pete

https://www.theregister.com/2025/10/09/discord_photo_ids_leaked/ But sure, Peter Kyle, you keep patting yourself on the back.

Yeah, I'll bet £5 on "they've got so many redirects and CNAMEs that are not properly* documented that moving to the .microsoft domain is breaking things all over the place".

I was troubleshooting a Salamander sync error the other day and discovered group memberships in Bromcom are cached for much longer than other data and that cached info is what's provided to the API. Open Bromcom, go into Config > Setup > System Configurations and click the "Refresh Student Cache" button and Wonde will be correct on the next sync. (we were wondering why a returning student had been synced across into the wrong year group in AD). Most day-to-day "put people into Bromcom" staff may not have access to that button and frankly it's pretty stupid that it's necessary (especially at the beginning of the year when there's so much churn).

In the last 12 months, all of our primary school SARs are related to SEND provision. School applies for X to support the child, LA denies X, parent makes SAR to school because (perhaps inexplicably) they're unwilling to believe how underfunded and/or incompetent the LA is. How about your schools?

OK, I have a second student with the same issue on a different Android tablet. I've contacted AQA, but so far haven't had a response.

Sorry, yeah - It's a wired desktop. In-wall cabling is all 6a and properly certified. In my limited testing (I'd gone to the office for something unrelated), web browsing was unaffected. Didn't check UNC paths via a command prompt. We do have another of the same desktop mounted the same way that's also been upgraded to Win 11, so I'll check that one too. Haven't tested headphones either.

This has been mitigated for the moment by unplugging the built-in speaker, but.... HP ProDesk 440 G9 uSFF (external PSU) Previously running Windows 10 22H2 Reimaged to Windows 11 24H2. Drivers updated to current stable using HP Image Assistant. Installed with a HP VESA mount on a atanding desk with linear actuators (same behaviour whether the desk is powered or not) Attempting to browse a UNC path or add a printer, causes the built-in speaker to crackle and pop. If you stop browsing, the crackling stops and doesn't begin again until you start again. Muting the audio in Windows does nothing. Didn't happen in Windows 10 (it's noticable when it happens). No changes to onboard speakers in BIOS (enabled vs disabled). No obvious damage to speaker, motherboard, USB ports, internal or external cabling. Any ideas? cheers Pete

The full RCA has just been sent out to the school/trust main contact.

Bit of a long shot, but I need to gather a bit more data if anyone is at a school using AQA for EPQ via the Project Q site (https://my.projectq.co/) and has a student with an Android tablet: One of our students has a Samsung Tablet. Android 15, Chrome up to date, reasonably new. Clicking into a textbox on the "Production Log" tab (where most of the typing is done) reloads the page, which automatically hides the on-screen so you can't type. A bluetooth-connected physical keyboard also doesn't work beyond a couple of keystrokes. Clicking back into the textbox (after it reloads), reloads the page again. This happens at home and school (not a filtering issue). On the "Inbox" or "Journal" tabs the keyboard remains usable. Both keyboards work on other websites, apps and form fields (such as Microsoft Forms). The Production Log tab works fine on an Android phone. I don't have any other "bigger-than-phone" Android devices around, so I'm hoping someone out there may have also spotted this. cheers Pete

I like Wazuh (https://wazuh.com/), but it might be a bit overkill for syslog on 5 devices.

Just logged in as a test and paid a pending bill - didn't have any issues with login and payment.

We've used Anker and Startech docks and they work fine in all but one of our buildings (it's something odd with the particular building or the behaviour of the inhabitants, but we've never narrowed down exactly what). The Anker docks can become less reliable if they're allowed to overheat and they stay hot for extended periods (someone uses both HDMI, all the USB, charges through the dock and buries the dock on the desk). Consider mounting them where they can't be buried in classroom detritus.

Is that massive staff changeover or do staff alter their appearance over the summer holidays in the hope of avoiding 9B? We do new staff and a quick "does this still look like Bob?" test for existing staff, unless someone really doesn't like their current picture.

We're running J9150D clones from FS.com in J9993A (8x SFP+ module) and the SFP+ slots of J9990A (20xPoE+, 4x SFP+) in a few 5406zl2s without any issues. I'd echo the "check the fibre's not marginal" (rodents, crushing, loose panel connectors, bad patch lead). If you've got a known good fibre patch lead and another 10GB-capable switch I'd check that a 10GB connection can be established over a short patch lead.

If you're on speaking terms with the IT at the school down the road (and you're reasonably certain they're not muppets) ask them to be a critical friend. Suggest you eyeball each other's stuff and ask awkward questions and pick holes in the "we've always done X" justifications. Don't wait for the DfE to get their backside in gear. There are people on here who offer an informal (you're local and you understand you owe us a favour) or formal (your school pays the day rate - it's not cheap) audit service.

True, but many schools (and trusts and LAs) procure goods and services via government frameworks because said frameworks implied the government had already done a certain amount of due diligence around supplier competence, ability to deliver the promised service and value for money, offering a list of "pre-evaluated suppliers". But as is frequently demonstrated that "pre-evaluation" is at best a snapshot in time. Great if you're familiar with the product(s) on offer and know what you want - it saves having to do the "three quotes" farce when the margins are razor-thin already. Absolutely useless if you're buying a widget for a thingy and have no experience of either.

No - I emailed Caroline H (or CSM) with a "Mailroute are saying the below, what's the Smoothwall side of things?" I'll PM you the details. I've just spent the last hour our so faffing about pulling together working mail delivery for the school. With "the below" being: Hi there, Smoothwall is discontinuing your MailRoute service as part of your contract with them. To retain your data and the reliable service you’ve been using, let’s discuss being a direct customer of MailRoute. I noticed they have your account set to auto-add which doesn’t take advantage of the proprietary integration we have with o365. Using that tool alone would streamline and improve your account management. Let’s discuss how to improve your experience and continue protecting your staff, faculty and student accounts. I’m available at your convenience. Best regards,

One of our schools (who use Mailroute via Smoothwall) just found out that "Smoothwall are discontinuing their relationship with mailroute" by having email delivery broken circa midday today by Mailroute terminating the service. @tom_newton to whom was the advance warning about this sent? The last email I've had regarding Mailroute was in September 2023.

Occasionally working here (5 schools), but mostly not.

If the issue is diminished capacity (which it appears to be if they've lost a server), then kicking everyone off by restarting isn't a solution. That's just redistributing the available capacity on a first-come, first-served basis until it's gone again.

@Bromcom_Alec can you shed any light on whether the performance issues from yesterday afternoon are linked to this morning's outage?

Yup. It started to be (unusually) grindy yesterday afternoon so any performance monitoring on their end should have flagged that up.

I'd echo the "remove existing licenses, have a coffee while you give it 5 minutes to make sure it's happened, re-allocate licenses based on groups". Student licenses get allocated based on intake group membership. Staff have a couple of licensing groups that they get dropped into on account creation.

^ beginning to think so. A quick look through reddit implies the O2 backend is fairly awful. EE/BTOnePhone/WTF they're calling themselves at the moment is pants too. And I doubt any of them have customer-accessible APIs. So the question is "how much of a premium am I willing to pay to delegate this faffing off to a reseller"?

If you're using either O2 or Vodafone for business phones/SIM cards in various premises equipment, how awful is the backend (ordering new SIMs/Phones/etc)? cheers Pete