User Group Meeting 2022

This year we are again back to the more traditional format of the UGM with two days of plenary sessions, split sessions, lots of networking opportunities – and of course fun! Some of which is now also available online and this is where you get an overview:

After the in-person meet and greet Monday morning, we start with the welcome plenary session, followed by the split sessions and finally the in-person dinner and night out.

Welcome and introduction, and presentation of new features in ASIMUT:

This pilot session will break new ground by bringing together project management- and ASIMUT training, in an integrated approach. It will be co-hosted by Keld Hosbond, Vice Principal of the Royal Academy of Music, Aarhus / Aalborg.

We will focus on operational lessons learnt during the pandemic, share notes for emergency operations, and how to translate all of that into ASIMUT rules and protocols – including your input on best practice and system capabilities we should develop further.

Please note participants will be invited to share their experiences, in c. 100 words, prior to the UGM.

Hosted by: Marc Ernesti, Keenan Linsly and Keld Hosbond, Vice Principal of the Royal Academy of Music Aarhus/Aalborg

The sign-up functionality allows administrators to invite specific groups of students and staff to sign up to participate in selected events like masterclasses and individual tutoring. Individual deadlines may be defined for specific groups and a waiting list may be enabled in case all seats are taken.

The sign-up function in the new Common Interface has been enhanced to give users a better overview of sign-up opportunities and to make the process of signing up easier and more informative.

During this session, we will first go through the functionality both from an administrator’s and from a student’s point of view. Then we will open the floor for a discussion of how this functionality can be used, and how we may improve it further in upcoming releases.

Hosted by: Dennis Jung Møller and John Kjøller

A lesser-known feature of ASIMUT is the ability to set up separate “workspaces” that allow groups of planners to work together creating and editing events in a private workspace that only they can see and access. At a given point in time, these events can be “published” into the main ASIMUT system, where they are visible and editable like normal events. You can set up one or more draft workspaces for the next semester, or your concert office can work on future planning in private, releasing the plan one week at a time.

During the session we will show you in detail how workspaces operate and discuss some examples of how they may be useful. We encourage current users of the functionality to participate and provide feedback.

Finally, we will discuss potential improvements to the feature.

Hosted by: Silvia Bortolotto and Monika Ziegler

Exporting and importing data in ASIMUT is useful, not only for statistics or initial imports and synchronisation. If you need to modify a large number of events, you may save hours by first exporting the events, modifying the export file (i.e., in a spreadsheet programme), and then reimporting the changed events.

This procedure was very useful when COVID struck, since it allowed clients to very quickly convert standard on-site classes to online classes with links to Zoom, Teams, or other video conferencing platforms.

During this session we will go through the process and make sure participants get a full understanding of how it works, what it can do, and what you must watch out for to avoid disaster.

Hosted by: Mads Skovbjerg Paldam and Maarten Vruggink

Some customers have already implemented the new Common Interface while others are still in the process of introducing it. It is a complete redesign of the user experience for students and staff; how they access their agenda, make bookings, and interact with ASIMUT, designed to prioritise convenience and ease of use on smart-phones and tablets.

The new Common Interface is the focus of this UGM, both during the new features presentation and many of the split sessions, which will concentrate on specific aspects like attendance, sign-up etc.

This session will focus on the overall user experience – navigating the menus, agendas, location group overviews as well as the search functionality.

Hosted by: Dennis Jung Møller and John Kjøller

The student registration system (SRS) is a core component of any school’s IT-infrastructure. Essentially, it is the registry of students, enrolment, academic requirements, and progress for every student. Some schools refer to it as the SiS, Campus Management, or by a specific product’s name.

A central task when implementing ASIMUT is to establish a data flow from the SRS to ASIMUT, and to determine how to best use the two systems together.

During this session, we will talk about different ways of organising the processes that involve both the SRS and ASIMUT as well as how the required data flows can be implemented.

Participants are encouraged to share experiences and help qualify future development relevant in this context.

Hosted by: Marc Ernesti and Keenan Linsly

A lesser-known feature of ASIMUT is the ability to set up separate “workspaces” that allow groups of planners to work together creating and editing events in a private workspace that only they can see and access. At a given point in time, these events can be “published” into the main ASIMUT system, where they are visible and editable like normal events. You can set up one or more draft workspaces for the next semester, or your concert office can work on future planning in private, releasing the plan one week at a time.

