EARLY WARNING – Schools have asked to have exports from Crystal to Word etc without some of the clutter that comes with them. We have found a way to accommodate this but only by using .Net framework version 4  or later. It is up to each school to load the framework. Our changes will be incorporated in SchoolBase® 4.04. You will also need the latest version of the Crystal Reports redistributable which is available on our web site. HOWEVER you do not need to rush to change your machines. We have also found a way to detect what you are running. If it finds an earlier version it will use the older Crystal report format (with the clutter) whilst if it finds 4.0 or later it will use the new, better exportable, version of Crystal.

Please switch from IE – if you like your online systems fast then think about moving to Firefox or Chrome or almost any browser other than IE. We have seen screens handled twice as fast and even better as a result of a switch of browser. If you really must use IE please note the system will not work in version 6 and 7 is painfully slow so try switching to a later version.

Office 2003 still supported – All testing is now done in 2007 and 2010 but we will continue to release in 2003 for the foreseeable future. Thus those schools still trying to move from 2003 can use this and the next release (and probably all releases through the rest of the year) in 2003 but please be aware that testing is limited to the later versions. If you have a mixture of versions please remember to build the reports in the oldest version.

Chronically slow machines – We still visit schools where the pupil finder is chronically slow. This is caused by a Microsoft bug in 2007. If you have service pack 1 or 3 and have not run the patch, please download the patch – Office 2007 Performance Hotfix - the difference is startling.

iPads and other tablets – The vast majority of features and functions work on these devices but at present the Finder is not working well. If you want details about a pupil, type their name into the names like, click 'list' and then 'open' and you will see the pupil details. But we cannot give you a nice list of names in the way we do elsewhere. The reason is that the browser Apple have used is the same as on the iPhone and the way it handles list boxes assumes it has a very small space, even though the iPad has far more space! We are looking at a 'mobile' version of the finder to resolve this issue but not for this release.