Dave_O

It's a reseller with education pricing. Still doesn't change the fact that it burns the money away quickly

Reporting back from my testing to date:- 1. SQL in Azure is very expensive (too expensive) eg £3 per day and that's without much I/O. Abandoned this within a week. 2. Started afresh with £230 credit on Azure and started to do DPM backups, which to be fair (and after I'd got the caching drive sorted) works very well. However it does seem to be expensive (I suppose this depends on your perspective). See attached for details. As this rate I will use approximately £210 within the calendar month (£130 left with about £70 used) working out at around £2500 for the year. This (as you can see from the diagram) is based on around 5Tb of data on Azure most of which is data from the file servers.That doesn't include any restores only sticking stuff out there and storing it. If the cost for the year was around £1000 then yes I would think it was a good solution. On reflection, rather than pushing everything out there I will probably be selective which will cut costs considerably. My next test was just having blob storage and push Veeam backups out there, however my first venture into this a week or so ago when I backed up the DCs (which are quite small) was not brilliant in that it took 3 days to copy the vmdks up there. God know how long it would take the fileservers to complete. Yes you can use the seeding solution but not I think for Veeam backups. All in all cloud storage is expensive, certainly too expensive for us at the moment.

In the spirit of adventure and armed with 4 quatloos of Azure credits, I am going to build a SQL instance, put all the SIMS stuff on it and attempt to run with a few clients both via the internet and through a p2s or s2s vpn link. Not sure how/if this will work with Solus, document server etc but hey if you don't try you'll never know. Might even try publishing as a remote app through our VMWare View presence. Unless of course someone has already done it in which case I'd love to hear from you so I don't waste my time. Will keep you posted.

Firstly staff, students and techs need to get away from the concept of having to have locally stored files and the whole sync thing. Fine to have a small area to save things in the short term but more generally keep things out there. As for video, the O365 video is very good at transcoding them and even large videos stream well over 100mb.

Let's say we get rid of all these legacy app and run container based solutions IaaS or PaaS, what type of app/compute/webservice exactly would a school put on Azure?

Nail on the head. This is why many schools who were in a managed service are now coming out. As you say flexibility.

Pete I did but have heard nothing back yet. Not sure they'd be interested in listening to a sad old man like me.

I have been looking at cloud services and thought I'd do some rough costings to see how Azure matches up both for backing up and for server workloads Present backup solution 1 x ESXi free server with VM (Windows 2012 R2 & Veeam) (18Tb) location A, 1 x NAS box (18Tb) location B, 1 x ESXi free server with VM (Windows 2012R2 & DPM) (12Tb) location C. By location I mean physically seperate buildings. Total cost including all warranties, licensing for Veeam (5 years) & Windows all new kit £10,000 over lets say 5 years thats £2,000 pa. For that I can realistically back up 12Tb of data (no transaction, egress or ingress costs) in 3 seperate locations on a weekly basis. Granted if we had a direct hit from a nuke then that would be game over but we are using SQLtoFTP to a Google drive account for MIS and financials also quite a lot of staff and students are putting stuff on O365 or Google Drive so if anyone actually survived or gave a damn after armageddon then not absolutely catastrophic (all relative of course) Azure equivalent So we would need 12Tb of storage with a weekly data transfer of say 2Tb Using Block Blobs, LRS on Cool (love the lingo!) that works out at about £80 per month ie £960pa. Which is cheaper until you realise that you still need a DPM & Veeam server on site to push the stuff up there! Probably not an alternative but interesting as an adjunct to an existing solution. OK back to the drawing board. So what if you start putting server (compute) instances/load up there. First off lets look at things you realistically couldn't put up there. 1. A DC - got have some AD on site to process the group policies otherwise logins would be unacceptably slow 2. SCCM - can't really PXE and download a wim over the wire 3. Print server - not sure that the MFDs and printers could cope with a remote print server 4. MIS - SIMS (possibly moving out there in the future) Not a huge amount needed on site, however you would need some iron to run this stuff on. Lets say with licensing, warranties 2 x ESX (HyperV) servers, storage (which would be local because by then they could run the virtual san on 2 nodes not a min of 3) total cost £12,000 over 5 years giving £2400 pa. Hang on you'd need that whether you embrace the cloud or not!! If you are prepared to risk it you could run all of that workload on one node with a total cost of £6000 over 5 years or £1200 pa OK. So what about the cost of the rest of the servers running in Azure. Lets say you manage to put your other 6? servers out there and one SQL (standard) total cost about £400 pm ie £4800 pa. Now bear in mind you're already spending £2400 pa to support your on site servers. What's the incentive to spend another £24,000 over 5 years to run the Azure workload? Why not just run it on site on the kit you've already had to buy to run the stuff you have to run on site (confused)! As for switch/wireless infrastructure savings, well there aren't any as you still have to make the devices (what ever they may be) connect to the interweb in some way. Unless, of course, you're going to get everyone to use their own 3/4/5 G connection. I'll not bother going into internet costs Given the size of most schools (mine has 1750 students with around 1000 devices of one sort or another) I don't think a whole sale push to the cloud on the server side is on the cards in the short term but putting things out there one at a time might be worth considering. I have just purchased 4 quatloos of Azure credits and am experimenting with Veeam backups to blob storage & DPM on line backups as well as running a SQL server instance (not sure what for yet) just to see what the money drainage per month is like. I've even gone and bought a book on Azure "Mastering Microsoft Azure .... something or other" and had a play using the free credits. If you familiar with VMware or HyperV then it's not rocket science, you just need to get your head around the terminology and the topology. Personally I can't see all on-site backend services disappearing within the next 5 years, (beyond that it's not my problem - retiring), what I do see is more and more server loads going out there over time. To be honest the specialist software so prevelant 5 years ago, is dying a death as is the need to support it. I see very few staff using anything other than office (MS and Google) productivity tools any more. What am I saying? 1. You will still need to invest in back end kit despite what the MS licensing guy says 2. Learn how to use Azure, AWS or some other cloudy provider 3. Think carefully before changing your backup habits

