Difference between revisions of "Test"

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This page is used to send messages via email or SMS, and to generate letters. This page can also be used to record the details of phone calls and meetings. All of this information is saved on the student's contact log. <br> <br>
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PINs can be enabled in PARS for two factor authentication; the user must login using their SIMS or Active Directory details, then also enter a PIN. The PIN can either be a four digit number received by email and SMS, or a six digit TOTP generated by an authenticator app. <br> <br>
  
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This page is accessed via: <br>
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PINs can be disabled for login attempts from given IP address ranges. This allows you to use single factor authentication for logins within the school network and two factor authentication for all other logins. <br>
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'''Main menu > Contact Management > External contact''' <br> <br>
 
  
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=How to=
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''Note that some configuration must be performed in PARS before it is able to send emails or SMS messages. See the '''[[Contacting_parents#Configuration|Contacting Parents]]''' page for further information about the configuration required.'' <br> <br>
  
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==Batch send messages / batch generate letters==
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==Enable PINs==
  
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* Click the generate batch button at the top left.
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The PIN settings for PARS are stored in the web.config file for the PARS site, on the PARS IIS server. The web.config file is found in the PARS installaion folder which is usually located: <br>
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C:\inetpub\wwwroot\PARS\web.config <br> <br>
  
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===Stage 1===
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The web.config file is in xml format and can be edited using Notepad or a similar text editor. To enable PINs in PARS, find the setting called "PINS" and change the value to "On" e.g. <br>
 +
<setting name="PINS" serializeAs="String">
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      <value>On</value>
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</setting>
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<br>
  
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Deselect any student you do not wish to contact because of court orders, unusual arrangements, etc. Select the type of person you are going to contact. There are four options:
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==Disable PINs internally==
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* Students - contact the students themselves. Emails will be sent to their 'work' email addresses (as set in SIMS)
 
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* Priority 1 contact with Parental responsibility - contact people who are both priority 1 and have parental responsibility
 
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* Priority 1 contact regardless of Parental responsibility - contact people who are priority 1
 
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* All contacts with Parental responsibility - contact people who have responsibility <br> <br>
 
  
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'''(a)There is an alternate set of options depending upon preferences''' <br> <br>
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If you would like to disable PINs for a certain range of IP addresses, find the setting called "PIN_Exclude_IPs". Enter each IP address or range of IP addresses into the value, separated by semi colons. <br> <br>
  
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===Stage 2===
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You can specify a range of IP addresses using a subnet mask. The subnet mask must not be in 'classless' format e.g. 192.169.1.0/24 is not acceptable; you should use 192.169.1.0/255.255.255.0 instead. <br> <br>
  
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This tab will check that, for each student, there is a person in SIMS who can be contacted based on the options selected on the previous tab. <br> <br>
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The value field in the web.config file must not include line breaks. <br> <br>
  
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Students who do not have a valid contact will be highlighted in red. If there are no named contacts to the right of the student's name then there are no contacts who have a suitable priority level and/or parental responsibility in SIMS. Alternatively if a named contact does appear, then they do have suitable priority and parental responsibility, but do not have a valid method for contact e.g. they have no email address. <br> <br>
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'''Correct'''
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<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
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      <value>192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0</value>    
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</setting>
  
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===Stage 3===
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'''Incorrect'''
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<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
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      <value>192.168.0.0/16</value>     
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</setting>
  
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This tab is used to select the message that will be sent. Click the relevant button (Email, SMS or Letter) to manually create or edit your message. If you have message saved in the message bank, dropdowns will appear allowing you to select these messages. <br> <br>
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'''Incorrect''' 
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<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
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      <value>192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0
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      </value>    
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</setting>
  
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If your letter includes General Attendance merge fields, a Range button will appear on the top toolbar. This button is used to select the date range from which the attendance data will be gathered. <br> <br>
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You may enter multiple IP address ranges or single IP addresses by separating with a semi colon e.g.
 +
<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
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      <value>192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0;172.16.0.0/255.240.0.0</value>     
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</setting>
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<br>
  
