BITS_BryanS

I had some communication with them about the app couple of weeks back, and this was the response. I was asking about PIN / biometric login, and generally fixing it to work properly. I was asking as a parent that now has to use it "We don't have a timescale as of yet I'm afraid but this is being worked on by the product team at present after feedback from parents using the app. There is a lot of work going on in the background to resolve bugs within the app as this isn't something that will be a quick fix. The team are aware of the limitations within the app and it is under review🙂️"

I hope this is the case. Daughters school has just started using it, and logging in with password is a pain (PIN doesn't seem to be an option). Must say, not overly impressed so far, feels like very much a work in progress. Will be interesting to see how it develops.

One option is to create a simple web service that runs internally on your network, and performs the AD authentication locally. This is dead simple in .net for example. You could then just call the service from your website. Nice thing is you'd only need to open https on the firewall. We've done this on our website and works well for us

20 years ago I remember everyone saying the same thing about Windows NT when compared to Novell.....

A number of the primary schools we support have gone with iPads. After a couple of false starts (pushy PTA or heads insisting on them without a strategy) they are generally very popular with staff and pupils, and have a productive place in the classroom. Its important that teachers understand they are not replacements for laptops / pcs, but compliment them. Choose the right apps, work out how they will fit in with what they are trying to teach and ensure you know how you are going to configure them / save work / store & share them and they can be a great success

I know this is a couple of months old, but local fire station had an open day last week, so I asked the question about registers. They said the school absolutely should have a fire register (and said there was legislation for this, but I can't remember the details). If everyone was accounted for, a full sweep would still take place, but would depend on state of fire / risks etc. If someone was un-accounted for then a search would be a priority. It was pretty clear cut as far as they were concerned.

The "Open In" function will display up to 10 supported apps, and there is no way to control which apps will appear in this list, which does make this a somewhat random process. There are numerous threads across the web complaining about this. Our solution uses the 'Send To / Share To" type option, which is present in most apps. For many users a 'Save Only' solution is fine. They are creating videos / photos / cartoons / stories etc on the iPad, and they just need to save them to a server for later viewing / reference. If you are looking to re-open files on the iPad for continued editing them something like Foldr or WebDAV will be a more suitable solution, but in our experience that is not what everyone wants or needs.

If it's saving from Apps you are looking for, then we have a solution called AirCatch that you may want to take a look at - Business I.T. Systems Ltd Opening saved documents is a different ballgame. Most apps don't support WebDAV, and only allow opening from their own sandbox storage area on the iPad. Some Apps do support the 'Open In' option, but it appears to be completely random as to what Apps will be displayed their, so not particularly reliable.

Not sure I follow your logic. Why would a school having a training database affect Capita? And training databases are available as part of the partner programme.

Probably the SIMS setup files and training databases. Remember, most developers are not schools, and so will not have SIMS

Hi Phil The main document for write back extends to 13 pages. Not much when you consider how much information is in SIMS. The document detailing the 3rd Party Interface, used for reading info, extends to 77 pages, but this is largely xml structures. There are pretty much no code samples. In our experience is was pretty much trial and error, or specific questions to partner support (who have been very helpful). If you know exactly what area of SIMS you want to manipulate then you could well be OK, but don't expect a comprehensive guide that you can cut and paste from Regards Bryan

Hi Phi As I mentioned earlier, the documentation is pretty sparse. Unless you intend to do quite a lot with it, and have quite a bit of coding experience, I'd seriously question whether you'd want to down this route. I obviously don't know what you are trying to do, but I assume you've investigated existing solutions? Regards Bryan

Hi Our partner company is a SIMS developer, and the Business Objects are usable by developers. I'm not sure what documents are available to schools, but the SIMS documentation, particular for write back, is pretty poor anyway. What exactly are you trying to do? Regards Bryan

If you want a nice GUI and you are working with AD then I'd suggest Visual Studio and C#. Some examples that might help Everything in Active Directory via C#.NET 3.5 (Using System.DirectoryServices.AccountManagement) - CodeProject Querying and Updating Active Directory Using C# (C Sharp) Bear in mind that these things can quickly grow in scale, and what seems like a simple task can evolve into a larger project very easily!

OK, can't help I'm afraid...