During the session we will show you in detail how workspaces operate and discuss some examples of how they may be useful. We encourage current users of the functionality to participate and provide feedback.

Finally, we will discuss potential improvements to the feature.

Hosted by: Silvia Bortolotto and Monika Ziegler

The booking rules limit where and how students and staff are allowed to create events (practice bookings, tutoring, etc.). ASIMUT features a comprehensive set of booking rules, including quotas that limit how much time a user can book and horizons that limit how far ahead a user may book.

During this session, we will recap the possibilities for setting up booking rules to ensure a fair and optimum use of rooms as well as prioritising certain groups of users for certain rooms. We will discuss the pros and cons of different configurations.

After the presentation, we will invite a discussion of how to improve existing possibilities, and we present a proposal for how to make quotas more flexible and able to handle some of the scenarios that, currently, cause difficulties.

Hosted by: Mads Skovbjerg Paldam and Maarten Vruggink

The Advanced Interface has many features that most planners do not require to do their job, but all of them have the potential to save you hours doing specific tasks, or to add flexibility in certain contexts. Some have always been there; some have been added over the years of improving ASIMUT.

In this session we will dive into features that you may have forgotten about or that may have been added since your implementation workshop. Features include slicing events, splitting and merging arrangements, event wizards, smart paste, ad hoc and other person group features, smart event selector, add/copy events, time periods, arrangement views and drag-and-drop.

Mastering ASIMUT by implementing these features in your daily work can save you hours!

Hosted by: Dennis Jung Møller and John Kjøller

The reconfirmation functionality enables workflows where students and faculty make provisional bookings that must be re-confirmed or, otherwise, will be automatically cancelled. Reconfirmation can happen in different ways:

• By swiping a student card at a kiosk in the building.
• By activating an electronic door lock when entering the room.
• By front desk staff when the user collects the room key.
• By an administrator responsible for overseeing bookings.
• By tapping a button that appears on the user’s phone when it is connected to the school’s WIFI.

We will present the functionality, how it may be implemented, and discuss how we can improve it.

Hosted by: Silvia Bortolotto and Monika Ziegler

Being a web application, ASIMUT lends itself very well to integrations. It features a so-called REST API, which is the industry-standard open interface for building integrations. Using this REST API, our customers have built a large number of interesting integrations with other systems, saving time and opening up new possibilities.

Typical systems to integrate with are campus management systems, Electronic Access systems (door locks), and learning management systems.

In this session we will present the API and the possibilities and limitations of integrations. We encourage you to exchange ideas and specific experiences with integrations, and discuss how we can further improve the API.

Hosted by: Marc Ernesti and Keenan Linsly

For many of our customers, an equipment module has long been a missing piece of the puzzle to complete the planning of events. It will allow keeping track of resources like instruments and audio-visual equipment, lending it out to students and staff, or reserving it for events, ensuring its availability. Furthermore, it will allow keeping a maintenance log and efficiently taking stock of inventory at regular intervals.

Last year, we presented the development plan for the first phase of this upcoming module; and we will now present the current status of development and talk about questions that have come up since last year’s session.

Hosted by: Mads Skovbjerg Paldam and Maarten Vruggink

After the morning meet and greet, the second day starts with split sessions, followed by in-person sticky-note vote, the plenary round-up and the traditional final surprise in-person.

One of the primary goals of ASIMUT is to enable collaborative scheduling, i.e., to allow all the people involved in planning the school’s activities to work together in real-time – academic schedulers, staff involved in planning performances, exhibitions etc. and, in addition, to allow faculty and students to take part by planning their own classes, practice etc.

Some of our clients allow faculty to plan both individual tutoring and even most of the academic schedule, while others keep the core planning centralised and only allow students and staff limited booking rights for individual practice bookings.

This session will consider how you can allow students and staff greater freedom to plan their own activities, and we will discuss how we can develop features to better facilitate such an approach.