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When sending a letter there is an option to Upload a copy of the letter to the student's linked documents in SIMS. When using this option you will need to enter some fields for the document which will be recorded in SIMS. <br> <br>
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==PINs by TOTP==
  
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'''(2) This is where stored messages "go missing" if you have accessed external contact via the wrong route''' <br>
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[[Image:TOTP_kep.png|thumb]]
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'''(3) Should say more about using merge fields in message composer? What about headers and footers?''' <br> <br>
 
  
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==Send single message==
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The default method for delivering PINs to users is to send an email and a password containing their temporary PIN. PARS will use the user's mobile telephone number and work email address from SIMS. <br> <br>
  
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Messages can be sent to students or contacts individually. Each person will have their available contact details listed. Click on the Email or SMS buttons to send a message to that person's mobile phone or email address. <br> <br>
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The alternative is for users to download an authentication app. Users can request a key from the PARS login page which will be sent to them via email and SIMS. Once they have entered this key into their authentication app, they will be able to generate PINs using the authentication app without the need to receive emails and SMS messages. <br> <br>
  
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You will then see a window to compose your message. You can access the message bank by clicking Insert > Template, or access merge fields by clicking Insert > Field. <br> <br>
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To enable PINs in PARS, find the setting called "PINS" and change the value to "On" e.g. <br>
 +
<setting name="PINSBYTOTP" serializeAs="String">
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      <value>On</value>
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</setting>
  
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==Record meetings or phone calls==
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Once TOTP PINs have been enabled, users will be able to collect a key for use in their authenticator app. To receive a key the user first needs to attempt to log in to PARS. They will then be prompted to enter a PIN and will also see a cog button. Clicking the cog button will sent a key to the user via email and SMS. <br> <br>
  
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You can type and save the details of any phone calls or meetings using this screen. For telephone calls, find the telephone number that was used then click the Call button next to it. For meetings click the Ad-Hoc button next to that contact. <br> <br>
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==Troubleshooting==
  
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When recording telephone calls there is an additional Contact Type option. This is used to record whether the call was successful, or whether there was no answer, a voicemail was left, etc. <br> <br>
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If you are experiencing trouble in disabling PINs for internal IP address ranges then enter "*log*" as the first item in the list of excluded IP address ranges e.g. <br>
 +
<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
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      <value>*log*;192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0</value>     
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</setting>
  
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When recording meetings and telephone calls most information will be recorded on the contact log. This includes the date, time, the name of the staff member recording the information, the person contacted and the student. In the case of telephone calls the telephone number is also recorded. <br> <br>
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PARS will then log information in the Application Log of the IIS server on which PARS is installed. These logs will show which IP address was used during a login attempt and whether it matches any of the ranges that have been excluded. <br> <br>
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==View contact log==
 
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There Contact History and History Report buttons are used to access a student's contact log. <br> <br>
 
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Contact History shows a summary of contacts made, but to see the details of each contact you must click the view button. This report is easier to read at a glance but requires more clicks to see the details of a message. The Contact History report can also be used to edit and delete items from the contact log. <br> <br>
 
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The History Report shows all information from the contact log. It is not possible to view the details of letters using this report. Items on the contact log cannot be edited or deleted using this report. <br> <br> <br> <br>
 
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There are two other methods for accessing the contact log. Both of these methods involve using different pages in PARS: <br>
 
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* Pupil information
 
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* Contact reports <br> <br>
 
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=Relevant settings=
 
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==SMTP preferences==
 
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In order to send emails, PARS needs to be given the SMTP details of your email server. These settings are entered into PARS via: <br>
 
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System management > Preferences > Email <br> <br>
 
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==SMS account details==
 
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In order to send SMS messages you must have an account with TextAnywhere and enter those account details into PARS. If the details have not  been entered into PARS you will be able to select SMS as a method of contact. The details are entered into PARS via: <br>
 
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Contact management > Configure > Configure SMS <br> <br>
 
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==Contact management preferences==
 
