Scheduled Sunday ICT Service Break 1.2.09

The following services will be affected by the Service Break from 08:00 until 18:00 on Sunday:

• All shared Data
• Exchange e-mail (including libraries)
• Blackberry service
• Aspire
• One.net (ICS) & One
• Swift

Details are listed below.

Shared data
There will be no data access to any shared files or folders for OCS, CEX, OCYPS or OECS on Sunday between 08:00 and 18:00.

Exchange e-mails
The e-mail service will not be accessible (from the CCC network, libraries, remotely or on BlackBerry devices) throughout the duration of the Service Break on Sunday.

BlackBerry service
BlackBerry devices will not send/receive e-mails from 08:00 until 18:00.

Aspire
Due to the work being carried out to upgrade the Aspire, One and Swift database/servers they will be unavailable during the service break. The services will be down from 08:00 until 18:00.

Remote Access Services

Corporate Netilla will not be available on Sunday.For your information there are three Netilla services operated by the County Council:

Corporate Netilla is used by County Council staff accessing County Council IT systems via the public internet. Access to the system is granted by authentication using a keyfob in conjunction with normal County Council network login details.

NHS Netilla is used by NHS staff to grant access to County Council systems from a PC on the NHS network via the secure link between the networks. No keyfob is required for this service.

Schools Netilla is used by Cambridgeshire schools staff to access County Council systems. Access is granted by authentication using a keyfob

As soon as each service becomes available we will advise the Out of Hours Helpdesk (01223 717333) so that they can answer any queries you may have. Should you have any queries regarding the availability of services on Sunday 01 February 2009 please contact the Business Support Helpdesk on 01223 717333.

Information is posted and updated with details of upcoming Service Breaks on CamWeb. Please follow this link to go directly to the IT Service Break Information page

SIMS December Release

The latest version of SIMS has been released to all Non-Centrally Hosted schools. Please make sure you create your backups before applying this upgrade.

Click here to read the new release notes for SIMS Version 7.114.

There is also a new SIMS Permissions spreadsheet for this release. This is a useful at-a-glance guide to which areas can be viewed and edited by SIMS users.

SIMS versions and release notes are regularly updated on the SOLUS planet of the SIMS Home Page.

Scheduled Sunday ICT Service Break 25.1.09

The following services will be affected by the Service Break from 08:00 until 18:00 on Sunday:

• All shared Data
• Exchange e-mail (including libraries)
• Blackberry service
• CCC website will be read-only
• Cambridgeshire.net will be read-only
• CamWeb
• Internet/intranet authoring (CMS)
• No access to user data (‘My documents’ etc) and profiles for Cambridge users
• No access to Hereward Hall file and print services
• Aspire
• One.net (ICS) & One
• Swift
• Corvu
• Flare

Details are listed below.

Shared data - There will be no data access to any shared files or folders for OCS, CEX, OCYPS or OECS on Sunday between 08:00 and 18:00.

Exchange e-mails - The e-mail service will not be accessible (from the CCC network, libraries, remotely or on BlackBerry devices) throughout the duration of the Service Break on Sunday.

BlackBerry service - BlackBerry devices will not send/receive e-mails from 08:00 until 18:00.

Cambridgeshire.gov.uk & Cambridgeshire.net - The Cambridgeshire.gov.uk and .net websites will be ready only. This will mean that no payments can be made during the service break. This will be between 08:00 until 18:00.

Camweb - CamWeb will not be accessible and you will not be able to update/edit web pages during this period. This will be down from 08:00 until 18:00.

Cambridge users - There will be no access to user data (‘My documents’ etc) and profiles for Cambridge users on Sunday.

Hereward Hall - Due to the service break there will be no access to file and print services at Hereward Hall.

Remote Access Services - Corporate Netilla will not be available on Sunday.For your information there are three Netilla services operated by the County Council:

Corporate Netilla is used by County Council staff accessing County Council IT systems via the public internet. Access to the system is granted by authentication using a keyfob in conjunction with normal County Council network login details.

NHS Netilla is used by NHS staff to grant access to County Council systems from a PC on the NHS network via the secure link between the networks. No keyfob is required for this service.

Schools Netilla is used by Cambridgeshire schools staff to access County Council systems. Access is granted by authentication using a keyfob.