MS do initial offline backups or seeding, where you can send them your initial data on 3.5" SATAs (suitably encrypted of course) https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/blog/new-features-in-azure-backup-long-term-retention-offline-backup-seeding-and-more/

What servers (services) were you looking to move out to the cloud?

I had this some time ago. Do you have any transport rules set up that may hinder mailflow?

Mmmm, yes, I have seen this in action and I can't say I'm impressed with the speed or the high cost. No, I am talking here about schools doing it themselves (with Capita support as per now with on premises SIMS)

I have been working with Azure cloud services recently for backups, identity and web services and wondered if anyone had tried putting SIMS out there or if Capita would help or support schools in doing this?

Tautological arguments aside, unlike a business, I don't think schools can define their IT needs clearly enough to enter into a full contract with agencies who, as eluded to in a previous post, have profit making at the top of their agenda. I know the contracts certainly in Sheffield were so bound up in legal and semantic niceties that it became a beast to be vanquised rather than to be embraced. It has cost the schools and LA dearly both financially and in terms of trust. Schools are not experts in contract management. Also, as pointed out previously, requirements change over time frequently due to external pressures. I know this is part of the whole change management process but the volume of change for an organisation that is not driven by IT is just too overwhelming. Does this need to change? More than likely. If pushed, I believe for outsourcing to succeed in schools, it has to be partial and spread over a long period of time. As an example, we have moved many things to O365, Goolge apps have a managed print service and will be investigating other IT contracted services over the next few years. Does that mean we don't use on site services? Certainly not. Many staff cling to their shared drive and home folders and insist on printing documents, but with guidance (and a lot of support) things are moving forwards. To outsource, schools need clearly identified need and a direction few schools have that level of clarity. At least with some expertise on site be that an "IT Manager", IT Architect", E-learning specialist" whatever, they have some chance of being steered appropriately. Does that need to be an IT mangager? Probably not. Will outsourcing succeed? I believe only on a partial basis. You ask "how does one quality assure advice?" - 1) By talking to one's peers. (connectivism) 2) Visiting other school. 3) Following relevant IT developments 4) Creating a penalty based contract with the supplier of the advice. 5) Defining your requirements clearly. I half jest but history is littered with IT contracts and solutions that have suffered from bad advice. You only have to look at the medical profession and the government to see that. I have moved through the last 10 years ignoring many initiatives and embracing others. Why have I chosen particular ones? You know I'm not that sure, possibly big names like MS and Google as they will persist (we hope). To be honest if you can do 5) you will probably be able to answer the question yourself.

So to work out an IT Manager salary you look at historical data rather than look at the requirements of the post, interesting. Market rates as you define them are only useful if the job descriptions and roles are the same. In many schools they are not. What tends to happen is that schools look at "market rates" for an IT Manager define a role and vastly underestimate the skillset required to fulfil that post. They are then surprised at the lack of applicants. I have been involved in quite a number of IT Manager appointment many of which have to be re-advertised at a higher salary due to either disappointing numbers of applicant or applicant who do not have the relevant background or experience.

