Command Solutions

What are the basic hardware requirements?

Operating System: Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7 Professional
Processor: 1.4GHz or higher
Memory: 4GB

Recommended Hardware Requirements

Operating System: Windows Server 2012 R2 64bit
Processor: 2.0GHz or higher
Memory: 6GB or more

Required Third-Party Software

The CompStat Dashboard requires the use of the following third-party software:

Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) 5.1 or higher
Microsoft SQL Server Express (MSSQL) 2008 or higher
Microsoft .Net Framework (.Net) 3.5 and 4.5.

In regards to the system requirement to run the dashboard program, we are using Microsoft SQL Server 2005 on our local PD Server. Is that ok or do we need to upgrade to another version of Microsoft SQL Server?

SQL Server 2005 hit end-of-life with Microsoft in April of 2016. As such, SQL Server 2005 and previous versions are not supported. SQL Server 2008 is the earliest version supported and has been tested on all versions of SQL Server after 2008.

If your department does not already own SQL Server, we can install Microsoft SQL Express instead. This will allow us to run the application without requiring further licensing costs for the database. We can also run the CompStat Dashboard on a virtual machine if you do not have a server to dedicate to the dashboard (so long as the VM stays up).

"I will need to provision a fresh virtual server for this purpose. What operating system does your software will work best with?"

The CompStat Dashboard is a web application. Therefore, anything that IIS and SQL Server work on will work for us as well. We recommend agencies use Windows Server 2012 or Server 2008. Previous versions of Windows are not supported due to end-of-life concerns.

"How much disk space and RAM would be optimum for this server?"

The hardware requirements are mainly for SQL Server and the OS. The dashboard itself only uses around 200 megs of disk space for the database files. For memory, 4 gigs is a safe number. Systems which are low on resources will continue to work in most cases, however the different pages in the application will be slow to load.

"What are the steps for the install process?"

Once the server is set up, we do the following:

• Login via VPN/RDP or via a remote session using Goto Meeting
• Download the files from an FTP site, or if that is not available, an HTTP connection
• Unzip the web portion to an installation folder
• Install SQL Server Express
• Verify IIS is running and configure it
• Configure both the web portion and SQL Server
• Pull data in from Spillman to the CompStat Dashboard warehouse

"What happens after the program is installed?"

Once the program is installed, a time will be scheduled with the user to demonstrate how to setup the program. The categories, locations, department badge and other settings will also be discussed. After the program has been setup, a time will be scheduled to train those that will be using the dashboard.

Will you be doing the software install and configuration remotely? Or will you be on site?

We install remotely. Installation takes about 1.5 hours if we don't have any issues. We prefer to install via Remote Desktop but can also install via Goto Meeting. If you're not familiar with Goto Meeting, it requires someone to login on the server and then connect to a URL.

Once connected, you can monitor the progress of the install. The main disadvantage of Goto Meeting is finding a meeting time to do the install, as well as setting up times to perform upgrades or address issues which may arrise. With a Remote Desktop, we can install as soon as the connection is up, and if there are problems in the future, you can just re-enable the connection.

Which version of SQL Express is preferred?

The version of SQL Server Express we install is dependant on the OS. For Server 2008, we install SQL Server 2008. For newer versions of Windows, we install more current versions of SQL Server.