Addison UK Server Roadshow for Schools

NeTraverse writes "Addison UK is doing a Linux server roadshow demonstrating Linux at schools throughout the UK. This is a easy way for schools to see how Linux could be implimented in their school. Nice resource for those schools thinking about becoming enlightened. They are demonstating thin client computing using Linux and Windows-to-Linux migration software WinLin Terminal Server from NeTraverse..."

Comments

It's About Time

[tomakaan]

I'm suprised there hasn't been this sort of "push" before. Why should money be wasted on Microsoft licenses when it could be spend on something more useful? Maybe even education.

I think using *nix is something that needs to be more forcefully sugested to schools, especially with the current financial situation most schools are being placed in (at least in Michigan). You drop Windows, Novell, and expensive website solutions, and convert to open source ones and you're gonna save a heck of a lot of money.

Future OS users are now playing games

[jabbadabbadoo]

Microsoft has grown large because kids started on Microsoft OS's, playing games, doing fun stuff.

So when they grew up, they knew the ins and outs of their favorite Windows OS.

The point? If Linux is to grow big, focus on making it a great gaming platform. Todays gamers are tomorrows professional users.

Re:Future OS users are now playing games

[Realistic_Dragon]

No, it's because of the teachers - generally their skills were seriously eroded when Windows came along and it was standardised for staff rooms.

My mother used to be able to write BBC Basic (no major feat, i'll grant) with no real problems, and the BBC masters in her classroom were well used by the kids. All of them were perfectly happy with the command line and loved messing around with the things.

Now she is a WinXP user (after several versions) and has panick attacks over having to install stuff - years of experience have taught her that it can easly make stuff break. She thinks the Linux command line is scary and unusable. The kids in the class write the odd dcument in word and play a few shitty little games. No chance of them writing their own.

Windows degrades computing skill like nothing else - new users and kids should be made to use a fun, tweakable, stable platform which requires you to pick up a few things about programming (that are easy to learn for large returns, like BBC Basic) to get the most out of it.

I got my early education, like programmers most I suspect, hacking around with simple computers that could do little unless you wrote it yourself. How are this generation going to lean those skills with Microsoft dumbing down the computing experience at every opportunity?

Re:Thin client using Linux...

[sould]

With the Windows License (EULA) is there any cost benefit in using Linux as a thin client?

The winlin link from the article mentions quite a few cost benefits:

...reducing costs and increasing productivity by migrating to a more reliable, cost-effective and high-performance computing platform...

...ensures the significant cost savings necessary to reduce the Total Cost of Ownership of desktop management...

shrug. Adspeak.

More importantly (and they also mention this) - you can use it to ease your users from (expensive) windows to (cheap) linux.

We evaluated Citrix and discovered the opposite.

Citrix doesn't give you the wealth of linux tools + an eventual end to windependence.

I see two problems....

[madmarcel]

(Without reading the article - as usual ;)

I'll assume they're going to visit high schools and primary schools...

This is a good idea...but:

I see (at least) three problems:

(I'm going to get flamed to a crisp for this :^o

1) From (my own humble) experience...the teacher who takes the 'computer class' at high school is not necessarily a very experienced computer-user. He is usually a random teacher who was sent to a course to learn about computers, someone else set up the network for him, that is all he knows.
More often than not his students know more about the computers they are using than the teacher.
(Ah, sweet memories...Anyone here who did NOT hack the high-school computer network? ;)

Now it's stupid of me to generalize like this, but I don't see the average teacher installing linux just like that without help. I'm not saying that teachers are stupid - just lacking experience perhaps - and no, not all schools have an IT department. (OTOH Usually there's a 'whiz'kid around, who's more than glad to help...)

2) Don't Micro$oft and Apple sponsor schools and
give them free computers? Do they still do that?
(The obvious idea is: Get the kids to use your
software and computers in school --> they'll want to use them at home and later at work as well --> more customers)
How do you convince the schools to switch to linux (and potentially miss out on future freebies?)

3) See 2, the kids (and parents - the ones who pay the bills) will want what 'everybody else' uses. Experience with $%#% Word etc is perceived as being essential for getting a job. OpenOffice? Hmmm...don't think so.

Of course it's not all bad....
Obvious advantages (for a school)

- Linux is cheap.
- Linux is secure.
(And it will be placed in an environment where
its security-model will get thoroughly tested ;)
- By 'exposing' kids to linux earlier we can increase it's acceptance. (see 2)
- Will run on older hardware (schools have limited budgets)

</rant>

Microsoft UK education

[pubjames]

I used to work for a large educational organisation in the UK. Microsoft wanted to work with us on their stand at BETT, which is a big education fair in the UK. I met with the Microsoft people and they explained what they wanted - basically educationalists from the organisation I worked for to do various demonstrations using MS software showing how it could be used in schools. We would get a load of free software in return.

