dmj

This is exactly what I was talking about in my post earlier, getting those four systems running on containers means you'd power down to probably 1-2 servers, then ramp up as load increases.

I was talking about SaaS databases, infact I've not built a VM for a database in over 5 yrs, they are all SaaS. Come to think of it, I've done several email server migrations and they've all been to SaaS. Definitely leverage SaaS when you can, and move everything else to containers.

TLDR: It's cheaper to be 'cloud native' than migrate your current workloads. There are more benefits than cost. I thought I'd add my 2p as I've been working in this area for some time now (the cloud bit, not electrical supply). I started moving workloads to the cloud back when I was working in schools, then at a University as part of a cloud migration project and now in the commercial world - so I'm familiar with some of the cost saving methods to employ. Schools who've kept to the traditional windows server infrastructure are going to be paying more for cloud than those that took a Linux/containerisation approach because many of these windows-centric applications are stateful, monolithic and difficult to segregate. If you're scared of Linux enterprise applications it's going to cost more - not due to licensing but simply because Windows containerisation/orchestration is still catching up; some of the documentation is sketchy, there are fewer real world examples, it's harder to do and harder to get support. This means those with the more traditional windows server environments are not going to get the reliability and cost saving advantages such as automatically scale up under load, scale down in quiet times or be able to use the really cheap 'spot instances'. In other words, the infrastructure is not 'cloud native' so you're left with a 'lift and shift' approach of migrating on-premise servers to cloud - it's not the most efficient or effective use of resources. That being said, even with traditional server infrastructure It's pretty simple to suspend a VM to RAM overnight when it's not in use. When you do this the cost goes down to zero (ok, you can't do it with Azure yet but GCP supports it) and even with Azure it's OK to shut down machines, so if the thought of migrating to ephemeral containers fills you with dread then there is always this approach combined with committed use discounts (the aforementioned methods can also benefit from CUD's - so there is a huge benefit to container orchestration) It's also worth mentioning that the organisation will benefit from other things that cloud computing offers. One of the most useful for me at the moment is being able to spin up an exact replica of the production system in 20mins - It makes testing so much easier, costs virtually nothing as it's only online for a few hours at a time and massively improves reliability as there are no changes made on the live system until they've been deployed into the test environments. This also means I can spin up a new instance of the production environment in 20 mins too. Technically speaking you can do this on premise, but it's going to cost. Another feature I use regularly is point in time recovery for databases - it means I can replicate a database from any point (down to the second), not just for DR but also deploying test infrastructure scaling the databases across regions etc. I'm pretty sure our exposure to hackers encrypting data is reduced to how easy it is to recover old data versions too.

OMG I guess I've been using linux distros for so long now I forget how behind windows can be sometimes.

Doesn't windows come with Android support now?

NOOOooo Expeditions was awesome. Kids really loved it.

I've been a bit out of the loop recently with regards to MDM and small scale tablet deployments. Asking for a friend. The scenario is that a museum has a budget for a number of tablets (30 ish) to enhance their educational programme. The museum is run by the local authority, but this is an in-house project, we're not expecting much support from the LA. There is site-wide wifi available that the devices can use ( I assume managed by the LA). So the questions are: What is the lowest cost MDM that could manage a small number of devices - it has to be super simple for the staff to manage. Any suggestions for suitable tablets IOS/Android and suppliers Any recommendations for cases, charging trolleys etc. I'm tempted to recommend touchscreen chromebooks, but with no Google domain I'm not sure if Google would allow a museum to register for free as a school Thanks any advice welcome

as long as the UPS covers the timer period.....

Yeah I'm pretty sure Moodle has paid option plugins

presumably the bigger the computer, the better the educational experience?

You're between a rock and a hard place. I think you're just going to have to write up all the options and let the school set a policy.

Some WiFi systems (Meru , cisco do) have a function to block rogue wifi - it's usually to prevent devices connecting to the same SSID as your own. IIRC it works by sending disconnect packets to the device. We used it for a while, but it's a bit dangerous if your wifi extends beyond the site as you can end up preventing all your neighbours from using WiFi (that happened!)