As soon as each service becomes available we will advise the Out of Hours Helpdesk (01223 717333) so that they can answer any queries you may have. Should you have any queries regarding the availability of services on Sunday 25 January 2009 please contact the Business Support Helpdesk on 01223 717333.

Information is posted and updated with details of upcoming Service Breaks on CamWeb. Please follow this link to go directly to the IT Service Break Information page

School Spring Census - Thursday 15th January 2009

NOTE: The COLLECT website address is:

https://data.dcsf.gov.uk/collectportallive/login.aspx

Helpline notes for running the School Spring Census are available for download from the SIMS Home Page on the Portal, as are the DCSF Guidance notes which should be used for all three Censuses in 2009 and give detailed advice on what data will be collected in each.

The DCSF notes explain what extended services, staff etc. to include and are a vital point of reference for all schools. If you are not Centrally Hosted, please ensure the files sent out by e-mail on 19th December have been copied into the SIMS .net folder on the machine that will run the Census. These files update the DCSF validation file and should remove a number of Census Errors and correct some omissions in the Census Summary.

Please do ensure all Extended Services provided by your school are recorded in School Details, these are being greatly underreported. Any school that does not have any Extended Services will receive error 1340 which will have to be ignored if your school does not provide any extended services.

Do ensure that the figures on the Census Summary are checked very carefully, these figures are used as a basis for the budget your school will receive, areas to pay particular attention to are Part-Time pupils, EAL, First Language, Ethnicity, SEN and Modes of Travel. Pass the summary to the relevant members of staff such as the SENCO and the Attendance operator forchecking.
Check what time to use for recording Class Activities, please note if there is not a qualified teacher in a class at your given time, this should be recorded as such, please be aware that this will generate error 1070.

Use the Detailed Reports in the Census itself, these can be extremely helpful for locating inaccurate data, such as pupils showing as part-time who should not be. The Pupil/Student Contact Details report is particularly good for identifying missing or incorrect data.
Once the Census is complete, the Headteacher should sign the summary as a true record of your school on Census Day. The Census should then be authorised, which will change the file to an xml format which will need uploading to the Collect website.

The URL for Collect is:
https://data.dcsf.gov.uk/collectportallive/login.aspx

This website only goes live on Census day. There is a familiarisation website where dummy files can be uploaded for testing prior to 15th January. Guidance notes on using the Collect Website can be downloaded from the ISSIS Homepage on the Portal.

Scheduled Sunday ICT Service Break 11.1.09

The following services being unavailable over this Service Break weekend:

• CCC shared data
• Users and Profiles
• Aspire
• Camweb
• Internet pages will intermittent
• Geographic Information Systems (GIS)
• Smartcard Service
• Corporate Netilla

Details are listed below.

Shared data
There will be data access to any shared files or folders for OCS, CEX, OCYPS or OECS on Sunday between 08:00 and 18:00.

Aspire
Due to the work being carried out to upgrade the Aspire database/servers it will be unavailable during the service break. The server/database will be down from 08:00 until 18:00.

GIS
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) will be unavailable during the service break. This will be down from 08:00 until 18:00.

SmartCard Service
The SmartCard Service (a card based scheme to deliver cash or non-cash transactions) will not be available for the duration of Sunday’s Service Break.

Remote Access Services

Corporate Netilla will not be available on Sunday.For your information there are three Netilla services operated by the County Council:

Corporate Netilla is used by County Council staff accessing County Council IT systems via the public internet. Access to the system is granted by authentication using a keyfob in conjunction with normal County Council network login details
NHS Netilla is used by NHS staff to grant access to County Council systems from a PC on the NHS network via the secure link between the networks. No keyfob is required for this service
Schools Netilla is used by Cambridgeshire schools staff to access County Council systems. Access is granted by authentication using a keyfob

As soon as each service becomes available we will advise the Out of Hours Helpdesk (01223 717333) so that they can answer any queries you may have. Should you have any queries regarding the availability of services on Sunday 11 January 2009 please contact the Business Support Helpdesk on 01223 717333.

Information is posted and updated with details of upcoming Service Breaks on CamWeb. Please follow this link to go directly to the IT Service Break Information page

Notification of Virus Attack

KB0109-001: IMPORTANT NOTIFICATION OF PREVALENT VIRUS ATTACK

w32-downadup/Mal/Conficker-A Worm Infection: Mal/Conficker-A is a worm for the Windows platform.