Hosted by: Mads Skovbjerg Paldam and Maarten Vruggink

For many of our customers, an equipment module has long been a missing piece of the puzzle to complete the planning of events. It will allow keeping track of resources like instruments and audio-visual equipment, lending it out to students and staff, or reserving it for events, ensuring its availability. Furthermore, it will allow keeping a maintenance log and efficiently taking stock of inventory at regular intervals.

Last year, we presented the development plan for the first phase of this upcoming module; and we will now present the current status of development and talk about questions that have come up since last year’s session.

Hosted by: Dennis Jung Møller and John Kjøller

The sign-up functionality allows administrators to invite specific groups of students and staff to sign up to participate in selected events like masterclasses and individual tutoring. Individual deadlines may be defined for specific groups and a waiting list may be enabled in case all seats are taken.

The sign-up function in the new Common Interface has been enhanced to give users a better overview of sign-up opportunities and to make the process of signing up easier and more informative.

During this session, we will first go through the functionality both from an administrator’s and from a student’s point of view. Then we will open the floor for a discussion of how this functionality can be used, and how we may improve it further in upcoming releases.

Hosted by: Marc Ernesti and Keenan Linsly

The Advanced Interface has many features that most planners do not require to do their job, but all of them have the potential to save you hours doing specific tasks, or to add flexibility in certain contexts. Some have always been there; some have been added over the years of improving ASIMUT.

In this session we will dive into features that you may have forgotten about or that may have been added since your implementation workshop. Features include slicing events, splitting and merging arrangements, event wizards, smart paste, ad hoc and other person group features, smart event selector, add/copy events, time periods, arrangement views and drag-and-drop.

Mastering ASIMUT by implementing these features in your daily work can save you hours!

Hosted by: Silvia Bortolotto and Monika Ziegler

Exporting and importing data in ASIMUT is useful, not only for statistics or initial imports and synchronisation. If you need to modify a large number of events, you may save hours by first exporting the events, modifying the export file (i.e., in a spreadsheet programme), and then reimporting the changed events.

This procedure was very useful when COVID struck, since it allowed clients to very quickly convert standard on-site classes to online classes with links to Zoom, Teams, or other video conferencing platforms.

During this session we will go through the process and make sure participants get a full understanding of how it works, what it can do, and what you must watch out for to avoid disaster.

Hosted by: Marc Ernesti and Keenan Linsly

One of the primary goals of ASIMUT is to enable collaborative scheduling, i.e., to allow all the people involved in planning the school’s activities to work together in real-time – academic schedulers, staff involved in planning performances, exhibitions etc. and, in addition, to allow faculty and students to take part by planning their own classes, practice etc.

Some of our clients allow faculty to plan both individual tutoring and even most of the academic schedule, while others keep the core planning centralised and only allow students and staff limited booking rights for individual practice bookings.

This session will consider how you can allow students and staff greater freedom to plan their own activities, and we will discuss how we can develop features to better facilitate such an approach.

Hosted by: Mads Skovbjerg Paldam and Maarten Vruggink

Taking attendance and self-reporting absence are functionalities that have existed in ASIMUT for years as an optional module used by many of our customers.

Both functionalities are now available in the new Common Interface. Especially the interface for reporting attendance has been restructured and improved, not least thanks to the feedback we have received at previous User Group Meetings.

During this session we will present the new interfaces and discuss how they can be further improved.

We will also show a new feature that we are developing and testing with the Guildhall School, which enables students to report themselves present by touching their student card to a device installed at the entrance of the classroom or lecture hall.

Hosted by: Silvia Bortolotto and Monika Ziegler

Some customers have already implemented the new Common Interface while others are still in the process of introducing it. It is a complete redesign of the user experience for students and staff; how they access their agenda, make bookings, and interact with ASIMUT, designed to prioritise convenience and ease of use on smart-phones and tablets.

The new Common Interface is the focus of this UGM, both during the new features presentation and many of the split sessions, which will concentrate on specific aspects like attendance, sign-up etc.

This session will focus on the overall user experience – navigating the menus, agendas, location group overviews as well as the search functionality.

Hosted by: Dennis Jung Møller and John Kjøller

We end the UGM with the in-person sticky-note vote and the Round-Up session: