matt40k

You would NEVER develop of a live db anyway, you would NEVER test on a live db either. What data do you want to retrieve? If you can't tell them what you want to extract and why, I doubt they'll be willing to allocate what limited resources they have when you can use the reporting engine.

You guys want to be careful, you'll give two people at Capita big heads the way you speak about that mythical 18 page word document written back in April 2008.

I suspect that sample docs was the actual documentation, you REALLY need to be a programmer to understand it, also helps to understand how schools works - like the fact that although UPN stands for UNIQUE pupil number, you can't be sure it's UNIQUE. They can't be expected to teach programming after all, so it's not going to be click this, type that and bam you've made an app! They can however teach a programmer about schools, but I doubt many programmers would want to spend hours reading SIMS manuals and DfE guidance when they could be working on something more exciting and getting paid a heck of a lot more money.

If it boils down to if you're profiting, you pay. I don't see a problem, which is how I see it. Far as documentation - it's pretty limited full stop. It's not exactly something you can document - the code is the documentation. PS: Cheers vikpaw for splitting this out

Litecoin would be better - still CPU mining sucks. Be better off saving the world - try BOINC \ Rosetta@Home assuming the electric bill isn't an issue. Failing that I'm sure we could find a few people to come take them off your hands

Sorry, taking this further off topic Umm... Can I just direct your attention to: SIMS Bulk Import - Home. So no, you don't need to be a Capita partner. If you have SIMS, you have everything you need (other then a programmer). Far as I am aware I'm the first person to use the business objects that isn't a professional development company and not requiring any consultancy. They produce a training database you can use (chargeable), or failing that you can create your own, or use a copy of a schools*. Capita actually had a public API for Capita ONE which is SIMS bigger (LA) brother - not sure if it's still public public. I've yet to actually get access to a sandbox from any other MIS supplier without cost - feel free to PM if any MIS supplier is reading this and would like to give me access I accept why they charge for write back - after all writes are more dangerous then reads. I'm currently in a nice grey area where if it goes wrong, the fix will be to manually remove what is imported. It's not exactly as complex as some other things you can write back - money is a difficult one as you have to worry about auditing, something that often gets overlooked. Also, if a school pays for something, they want proper support, which means you need to hire people at Capita to take your call. Now excuse me whilst I go scrub myself clean. * DPA exception of course

I would say releasing InTouch damaged alot more then just Schoolscomm and I wouldn't put it pass Capita at increasing their API prices. I think personally their having to do this to keep their customer base. I grow up in Wisbech, doesn't mean I stuck around. It'll be a pretty career limiting move if I had! I'm not saying they should drop SIMS support, that would be silly. I'd just start support other MIS systems after they released InTouch!

Don't be silly, if Capita decides to up the API costs, they're going to have to up their costs which means they control the pricing. They can't do anything that isn't already present, so everything they've done, anybody could throw money at Capita and do. Capita are the only one that can do anything new with SIMS, so they control the product. Personally, I wouldn't mind running a company that is dependant on another so heavily, I just wouldn't be doing it after they released a rival product - I'd feel like a Capita crash test dummy after they did that. Hopefully they've got a stake in SIMS and my god must the partners team got a bonus for keeping them and the others on-board.

Surprising as it might seem, especially after Capita released InTouch, @Schoolcomms is SIMS only. Means they have less problems and are more focused. Does however mean they are basically under Capita control.

note: Posts moved here from Schoolcomms thread, below two posts are for context only. Surprising as it might seem, especially after Capita released InTouch, @Schoolcomms is SIMS only. Means they have less problems and are more focused. Does however mean they are basically under Capita control.

@SHimmer45 - the backup will truncate the SQL log file - so the physical .LDF, assuming a few things - like it's under 4gb if it's recovery mode is set to FULL. It won't do anything with actual tables. Like remove old audit logs or removing records that even legally aren't allowed to be held anymore. Split log file - MDF on one drive and LDF on another has been supported for a while. Me and Bob got that one pushed through Capita - good old Simon 1.0 @ Capita did have his uses. Growth size is a very good point - dbattach won't set it "correctly" so its worth a tweak and won't anger Capita. This will stop disc fragmentation so you database won't be randomly dotted about the hdd.