Mal/Conficker-A may spread through Windows file shares protected with weak passwords, by
copying itself to removable storage devices and by exploiting the MS08-067 Windows Server
service vulnerability.

SYMPTOMS: Please refer to the following site pages for details of the symptoms of this virus:
http://vil.nai.com/vil/content/v_153464.htm (see Characteristics Section)
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/malconfickera.html

• Users being locked out of directory

• Access to admin shares denied

• Scheduled tasks being created

• Access to security related web sites is blocked.

STATUS: This is an urgent issue and requires your immediate attention. Please review the
Resolution section below

APPLIES TO: All currently supported Microsoft Operating Systems are vulnerable.

RESOLUTION:
• Ensure all devices are up to date with latest Sophos Antivirus definitions

• Visit the MS08-067 page and ensure all Windows devices are fully updated to fix the
vulnerability that Mal/Conficker-A uses to spread.

• Ensure that writable shares on networked computers have strong passwords.

• Ensure that all removable storage devices are scanned after being connected to a
computer infected with Mal/Conficker-A.

• Ensure the on-access scanner is turned on and that "on write" scanning is enabled.

• After enabling the above, reboot the computer and run a full scan and cleanup of any
remaining items.

School Spring Census - Thursday 15th January 2009

Helpline notes for running the School Spring Census are available for download from the SIMS Home Page on the Portal, as are the DCSF Guidance notes which should be used for all three Censuses in 2009 and give detailed advice on what data will be collected in each.

The DCSF notes explain what extended services, staff etc. to include and are a vital point of reference for all schools. If you are not Centrally Hosted, please ensure the files sent out by e-mail on 19th December have been copied into the SIMS .net folder on the machine that will run the Census. These files update the DCSF validation file and should remove a number of Census Errors and correct some omissions in the Census Summary.

Please do ensure all Extended Services provided by your school are recorded in School Details, these are being greatly underreported. Any school that does not have any Extended Services will receive error 1340 which will have to be ignored if your school does not provide any extended services.

Do ensure that the figures on the Census Summary are checked very carefully, these figures are used as a basis for the budget your school will receive, areas to pay particular attention to are Part-Time pupils, EAL, First Language, Ethnicity, SEN and Modes of Travel. Pass the summary to the relevant members of staff such as the SENCO and the Attendance operator for
checking.

Check what time to use for recording Class Activities, please note if there is not a qualified teacher in a class at your given time, this should be recorded as such, please be aware that this will generate error 1070.

Use the Detailed Reports in the Census itself, these can be extremely helpful for locating inaccurate data, such as pupils showing as part-time who should not be. The Pupil/Student Contact Details report is particularly good for identifying missing or incorrect data.

Once the Census is complete, the Headteacher should sign the summary as a true record of your school on Census Day. The Census should then be authorised, which will change the file to an xml format which will need uploading to the Collect website.

The URL for Collect is:

https://data.dcsf.gov.uk/collectportallive/login.aspx

This website only goes live on Census day. There is a familiarisation website where dummy files can be uploaded for testing prior to 15th January. Guidance notes on using the Collect Website can be downloaded from the ISSIS Homepage on the Portal.

Reporting on Staff Absences

Since the November SIMS upgrade, reporting on Staff Absences has not been working. This applies to both user defined and predefined reports. There is a patch that can be released to schools that require it. This will be fixed in the next upgrade.

Also since this upgrade, when a leaving date is added in Student Details, the record changes will not save until an end date has been entered for Meal Pattern on the new Dietary Needs Panel. This problem does not occur when leaving dates are assigned using Routines Student Leavers. This should be fixed in a future SIMS release.

Schools Workforce Census

Thank you to all schools who attended the recent seminars on Schools Workforce Return (SWR). For those who are not aware, all schools are required to submit a SWR in January 2010, with a pilot of all schools in September 2009.

Cambridgeshire is aiming to submit the SWR centrally on behalf of our schools. Currently we
are working with EPM and HR at CCC to enable all contract information held by them to be uploaded into ONE. This will provide the basis for the SWR to be generated from within ONE.

