System Manager 7 Quick Guide (SIMS.net onwards)

System Manager 7 Quick Guide (SIMS.net 7.142 onwards) Published December 11 School IT Systems Support Hertfordshire Development Centre Six Hills Way Stevenage SG1 2FQ Website: http://www.thegrid.org.uk/info/traded/sitss Doc Ref S1191 6 July 2011

CONTENTS INTRODUCTION... 1 LOOKING AT THE NEW SYSTEM MANAGER... 1 MANAGING USERS... 2 Creating new users... 4 Removing Permission Group Memberships... 6 Resetting a user s password... 7 Making Users Inactive... 7 MANAGING GROUPS... 8 Creating new Permissions Groups... 11 EXPORTING AND IMPORTING PERMISSIONS GROUPS... 14 USER ACCESS LOG... 15 SYSTEM MANAGER SETTINGS... 16 SYSTEM MANAGER 6... 16 Printing information from System Manager 7... 17

Introduction This document is a quick reference to System Manager 7, provided in SIMS. net from the Summer 2011 release onwards. System Manager 7 replaces all the user-related functions that were previously possible in System Manager 6, such as defining new users and their rights in SIMS.net, or changing SIMS.net users passwords. However, all technical functions (for example backing up and restoring databases) that would previously have been found in System Manager 6 have been removed from System Manager 7. In Hertfordshire schools, these tasks are currently carried out using different tools and processes, and, in the future, it is intended that they will be carried out using SOLUS 3. The user interface for System Manager 7 will look and feel familiar to users of SIMS.net. However, the underlying permissions system is unchanged. Looking at the new System Manager The System Manager 7 options are reached via Focus System Manager. There are options for managing users and permissions groups, and for exporting and importing permissions groups. There is also an Access Log and a Settings screen that allows System Manager s behaviour to be customised. Finally, you can still reach the old System Manager 6, and this is still useful for certain tasks. Doc Ref S1191 1

Managing users As noted above, the screen for managing users is reached via Focus System Manager Manage Users. Initially the screen is empty until you select the type of user you are interested in (in this case Active users in role Employee) and click Search: Then, the screen populates to show a list of users similar to that shown below: The browse shows each user s Name and Username. The Password field is blank if the user has logged on and set a password, or shows a randomly generated password if they have not. The SIMS Role(s) indicates the user s role in the SIMS database while the Group(s) indicate the permissions the user has in SIMS and so are related to the user s role in school. Double-clicking on a user s name brings up a screen showing their user characteristic, in a number of separate panes. The first of these is the Basic Details pane the contents of this comes from the user s record in Personnel 7 and cannot be changed here, so all the fields are grey: The Login Details pane shows the user s username, whether they are an active user or not, and their password. The password is blank if the user has logged on and set a password, or a randomly generated password if they have not with a password Reset button if required. When clicked, this generates a new random password that the user can subsequently use on their next login when they will be prompted to set up a password meaningful to them: Doc Ref S1191 2

The Groups pane shows the permission groups the user is in as at the Effective Date (which defaults to today), together with the Start Date and End Date of their memberships. Clicking the Add icon allows you to add the user to one or more other permission groups, while clicking the Copy button allows you to copy the group assignments from another user to this one. The Permissions pane shows the user s permissions in SIMS. By default it shows all the permissions a user has and indicates with a red X the ones a user does not have, as illustrated below: It is possible to customise this view: Removing the tick in Show unassigned permissions removes the permissions the user does not have from the view Selecting the Selected group only.. radio button causes only those permissions that the user has and that are associated with the group previously selected (highlighted) in the groups pane (in this case the Profiles Operator group). The Telephones and Emails panel displays telephone numbers and email addresses. Again, these come from the user s staff record in SIMS.net and cannot be altered in System Manager. Doc Ref S1191 3

Similarly, the Addresses panel displays address information from the user s staff record in SIMS.net and cannot be altered in System Manager. Creating new users in System Manager 7 Note: although System Manager 7 is very useful for creating, or making changes to, small numbers of users and makes it easy for you to control which permissions they have over a period of time, it is a time-consuming way to set up large numbers of users. Therefore, if you are setting up a significant number of new users (for example staff arriving at the start of an academic year), you may still prefer to use System Manager 6. New users are created by selecting Focus System Manager Manage Users and clicking the New button: The familiar Basic Details screen appears first, type in details for the user you wish to create and click Continue. A staff record (for a new teacher for example) will generally have been put into the SIMS database in advance of them being set up as a SIMS user. In that case, when you click Continue and the screen displays Matched People (i.e. people with matching details in Focus Person Staff) a match for the correct person will be found: If a person is found who matches your search criteria click Open this will be the normal case, as anyone who works in your school should have had their details recorded in the SIMS personnel area i.e. via Focus Person Staff, before being set up as a user. In the very rare case (for example, a welfare officer, or governor) where the person you need to set up as a SIMS user has not had their details recorded in Focus Person Staff, click New. The screen shows your new user s details. The Basic Details, are greyed out as they have been set up elsewhere in SIMS.net and cannot be changed here. The format of the username has been automatically set from the System Manager Settings (see later), and a random password has been generated automatically. Doc Ref S1191 4

