Monday 28th July 2008, 08:41 - posted by John Howarth
Our very own Neil Gregory has been awarded for his Outstanding Contribution to SIMS User Acceptance Testing in 2008.
Over the past 12 months, Bolton Council has participated in user acceptance testing (UAT) programmes for Cover 7, Attendance 7, Lesson Monitor 7 and SIMS Learning Gateway.
We have also attended software consultation groups for the technical aspects of SIMS, primary and secondary school administration and the SIMS performance suite.
It should be recognised that Neil has contributed a significant amount of his own time to various UAT programmes and we applaud him for his involvement.
In an email to Bolton Council, Stephen Pagano (SIMS User Acceptance Test Manager at Capita Children’s Services) wrote:
“Many thanks for your continued contribution to SIMS UAT. The impact of colleagues of your calibre testing our product is fantastic and I know 22,000 schools see the benefit!”
The next step in our association with SIMS UAT is that we extend the invitation to colleagues in schools. This was tremendously successful with the Cover 7 Field Trial (thanks once again to Turton and Canon Slade), so watch this space for details!
There wasn”t a photographer available to record Neil accepting the award but there was, unfortunately, a caricaturist. Please click on the image below to the reveal this blatant misrepresentation in all its horror. 
Thursday 24th July 2008, 15:57 - posted by John Howarth
The Schools ICT Unit will be carrying out essential maintainence on the two internet servers (LEANISA1 & LEANISA2) on Friday 1st August 2008. This will result in a loss of internet access for the entire day.
If you have any questions or concerns, please don”t hesitate to contact the Schools ICT Unit.
Friday 11th July 2008, 15:21 - posted by John Howarth
After upgrading to 7.106 (June Update), colleagues at Ladybridge High School have discovered an issue with the display of preferred forenames in Take Register.
Prior to upgrading (from 7.102 March Update), students” preferred forenames were displayed in Take Register. After upgrading to 7.106, legal forenames were displayed, causing a degree of embarrassment to some students.
SIMS .net 7.104 (May Main Release) introduced an additional Attendance Setup option. I”ve detailed below the steps that need to be taken in order reinstate preferred forenames.
- In SIMS .net, click on Tools | Setups | Attendance Setup | Module Setup
- On Panel 2 Display of Names, put a tick in the box next to Show Preferred Forename instead of Legal Forename
- Click on the Save button
Tuesday 8th July 2008, 23:00 - posted by John Howarth
I am in the process of contacting secondary schools to discuss the latest SIMS .net upgrade. While many colleagues who attended the Cover 7 training courses last week will be keen to get their hands the new module, there are a few things to consider before upgrading to 7.106.
.net Framework 2
Microsoft .net Framework 2 must be installed on SIMS clients prior to upgrading to the SIMS June 2008 Update Release. If .net Framework 2 is not installed, it will not be possible to log into SIMS .net.
Personnel 7
Personnel 7 is activated as part of this release as it is required for Cover 7 to operate normally. Please note that the additional functionality provided by Personnel 7 is not currently supported by Bolton Council.
Nova-T6
A link for Nova-T6 has been added to the shortcut panel in SIMS .net.
The problem is that anyone with access to Nova-T4 gets FULL access to Nova-T6 via the new link. Access to Nova-T6 via Nova-T4 is unaffected.
This isn’t expected to be resolved until the August 2008 Main Release (7.108).
Full details of this update and the previous release (which wasn’t installed by most schools due to stability issues) can be found in the Release Notes, available at the following internet links:
If you have any suggestions on how your school might get around the Nova-T6 access issue, please leave a comment below.
As always, please don”t hesitate to get in touch if you wish to discuss this further.
Thursday 3rd July 2008, 12:58 - posted by John Howarth
A number of schools have contacted me to discuss Capita’’s SIMS Infrastructure Update Tool. According to Paul Christie at Ladybridge High School, RM are advising that this program be run on all SIMS workstations.
The SIMS Infrastructure Update Tool does the following:
- Installs .net Framework 2 and 3
- Removes old setup files from PCs which had SIMS installed prior to March 2004
- Installs two bar code fonts used by SIMS Partners
Even if .net Framework 2 hasn”t been rolled out, I suspect most schools won”t need to use this tool as PCs will have been rebuilt/replaced since March 2004. Also, unless schools use optical mark readers, the bar code fonts won”t be required.
In addition, Judith Holden at Sharples Secondary School has reported that the program takes a long time to run. Judith has kindly informed us that Capita document InfrastructRNa_12377.pdf suggests it can take 15 minutes or more depending on network configuration and memory. Judith has also tried installing .net Framework 3 onto a PC with 1GB RAM and that too took a long time to install.
The SIMS Infrastructure Update Tool can be downloaded directly from Capita by clicking here.
To download the SIMS bar code fonts on their own, please click here.
If you wish to discuss further, please don”t hesitate to get in touch or leave a comment below.
Our very own Neil Gregory has been awarded for his Outstanding Contribution to SIMS User Acceptance Testing in 2008.
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