matt40k

The whole IE EU thing has expired @mavhc. Chrome has a big enough share of the market that they're not going to renew it. That's why they've been OEM bundling Windows 10 with Bing for a while now Windows 7 is 7 years old. It's pretty dated nowadays and really should be replace (yes, yes I know, I know. But we had the same thing with XP didn't we and the world didn't end did it?)

They'll say\demo something at this years BETT. In terms of when you'll get it? Well when did you adopt SOLUS3? I was rolling it out what, 5 years ago and that just installs a few pieces of software. So how long do you wait for it to be "stable" before you roll it out when its mission critical and everything changes? Serious question. I've heard rumours the main reason they've developed it was because their biggest customer threatened to ditch them, so if that's the case, you've got to ask how many stupid user requirements got in.

Yer AD login for the win. SIMS passwords aren't case sensitive, aren't forced to change regularly and until a few years ago pretty weak min password complexity (which I think you can still get round). Combine with the fact the "encrypted" passwords are stored in a SQL table and folks have zero brute force protection on SQL logins, your pretty much asking for it. Teaching Windows Key + L is better then a separate password (at least within a single organisation\school). Surprisingly I seem to remember Capita documenting the setup process quite well too, it was either in the built in documentation or the techy training course guide they created - it included mapping SIMS users to AD accounts and updating the connect.ini file and deploying it via S3, still might be the nostalgia setting in!!

Add-on in Excel 2013, built in Excel 2016. Same tool as whats in PowerBI. Guy you want to look for is Chris Webb - he speaks at lot of events around the UK and does training. Loads of resources online about it - and its a reusable skill that isn't limited to the education sector!

Sounds you need to learn PowerQuery @emmaburt - or Get Data as they call in Office 2016.

Size really doesn't come into it, its more how complex your setup. The key is to keep it simple and I assume they just want to make sure you guys don't over complicate it because someone wants to keep their Nova-T skills up. Kinda get your point about SCCM, you could use InTune, CentraStage or such, whatever automation process you use it makes more sense then doing it all manually

Could be they've over quoted as they suspect it'll be overkill. Pointless if they stick to the same class groups and they just move between a few teachers regularly. Better off with a creating calendar for each class.

Have look on Eduware Network, @GREED published a spreadsheet with what MIS systems schools used to submit their census - https://eduwarenetwork.com/mis_market_statistics/ - should give you an idea what systems them use and who to speak with. I've made a basic report on the data that might be of interest: https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiYTM5ODQyMzUtODI5Mi00Y2EwLTliMzAtODQyYWI5YzkyODFlIiwidCI6ImRhZmFiZWU0LWIwODMtNDk1OC1hYjBhLWQxZGFiNjI2ZGE3OCIsImMiOjh9

Isn't Office 365 free for Education?

Individuals is different to large companies. Individuals you can pretty much ignore conversions rate mistakes, large companies its a difference between profit and going bankrupt. Also you can get into tax issues. I don't pretend to understand global economics - I just accept the fact that somewhere else in the world they are getting a better deal on Office 365 then I am - still I earn more in a month then they earn in a year. @unixman_again - LOL!!!

To prevent the big US customers taking advantage by buying UK licenses. Not that the UK tax man would mind the extra revenue. If the pound bounces back, they'll have to lower the costs, and I'm sure they'll make a big song and dance about how it's because of Azure somehow, else we'll all just pretend to be in US.

Someone had their coffee this morning!! You'd give Usain Bolt a run for his money at the speed of that reply! @2ilent8cho So you just need to ask them if they support the B2B Open standard.

Your new MIS provider should support it. I found the details about the XML schema via google by looking for "capita one b2b open", which will give them something to work with - if they haven't already got support. LEA should a test system the can valid against also (its in their interest for it to work as it saves them having to re-key everything - remember this is a daily task too). Of course they can always get support from Capita. @PhilNeal should have a list of MIS suppliers that they know support it.

Give David @ Capita a ring, sure he can sort you out

If only that was the case. They charge for write back. If they didn't, SIMS Bulk Import would be with its new owner now.

Suggest you read the full story on the link above, basically they won't transfer the grey area agreement I had with them - they point blank said they'll get charged (what that is etc I don't know). Not that surprised, Academy re-licensing anyone?

In terms of my app you can pretty much do whatever you wanted with it - you could take the code and sell the program, even without any changes. The only restriction was really crediting the source aka me. The problem with someone else putting it up publicly would be Capita chasing you for cash cause it uses the BO.

Afraid I won't be send out any copies as its basically abandomware, least until Capita figure out Freemium. There are a few commercial companies still with a copy they're giving out to help out their customers - nothing from my point of view to stop them, license permitted it and I've not put anything to stop it working after a period of time, it should carry on working until Capita make a major change (so what Oct 2030 ?)

Its only LEA that use Capita ONE (formally EMS) use B2B, stands for Business-to-business, its another case of Capita using a generic term - like Microsoft and SQL Server, there are other types of SQL servers, like Oracle, MySQL etc. Other LEA that use other systems use other tools - like Groupcall exporter. If your LEA uses Capita ONE (which is sounds like they do), they can also take a CSV file (send it over AnyComms or such) or your new MIS provider can use B2B open - all links into the Capita ONE B2B process - so really they shouldn't really care - it feeds in via the same routines (suspense) and ends up in the same tables. Hope that helps

Awesome - could you put the code on GitHub please? It'll make it easier to track\manage changes overtime and give a central point to download\check for updates rather then ad-hoc requests.

We had of "line of sight" wireless broadband and I know when it came up to renewal (fyi we went fibre) they had a new updated version of the technology that was alot less line of sight - ie a tree grows into your path it doesn't knock your internet off and we were getting 300mbps off the old gen wireless. Anyway point still stands, in this digital age, not having broadband isn't really acceptable, how can you honestly say you can prepare children for the future when you physically can't even teach the basics? I think that's a security feature.

Is it just a SIMS server? If it is, in terms of the OS. Its about half a day to reinstall with Win2012 R2. SQL Server is a lot or difficult. Like recovering data from a failed raid array hard, do-able, but not easy.

I hate this argument. If my mate can stream game of thrones from the middle of a field in HD in the bog end of nowhere, I'm pretty sure you could mark a few registers even in rural school. I know that's oversimplified, but I've yet to be to a school that can't run YouTube. If you can't run YouTube, then fine, onprem makes sense, otherwise its a false economy. It's like blaming your LA "forcing" you to use SIMS. No LA forces any MIS on you. FYI - last time I saw Capita charges, it was £500~£1000 per year for a primary to be host, so I'm not sure the onprem is cheaper is actually correct. Not the best option, I still think picking another MIS would be better, that IS actually web based - and I'm not saying wait til SIMS 8 - we all know how Capita is with anything new, its been what 5 years to get SOLUS3 to a point where people are generally happy with it!! Anyway, just my 2p, go spend mega dosh on an add-on, just make sure you can justify whatever decide you make, especially if your an Academy!

Apart from a lot of the business logic is in those pesky .NET dll's. So you'd need to web-ify those before you anything. So bypassing the dll would put you into unsupported mode. And actually they have - SLG and kinda-of SIMS Teacher app.

To be fair to PARS any system is going to be slow when you think about how its going to have to interface with SIMS. If your saying you need SIMS to be web based, then really you're saying you need a web based MIS and SIMS isn't a web based MIS - just saying, square pegs and round holes...