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What is eCopy Desktop? |
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eCopy Desktop is a PDF editing suite that also handles TIF and JPEG formats. It is simple to use and unlike other PDF handling packages is unique in its ability to be integrated with SIMS with the eCopy Desktop Connector for SIMS. You can download a free 45 day trial of eCopy Desktop here.
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| Q |
What are the benefits of eCopy Desktop and the eCopy Desktop Connector for SIMS? |
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Integrating PDF files with SIMS enables you to scan hard copy documents and store them as electronic files within the SIMS document management server rather than in filing cabinets. You can also render other formats such as MS Word documents as PDF or PDFA for legal admissibility. Once PDF files are on the network they can be edited and shared with eCopy Desktop in much the same way as hard copy can be. eCopy Desktop with SIMS connectivity deployed in parallel with RECORDLINKwriter allows a school to work with the majority of document formats on the network and integrated with SIMS. So in brief the benefits are:
- Centralise all student records for an entire student view from SIMS.
- Add hard copy to your Disaster Recovery Archive.
- Add audit trails and network security to ensure integrity and accountability.
- Save space and reduce paper use.
- Increase operational efficiency by reducing time in archive and retrieval.
- Accelerate workflows and reduce response time.
- Unlock information in paper documents.
- Add leveraged utility to your current IT investment.
- Add new time saving functionality to SIMS.
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| Q |
What support can I expect? |
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Cohesion and resellers provide end user support that is explained in the purchase process. We also provide second level support to resellers. To be contacted by a reseller please go to How do I purchase and install eCopy Desktop, the Connector and RECORDLINK products? In addition FAQs are updated here as necessary. The discussion board allows for users to discuss further hints, tips and more importantly how to deploy eCopy Desktop and the Connector and RECORDLINKwriter most effectively.
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What problems can I expect? |
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- We have found few technical issues arising from eCopy Desktop Connector, however the SIMS .ini file is sometimes incorrectly located and once this has been corrected most installations are straightforward. As long as you use Add and Remove Programs to remove old versions before updating you should not have problems during updates.
- As problems arise fixes are posted on the forum in the Tech Stop.
- Our experience is that the business of changing working processes to incorporate less hard copy is somewhat more complicated than the technical considerations, which are relatively minor. The experts on this issue are the end users and for this reason we have launched a discussion board to enable users to learn from each other. Please feel free to comment on this forum.
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| Q |
What are the system requirements? |
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You will require the following system elements before installing the eCopy Desktop Connector:
- SIMS .net November 2007 Release or newer.
- eCopy Desktop, available from Cohesion.
- SIMS .net workstation components
- 32 bit Windows operating system
Please note that support may be limited to the latest release of the eCopy Desktop Connector and you are advised to keep up to date with releases. Changes in SIMS may require you to install a new release of the eCopy Desktop Connector.
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| Q |
What are the security considerations? |
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Users log in to the eCopy Desktop Connector wizard with their SIMS permissions using Trusted Logon if required. Workstation security is therefore as per SIMS. Documents are securely saved to the SIMS document server according to the permissions of the user and are therefore password protected and digitally secure. Electronic documents are generally perceived as more secure than hard copy documents.
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How much storage space will I need? |
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- There is no fixed answer. It depends on the size of school and the number of processes that you choose to treat digitally rather than in hard copy. In very rough terms 80GB of storage costs less than a three drawer filing cabinet and will store approx. 750,000 A4 pages of text and graphics depending on the mix and resolution. How a school chooses to use this is highly variable but it is fair to suggest that as you use your network more you will need to invest in its resource. Please feel free to poll other end users via the discussion board.
- If one file is saved to multiple student records the file will be replicated, one for each student. Storage and network traffic will reflect this.
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| Q |
How reliable is the software? |
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The core elements of the eCopy Desktop Connector have been operating without any functional or warranty issues since August 2006. The technical resource for The eCopy Desktop Connector is provided by Cyclone Industries, a Capita Technical Partner since 2005. Both Cyclone Industries and Cohesion work closely with schools and Capita to ensure the stability and increasing utility of the software.
