Administering SIMS ID
**Administering SIMS ID Users
Administering SIMS ID Users
Managing Users with Hosted SIMS
SIMS ID Site Admins are the only users that can manage user account permissions across your school so when you first join the service we will ask you to provide details on who you want your Site Admins to be. The school’s first site administrator can setup other users to also be Site Admins. It is common for users to be SIMS ID Site Admins as well as being SIMS and or FMS users.
A SIMS ID Site Administrator can:
Pick up new staff unclaimed usernames and passwords.
Grant users access to Applications such as SIMS and FMS. (By default users do not have access to any Hosted applications)
Reset other user’s passwords, if they are unable to carry out the self-service password reset process.
Change the schools background theme based on a set of pre-defined background images.
Approve a user from another SIMS ID school or SIMS Support unit to be part of the school site so that access to SIMS or FMS can be granted to users outside of the school.
Creating new users in SIMS and SIMS ID
Hosted SIMS \ SIMS ID users are created automatically in SIMS ID once a user has been setup in System Manager and SIMS
Adding a new staff member follows this process.
Create the new staff member in SIMS Personnel. This Quick reference sheet will guide you through the steps.
Setup the user in SIMS System Manager and grant them the required SIMS Permissions.
Wait up to 70 Minutes for your new user to appear in your SIMS ID user list
Change the users security groups to include SIMS and any other hosted SIMS application (please see page 28 of this guide)
Pick up the users new SIMS ID username and password from the “unclaimed password” list in SIMS ID
Once the user has been created in SIMS System Manager they will shortly appear in the “Users” list of SIMS ID. Once a user has been created from SIMS and is managed in SIMS ID they cannot be deleted manually from SIMS ID, staff should have their contract set to expire and be removed from SIMS system manager as well as having their SIMS ID permissions removed.
Granting SIMS ID users access to SIMS
After logging into https://id.sims.co.uk as a SIMS ID Site Administrator click on the Orange “Users” icon and then the Blue “Manage Users” icon
If you are a SIMS Support Unit or a Multi Academy trust you will be asked to select the school for the users you wish to manage. A list of all of your users for the school are displayed, you can filter these by clicking on a filter type such as Admin users. The users list is based on the 'live' staff in SIMS and is updated up to an hour after new users are created\recorded in SIMS.
The list of users can be filtered using the filter buttons above the list of users. Filtering by “Locked out Users” shows users who have failed to answer their security questions three times. Inactive users will be users that have been disabled in system manager or have an expired contract date in SIMS personnel. You can also search for a user by typing all or part of their name.
To manage a user click the “Manage” button to the right of the user’s username. Users with the menu icon on the right of the screen are Site Admin users and cannot have their permissions changed by other Site Admin users. Changes to Site Admin users can be requested by logging a support call.
To grant a user with access to a hosted application choose “Change Security Groups” from the Manage button.
Tick the applications you wish to grant the user access to and click “Save”. This will place a Tile on the users launch screen or remove a Tile from the users launch screen if un-ticked.
Please note: If you require access to a specific Northampton application please log a support call to have these enabled.
Hosted SIMS Licences
If you receive a message “You have run out of Hosted SIMS Licences”, please remove all of the ticks from users who no longer require access and click save, this will free up licences back to your school. Alternatively please log a support call to discuss purchasing additional licences. You will also receive a warning message when you are running low on licences.
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| Selecting “View Profile” will show details about the user including.
- Name
- Login name
- Email address
- User Data source - Where the user originated from
- Last password change date
- Modified date |
|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------| | The Site & Roles screen shows which schools\sites the user is a member of and what their role is at that site.
The My Profile (user profile) has a new tab called My events. This tab details user events such as when user passwords were changed and by who. Further details will be added to this tab to allow you to keep control of your identity.
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Removing access to SIMS ID, SIMS and FMS
To remove access to all applications it is recommended changes are made both within the application and within SIMS ID.
- Login to https://id.sims.co.uk as a SIMS ID Site Admin click on the Orange “Users” icon and then the Blue “Manage Users” icon
Find the user you wish to remove access for, you can also search for a user by typing all or part of their name.
Click the “Manage” button to the right of the user’s username and reset the users password so that they can no longer access SIMS ID
Click the “Manage” button and select “change security groups” Untick all of the application security groups and click save.
Remove the user’s permissions from SIMS and change the user’s personal record to reflect their current status.
If required remove the users permissions from FMS.
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Finding a users’ initial username and password
After logging into https://id.sims.co.uk as a SIMS ID Site Administrator click on the users’ icon. This will take you to the user management screen.
If you are a SIMS Support Unit or a Multi Academy trust you will be asked to select the school for the users you wish to manage. Click on the “Unclaimed passwords” link
This page allows you to view all users at your site that have not yet logged into SIMS ID so you can provide the user with their initial username and password. Once a user changes their password they no longer appear on this list.
