Configuring the RISC Preferences File
The Preferences settings for RISC are defined in the Preferences option in the Configure menu using the RISC Admin program. These settings are used to setup the default configuration for RISC. When selected, a help screen is displayed explaining what the function does. Click OK on the help message and the Preferences screen shown below will be displayed:
The first time the Preferences screen is displayed after installation, several items should be blank - Short Name, RISC Passwords and Confidentiality Status. Each of the items in the Preferences screen is described below:
Your School Name:
This field contains the name of the registered user (normally the school's name) that was defined in the installation process. If a typographic error was made during installation or if the school's name changes, this field can be edited as necessary.
Please remember that copyright law protects RISC and copies MUST not be made and given to others.
Short Name:
This field is used to define an abbreviated name for your school and should be kept to less than seven (7) characters. For example, if your school name is New York Girls High School, then put
NYGHS as the Short Name. The Short Name is used on reports and student contact forms.
RISC Security Levels and Passwords:
This section of
this screen defines the passwords for the four different user
security levels now included with RISC v9. Previously, RISC only
relied upon the Network Security privileges applied by your server.
Now, in addition to that security, RISC provides its own and
rather than implementing the complexity of individual usernames and
passwords for every staff member at your school, RISC v9 opts for
group passwords, with the four security groups being:
- RISC Administrator: Full access to all aspects of RISC, including configuration and admin tools. However, cannot view Confidential incident records in RISC
- RISC Executive: Same access level as RISC Editor, but can also open and view incident records marked as Confidential
- RISC Editor: A normal user that can enter and change incident data into the RISC system, but cannot change settings or open incidents marked as Confidential
- RISC Viewer: A read-only viewer of existing non-confidential RISC data. Cannot enter new records nor change existing ones.
Basically, each security group has its own password for opening and accessing RISC, and depending on which password was used to open RISC, different software privileges are applied. We STRONGLY recommend that you set passwords for each of the four Security Levels when configuring RISC and only provide the appropriate level password to each prospective user of RISC. If you choose to leave these passwords blank, you will not be prompted for any password to open RISC.
RISC Program Path:
This is automatically entered in the Preferences screen as the path where RISC was installed during the installation process. Do NOT change this unless the LAN Systems Administrator wishes to move RISC to another path on the server. You
MUST either specify a drive letter as part of this path, or use a
UNC path.
RISC Data Path:
Is automatically entered in the Preferences screen as a \DATA folder under the path where RISC was installed to during the installation process. Do NOT change this unless the LAN System Administrator wishes to move RISC or the data files to another path on the server. While the Data path is fixed during installation, it can be moved to another path, even onto another drive if desired. You
MUST specify a drive letter as part of this path, or use a UNC
path.
Temporary Files Path:
RISC creates Temporary Files when searching through the Contacts database for specified criteria and when selecting and printing Form Letters. It is very important in a multiple user situation that each user has a unique path to store temporary files.
By default, RISC will user the normal Windows Temporary Files Path set
for each user, but if that path is not available for any reason, RISC
will revert to this set path as an alternative location to store
temporary files. The path set here should be unique to the user - eg. on
the local hard disk or in the user's home folder.
RISC Confidentiality:
RISC has the ability to mark certain contacts as ‘Confidential’. The details of these contacts can only be viewed by staff who know the
Executive (Confidentiality) Password. See
the Help Desk webpage on RISC Confidentiality.
The default setting for Confidentiality Status in RISC is Off. This means that all contact records are available to all users and no contacts can be marked Confidential. To turn on Confidentiality, click on the Confidentiality Status field to toggle it from Off to On
(and vice versa).
User-Defined Field Names:
RISC contains eight user-definable field names to make the system very flexible. For example, the field named ‘Contact Status’ could be used to define the status of individual contacts, or can be completely redefined to be ‘Location’ if it is felt that this definition would be of better use. Each of the
eight user-definable field names is described below. Be sure to place a colon
immediately after each defined field name.
Name Field:
This field refers to the name of the individual student with whom contact is made. The field title ‘Name:’ could be replaced with ‘Student:’ if desired. No more than 12 characters should be used for the Name field.
Imported Student
Database?:
Can be set to either True or False. If you exported student data from your
school’s administration system and imported it into RISC, this will be
set to ‘True’ (enabled). If set to True, RISC will use the files
STUDBASE.DAT and STUDBASE.NDX for student data which includes student
name, parent/guardian contact, home phone number, address details,
grade/year and roll class/homeroom. If set to ‘False’ RISC will use the
Student List file called STUDLIST.DAT that contains only student names.
Student List is NOT recommended. Clicking on the field will
alternate between True and False.
Contact Category Field:
RISC offers five definable fields for classifying individual student contacts (Category, Type,
Category 2, Type 2 and Status). You may wish to define the Contact Category Field as ‘Subject or
Location:’ to allow for statistics to be calculated by these groupings.
Contact Type Field:
This field name is restricted to 13 characters, so it is best left set as ‘Incident Type:’ or ‘Infraction:’.
Contact Category 2 Field:
This field name defaults to 'Action Type:', so it can be used to keep
track of what was done regarding each contact (incident).
Contact Type 2 Field:
This field name defaults to 'Motivation:', so it can be used to keep
track of the reason or motivation for each incident recorded.
Contact Status Field:
You may wish to define the Contact Status Field as ‘Status:’ to allow for
easy retrieval of contacts marked 'Complete' or still 'Incomplete' or
'Pending'.
Contact Description Field:
This field is normally used to describe the individual student contact. The default field name is ‘Contact Description:’, but can be changed to ‘Description of Contact:’ or even ‘Description of Individual Student Contact:’.
Contact Action Field:
This field is normally used to describe the result, action or solution to an individual student contact. The default name is ‘Contact Action:’, but can be changed as desired.
RISC Alert Tab No. 1 & 2:
The RISC Student Alerts and Notes are "stickies" attached to each student
that contain two tabs of information. These tabs can be renamed if
desired, but by default are set to 'Alerts' and 'Notes'.
More information about this can be found
on the RISC Alerts page. Alert Tab No. 3
cannot be changed. By default it is named "Levels" and is linked to the
RISC Student Levels sub-system.
Saving Preferences:
Once you have filled out the Preferences form as desired, click the Save button to write the settings to the RISC.INI file. If there are any problems with the settings entered, a message box will appear alerting you to the specific problem. After successfully saving the Preferences, you will be returned to the RISC Admin main menu.
Quitting Without Saving Preferences:
If you do not wish to save the changes to the settings in the Preferences form, click the Cancel button and then click the Yes button to quit. After quitting the Preferences form, you will be returned to the RISC Admin main menu.
Back to Preferences
Screen
The Register of
Individual Student Contact (RISC) is developed & distributed
by Marillion Designs.
Copyright © 1995-2010 Marillion Designs. All rights reserved.
Information in this document is subject to change without notice.
Other products and companies referred to herein are trademarks
or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
