How to Set up the SIMS Integration:

School Guide

© Learning Ladders 2017. This document may not be edited or reproduced in any form without permission.

Thank you for choosing to purchase the integration between Learning Ladders and SIMS Assessment. If you require assistance with your integration at any stage, please contact your local SIMS Support Team.

Before proceeding with your installation, please take note of the following:

You must take a backup of your SIMS database which can be restored from if necessary.The connecting software ('middleware') should be installed on a local machine and NOT on the SIMS server.The connecting software ('middleware') is a Windows application and cannot be installed on any other operating system. Windows 7+ is required.You must NOT install the connecting software ('middleware') on more than one local machine. The connecting software ('middleware') should be installed on a local machine which will be switched on when the task is scheduled to run (an office computer is usually best).Only assessments from the current academic year will be transferred into SIMS Programme of Study, no historical assessments will move from Learning Ladders to SIMS.

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The first stage is to set up Learning Ladders as an agency in SIMS.

1. Log into SIMS. 

2. Click ‘Focus’ in the top left hand corner of your screen and select Agency > Agencies. 

The middleware should be installed onto a PC/Laptop with SIMS installed. Please DO NOT install it directly onto the SIMS Server. The middleware will run during the day. This shouldn't impact staff using SIMS, although they may find that while the integration is running, SIMS is slightly slower than usual.

You can download the middleware here: https://s3-eu-west- 1.amazonaws.com/sims-ll/LL-Middleware.zip

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3. Click ‘New’ to create a new agency. 

4. Enter ‘LL’ as the agency name and set the type as ‘other’.

PLEASE NOTE: You do not need to enter any other information apart from ‘Agency Name’ and ‘Agency Type’ but the agency name must be as above. 

5. Click ‘Save’ to create ‘LL’ as an agency. 

Before downloading and installing the middleware please ensure that you have the following patches applied to your SIMS database. They can be downloaded from SOLUS and your SIMS Support Team can help with this.

3.62.261 to 3.99.999 – 21691 3.62.261 to 3.99.999 – 21865 

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© Learning Ladders 2017. This document may not be edited or reproduced in any form without permission.

Next you will need to download the middleware from this URL: https://s3-eu-west- 1.amazonaws.com/sims-ll/LL-Middleware.zip

 1. Save the Middleware to the local drive on your PC.

 2. Right click the ZIP folder and click ‘Extract All’. 

2. Open the unzipped folder, right click 'LLSetup' and click ‘Run as Administrator’.

Please note: The middleware will not run correctly if you don't click 'Run as Administrator'. 

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3. Click ‘Add a new School’. 

4. Enter the details of your school.

School Details

School name: Name of your school as shown in SIMS.  

School number: Your school’s three digit LA number followed by your 4 digit school number. For example, 1235678. (This can also be found by going to Help and System Information within SIMS. 

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SIMS Information 

User: This is your SIMS username. Please ensure that you use administrative login details.

Password: This is the password for the username above.

Server & Database: This information can be found by going to Help and System Information within SIMS or via the connect.ini file. 

Learning Ladders 

URL: This is your school’s Learning Ladders URL (provided in the setup email).

Key: This is the unique key for your school’s assessment information. You will find this within your school's Learning Ladders site by going to School Admin > Settings > SIMS Integration > Show API Key. Please keep this information safe.

5. Click ‘Save’. 

6. Your school will now appear in the list on the left hand side of the window.

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7. If your school needs to use a proxy to connect to the outside world, enter the proxy server details on the right hand side of the screen and select ‘Proxy server required’. Otherwise leave blank. 

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8. Enter a time when the PC will be switched on to schedule the task and click "Schedule task" (try and avoid scheduling the task when other tasks might run).  

9. Enter the computer username and password (to authorise access to run the task) and click ‘Save’. 

© Learning Ladders 2017. This document may not be edited or reproduced in any form without permission.

The integration will now run daily. The final stage is to manually run the task (first time setup only)

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9. Re-open the middleware as administrator  (right-click on the middleware icon and select 'Run as Administrator) and click ‘Run the Task’

The data transfer will now begin. Please let the task run in its entirety and do not close. Once the task has finished you should see the assessments within Assessment Manager and any pupils who still exist in Learning Ladders but not in SIMS should have been archived.

If you have problems at this stage, please contact your local SIMS Support Team for assistance.