Initially the list will not show the password, this is done for security reasons. Click on ‘Show Password’ link to show the password. Click on ‘Hide Password’ to hide a password.
If you are searching for a particular user you can use the search feature in your browser. Pressing CTRL-F on your keyboard will normally launch this.
If you wish to you can copy and paste all of the users from the screen into an excel spreadsheet to further filter your users and their initial passwords.
You can choose to distribute your user’s initial usernames and passwords in a secure method of your choice.
Resetting a user’s password
After logging into https://id.sims.co.uk as a SIMS ID Site Administrator click on the “Users” icon. Press CTRL-F to launch the browser find feature and enter the user’s username. Click ‘Manage’ and choose “Reset password”
The new password entered will tell you the strength of the password you are choosing.
Accessing multiple sites
SIMS ID allows users to access more than one school with a single username and password. The process starts with the user’s school that contains the user wanting to access another school, this school is called the originating site.
The originating sites data controller will need to log a support call asking for a named user to be sent to a Destination site for security approval.
Once support call has been completed the target site will need to approve or decline the security request from within the “Security Request” page. If the user is approved the user will appear under the “users” list and permissions to applications can be setup like any other user from the site.
The Destination site will be able to see that the request is pending from the “Requests Pending for this Site” screen
The following scenario explains the process of setting up multi-site users:
Scenario: A teacher Jeremy Colburn requires access to two Hosted
SIMS schools. He wants to use his account jcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.ukjcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.uk
to login to both schools.
Process:
Jeremy Colburn is setup in school 1 in SIMS Personnel and SIMS System Manager. School1 automatically syncs with SIMS ID and creates a SIMS ID username of
jcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.ukjcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.uk which has access to School 1.A case is logged with the Capita service desk asking for jcolburn1 of school1 to be granted access to school2.
The desk will send a pending request for jcolburn1 to school2. A site administrator of school2 logs into SIMS ID and under user management “Security Requests” Approves the security request.
A site administrator of school2 logs into SIMS ID and finds
jcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.ukjcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.uk in the list of users and grants jcolburn1 access to the SIMS application of school2.A SIMS manager at school 2 logs into SIMS System Manager of school2 and creates a user Jeremy Colburn with the correct SIMS System Manager group permissions and sets the user to Active.
The “username” for Jeremy Colburn at school is us updated with “SIMS\jcolburn1” where jcolburn1 is the first part of the person’s username, the user is saved. . See example below.
jcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.ukjcolburn1@hosted.sims.co.uk will now be able to login to https://id.sims.co.uk and access both schools.*Please note an additional user Jeremy Colburn will appear in the list of users at school 2, this user can be ignored. This process can be repeated at multiple school in a scenario where a SIMS Support person requires and permitted access to multiple schools. *
Managing Access to multiple schools
Some customers from Multi Academy Trusts or Local Authorities have access to multiple databases.
If you have access to multiple databases then you are able to swap between the databases using the SIMS Multi Site Selector or the FMS Multi Site Selector. You simply need to select the school from the grey drop down and launch the application for the chosen school. You can only be connected to one school at a time.
From the drop down simply select your school and you will notice the tile text changes for each tile based on the selected school. Simply click the tile to Launch, SIMS or Discover for the required schools. Please note you can only be logged into one school at a time, trying to open another schools SIMS or Discover system will prompt you to logout of your current school.
FMS Multi Selector
Click on the FMS tile in SIMS ID.
When the application launches you will be presented with a drop down list of the databases you have access to.
Click on the drop down list and select the school you wish to access and click on OK to launch FMS.
Adding a user manually
In addition to SIMS populating and managing the users in SIMS ID, Site Admins also have the ability to manually create users in SIMS ID. If you are a hosted SIMS school it is recommended you wait for the user to come through from SIMS into SIMS ID rather than creating users manually.
The following scenarios are typical reasons to use the “Add New User” feature
You are a site that uses Hosted FMS only and your users will need to be setup manually.
You want to setup an additional Site administrator that does need to exist as a user in SIMS or have access to SIMS.
You use SIMS ID Light to manage your office 365 / Google accounts and you want to create a new user.
You are a SIMS Support unit and you want to create Support users.
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| To complete the manual creation of a new user enter the details in the Add New User screen, clicking on the blue arrows button will generate an available username for your new user.
The email address field is not mandatory. After the user has been created the user’s new password can be obtained from the Unclaimed Passwords list. |
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| Users that are created manually have two additional options under the “Manage” drop down, Edit and Delete. You will only see the Edit and Delete options for user that are created manually and added through the “Add New User” process. |
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Managing Users without Hosted SIMS
Finding a users’ initial username and password
After logging into https://id.sims.co.uk as a SIMS ID Site Administrator click on the users’ icon. This will take you to the user management screen.