However, there is some data that only schools can provide, particularly information on staff absences. In preparation for this we need schools to be using the same lookup codes and service terms.

To this end, we will be sending an e-mail to all schools with all the necessary files attached. Please import all the attachments as per the instructions, this needs to be performed while your school is running the November version of SIMS i.e. version 7.112.

Once these files have been imported please start recording staff absences in SIMS, as the Return in January 2010 will collect all absences for 2009. There are guidance notes on how to record absences in SIMS available for download from the Portal on resource 4465.

In preparation for the SWR please ensure basic details; name, date of birth and national insurance number, of all members of staff are entered into SIMS. Please take care not to create duplicates, previous records may not be visible in the “Current Staff” view. Staff absences should be recorded in SIMS from the beginning of the year, once all the lookups mentioned above have
been imported.

We will be issuing regular bulletins and newsletters to keep schools up date with progress and guidance on any actions that may be required, please do look out for these.

End of Support - Attendance 6

Capita support for Attendance 6 ended in December 2008. Please note you SHOULD NOT be accessing attendance from the link on the SIMS shortcuts. Attendance should now be accessed from Focus.

There is a patch available to disable the old link to Attendance 6 which will be made available on request.

There are courses on using the new Attendance 7. See below for dates or contact ICT Service Courses Admin team on 01480 376670

E-mail Exchange Migration

The Email Exchange project is progressing as planned and is still on target to be delivered by the end of March 2009. The Project is migrating an average of 15 schools a week over onto the new email system.

If you have any questions about the migration, the new system or are experiencing any problems, please contact the Helpline directly. In response to feedback from schools, we will be offering regular drop-in sessions from January until the end of the project, which will provide Exchange users with the opportunity to learn how to use it's features more effectively.

Further details about these sessions will be sent out in the New Year. Many thanks to those schools we have already worked with for their cooperationin 2008. Any queries please contact the Helpline on 08 450 450 973.

Central Hosting

We currently have 109 schools on Centrally Hosted MIS - of which 4 are Secondary Schools. The SLA is still available pro-rata for schools who wish to migrate.

Scheduled downtimes for 2009 will be posted on the Central Hosting Homepage at the beginning of January.

Did you know? Central Hosting can be accessed from any machine in school with internet access.

Nova T-6

When submitting your timetable to SQL for the first time following the November Sims .net upgrade you may get an error message. The error reads:

"One or more critical errors have been detected but the submission cannot continue. Some existing class memberships last beyond the last academic year. "

Should you experience this error there is a patch that can downloaded from the Secondary Planet on the SIMS Home Page. Alternatively contact the Helpline to request the patch.

Key Dates Jan - Mar 2009

To book on a course listed in Key Dates, telephone 01480 376670

• School Spring Census - Thursday 15th January 2009
  
• Managing Student Data (SIMS for new users) - 8th & 14th Jan
  
• School Census Primary Hands-on Training - 7th, 9th, 13th Jan
  
• RAISEonline Data Management - 29th Jan
  
• Attendance 7 - 28th Jan (WB), 3rd Feb (WB), 4th Feb (G), 10th Feb (G)
  
• RAISEonline Data Management - 29th Jan
  
• ToPP Spring Marksheet & Analysis - 5th, 12th Feb (WB)
  
• RAISEonline - 10th Feb (WB)
  
• Fischer Family Trust (Secondary) - 24th Feb (G)
  
• FMS6 Year End Primary - 4th, 5th Mar (WB)
  
• FMS6 Year End Secondary - 3rd Mar (WB)

Venues: (G) = Godmanchester; (OC) = Oliver Cromwell, March; (ML) = March Library; (CPDC) = Cambridge Professional Development Centre; (WB) = ICT Service Waterbeach; (BMC) = Buckden Millennium Centre; (OV) = Over Community Centre.

Nova T-6 error when submitting timetable to SQL

When submitting your timetable to SQL for the first time following the November Sims.net upgrade, you may get an error message. The error reads:

"One or more critical errors have been detected and the submission cannot continue. Some existing class memberships last beyond the last academic year."

Should you experience this error please apply patch 12603. The file will need to be unzipped and applied using dbupgrade.exe.

You can download this patch direct by clicking here.

This patch can also be found on the Secondary Planet of the SIMS Home Page.