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| Q |
How do I purchase and install eCopy Desktop, the Connector and RECORDLINK products? |
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You can purchase annual all-inclusive licences from Cohesion or our resellers. You can purchase up to eleven concurrent seats of the eCopy Desktop Connector. For the cost of twelve seats you can purchase a licence for unlimited concurrent seats. If you would like to be contacted by Cohesion to discuss your requirements please click here. Once you have purchased a licence, from the Download tab download the Connector licence manager and install on the SIMS server. Download the latest version of the eCopy Desktop Connector and install on your choice of end user terminals either individually or using group policy.
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| Q |
What about Trusted Logon? |
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In the August 2007 Release of SIMS .net Trusted Logon was introduced as a new method
for authentication. The eCopy Desktop Connector uses this same logon method.
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What permissions do I have? |
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The eCopy Desktop Connector uses the same permissions as SIMS .net to manage end user access.
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| Q |
How do I open a file from SIMS? |
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From eCopy Desktop, select “Open from SIMS ” and log-in as prompted, selecting “Remember Me” if required for seamless future use. You can then browse the focus areas of SIMS according to your permissions and open documents from the Student, Staff, Contact, Agent, or Pre-Admissions areas. In the student focus area you can browse the student record according to Achievement, Medical Event etc. Once a student has been selected you will see a photograph of the student if available.
IMPORTANT: If you open SIMS and browse to a document and then open the document with the Open option in SIMS then the eCopy Desktop Connector will not recognise the SIMS link to the document you have opened. Save to SIMS will not be enabled. For full Connector functionality open the document using the eCopy Desktop Connector.
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| Q |
How do I save a changed file or document to SIMS .net? |
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The “Save to SIMS ” option is enabled when a document has been opened from SIMS or saved during the current session. Clicking on “Save to SIMS ” and following the prompts will save further changes to SIMS . If you do not alter the Notes and Summary fields and have adequate permissions you may overwrite the previous version. You will be prompted in this case. If you do not wish to overwrite the original alter the Notes field or save the file in a different location using “Save to SIMS As”.
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| Q |
The “Save to SIMS .net” command is not enabled, why? |
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“Save to SIMS ” provides a rapid save of the current version back to the same location and allows an overwrite of the previous version if required and if permissions allow. The “Save to SIMS ” command is therefore only enabled when the current file has live links to SIMS . The eCopy Desktop Connector therefore requires that the current document either be opened from SIMS using the eCopy Desktop Connector or saved with “Save to SIMS As” before “Save to SIMS ” is available to use.
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| Q |
How do I save a new file to SIMS |
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“Save to SIMS As” is where the major functions of the eCopy Desktop Connector lie. Much of the workflow mirrors that of linking a document in SIMS so many elements, such as searching for a student, mirror the commands in SIMS.
On the eCopy Desktop Connector toolbar click “Save to SIMS As” and follow the prompts. Once a student has been selected the user can then browse to the correct area of the student record. Select the sub-area of General, Medical Notes etc and hit “Next”. In General and Medical Notes you will then be taken to the final screen and be prompted to chose the document type, given an option of Public, Private or Confidential, and asked to add Notes and optionally, Summary information. In other sub-areas where the data is organised as database entries such as Medical Conditions, you will find another layer of navigation. You will be asked to select the relevant entry before proceeding to the final screen.
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How do I create a database entry such as an Achievement, Exclusion or Medical condition? |
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Follow the instructions for How do I save a new file to SIMS .net? until you arrive at “Select Student Sub-Area” then select the Sub-Area you require. At this point you will have the option to create a new entry if the required entry is absent (such entries are not used in General and Medical Notes). Hit “Create” and fill in the required fields as in SIMS .net. Having created a new entry and been returned to the list of all entries for that student you can again create further entries or select an entry and proceed to the final save screen. To create an entry for multiple students see How do I create multiple database entries?
