Untis Timetable integration
Untis Timetable
“You and your team are super STARS! Thank you. This new feature is going to save us a lot of time,”
Francina Oliver, IT Manager, Deutsche Schule Internationale, Johannesburg (DSJ).
Efficiency rules
Untis has many feautures not available from other timetable softwares.
Key to DSJ’s requirement was to use the special ability of Untis to configure ‘efficiency rules’ such as timetabling a temporary staff member’s time to the maximum whilst taking into account their personal availability, such as a long journey time to school and days in the week when not available.
German International Schools
Many German International Schools have to meet German legislation for teachers which Units accomplishes.
Engage development staff commented…
Simon Parsons, Lead analyst
“The design was around using the existing import Timetable routine functionality, but allowing the new Untis XML import files to connect and pass timetable data into Engage.
“Engage holds the building blocks for Untis including Rooms, Staff and Classes. Unique import codes are matched and timetables are imported into Engage. Specific data in Engage is back populated at the same time so that there are no validation issues. These include, for example, Timetable Subjects and their frequency, Teacher Allocation and Timetable Room Allocation.”
Simon Whitty, Lead developer
“Using Data supplied by the school, as well as clear, concise communication from the ever-helpful Francina at DSJ, we were able to piece together the structure of the Untis XML Export. With the strong foundation of our existing Timetable importer, the bulk of the work required was to read the data from the XML export, convert it into our internal proprietary structure used within our Timetable import routine. Once this was done, the additional features of validation overrides were added to smooth the process of the import, regardless of the preferred Timetabling partner.”
Andi Savu, Lead Tester
“Testing felt tricky to start with as we worked with this new product (Untis). However we overcame this with in-house advice, expertise, research and a great deal of trial and error! I, too, am also very grateful to Francina Oliver for providing a working import file which allowed us to test against working data in a controlled environment.
“Having the school’s import file actually presented us with a new challenge as the way they build their classes and forms is different from that what we expected. The import was built around grouped forms. Having multiple classes with same name proved limit bending for Engage. However given we had the file we were able to overcome this challenge in due time, thanks to some great ideas and ability to adapt to situations quickly from our Lead Analyst (Simon Parsons) and Lead Developer (Simon Whitty) on this project.”
