E10 - Synchronisation to Sentral via Direct Connection

Modified on Thu, 14 Aug at 12:52 AM

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preamble
Type of sync
Which data is sent to the other system?
Which data can be received from the other system into E10?
Steps to synchronise data
Troubleshooting

Preamble

Timetabling data that exists in E10 files are usually sent on to one or more other non-Tes systems, such as student learning management systems, reporting systems, administration systems, and many more. The Tes integration team works with other systems to make sure that the data required to be sent is in the correct format.

This document can be referenced for:

new school file set up
synchronisation processes
synchronisation troubleshooting

While Tes takes all care to ensure any mention to the other system is correct and up to date, it is the user's responsibility to check with the other system prior to an initial sync. If the user becomes aware of any changes to the other system, we would very much appreciate this feedback.

We have recorded a joint webinar with Sentral that covers a number of topics for the integration and sync, it will of great help in setup and tips. Please watch it via this link.

Type of sync

This sync is performed by a 'LISS' sync, which is a sync that sends and receives data at the push of a button with no need to manually upload data into the other system.

Which data is sent to the other system?

This table lists many of the data and features found in Tes and and whether they are understood by the other system.

Note that Tes builds many excellent features to help users build high quality timetables, and while these features can be sent onto the other system through the synchronisation process, not all systems have built the capability on their end to receive/display these features.

Tes feature	Is this feature received by the other system?	Other notes
Bell times	Yes
Campuses	Yes
Classes	Yes	Classes must contain students
Class lists	Yes
Composite classes (linked classes)	Unsure
Duty roster	Yes	The data will appear with duty flag in Teacher's timetable
Faculty data	No
Grid structure codes	Yes
Multi-file	Yes
Multi-grid		The number of periods across campuses and different grid structures must be the same. Sentral does not support different number of periods in each grid.
On-call roster	Yes	The data will appear with on-call flag in Teacher's timetable
Priority classes	Yes	Sentral > Teacher timetable will show both classes but PxP will show the higher priority class only.
Room data	Yes	Note. Rooms are associated with classes we do not send room data as the source of truth for room data is Sentral.
Rotation classes	Yes
RTO roster	No
Student data	Yes
Study roster	Yes
Sub-classes	Yes	Sentral > Teacher timetable will show the umbrella class on both teachers.
Teacher data	Yes
Teacher days off (Unavailables)	No	Sentral will show the period on Teacher's timetable as blank.
Timetable data	Yes
Two (or more) rooms at once	Yes
Two (or more) teachers at once	Yes
Year levels (non-numeric)	Yes	Sentral is the source of truth on year levels, Tes must follow the exact year level configured in Sentral. if the non-numeric year levels already exist in Sentral then it will accept it from Tes.

Which data can be received from the other system into E10?

Tes data	Notes on data	Can this data be drawn down into Tes Timetable file?	Other notes
Room data	Room Code, Name, Size, Campus, Comment	Yes
Student data	Student Code, Name, Preferred name, Year level, Letter group, House, Gender, StatewideID, Email, Phone	Yes
Teacher data	Teacher Code, Name, Preferred name, Faculty, Gender, Email, Phone	Yes
Year levels	Year levels existing in the other system that will be created in Setup > Year levels	No

Steps to synchronise data

Step 1: Configure Sentral

Contact Sentral to setup the connection for Tes to sync. Sentral will need to provide you the URL, username and password.
If you are multi-file or multigrid, make sure the relevant function has been configured in Sentral. Often the other system requires some notice notice before the syncing to implement the change.

Step 2: Configure the Timetable file

Go to File > Synchronise > Configure
Select the ‘Sync’ sub-tab
Click the '+' and select "Sentral" from the dropdown

Multiple systems can be set up to sync. It is common to have both the Edval webserver, the schools learning management system configured, along with any other systems the school wishes to regularly sync to

Go to the ‘Connection’ sub-tab
Ensure that “Sentral” is selected in the top-right corner
Input your credentials
Click on test connection button to confirm if connection successful.

Options	Details
Sentral Server	Contact Sentral for server address. e.g. https://xxx.sentral.com.au , https://xxx-h.sentral.com.au ,
User Name	This usually would be your username that you logging to Sentral online.
Password	The password to login

Go to the ‘Other sub-tab and change any options to your preference.

