CyberNerd

AFAIK they released their linux distro as GPL and the SQL is closed so not sure why ?

Surely it's the time taken to make a snapshot thats an issue, not the time it takes to backup the snapshot. ?? Snapshot usually takes seconds.

Can you get wired bird boxes ?

Yes because all you are doing is overriding the permissions that the student has set using the API. so it would be the same as the student sharing them. The trick is that you need to script it: get a list of all folders gam.py user [username] show filelist query "mimeType = 'application/vnd.google-apps.folder'" then feed the result into a script to share it.

If it's teachers that need access, just give them read access on the students accounts using gam.

Folder structure is an abstract concept in the cloud. You can't really think of things in the cloud as being in folders because they do not exist in folders - it's just a database reference. Sometimes with computing applications it's worth unlearning what you have learned. Imagine if your method of searching the web was doing through directories? It just wouldn't work. SEARCH is the key here - it's faster too.

The way the licenses work is that you buy a license for £19 from a supplier (misco, BT, XMA etc). They then assign it to you GAFE domain. You then enrol the chromebook on login to the domain. Once it is enrolled it uses a license. The licenses are perpetual but can transfer to different devices.

Use Vault for this, it works out of the box. You can also assign teachers admin permissions over the vault to have teachers examine the work too. If you need write access then CLi /API is the way forward. There are probably third party apps that use the api to do this, but for us a simple script is straightforward.

Either you give someone else access to the files - which it does, or you download them - which it does. What were you after ?

It's a pretty big step for MS, who have been really hostile to anything opensource, to develop their own linux and run the network stack for the whole of azure on it. I'll probably be waiting a while for Capita to get on board so I can run SIMS on a linux server....

yes, all the Google API's are open. You can do pretty much anything with the admin account. There are so many options though I couldn't really do GAM justice in a post. Suffice to say you need to give somebody else permissions on the files, using a script, or download them en masse; https://github.com/jay0lee/GAM/wiki/GoogleDriveManagement

Azure runs on linux. Whoa. Microsoft Is Using Linux to Run Its Cloud | WIRED

and just ban them from BYOD ?

That's insane. surely they can be configured to do p2p updates from local clients like chromebooks do?

IIRC it is £1500 per year for 30 users and £20 per user per year thereafter. This is on top of any existing licensing and maintenance costs.

This is what we use. Admin can add files to all drives and take ownership from students. works a treat.

There is an add-on in their store. You configure it to sync to a single user account.

This isn't really the Governments goal. The goal is to get rid of LA's and introduce private money; it's an ideological goal. The 'spin' is that academy MATs perform better and save money but the data is dubious. Even if there was stacks of data to the contrary they would still pursue it.

I was just expanding the 'private entities should be nowhere near education' comment. Wondering if the govt put the same amount of money into a venture as schools already pay into Capita whether we'd have a better system.

Like the Capita,Microsoft cartels have been doing for years. If all that administration money could get ploughed back into teaching and learning....

Our HT is saying pretty much the same thing as you described in your points. I've not seen 'evidence' either. From my understanding when DfE want schools to do things, rather than dictate it with words, they just make an offer you can't refuse eg: over a short time period give schools who go into MAT large amounts more cash and cut cash for those under LA control - and justify it with some 'community' 'results' jargon. I think this is probably where it comes from. Why not ask your bursar - s/he will be best placed to know if this is true.

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This may look great on paper, but in reality to centralise these services is going to require technical managers to oversee the local service managers, much larger procurement exercises, more centralised and less ad hoc training. What makes LA's inefficient and waste money also applies to MATs. I agree it will probably happen, but it doesn't always mean it's a good idea or that it's a better economic plan

The GCE (Google Compute Engine) Data IS held in EU if you request it, GAFE isn't necessarily held in EU but could be.

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