First, check that you have not installed the server setup and the client setup from the same machine. If you have, this could cause the program to hang. If this is the case, please try uninstalling both the server and client setups for eSongbirds and reinstalling the server setup on the physical server machine, then the client setup on the client machine and see if this fixes the problem. If this doesn't resolve the issue, please read on. The hanging 'Loading' screen is a known issue with eSongbirds that affects a small number of users. We are still looking into the causes of this issue with the company who developed eSongbirds and would like to know how many customers have been affected. If you have experienced this problem, please contact our Technical Support line on (01865) 353374 to let us know and leave your contact details so that we can get in touch with you when we find a solution. We believe that the issue may be caused by either server security settings or by a conflict between eSongbirds and another program running another version of Apache PHP or another version of Java Runtime Environment. It may be worth investigating these possibilities further with your network administrator. Neither we, nor the developers, nor an independent software testing house have been able to replicate this problem in a testing environment, so if you are able to make any progress in finding out what is causing eSongbirds to hang on your network, we would appreciate your feedback, as this may help to solve the problem for others. This issue does not occur when using the standalone version of eSongbirds, so you should still be able to use eSongbirds on standalone machines, but you will not be able to hold the data on a central server. However, we recognise that this solution may not be suitable for all customers, and would be happy to offer you a refund if you prefer, please contact Customer Service on (01536) 741171.
We have created a questionnaire about your server and how you're using eSongbirds. We would be very grateful if you could fill this in with details of your server setup to help us to work out if there are any common factors with schools experiencing this problem. Please email your completed questionnaire to edtechsupport@oup.com. Thank you in advance for your assistance.
Download Questionnaire
Due to the way it is built, eSongbirds does not have an MSI installer. However, it can be installed on an RM CC3 network by following these steps:
- Instal eSongbirds > Network > Server on the server machine by the following the user instructions on the installation wizards.
- Open the package builder on a clean machine, click on Build Package and create the first screen shot.
- When asked for the location of the exe to launch, navigate to the eSongbirds CD and select setup.exe.
- Install eSongbirds > Network > Client by following the user instructions on the installation wizard. Ensure you have the correct IP address of the server computer from step 1. To find the system IP, open a DOS prompt, click Run, type CMD, and then type IPCONFIG
- Take the final snapshot and finish the package-building process.
- Allocate the package to workstations as normal, ensuring that you manually put the shortcut on machines.
By default all students have the default user type Standard on RM networks. You cannot change any security settings in this user type (it is read-only for safety reasons and cannot be modified). However, you can create a new user type and assign the students to this user type by following these steps:
- Go to the management console > configuration settings > user types.
- Right click on standard and select copy user type'
- Give the new account a name (e.g. Oxford)
- Double-click on Oxford�and select Software restrictions in category.
- Either uncheck Disable the command prompt, or keep this checked but change the value from Disable the command prompting processing also to no.
- Assign the students you want to use the eSongbirds application to the user type 'Oxford'.
- The application should now work for users with student rights.
There was an error with the minimum system requirements printed on the back cover of the first run of eSongbirds CD-ROMs, which showed Windows 98 as a supported operating system. eSongbirds was designed to run on Windows 2000 and Windows XP, but not on Windows 98. This error on the packaging will be corrected with the next print run. If you only want to use eSongbirds on a machine running Windows 98 and therefore cannot use the product at all, please contact Customer Service.
A: eSongbirds version 1.0 CD-ROMs should be uninstalled using the program�s uninstaller files, available from the location to which you installed the program (the default location is C:\Program Files\OUP\eSongbirds\CD1 or CD2 or CD3). Go into the _uninst folder and double click on uninstaller.exe to run the uninstaller. Repeat this for each CD you want to uninstall. You will need to reboot the system once you have finished uninstalling the CDs.
You can uninstall the Firebird database using Add/Remove Programs however, please be aware that if you remove the Firebird database you will also lose all of your eSongbirds pupil data (classes, pupil names, results).
Version 2.0 eSongbirds CD-ROMs can be uninstalled directly from Add/Remove Programs.
A: We have developed a web service version of eSongbirds, which is now available. This will keep eSongbirds running on to the server at all times without you having to keep the server logged on or restart the server app whenever you shut the server down. Please contact Technical Support if you would like a copy of the web service version to replace your current eSongbirds CD-ROMs (you will need to uninstall eSongbirds and then reinstall it using the replacement CD-ROM). The web service version will be printed as version 2.0 and will be available shortly to replace the application version (1.0).
