thom

Over Easter we merged our Admin and Curriculum domains with great success. It has helped the teachers to share their information/resources with each other as well as introducing the concept of "file security" to our secretaries. Our domains were previously not connected to eachother as the council blocked the trust so managing these was very complicated. Like monkeyx said, we can now put more money into making our single domain more ressilient P.S. We transferred 100 users and 60 PCs from admin to the existing curriculum domain already containing 1100 users and 450 devices

The whole point of Office 2007 is the ribbon. If you don't want it then stick with Office 2003. However, you can customise options through the Office 2007 Group Policy ADM template. I'm not sure if that would contain the setting you need.

I am at the conference today and tommorow (Wed 4th July) Wondering if any other Edugeekers are coming. I will feedback any useful info from the event

If you are a Network Manager in Bedfordshire then please come along. We are happy to announce the 3rd BITEN meeting for all ICT technical support staff. Highlights include a rare chance to talk to a member of Russell House, coming to discuss changes to the network over the next 12 months. Everyone in Bedfordshire is welcome to attend so please pass the invite to anyone who you think would find it beneficial to come. Please reply whether you are able to attend so we know you received the message plus include any agenda items that you would like to discuss. bitenuk (at googlemail dot com)

Thanks everyone, that PIR site had just the sounds he was looking for.

Can anyone recommend a site where you can download free QUALITY sound effects? The Drama teacher needs some "stampeding horses" for an upcoming production and wanted some help tracking them down.

If you have heard of the Shared Computer Toolkit Microsoft have upgraded it and re-release it as Windows SteadyState. This is a great tool that protects shared computers. We used it to protect our open access library PCs which would always get messed about with. The problem with the old system was that you had to create a separate partition on the hard disk but that step is now unnecessary Microsoft also claim it is easier to use This is obviously not a substitute for good practice/group policy settings but it helps if you are not that technical with desktop management More Details: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/sharedaccess/default.mspx Download: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=d077a52d-93e9-4b02-bd95-9d770ccdb431&DisplayLang=en

I've had a look at most of the flavours of Me ticrosoft Learning Gateway(about 12 at Bett 8O ). It seemed lots of them were identical more or less. The differences started appearing when it came to creating lessons/content. You can use RM Kaliedos or Microsoft Class Server (What Enterprise MPC use) or the new Sharepoint Learning Kit (free) or Moodle (Free) or anything else that can make web parts. RM look like they are going in the right direction but not quite there yet I think teksys support the Sharepoint Learning Kit http://www.codeplex.com/SLK which is what we have chosen, along with the possibility of using Moodle web parts. The reason for this was to reduce the annual cost of the MLG "solution".

The one that I saw folds down flat and you can use the camera arm as a handle. I just got an e-mail from GeneVision people (http://www.interactive-education.co.uk). Theirs are on offer through June for £795 for the 6100 or £450 for the mini one. The sales rep I was talking to was Val on 0870 043 4024

@Trav - is there an echo in here? @localzuk - the main benefit of the visualizer for me is that it is a dedicated resource. i.e. you plug it in to the projector and it works straight away with just the buttons you need on the front of it. You can plug them into a laptop etc to do more advanced stuff if you want. We tried having a camera/tripod setup but staff found it a hassle to set up so they wanted me to do it, then someone "borrowed" the camera for a media lesson and the science dept never saw it again!

I had a really good demo from Genne Vision. They do a fanatstic model (6100) which they offered to me for £899 with a free slate or carry bag. They also do a smaller version (GenneVision Mini) for £499 but I didn't ask to see this. The Science Dept. were drooling over it and said they would prefer these a lot more than an interactive whiteboard. They will probably come and do a demo for you http://www.interactive-education.co.uk

I have the same issue, We changed our proxy through Group Policy and it was fine everywhere apart from in one computer room. I think it is to do with loopback policy which I set up in there to try and get a printer set up as default. I haven't looked into it much, I don't have the time at the moment and the room isn't used that much. The teachers just tell the students to run a "gpupdate /force" shortcut that i set up in a shared area. It will ask the students to log off and reboot but they can answer "no" and it will work OK.

I know about 2 messaging applications developed by the OU BuddySpace - http://kmi.open.ac.uk/projects/buddyspace/ and MSG - http://kmi.open.ac.uk/technologies/msg/about/ they look pretty cool but I haven't got the time to check them out properly

@Yeoman did you ever find out if this is possible. We have just set up ISA and use the e2bn proxies. Before ISA staff used proxy 10.15.xx.x7:80 and students used 10.15.xx.x6:80 Now I am using ISA all requests go to the upstream proxy which is set as the students proxy. This means staff access uses the student filters. Is there a way to sort this out without setting up a seperate ISA for staff?

@Yeoman did you ever find out if this is possible. We have just set up ISA and use the e2bn proxies. Before ISA staff used proxy 10.15.xx.x7:80 and students used 10.15.xx.x6:80 Now I am using ISA all requests go to the upstream proxy which is set as the students proxy. This means staff access uses the student filters. Is there a way to sort this out without setting up a seperate ISA for staff?

@Yeoman did you ever find out if this is possible. We have just set up ISA and use the e2bn proxies. Before ISA staff used proxy 10.15.xx.x7:80 and students used 10.15.xx.x6:80 Now I am using ISA all requests go to the upstream proxy which is set as the students proxy. This means staff access uses the student filters. Is there a way to sort this out without setting up a seperate ISA for staff?

The programme that uses it is called ClickView http://www.clickview.co.uk I e-mailed them with the issue and they told me that it can't be done through group policy. The clickview app installs ok but the codec doesn't. I will have to install locally for now until I get it sorted. If I get anywhere I shall feed back

Does anybody know how to deploy the divx codec through group policy? We have a programme that uses it but when you deploy the software it skips the codec installation so I wanted to chain divx on after the software.

There is a guide at http://www.tacktech.com/display.cfm?ttid=297 that goes through the process. Also, have you tried using Nero's help? That's always a good place to start

I have had a similar problem but I can't find the full solution. This should remove any corrupted updates Stop the WUAU Service Delete "c:\windows\softwaredistribution" folder Start the WUAU service I'll keep a look out for that fix

I got one of the keen year9 students here to create a piece of software for bulk imports. He got a decent system working using visual basic and you can download it for free here http://www.biddenham.org/tools/uDirectory.exe Being a teenager, however, he got bored and isn't going to develop it further. I asked him for the source code and he said he had deleted it!

That sounds like a good script Any chance we could get a peek?

We are in the process of changing our Learning Platform/VLE from a mix of digitalbrain and TALMOS to something a lot better. We just don't know which one yet! We have had lots of sales people come in and they often say we have x amount of users and I was wondering how true this was. I would be really grateful if people could put themselves on this map and state what VLE/Learning Platform that they use. MAP: http://www.frappr.com/uklp

The staff and students are in "School_Users" OU. I have a logon script in "School_Users" that maps any drives that both groups need.

@W32/Jbot - I take it you are talking about the Activation grace period. Have you actualy experienced this limitation because I haven't (Using Vista Business with WDS & WAIK)