Note: the spyglass next to the Username field allows the Username to be populated from Windows Active Directory, allowing the user s Windows login to be used to login to SIMS as well. Please refer to the Capita manual SIMS System Manager 7, available from our website for further details. The user is not yet a member of any permissions groups. Click the Add button in the Groups panel to add the user to permissions groups and selecting groups as required, or use the Copy button to copy groups from an existing user. Once you have done this, the Groups and Permissions panels update to reflect your choices: Note that by setting the Effective Date in the Groups panel, you can determine the date from which permissions will take effect (this defaults to Today), and also that changing this date may affect the displayed Status (if this is different at the chosen date). Doc Ref S1191 5

The Start Date and End Date for membership of a group can be edited to restrict a user s rights in SIMS over a specific period of time. For example, the screen shot below shows the teacher Stephen Green being assigned SEN Coordinator group rights for a short period of time, perhaps to cover an extended absence. Click on the SEN Coordinator group name in the Groups panel and then click the Edit button, enter the required dates in the Edit Membership Dates window and click OK. Then click Save in the User Details window and the required membership dates for the SEN coordinator group for this user will be displayed. Removing Permission Group Memberships If a SIMS user no longer needs membership of a particular permissions group, the group membership can be removed Select Focus System Manager Manage Users to display the Find User browser and select the required SIMS user. Click the Groups hyperlink to display the Groups panel and highlight the group whose permissions you wish to remove from the user: Click the Remove button and confirm that you wish to remove the user from the group (as from the Effective Date) by clicking the Yes button in the prompt. Then Save the user s record. Doc Ref S1191 6

Resetting a user s password The Login Details panel on a user record in System Manager show you the user s username and the password which will generally be blank so that you cannot see the user s password. Should a user forget their password, you can Reset this for them and then (provided a MAPI compliant email client is installed at your station) click the Email button to send an email to advise the user. The email client on your machine will open with a readymade message addressed to the Main email address of your user. You can customise the details of the appearance of this message using the System Manager Settings screen: Making Users Inactive Although there is an option to delete users (in the Manage Users browse), in practice it is rarely possible to completely delete a user in System Manager if they were originally entered in Focus Person Staff or they have ever logged into SIMS, it will not be possible to delete them. However, these users can be made inactive so that they can no longer access SIMS. To do this, select Focus System Manager Manage Users to display the Find User browser and highlight the user you wish to make inactive. Click the Login Details hyperlink to display the Login Details panel: Deselect the Active checkbox, then click the Save button to make the user inactive. Doc Ref S1191 7

Managing Groups The screen for managing groups is reached via Focus System Manager. Initially the screen is empty until you select the type of group you are interested in (in this case any Active group) and click Search: Then, the screen populates to show a list of groups as shown below: This shows the group description, its code (which can be used if you know it to search for individual groups), its type and whether it is active or not. The Type field can take one of 2 values Template or Custom. A group of type Template is a built in System Manager group and would be present in the system from the time of original SIMS installation or installed automatically during an upgrade, while a Custom group is one that you have made yourself. Double clicking on a group causes information relating to the group to be displayed, starting with the Basic Details: The code and description are displayed in grey and cannot be changed. The group can be made inactive by removing the Active tick if you do this, you will be warned that this group will no longer be offered in the list of available groups when assigning permissions to users, and that any memberships of this group will end. The Members panel shows you which users are members of this permissions group and allows you to Add or Remove members using the buttons, or to edit membership dates of the group via the Edit button: Doc Ref S1191 8

The Permissions panel shows you the permissions associated with this group and because this is a template group, these cannot be modified: As with the equivalent screen in Manage Users, it is possible to remove permissions that members of the group do not have from the view by removing the tick from Show unassigned permissions. The Templates panel shows the template(s) the role you are examining is based on. In this case the Admissions Officer group is itself a group of type Template and the panel indicates this: As stated earlier, the Type field can take one of 2 values Template or Custom. A group of type Template is a built in System Manager group and would be present in the system from the time of original SIMS installation or installed automatically during an upgrade. Doc Ref S1191 9

