KarlGoddard

twitter is available here (Bolton).... quite shocked really

deducting credits. I've gone though *every* setting on the clj2550's properties with a working pcounter port and I can't see anything out of the ordinary. Its not a huge issue but I'm bothered about our yr11s sussing that they can print what they want on that printer

We have Pcounter installed as our print management software, which overall works quite well for us. We're experiencing a minor ish prob on a HP CLJ2550. I've set up two instances of the same printer - one colour and one mono so we can set the mono as a default as most of the jobs sent to it are just text - but the problem we're having is that even though a rule has been set to delete a job when the user has insufficient credit the job still prints. The user is notified that they have insufficient balance but the job still comes off the printer. As far as I can see the pcounter ports have been set up identical to other 'working' pcounter ports on other printers. Pcounter, so far, has been pretty much faultless for us so I'm a bit baffled as to why this is happening. I guess it must be something to do with multiple instance of the same printer but can't find any reference to this being an issue online or in the documentation Any ideas? Cheers

Yep, its to allow easy sharing of resources from school to school - or within a cluster etc My *personal* opinion is its because Uniservity is still a pretty much marginal platform (in terms of number of installs) they're looking at any angle they can to integrate their platform with other platforms which have a bigger slice of the pie, which Moodle obviously has. Any attempt to facilitate sharing of resources between sites and schools is a good thing so I'm quite happy that they've adopted this approach

totally OT but shouldn't the Latin under the clock on the homepage read Tempus Fugit not Tempest Fugit?

I think Learning and Teaching Scotland undertook a project, the 'Consolarium' blog has full details I think, that did this on quite a large scale. If I remember right academic grades didn't really increase significantly (if at all?) over the control set but what did improve was the social binding of the kids - being part of a group project boosted the confidence and 'team spirit' of the kids. The other issue is would teaching staff have the nous to design activities using DS's (my experience tells me that's a no, I'm sad to say). I love the idea of using DS's though... I'm playing around with the DS 100 Classic Books Collection hopefully for English revision use We also use a Wii for use with kids with developing motor-skills god, I love this kinda ed-tech

I hope he does rewrite FMS from scratch... or at elast get it to a point where FMS installs the same way on 2 different PCs

I'll happily write / contribute on e-learning, learning / emerging technology, ICT Inclusion or ICT Policy subjects not very 'techie' but v. pertinent for today's ICT usage in schools I've also got a nice set of man boobs should you need a Page Three model

another vote for a visualiser we've got 4 aver media ones which we use in Science dept and Technology dept they were about £300 each and well worth the money - flexible, easy to use and easy to install and set up and we've got a more full featured visualiser (can't remember the name but its got a corny name like PowerMax 2000 ) that was about £700 and is used for graphics / design lessons. the Aver media ones can't keep up with the speed of the hand movement if the teacher is sketching etc but yep get some visualisers!

I wonder if he's got the time to try and get FMS installed and working too

Just doing a quick vox pop on the use of OSS in schools. How many of us actually utilise the full potential of OSS when compared with Freeware. In other words how many of us actually modify / compile / redistribute OSS, as opposed to primarily using OSS because 'it's free'. Please be as honest as you can - don't just say you modify etc just because you think you *should be seen* to be modifying, redistributing etc Thanks!

id be interested in anything Joomla-ish

I'm 99% sure I'll be going

no BETT for me either only two of us on site at the moment and the boss is going so I have to look after shop while he's down there Russ, do you think they'll deliver me some pizza??

It's a bit like saying which is the best football team.. (which is naturally Arsenal) Moodle evangelists will say 'Moodle' FROG users will say 'FROG', Uniservity users will say 'Moodle' Seriously though I've only really used Moodle and Uniservity. I love Moodle, but I also like Uniservity for some perverse reason. As our LA has opted for Uniservity I'll be spending most of my time, when I move to VLE / curric development, making Uniservity the best it can be for the school, pupils, staff and parents. I don't really get too involved with which is the 'best' type things as, as Tony rightly says, there is no 'best'. Whatever I get given whether good or crap I'll make it work for my school.

I really couldn't give a toss about any low life / back stabbers / no marks / scum / trash / grasses. If I think a piece of software or kit or a service provider is crap I'll say it's crap. As long as the comment is based on my own experience and is factual I'm entitled to my opinion and I'd say it to the vendors / LA / SLT's face if asked to. I post with my name, post and school name so I'm very easy to find. Any posts I make here are my own thoughts and anyone who believes for a nano second that the posts I make are on behalf of my school are idiotic t*ats. mmmm anyone fancy a fight.... Im just in that mood now

I would've thought anywhere between 23k-30k would be a reasonable salary for ICT Manager in the Greater Manchester area anyway... but the job at Sharples... when I saw the LEA jobs bulletin I thought it was going to be a techies job with a bumped up post title to attract people but they do actually want a ICT Manager. I think I earn the same and I'm just a tech. The sad thing is some poor gimp will take the job to boost his / her cv and the school will get a totally distorted view of the the job and its value...

its about right for someone getting paid 7k less than the going rate

at least you know what your outcome is.... were still waiting to get our letters...

another Promethean school here... never had any major probs with them - 1 duff power supply and thats it. Software is painless to install and easy to use, but then again I have done all the Activ Board courses the lack of a free msi is a royal pain, but then again the drivers go on my IWB pc image so msi'ing the drivers isn't that important at the moment. More importantly the teachers here like them and as they use them far more than any of us techs, I'll tend to listen to them. I really couldn't care less how tricky or not a piece of kit is to install, here if a teacher wants something because its the 'best' piece of kit to teach with and enhance their lessons, they get it. It's my job to get it work reliably for them. also £30 for a Promethean pen? we found a source that supplies them at £4 or £5...

this comment is so true. Techs are paid (in part) to be creative in their search for solutions to day to day problems. Innovation, or more correctly, the desire to innovate, is in the personal make up of all good techs. Teachers are paid to get kids through exams. Most won't take 'risks'

Can anyone point me in the direction of an image of a laptop keyboard layout An image of a desktop keyboard would do at a pinch though Need a keybpard layout ASAP for our science techs, searched but not found anything decent Thanks in advance!

think I'll be coming this year.... first time in a very long time! @russdev, fancy a trip Ronnie Scotts?

my long term aim is to move into training, so I'd say consider looking into IT training as a potential career. you get the variety, you have to know your training specialism inside out and keep abreast of developments in your area so that should satisfy your techie side and you can earn shite loads of money

there you go a new internet craze is born... Fat Mobs