Options	Details
Sync timetable & class lists every time you save	This will send only the timetable and class membership data to Sentral each time you save the file
Exclude Yard duties/study classes/On-calls	Ticking any of these options will not sync yard duties, study classes and/or on-calls
Accept Statewide ID's that are sent to Tes timetable file (Recommended)	If Sentral contains this data then ticking this box will download the information into Student data > Statewide ID column
When download the list of students, what format?	Depending on how you have configured in Sentral, you can select the relevant option.

Step 3: Perform the sync

Basic Sync

Basic sync is used for general syncing. A basic sync will:

Download students from other system
Publish classes to other system
Publish class lists to other system
Publish Timetable to other system

To perform an Basic sync:

Go to File > Synchronise > Sync Now, and select the ‘Basic’ sub-tab
Ensure “Sentral” is selected from the dropdown in the top-right corner
Input the date range you wish to update the Sentral data in and select the rotation you wish to sync
Click “Go” to sync

Options	Details
Date	Select the date range you would like to sync to Sentral, Schools usually prefers a 2 weeks, term or whole year based date range.

Create support log file

Ticking this box will create a log file once sync is completed. The log file will be opened automatically in your desktop and as well saved in the folder where your timetable file is located. The file name would be debug.txt. The log file will assist Tes specialist to diagnose the issue if there is any problem with syncing. Please read here on what to provide to Tes to assist in troubleshooting the issue.

Tes Timetable Rotations

Select the rotation you want to sync to Sentral.

Check course codes

Click this button to see if there is any confusion over course code that Sentral might not support. Sentral only takes the course code into consideration and not the class identifier so if if you have two similar course codes, but different subject names, then Sentral will pick one of the subject names for both course codes. e.g. if you have class codes 11AHI.H1 (History), 11AHI.S2 (Ancient History) with the same code of AHI, Sentral will pick randomly one of the course names and assign it to both.

Advanced Sync

Advanced sync is used to publish specific parts of your data to Sentral. An Advanced sync also allows you to download rooms and teachers from Sentral, and publish bell times to Sentral.

To perform an Advanced sync:

Go to File > Synchronise > Sync Now, and select the ‘Advanced’ sub-tab
Ensure “Sentral” is selected from the dropdown in the top-right corner
Select which data you which to sync with Sentral
Input the date range you wish to update the Sentral data in and select the rotation you wish to sync
Click “Go” to sync

Options	Details
Download Rooms	This will download room information such as room code
Download Students	This will download students from Sentral. (Note: Students will move to year levels based on what is sent from Sentral)
Create new years (If new in download students)	This will create new year levels if they do not exist when students are downloaded from Sentral
Download Teachers	Download Staff from Sentral. (Note: Sentral sends all staff, not just permanent teachers. You will need to delete all non-teachers)
Publish Classes	Pushes Class data to Sentral
Publish Class list	Pushes Class list data/Class memberships to Sentral
Publish Timetable	Pushes Timetable data to Sentral. (Note: Only sync option that uses the date range)
Publish Bell times	Pushes Grid structure to Sentral
Date Range	From and To date for data to be applied to. (Note: Only used for 'Publish Timetable' option.
Create support log file	Ticking this box will create a log file once sync is completed. The log file will be opened automatically in your desktop and as well saved in the folder where your timetable file is located. The file name would be debug.txt. The log file will assist Tes specialist to diagnose the issue if there is any problem with syncing. Please read here on what to provide to Tes to assist in troubleshooting the issue.
Tes Timetable Rotations	Which rotation is sent to Sentral

If you are not downloading anything from other system and only syncing then the preferred method is to sync all the options on right panel that syncs the data from Tes to Sentral.

Data matching screen in Tes Timetable

The data matching between two systems happening if a basic sync is done or if you tick downloading data from other system to Tes in Advanced sync.

Depending on the data mismatch you will see individual screen on each data type you are downloading. In here you will see matching screens for rooms, students and teachers.

Download Rooms:

The screen displayed here will show the list of rooms that exist in Tes but does not in other system. You have the option to delete them or keep them.

Download Students:

If you have this option ticked in Advanced Sync or you perform a basic sync and there is a mismatch then you will get the following matching screen.