However, it has always been possible for users to modify any groups permissions although SITSS have always recommended that users do not modify permissions in System Manager s built in groups i.e. those listed as so-called Template groups. Where this has been done however, System Manager displays a yellow triangle next to the group description, as shown in the Admission Office example below. When a group which has permissions that diverge from the correct ones is selected, a Reset button becomes active, enabling you to reset the permissions: Sometimes, changes in permissions to standard Template groups are accidental or no longer required, perhaps having been superseded by other inbuilt Capita Template groups. In this case it would be appropriate to simply Reset the permissions. Doc Ref S1191 10

Creating new Permissions Groups There are 2 methods you can use to create new permissions groups by using the New or Clone buttons. An example of using the Clone button might be where the permissions on a template group have been changed as described above, but where the changes made reflect genuine requirements, you will want to select and Clone the permissions group, providing your own Code and Description for it: The cloned group has the same permissions as, and contains the members who were in, your original group. The original Admissions Officer role is shown as being the template for this group. It is also possible to add a new permissions group in Manage Groups using the New button in the Manage Groups screen: Edit the basic details, these must contain a code and description which should indicate the nature of the created group. You can also add notes to explain the usage of the group. Doc Ref S1191 11

The system automatically makes the group active and sets its Type to Custom to indicate that this is a group you created, rather than one of the system s own template groups: In the Members panel, click the Add button and select users as required to be members of the new group: The Permissions panel shows the tree structure of the permissions in SIMS.net, where each branch of the tree typically relates to a function or data area in SIMS.net. It will initially show the group as having no permissions: It is possible to set permissions manually in this screen, by navigating to and selecting the relevant area of the tree and using Set All (to give the group all available permissions in this area of the tree) or Set View (to give the group all View permissions available in this area of the tree). The Remove button removes all permissions in the currently selected area of the permissions tree. Doc Ref S1191 12

However, although you can set permissions of the new group in this way, this is likely to be time consuming and might result in a group that does not function correctly. It is generally easier and more reliable to Add permissions from one or more SIMS template groups and then add or remove individual permissions as necessary. Doc Ref S1191 13

Exporting and Importing Permissions Groups Once a new Permissions Group has been created, it is possible to export the created group (via Focus System Manager Export Groups )to an XML file that can then be imported into another SIMS.net installation.(via Focus System Manager Import Groups). In this example, the group Educational Provider has been selected for export to the file shown in the Filename field (use the browse icon to select the path to the file and specify its name): Clicking the Export button causes the selected Permission group(s) to be exported. To import the group into another SIMS.net installation, use Focus System Manager Import Groups and select the import file: Doc Ref S1191 14

The screen displays details of the permissions group to be imported click Import to import the group into your system: User Access Log A simple user access log is available via Focus System Manager Access Log: This screen allows you to specify a date range, username or workstation of interest or any combination of these. Click Search to display Login Date and Time for the criteria you chose. This screen does not tell you anything about what the user was doing during the session for which they were logged on to SIMS.net. Doc Ref S1191 15

System Manager Settings This screen is reached via Focus System Manager Settings and allows you to define a default username format and a suitable email template for communicating SIMS.net login details to members of staff. For the default Username setting, any of the fields shown in the drop-down can be used as required select the required field and click the Add button to add fields. The default Username field can be edited by usual SIMS methods: The password email template screen allows you to set up a standard email to be sent to users after you have reset their password, or when you have set them up as a user for the first time. Any of the fields shown in the dropdown can be included in the text of the email as shown in the example below and the body of the message can be edited as required: System Manager 6 The old version of System Manager is still accessible via Focus System Manager System Manager 6 if required. Note that none of the features associated with database backup and restore are implemented within the new System Manager these tasks are generally done by other means, for example, using scheduled tasks that create backups using the dbattach utility. The SIMS System Information Report can now be reached via Help SIMS System Information Report in the main SIMS.net screen. Doc Ref S1191 16

Printing information from System Manager 7 The ability to print information is available from various areas of System Manager 7. For example in the Find User browse, the Print button generates a report containing all users selected in the browse, listing their roles in the SIMS database and the permissions groups they have been assigned to: In this example, all Active System Manager users were selected in the Find User browse, but it would have been possible to select a different population of users to report on. Alternatively, once the report has been generated it can be exported to Excel and filtered and sorted as required. Note: because this report does not display passwords, if you have set up a large number of new users (for example new teachers at the start of the academic year) you will probably still need to use the Display/print a report of New Users button from the welcome screen in System Manager 6, which can be exported as a.csv file and opened in other applications such as Microsoft Excel. Back in System Manager 7, clicking the Print button in the Find Group browse lists the groups by name and code and indicates if they are active groups and if they are template (built-in) groups or custom groups you have created: Doc Ref S1191 17