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I want to save the same document to several student records. How do I choose the students? |
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Using “Save to SIMS .net As”, you can choose to save to multiple student records and the first process is compile the list of students. Follow the prompts to the “Select student” screen and use predefined lists under “Advanced” or create your own bespoke list using “Search”.
1. To browse lists of Academic Classes or User Defined Groups select “Advanced” and pick the appropriate group and “OK”, then use “Select All” to add the names to the Multi Pick list. You can edit the returned list by selecting “View” under “Multi Pick”.
2. Instead of using predefined lists you can also create a bespoke list. Search by surname, year group etc using the text boxes and drop down lists before hitting “Search”. To add multiple students to your Multi Pick list, select the students and hit “Add”. You may then conduct a new search, e.g. by a different year group, and add some or all of the students to the Multi Pick List. You can edit this list at any time using “View”.
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| Q |
How do I create multiple database entries? |
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First compile the list of multiple students (see I want to save the same document to several student records. How do I choose the students?), then follow the prompts to choose the Student Sub-Area. In General and Medical Notes you will be taken directly to the final save screen as database entries are not used in these areas.
In all other areas except SEN you should first choose or create a database entry against which the file will be saved. SEN is handled on a per student basis so creation of multiple entries is not available although you can still create a new database entry for single Student Records
The eCopy Desktop Connector caters for the situation where you may know that the correct database entry exists for at least one student. If you know this to be the case select the first student and pick the known database entry (e.g. a Medical Condition or Exclusion). Otherwise browse the list by picking other students and checking the entries. At any time you can proceed and select an existing entry for the first student or hit “Create” and fill in the required fields as in SIMS. Having created an entry and been returned to the list of entries for that student you can create further entries or select an entry and proceed to the next student. The chosen entry, whether selected or created is copied and the copy is temporarily saved.
For subsequent students you can then use the “Auto-Create” option and “Next” to copy the saved database entry to the new student and proceed to the next student. Alternatively, to create a different entry use “Create” once again and fill in the fields as required. NB you can create several entries for each student before choosing one and proceeding with “Next”.
You can then process the list, student by student, selecting or creating entries as required. To process all remaining students in Achievement and Behaviour select “Apply to All” to save the document and create the required database entry in SIMS and apply it to every student in the list at one click of the mouse. It is not practical to use “Apply to All” for Exclusions, Medical Conditions and Medical Events due to the frequent occurrence of overlapping or incompatible entries. You can still use “Auto-Create” and should apply this to each student in turn by selecting “Next”.
To skip a student, select “Skip Student”. To skip all remaining students and go straight to the final screen select “Skip Student” and “Apply to All Students”. This may all seem rather complicated, in reality each step takes seconds. So should you need to save a copy of a letter to thirty student records, you can print an MS Word letter to PDF using File\Print and select the eCopy Desktop Printer installed with eCopy Desktop. Once in PDF format in eCopy Desktop save the PDF letter to the student records and create the database entry such as an Achievement in SIMS simultaneously for all thirty student records. We estimate this to be a saving of approximately three minutes per student for each multiple save.
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| Q |
How do I handle Word, Outlook and Excel Files? |
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RECORDLINKwriter provides similar functionality to integrate common MS Office formats with SIMS. You can download a free 10 day trial or to be contacted by Cohesion to discuss this or any other matter just click here.
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How do I upgrade eCopy Desktop Connector? |
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The eCopy Desktop Connector and the licence server are upgraded in parallel with changes to SIMS. We also release new versions from time to time to enhance the functionality. When updated versions are released our registered users receive an email and we post on the website. To date we have not needed to update the licence manager that runs on the SIMS server. The eCopy Desktop Connector is upgraded on average every three to four months. If the new version includes an element that has been required to be upgraded in line with changes to SIMS then you will need to uninstall The eCopy Desktop Connector from the end user terminals and replace with the up to date version at the same time as the SIMS upgrade. You can do this individually or via group policy. At any time you can download the latest version and install free of charge. If the updated version only includes functional enhancement then you may choose to upgrade or not. There is no charge for upgrades during your annual subscription.
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