If you are a SIMS Support Unit or a Multi Academy trust you will be asked to select the school for the users you wish to manage. Click on the “Unclaimed passwords” link
This page allows you to view all users at your site that have not yet logged into SIMS ID so you can provide the user with their initial username and password. Once a user changes their password they no longer appear on this list.
Initially the list will not show the password, this is done for security reasons. Click on ‘Show Password’ link to show the password. Click on ‘Hide Password’ to hide a password.
If you are searching for a particular user you can use the search feature in your browser. Pressing CTRL-F on your keyboard will normally launch this.
If you wish to you can copy and paste all of the users from the screen into an excel spreadsheet to further filter your users and their initial passwords.
You can choose to distribute your user’s initial usernames and passwords in a secure method of your choice.
Resetting a user’s password
After logging into https://id.sims.co.uk as a SIMS ID Site Administrator click on the “Users” icon. Press CTRL-F to launch the browser find feature and enter the user’s username. Click ‘Manage’ and choose “Reset password”
The new password entered will tell you the strength of the password you are choosing.
What to do if a user forgets their password
If you forget your password, you can click on the ‘Forgotten password’ link from https://id.sims.co.uk .
If you forget your username, please contact your SIMS ID Site Administrator.
When resetting your password you will be asked to provide your username and asked to answer three of your five security questions. Please note the answers for your security questions are not displayed for security reasons.
If successfully answered you will be prompted to set a new password
If you do not successfully answer the security questions, after three attempts you will be prevented from using the Forgotten Password service and you will be directed to log a support call or contact your SIMS ID site administrator to have your password reset.
Managing Access to multiple schools
Some customers from Multi Academy Trusts or Local Authorities have access to multiple databases.
If you have access to multiple databases then you are able to swap between the databases using the SIMS Multi Site Selector or the FMS Multi Site Selector. You simply need to select the school from the grey drop down and launch the application for the chosen school. You can only be connected to one school at a time.
From the drop down simply select your school and you will notice the tile text changes for each tile based on the selected school. Simply click the tile to Launch, SIMS or Discover for the required schools. Please note you can only be logged into one school at a time, trying to open another schools SIMS or Discover system will prompt you to logout of your current school.
Adding a user manually
In addition to SIMS populating and managing the users in SIMS ID, Site Admins also have the ability to manually create users in SIMS ID. If you are a hosted SIMS school it is recommended you wait for the user to come through from SIMS into SIMS ID rather than creating users manually.
The following scenarios are typical reasons to use the “Add New User” feature
You are a site that uses Hosted FMS only and your users will need to be setup manually.
You want to setup an additional Site administrator that does need to exist as a user in SIMS or have access to SIMS.
You use SIMS ID Light to manage your office 365 / Google accounts and you want to create a new user.
You are a SIMS Support unit and you want to create Support users.
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| To complete the manual creation of a new user enter the details in the Add New User screen, clicking on the blue arrows button will generate an available username for your new user.
The email address field is not mandatory. After the user has been created the user’s new password can be obtained from the Unclaimed Passwords list. |
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| Users that are created manually have two additional options under the “Manage” drop down, Edit and Delete. You will only see the Edit and Delete options for user that are created manually and Added through the “Add New User” process. |
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Administering users with CSV uploads
You can administer SIMS ID users by CSV upload. This should not be done if you can administer users automatically from within SIMS using the SIMS People Service.
Login into SIMS ID
Click on the Users Tile
Click on the Manager Users Tile
If your login works across all the schools you manage select the school you are dealing with otherwise skip this step.
Click the CSV Import button
You can download the correct csv template for the action you wish to undertake
This template will be pre-populated with the currently provisioned users.
As this is personal data this should be handled securely.
Make the required changes to users.
New users can be added as new rows.
To delete a user set the status to ‘Disabled’ OR delete the row.
Upload the CSV using the upload function.
CAUTION – uploading a blank CSV will disable all CSV provisioned users. Just as it would in OPENHIVE.
Accept the confirmation dialogue
Any errors will be displayed.
Once corrected you can re-upload.
A Success message is provided following a successful upload.
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Once uploaded the changes will be processed by the system. How long the changes will take to process will depend on the action being undertaken and the services applied to the user. Some actions such as O365 provisioning are reliant on Microsoft or other third parties.
You can only edit CSV provisioned users using the CSV method. Manually provisioned users must be administered using the user interface. Users provisioned automatically by SIMS must be administered in SIMS.
How to tell by what method a user has been provisioned
If you want to know how a user has been provisioned, you can find the user in User Management and then select Manage next to the user concerned
Then Click View Profile (you can also tell this is a UI created user as you have the option to edit it in the context sensitive menu)
The highlighted section in the profile below shows this user was created in the UI, it would say CSV Import if brought in by that method etc.