Might be worth getting Capita to look at tables and the physical sizes @mm3, not saying you don't have a lot of data, it's just I found when I was looking into why a school was so big and trying to come up with a sizing guide, I found a few legacy tables that aren't used any more and few that we keeping data longer then I had hoped - no offence to Capita, but I don't really care that some teacher changed their password in 2004, especially when it's add a 1gb of data. I doubt it'll really help, but it'll help that new server go that little bit quicker.

Is that the size of the actual MDF? That's the key number. HP DL380\Dell R720 seem pretty popular at the moment with SQL 2012 standard, otherwise you'll have alot of free resources HDDs are key, hearing great things about SSD so long as you have a enterprise grade and you have good support when they go wrong - they'll die within days of a each others - I've heard stories of them dying within 30mins of each other, still that's when they get to 3/5 year point so worth having at least a spare onsite if you do go down that path.

The same folks who have added "Google" as a word.

He won't. Reindexing is a most basic DBA task, it's not rocket science to do - however it assumes a number of things - like it's done out of hours, that you have a correct backup before you start, that if your system is in a poor state at the start, you have a pragmatic approach to tackling it - ie not doing everything at once. You might find that your log file grows to the point that it fills your disc, so SQL won't start, or if you've been silly enough to put SQL onto your OS drive, stop your computer from booting. The safe option is to hire a DBA to do it for you. Performance wise it really depends. If it's in a pretty poor state you'll is a absolute massive increase, well worth any risk.

I thought with UDF you can define the block that it is attached to then restrict access to that block? Is a bit annoying about the lack of history however, I guess you could do regular exports if it came to it.

What is the reason why your not just installing SIMS on the DC? Are you thinking long term turn the DC into a virtual server as well? Just it sounds like your making it virtual it for the sake of making it virtual at the cost of complexity and performance.

You need to a log a call with your LA \ Capita. They'll need to check the config file to check it is correct and that the server can resolve itself correctly. I suspect you've got yourself into a pickle based on the shear amount of posts you've made and the fact you haven't actual got Capita to resolve fully\correctly. You really cannot resolve these problems via a forum, you need someone in who trained in SOLUS3 to remote in and resolve, then you won't have ANY more weird problems.

That's now include when you hit the export agent button (the js file). Have had a school where it fails because they had Dreamweaver installed. Problem with that is you get duplicate records - hopefully you don't reinstall regularly and your IT keeps on removing the old devices when they add the new ones - so it'll just be if you go into the backend you'll see the chaos it causes.

ABORT!! ABORT!! Can of worms alert. This is not simple. OK, the technical is absolute cake, the configuring is total pig and the undo button is restore the database. If this is for school fund you might be ok, but if it's for you changing to an Academy or as a new main school FMS database forget it. Seriously, by the end of the year you'll be wishing you set it up differently and you'll have grey hair trying to unpick it. Spend a bit of money and pay your someone to give you a preconfigured database. It would be the best money you could spend.

Short answer, yes, until Capita get it so the S3 server to push out the GUID. Until then you have to query the S3 database to get the GUID then pass it to the installer. Possible, just alot harder and error prone. Assuming you keep the computer name the same. As for in a image - don't actually install it, just have a RunOnce key to run when it boots up the first time then get it to install or push out the agent via SCCM or whatever. If they do something cool like have a rearm option or something then you could install the agent in the image then rearm it (wipe the guid etc). Once they've got this sorted they can move on to more cool things like assigning packages to AD groups - so you would just build a machine put it in a AD security group then it gets SIMS installed.

Correct. There are ways round this depending how clever your feeling\patient you are.

I'll send you a PM @clareq.

Lol - can already hear the YouTube ad - "Only £9.99, buy now and if Capita fixes all the problems by March 2014 we solve we'll give you your money back!"

Should be easier if its the same server, no re-registering the server. Just a question of restoring the database to SQL2012 then changing the settings using the tool like @Ghostgame says. If only they did the change I asked for ages ago so DBAttach would restore S3 database (Is that a S3Attach I see on the horizon?)