1300 301 931

  First Class Training

Melbourne
Human Edge Training Centre, 417 City Road South Melbourne

All other Melbourne training is booked up until 9 December, so reserve your place now!

Introduction to First Class

Wednesday 6 November 2002

Sydney
SCEGGS Darlinghurst, 215 Forbes Street Darlinghurst

Limited places still available...

	Introduction to First Class	Monday 28 October 2002
	Introduction to First Class	Tuesday 29 October 2002

The introductory course provides a great overview of the software as well as tips for using shortcuts and other useful features.

The cost of the course is $280 per person (ex. GST) for schools on Service & Support, or $350 per person (ex. GST) for schools not on Service & Support. Discounts apply for multiple bookings, please see our website for further details.

http://www.humanedge.biz/firstclass/fc2000training.htm

A light lunch will be supplied and you will also receive a copy of the First Class training manual for you to keep.

On completion of the course you will know how to:

	Import data into First Class from other programs
	Export data from First Class to other programs
	Create and enter data into databases
	Create and enter data into a grid
	Resolve clashes
	Allocate students to classes
	Move students between classes
	Allocate extras
	Generate and edit a timetable

The course commences at 9.00 am and concludes at approximately 4.00 pm. As our training courses are a forum for you to have your questions about the software dealt with, we remain flexible about the finishing time. Our instructors want to make sure that you get as much as possible out of your day and part of this is ensuring that we spend as much time as necessary answering your queries!

If you would like to reserve a place in this course please contact us using the link below or call 1300 550 765, but hurry places are filling fast!

Training Booking

  How Do I?

How do I make Forms absent after they have finished for the year?

A similar method is used here to the one explained in Issue 20 of the newsletter where we were allowing for a teacher with a long-term illness.

	Open the EXTRAS MAINTENANCE screen
	Click the EDIT button
	Click the CAMPS button
	Click ADD at the bottom of the left pane and give the Camp a name
	Click ADD under the FORMS section in the centre pane
	Select the Forms to be marked absent
	Click OK
	Click ADD in the right-hand pane
	The current date will appear automatically
	Pass the cursor over the date field and click on the context button that appears
	Select the first date that the year level will be away from
	Click ADD at the bottom of this section repeatedly until the last day of the year appears
	Click GENERATE EXTRAS under the left pane
	Close the screen once the extras have been generated

How do I interpret the data in the Iterative Analysis screen?

When Iterative Analysis runs there is some useful information displayed that may give you an idea of the progress of the generation.

Most of the items are fairly obvious but Least Cost Solution, Best Cost and Most Difficult Allocations may need some explaining.

Least Cost Solution

Least Cost Solution pane shows the allocations left off the best timetable so far. If the Best Number shown is more than 20 then there are some allocations that are not visible.

Best Cost

Each of the items in the Least Cost Solution pane has a cost. The cost is a measure of how difficult it would be to slot the class into the timetable manually. Blocks are considered to be the most difficult, single form classes run as consecutives are next, and single form classes running for a single period are considered to be the least difficult. Some indication as to the record of each of the allocations failures to be placed would also contribute to the overall cost. The sum of these costs is tallied in the Best Cost pane.

Most Difficult Allocations

The Most Difficult Allocations are, as indicated by the name, the allocations that First Class has found to be the most difficult to place and which have therefore failed to be placed the most often. The first column in the Most Difficult Allocations pane indicates how many times, out of the total number of trials, an allocation has failed to be placed into the timetable.

There are a number of problem indicators in the Most Difficult Allocations pane that can give you additional information about why your allocations cannot be placed.

1. The number of failures is the same as the total number of trials

If this is the case, then that particular allocation is never getting onto the timetable. To solve this, stop the timetable generator, close it without saving the changes, and check as to why that class is always missing out.

2. There are a number of allocations with the same number of failures at the top of the list, and then there is a drop in the failure rate

This is an indication that you have "mutually exclusive" allocations. For example, if there are 6 allocations with 50 failures in this column, and the 7th allocation has had 20 failures then, depending on the comparison with the total trials, you have between 1 and 5 of these allocations always missing out. To solve this stop the generator, close it without saving the changes, and check why these classes are stopping each other from being placed onto the timetable.

3. The number of failures are all about the same but total more than about 20% of the total trials

This indicates that your overall timetable is too tight. Removing some rooms, or changing rooms to room groups may alleviate this situation.

If you have any questions about timetable generation please give Robert Bakker a call on 1300 301 931.

  Website of the Week

Are some of the things you hear in everyday language "all Greek to you"? The Phrase Finder website not only explains some common sayings, in many cases it also reveals where they came from originally. To use the above saying as an example, it originated from a line in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, "But for my own part, it was Greek to me", meaning that he found what was said unintelligible.

The site also features a list of handy proverbs, explanations of the origins and meanings of euphemisms and some popular fallacies about the origins of well-known sayings.

An amusing part of the site to look at features misheard song lyrics, such as "Beelzebub has a devil for a sideboard" which is actually "Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me" from Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody. There are only a few listed currently but why not prompt them to add more by posting your own on the Discussion Forum?

  Quote of the Week

"Readers are plentiful; thinkers are rare." Harriet Martineau, Author and Philosopher

For more information, please contact:

Robert Bakker
Human Edge Software
Phone: 1300 301 931
Fax: +61 3 9690 2802
Email: firstclass@humanedge.biz

Human Edge adheres to a policy of not sending unsolicited (SPAM) e-mail. You are receiving this e-mail because you are listed as a contact for a product or service that our organisation provides or have requested that this service be activated for you. If you are receiving this message in error or wish to have our records changed please advise us via return e-mail or call us on +61 3 9690 5044