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The PARS preferences that affect the External Contact screen are accessed via: <br>
 
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System management > Preferences > External contact <br> <br>
 
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===Which email address is used===
 
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'''(4) I do not know what the Use Main Email Addresses Only option does''' <br> <br>
 
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If a person has multiple email address, by default PARS will send emails to the email address marked as Main in SIMS. The "Use Primary flag to indicate main" preference causes PARS to use the email address marked as Primary instead. <br> <br>
 
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===Only send to priority 1 contacts===
 
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When sending a batch message, the Recipients list will either give options to send to the highest priority contact, or the priority 1 contact. In some cases the highest priority contact may not be priority 1.
 
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==Contact management permissions==
 
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=What I am stuck on=
 
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* How to talk about arriving on this page via behaviour, detentions, etc.
 

Latest revision as of 11:42, 20 July 2018

PINs can be enabled in PARS for two factor authentication; the user must login using their SIMS or Active Directory details, then also enter a PIN. The PIN can either be a four digit number received by email and SMS, or a six digit TOTP generated by an authenticator app.

PINs can be disabled for login attempts from given IP address ranges. This allows you to use single factor authentication for logins within the school network and two factor authentication for all other logins.

Note that some configuration must be performed in PARS before it is able to send emails or SMS messages. See the Contacting Parents page for further information about the configuration required.

Enable PINs

The PIN settings for PARS are stored in the web.config file for the PARS site, on the PARS IIS server. The web.config file is found in the PARS installaion folder which is usually located:
C:\inetpub\wwwroot\PARS\web.config

The web.config file is in xml format and can be edited using Notepad or a similar text editor. To enable PINs in PARS, find the setting called "PINS" and change the value to "On" e.g. 

<setting name="PINS" serializeAs="String">
      <value>On</value>
</setting>


Disable PINs internally

If you would like to disable PINs for a certain range of IP addresses, find the setting called "PIN_Exclude_IPs". Enter each IP address or range of IP addresses into the value, separated by semi colons.

You can specify a range of IP addresses using a subnet mask. The subnet mask must not be in 'classless' format e.g. 192.169.1.0/24 is not acceptable; you should use 192.169.1.0/255.255.255.0 instead.

The value field in the web.config file must not include line breaks.

Correct 

<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
      <value>192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0</value>      
</setting>

Incorrect 

<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
      <value>192.168.0.0/16</value>      
</setting>

Incorrect 

<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
      <value>192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0
      </value>      
</setting>

You may enter multiple IP address ranges or single IP addresses by separating with a semi colon e.g. 

<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
      <value>192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0;172.16.0.0/255.240.0.0</value>      
</setting>


PINs by TOTP

TOTP kep.png

The default method for delivering PINs to users is to send an email and a password containing their temporary PIN. PARS will use the user's mobile telephone number and work email address from SIMS.

The alternative is for users to download an authentication app. Users can request a key from the PARS login page which will be sent to them via email and SIMS. Once they have entered this key into their authentication app, they will be able to generate PINs using the authentication app without the need to receive emails and SMS messages.

To enable PINs in PARS, find the setting called "PINS" and change the value to "On" e.g. 

<setting name="PINSBYTOTP" serializeAs="String">
      <value>On</value>
</setting>

Once TOTP PINs have been enabled, users will be able to collect a key for use in their authenticator app. To receive a key the user first needs to attempt to log in to PARS. They will then be prompted to enter a PIN and will also see a cog button. Clicking the cog button will sent a key to the user via email and SMS.

Troubleshooting

If you are experiencing trouble in disabling PINs for internal IP address ranges then enter "*log*" as the first item in the list of excluded IP address ranges e.g. 

<setting name="PIN_Exclude_IPs" serializeAs="String">
      <value>*log*;192.168.0.0/255.255.0.0</value>      
</setting>

PARS will then log information in the Application Log of the IIS server on which PARS is installed. These logs will show which IP address was used during a login attempt and whether it matches any of the ranges that have been excluded.

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