Same but MS Classroom has the ability to write class mark back to an LMS

We use Richard's Salamander solution for account provisioning but I don't think this stretches to write back to SIMS (probably into assessment manager). I may be wrong.

With along with My question is:- Do you think that people on Edugeek and by corollary IT staff in schools are second rate?

The 'market' is defined by individual view.

I didn't say that training wasn't part of a project or programme delivery, I was merely pointing out it's importance.

Define done properly. School's don't know what they want and the requirements change too quickly and too frequently for a realistic contract to be drawn up. The experience of Barnsley and Sheffield schools was not good, most of them have either brought IT in house with a small number going back to a different third party provider.

Only just picked this thread up again. E-learning education specialist - might have the following skills - ability to use and apply Office 365 or Google Apps in an educational context (functional skills), knowledge of the administration/architecture of above tenancies, knowledge of corporate wireless/wired infrastructures just enough to know what is and is not possible (architectural knowledge). As an example of the type of soft skills one might need http://online.education.ed.ac.uk/content/edua11222-an-introduction-to-digital-environments-for-learning/ Ability to monitor and assimilate IT and education trends and give direction to the organisation. Over the past 10 years and in the last 3 in particular, many services have moves into the "cloud". What schools need now is not just technical skills but the knowledge of how to integrate them effectively into the school as a whole. This change will inevitably lead to a reduction in technical knowledge within schools but to be honest that should not pose a problem. Perhaps a graduate with an IT degree who then goes on to do an MSc in Digital Education (see above for details) would fit the bill nicely. Where they would sit in the hierarchy I'm not sure, possibly (dare I say it) middle management.

1. I think we are talking at cross purposes here. I am pointing out that there is a diminishing need for high level technical skills. How you can draw the conclusion that this equates to me saying they have "poor technical skills" I have no idea. Please enlighten me. 2. This is what I hate most about the attitude of a "manager". I believe it is fundamentally wrong to pay as little as possible for technical skills. Just because the "market" ,whatever fickle beast that may be, thinks one should pay a pittance. I would rather value the individual. Do I value managerial skills more than technical skills? I do not. 3. You make many assumptions some of which are wrong a) E-learning specialist would not necessarily be a teacher b) I never used the term "e-learning manager" I use the term specialist (see 2 for my views on this matter) c) As to my comments about teaching staff, 20 years teaching and interacting with many staff across a variety of subjects and establishments has lead me to this. Innovation in IT from teaching staff is a very rare beast indeed. 4. "As a general observation, it's not lack of innovation that is difficult when it comes to effective IT use in schools, it is poor implementation (change/project management)." This is one area I mainly agree, although I would emphasise the importance of effective and appropriate training (one area perhaps for the e-learning specialist)

My experience is clearly different to yours. With the 20 or so school's I have worked with over the past 10 years all of the SLT teams, teaching and admin staff have described themselves as having poor technical skills none have taken exception when described as such. Quite rightly, their skills lies in the understanding of educational context not in their understanding of the technical nuances. As to "perhaps schools just find that they can employ the people they need for the money they offer?", a telling retort. I'm lost as to why my reasoning is at odds with your stated rationale. Like you I manage all areas of information delivery across a MAT. I am unclear how you arrived at this conclusion. In terms of the replacement "lacking competence", I do not believe anywhere in my posts have I suggested that the replacement would be in any way lacking. I believe I used the term "e-learning educational specialist", representing someone who has the skills to help bring together technology and education, this should be the replacement for the IT Manager. What salary level this should be at, I don't know. As eluded to previously, high level technical skills are needed less and less in schools as we move forward.

The time of the IT Manager are, I believe, drawing to an end. The number of times infrastructure and strategic decisions have to be made are very limited. How often do you change wireless or switches? As for the on-site stuff, as stated previously, on the decline. You just have to look at the pittance that is being offered in salaries for an IT Manager to show how much schools value IT technical skills. As for a symbiotic (my word) partnership between IT professionals and teachers, please! Call me a cynic, but after 31 years with time on both sides this is an illusion. Teachers and I do have to cite the new ones in particular here, stick with what they know best and suits them. So getting them, for example, to move their "stuff" to O365 will only work when you make their home folders read only, tell them they have 6 weeks and remove the drive after that. As for getting them to stop using removable media... Symbiosis or partnership suggests there are benefactors on both side. There are not. I see it more as a oligarchical relationship. When teaching staff understand this relationship, only then can we move forward.