Jonah

Morning folks, Does anyone use SSO to Google Apps via ADFS? We've noticed that for some unknown reason this seems to have just plainly stopped working since around the time Google introduced the new Google Drive. Was wondering if anyone else had noticed a similar issue and what might be going on! Cheers, Jonah

We're doing very similar but with App Controller, gives the added benefit of a persistent state for the students machines regardless of where they log in, so work can e saved/continued in future lessons.

We've recently purchased some Optiplex 7010s for our main ICT suite, with 3rd gen i5s, 6GB ram and a 128gb SSD. Should easily see us through quite a few years.

A few answers to one or two of the questions.. We use GADS for new accounts, etc, running every hour. Passwords are handled via GAPS (https://support.google.com/a/answer/2611859?hl=en) and is pretty much instantaneous so shouldn't cause any issues. We use SSO using ADFS, it can be fiddly to set up but is well worth the effort in the end. A little info here - Google Apps and Active Directory Federation Services | IT Link Maine You can limit what is available within Google Apps for students/years, etc, so any of the "messaging" type apps can be disabled.

We'll be using App Controller for this next year, after testing it works superbly. Posted briefly about it the other day - http://www.edugeek.net/forums/behind-red-door/27257-what-cool-thing-s-did-u-do-today-184.html#post1201860

Should be around ~£200 for a single 2 processor license, at an estimate? Don't have our previous exact costs to hand.

Now we're out of BSF (when the oldest backup at any one time was 3 weeks!) - we keep our EOYs for 5 years.

M247 - 100/100 leased line with ADSL2 failover. Smoothwall UTM1000 All in-house, no LA involvemennt. More than happy with everything, no issues.

We use PowerShell on a schedule. We do it for both staff and students, CommandReporter runs some pre-defined reports in SIMS and exports each year group and staff list in to a CSV. This is then queried against AD for any new additions/changes/anyone that's left, etc and accounts created/changed/removed as required. The process goes through setting user accounts up, assigning profiles, creating mailboxes, adding to security and distribution groups and e-mailing the relevant people with details. For the sake of it, we have it run on the hour which means whenever a new member of staff/student is entered in to SIMS by the admin team an account is created (with no further interaction required) within 60 minutes at worst. Can also be ran manually when/if required.

There's not much to it. We have two icons on the Ubuntu desktop, Firefox and the RDP client. All the games etc have been removed. If they just need Internet access for research, etc, they launch Firefox. Anything else they launch the RDP client.

We use RDS for a number of Axel thin clients in offices, etc, but we also use it with some if our more ancient laptops (Dell Latitdue 120L - a good 8 years old now. Used to take an age to boot in to windows and log in, so we now have a stripped down Ubuntu installed which gives filtered Internet access or an RDS session depending on the need. They boot in 20 seconds and log in in 7. The difference is astronomical and we expect to use this with further laptops as they approach the cliff where a full Windows 7 install becomes pointless.

Yep, same with us - weren't happy with the fact they were losing so many schools. Cannot stress enough how important it is you get all the information form them - and the correct, latest, information at best. We were given a so-called fully detailed information pack which should have included all network documentation, etc. When we received it, we saw it hadn't been updated in 3 years, so still had some old portable classrooms in and no trace whatsoever of our new sixth form and SEN wing! When it came to resetting the switches and severing the link to their server farm, they did this remotely but somehow managed to miss 19 of 37 switches completely (no doubt due in part to the previous network documentation not being up to date). This resulted in an engineer of theirs having to come to site when available to reset those missed - put us back a few days but luckily we were expecting some delays down the line so had planned time accordingly! Check, double check, and triple check everything they give you.

This is precisely what we went through. Our managed service contract was set to end in September 2012 (I worked for the school pre BSF and was TUPEd to the MSP). Myself and another engineer were appointed by the school in February 2012 to plan, design and implement a new network for go live when the contract ended. Every other school in the wave either went to another MSP or brought things in house but with third party support - so it was a step in to the unknown for us! Work started fully in March 2012 getting a skeleton network up and running (AD, Exchange, client images, etc). We got a leased line set up around June time which allowed us to get remote access, owa etc all set up in advance. By the time of the summer holidays all that was required was a full reimage of all client machines to the new network, and configuration of switches and migration of data from the MSP (which they messed up drastically - make sure they know exactly what you are expecting and can deliver it as part of the contract end!). The transition went even smoother than we expected with no major issues, and the feedback from the school and governors that it's in an entirely different world to the managed service. So we've been there and done that, any questions give us a shout!

We were part of Wave 1 in the North West and the contracts expired in September 2012. Every school within Wave 1 did not renew with the then MSP (Capita). As you can probably guess, not many schools were happy with the contract at all! We were the only school to come fully back in house. 3 that I am aware of went back in house but with some 3rd party support and the remainder entered a new Managed Service with a different provider.

It's used here, but primarily Google Docs and Sites (we still use on-premises Exchange). From what I gather the docs part is used quite heavily and it seems to work well. We have the AD sync and password sync working, as well as single sign on to Google using ADFS, which is something the staff appreciated hugely! We also have a trolley of Chromebooks so it obviously works well with them.

It's not quite right how addictive this game actually is. Was using the keyboard controls, but then dug out a really old Logitech dual action controller and it is perfect for it.

Single HTML/PHP page on IIS. Google search, couple of useful links (whole school calendar, cover list, network helpdesk, etc), as well as self-service password reset, student username lookup and student password changes (stops them bothering us when a student "forgets" their password!).

New-Item \\server\path\$student_login\ -type directory Start-Sleep -s 6 $stuacl = Get-Acl \\server\path\$student_login\ Start-Sleep -s 6 $stuperms = New-Object system.security.accesscontrol.filesystemaccessrule($student_login,"FullControl","ContainerInherit, ObjectInherit","None","Allow") $stuacl.SetAccessRule($stuperms) Set-Acl \\server\path\$student_login $stuacl

Quick question! Can somebody confirm the current version of Nova-T6 please? We're on 6.28, build 6 on SIMS 7.152. Cheers,

You would likely need to an additional DNS zone to your internal DNS with the name http://www.region.school.uk and point the A record to your internal server. YMMV.

We do similar to some previous posters, using a powershell script that checks an exported report from SIMS and then checks against AD. If it finds any new users then accounts are created, dropped in the right year group/OU, mailboxes set up, and an e-mail sent to us and the IT teaching department with details. The scheduled task runs hourly so any accounts are created pretty quickly once on SIMS.

100 iPads? Pah! Try.. Levenshulme High School spends £220k on an iPad for EVERY pupil - Manchester Evening News

Think we pay under £12k for a 100mb leased line with ADSL failover from M247.

All our servers here are Dell (with the exception of the Xserve) - because that is what was put in as part of BSF and we carried on because the support is second to none, and we've not had a single component fail in anything for 5 years now.

Magic Tetris mug!