who's absent at 10.00 (or thereabouts) when registration closes and then use ready printed, laminated, reg group lists to call the register when the fire bell rings. Our school is not large (NOR ~400), so the chances are that with a reg group list the form tutor will remember who wasn't in anyway, but it's confirmed by the absence list.

14 but it should have been 15 - I clicked on the cameras on the bridge rather than the van

Our staff drives just happen to be hosted on the ISA server (as I needed space in a hurry and it had loads ) which coincidently (or due to the actions of He-who-must-not-be-named and subsequently covered up by the ministry) blew it's network card over the weekend:confused: and all this at the same time as a managed switch goes bananas??? This afternoon I'm going to test the card to see if it is indeed dead - it might have been the jabbering that made it appear that way I suppose:confused:

Spookily I had almost the same thing here this morning Sophos had found a virus in the SIMS drive (just an anoying Autorun thingy that it dealt with ok, but I scanned anyway) and no web access and no teacher network drives... All seems ok now, having changed the network card in the ISA server and powered down and up again the central network cabinet to stop a switch that I suspect was jabbering... but it's all a bit odd

As it turned out, good old "Detect and Repair" in Office 2003 fixed this problem in both 2003 and 2007... Ho Hum! Strange how the obvious solution comes to you in the shower the following morning isn't it?!

We've just hit a problem with M$ Access 2003 and 2007 (our workstations are loaded with both) on Vista SP1: When a teacher or student (ie non-admin) is logged in, "Get External Data" doesn't work - no error, no wizard, nothing! Logged in as an admin, it works fine. It gets as far as displaying the contents of the folder where the source file is held, but double-clicking the file you want to open just gets rid of the "open" box... and that's it:eek: Interestingly we note that single clicking on the file *doesn't* make it appear in the "filename" box either. Anyone care to venture a guess at what the is going on?

I'm in pretty much the same boat actually. Our VLE provider (LP+) provides email but it seems pretty pathetic 20MB storage limit, for example. We get a perfectly usable mail system "free" from our LEA which isn't Exchange based (Squirrelmail) but works perfectly well with Outlook and Outlook Express when used with an IMAP connection. Part of the plan for the use of the VLE is to have as much stuff as possible as a "Single sign on", so just using a page viewer web part to connect via the usual webmail interface doesn't really help. What I could do with is a web part capable of displaying an inbox and subfolders and sending messages, that can store login details to connect to the LEA mail server by IMAP. I don't need anything as complicated as Outlook Web Access, just a simple inbox really. Any ideas anyone?

I'm not sure if this is the right forum for this, but here goes... A scheme came onto my radar yesterday run by "Funding Solutions for Education" (http://www.fundingse.co.uk/websearch.htm) whereby schools can get commission from a rebranded "ask.com" search page. What basically seems to happen is that you (the school) sign up and Email your school badge to them and they set up a search engine page with your school logo on. Everytime someone searches using your page, you get 1 or 2 pence, which is paid to the school monthly. Obviously, with a small tweak on the intranet (and maybe a bit of ISA magic to redirect Google ) we could pick up quite a few (thousand) searches monthly. To me, it seems to be win-win, as they don't charge anything up front to the school for doing it, they just take their cut of the proceeds before they pay the school... Does anyone have any experience of this scheme??