I use Jira for all medium to long term things. Free for upto 10 users. https://www.atlassian.com/software/jira

+1 Whilst you're there, ask him why they don't renew the certs automatically - it's not 2010 anymore.

I would try and make as few changes as possible, and hook up the o365 to google apps such that the sign in process is managed by google apps. Teachers won't see a difference except they have accounts provisioned in both systems.

The only real problem I had with macs ( University - so over 1000 of them) was that the upgrade cycle comes JUST after summer so there's a mad scramble to get the latest macos out (That and the keychain manager getting corrupted occasionally). As other said it's not a massive PITA to support them. Think of it as your first step into the world of Unix-like systems - after all *nix does power the backend to pretty much every large corp you care to mention. It's a good skill to have. I'm not really convinced by the costs argument, historically macs tend to last a lot longer than PC's, especially lower end or used ones, largely because they are lower power ARM . The TCO comes mainly from the overhead of managing a different O/S, which can be an issue with few people around to do it. Anyway the point I wanted to make was that there are other considerations that a head teacher has to give; supporting the teachers (who want macs) is one of them - and so is the perceived marketing benefit for potential students. I'm thinking retaining students for A level, but also to show parents around and look at the shiny shiny!! I know it sounds stupid to techs, but HT's face real pressure getting student intake up as it translates directly to money. 90% of the parents aren't going to refuse to send their students to a school because it's got a shiny mac suite, but maybe some are tempted to send them (further) if the school has. With each student 'worth' £4-5k per year for 5 years, it's going to pay for itself fairly quickly.

Me too. I picked up a macbook air M1 last year for £850 (through edustore). At the time it couldn't be beaten in terms of cost vs performance. At work (non-edu now) it's all macs with a small number of Linux workstations. The Macs are all managed by JAMF. Previously (in education) we used MUNKI https://github.com/munki/munki/wiki and we had no problem adding them to a windows domain or accessing windows shares (which were actually samba, I digress - that's not necessary)

It's been a while since I worked with network switch/routers, but when I did I used Ansible. Ansible is a configuration management tool for Windows/linux/mac and network equipment. It's opensource. Theres some info about network automation here: https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/network/index.html#network-guide There is a specific aruba role that has been developed by HP here: https://github.com/aruba/aoscx-ansible-role

From https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/6010255?hl=en "To help keep your account secure, starting May 30, 2022, ​​Google will no longer support the use of third-party apps or devices which ask you to sign in to your Google Account using only your username and password. For more information, please continue reading. Special Note on Apple Device Sign-Ins. Users who have not recently signed into their Google Account using only username and password will be able to only make new sign in attempts using the Google account type starting from February 28, 2022. Existing users may continue to sign into their Google Account using their username and password until May 30, 2022." Does anyone know how to configure Gmail as an SMTP relay without using 'less secure apps' ?

I knew the DFE mandated IT suites into the design of new schools, even if the school is 1:1 and the space is required for other purposes. I wonder if this is due to either backwards thinking of the DFE or whether they know there isn't going to be money for 1:1 in future and they are planning for worst case.

^ I agree with the round the edge and tables int he middle approach for traditional IT rooms. For many schools with 1:1, every room is an IT room.

Bit of a hijack/whine, but how/when did Windows get so complicated that there is thread on a technical forum about how to uninstall/block an application from running !!! Just seems crazy to me!

I would not commit to that. My reasoning is that Nielsens Law of internet bandwith suggests a 50% rise per year in bandwidth. https://www.nngroup.com/articles/law-of-bandwidth/ What you would need to do is calculate your current bandwidth using the compound interest calculation method (it's GCSE maths) over 25 years. Suppose your current bandwidth is 500Mb/s over 5 years at 50% increase per year that's over 5GB's - but over 25 yes it's 100,000GB/s so unless their dark fibre has that capacity it's not future proofed enough for the term of the contract.

presume I would include the forwarder in the spf record

My plan would be to use the iCloud domain as a relay to private free gmail, so the span shouldn't be an issue if google does the content scanning (even iCloud can tag basic spam based on dmarc, sppf). The only downside I can think is that I'll get google based advertising?