Options	Details
Open action log	This will open all the mismatching data in the log format which will then allow you to copy to clipboard or even comparing with 'Show old logs' from previous syncs.
Help	This will open the help window that will explain the matching between two systems
Delete from Timetable file	This will allow user to delete any data from Timetable file if it does not exist in other system
Match to SIS records (manual match if needed)	This will open the window that will show the Tes record on left column and other system on right column where it allows you to drag the data to match between two systems. Remember if any data is not matched and you click on 'Done" it will inactivate the data in Tes.
Mark as inactive	This will inactive the students in Tes that does not match with other system
Leave them as is for now	This will not match up the data but will download the new data from other system. In Tes both old and new will be kept.

Download Teachers:

The matching screen will allow you to drag and match teachers between Tes and other system, if there is an unmatched data left and you click on Done then you will get the message to delete or leave it as it is. This means it will downloaded the new ones but also leave the existing unmatched ones in Tes.

Step 4 Sentral Side:

Confirm by checking the other system if data has been received or if any error appearing. Depending on the system they might have activity log or sync history that will indicate what has been received from Tes.

In Sentral, the timetable screen on the left panel has the information when Tes was synced with what version plus the publishing detail.

The publish detail only contains what type of data has been received, it does not state the specific data synced.

The 'get call' section underneath in publish detail will only get updated if download data option is ticked from Sentral to Tes in Tes > Advanced Sync

Troubleshooting

A ‘Invalid username or password supplied’ message appears in Tes after ‘Test Connection’.

Check the username and password supplied by Sentral.

Error message 'We received a blank response from'

The url entered in server address is incorrect

I am trying to sync my Tes Timetable file multigrid file but I don't see the two grid structures in Sentral populated and neither I see the two campuses in teacher's timetable/PxP

The two grid structures need to be setup first in Sentral in order to see the two grids and campuses.

This can be done under Setup PxP > Timetable/Period Setup and click on 'Import from Timetable' at the right bottom section.

There is a class that I do see it in Sentral > Timetable screen but is not appearing in PxP

One of the areas to check is to make sure the class is not disabled under Setup PxP > Disabled Classes

How do I exclude a class from appearing in my PxP?

You can disable the class under Setup PxP > Disabled Classes

Some of the teachers are either not appearing in Sentral timetable or appears as inactive

There could be several reasons to this:

Make sure the class assigned to teacher is timetabled
The teacher is not yet enrolled in Sentral. Check Teacher's enrolment profile and confirm if it is active there. Tes is not the source of truth for Teachers, Students and Rooms. These type of data must exist first in other system in order to be accepted when synced from Tes.
There might be a confusion over the name or teacher code which may have result in creating duplicates in Sentral. There are are mainly two key matching identifiers from Tes to Sentral, the first one is teacher code in Teachers > Teacher data and 2nd one is the Admin ID/Sentral ID column in Teachers> Teacher data, if you don't see the column please tick it under View option. Often adding the teacher's admin ID (OASIS ID) in Admin ID/Sentral ID and syncing it to Sentral will fix the inactive or duplication issue.

How do I import all of my teachers' OASIS ID/AdminID into Tes Timetable > Teachers > Teachers Data > Admin ID column

There is an automated way where you can tick 'download teachers' under Advanced sync in Tes Timetable file, This will try to match up the data between Tes & Sentral and will also download the Admin IDs
You can manually type in the teacher's OASIS ID in Admin column

Where do I find the teacher's AdminID (Sentral ID) in Sentral?

In Sentral, the 'Admin ID' is the staff member's 'External ID'. This can be found via 'Setup > Administration Data > Staff'.

Error message 'I/O:PKIX path validation...CertPah..failed'

This error is caused by expired certificate issue on school's or Sentral's end. Please contact your school's IT administrator.

This is generally SSL certificate issue where school is unable to connect to Sentral server.

Everytime a sync is done, the students are moved automatically from their own custom year levels back to the academic year levels.

Sentral is the source of truth for any student information including the academic year, if the year level does not match with what student is enrolled under then it will force Tes to revert and move students to their own academic year levels. This usually happens if school performs a basic sync to Sentral which also matches the data between two systems. In order to stop Sentral moving students in Tes, You will have to only do an advanced sync and tick the boxes from Tes to Sentral.