I raised the point that I thought that the demonstrations they were suggesting were not very educational and poorly designed. I was amazed at the response I got from them. They basically said they didn't care if they weren't educational. They were just there to get schools to buy MS software and to try to get the maximum profit from schools. They actually said that, bare faced. I couldn't believe it - at least they could have pretended to be a bit interested in the educational aspect.

And before some of you respond "they're a business, what do you expect, it's only about profit" etc... I have worked with various companies before on joint projects between industry and education and most of them have been great - really helpful, genuinely interested, really wanting to do something to help educational organisations. IBM were great on one project for instance, and they didn't try to milk it for publicity either. That day with Microsoft I felt I'd really seen into the heart of the beast, and it's not pleasant.

No useful learning is OS dependant

[Ebony Run]

Kids can learn important computer skills on ANY operating system. Schools should be using Linux cause it allows them to put money back into other educational programs, like arts -- not because of some fancy road show, and certainly not because it can run Windows apps.

Re: is this really needed ?

[Cochonou]

Well, there might no point in "enforcing" several operating systems early in life.
Every people will have to deal with different languages in his life, but how many people on the whole will have to use linux ? Unless (and sometimes even if...) you're working in the IT or do scientific research, chances are that you'll never have to deal with linux.
So I believe that learning unix-like OSes should be a personal choice. Most people are happy using MS Word, and thus I don't see myself anytime soon praising the benefits of early "latex editing in emacs" learning.

I'd rather see me children (which I don't have yet...) learn italian than linux early in life.

Parent is a troll

[alpharoid]

But I'll bite. :)

This isn't college. Kids will only learn the basic usability issues that'll get them ready for "real" CS courses -- provided they even want to go that way.

By learning through Linux, they'll probably be one step ahead of the students bound to Windows. As a general rule, those familiar with Linux have no problem running Windows. The opposite is so not true.

An opportunity here...

[Snart Barfunz]

'I believe that children are the future' or some such sap. Schools have boards of governors who are parents, that have influence over what the school does. Schools' IT budgets come from our taxes. So, isn't there some scope for an advocacy groups of IT-savvy parents to push Linux in schools through becoming governors or lobbying them, providing voluntary assistance, and identifying preferred suppliers?

Re:This is NOT a good idea

[Eric Ass Raymond]

I fully agree.

It's kind of sad how some people insist that software should be chosen on some lofty ideological principles instead of acknowledging the cold, hard reality that MS Windows and Office are and will be the de facto standards in business worldwide for the decades to come.

Sure open source has its uses like the success of Apache and Linux in the server markets shows. However, most kids will not end up as system administrators but office workers who will only do word processing and spreadsheets. It is essential to get them familiarized with the standard tools of the trade at the earliest opportunity.

In contrast, those kids who end up as professional IT workers will always have the curiosity and skill to learn the more esoteric things like altenrative operating systems and other by themselves. There is no need to waste society's resources on trying to teach these difficult subjects to everyone.

Linux and learning

[pen]

Linux is a really good operating system to run in a learning environment, since a lot of tasks require the user to learn something about the software and hardware*. I think a nice after-school program (or even a week or two of a computer class in high school) would be just putting together and configuring a Linux box.

That being said, I think that "word processing" computers should remain Mac OS or Windows.

*Today, this is only true of some distributions.

Re:This is NOT a good idea

[minus9]

"acknowledging the cold, hard reality that MS Windows and Office are and will be the de facto standards in business worldwide for the decades to come."

I don't remember what the de facto standard was when I was at school. It certainly wasn't the same as it is now. Technology changes constantly, that is its nature.

Children need to be learn general principles not how to use Microsoft Office 2000 SP2.

Re:This is NOT a good idea

[Shimbo]

It's kind of sad how some people insist that software should be chosen on some lofty ideological principles instead of acknowledging the cold, hard reality that MS Windows and Office are and will be the de facto standards in business worldwide for the decades to come

Get real! Decades from now, computing is going to be nothing like today. The whole of the life of the NT family spans just over one decade. Two decades ago would you have backed MS against IBM - I think not.

I'm no Linux zealot but it's noticable that OpenOffice is making strong growth. I wouldn't dream of trying to predict beyond the next ten years but I'd give 50/50 that OpenOffice will be bigger than MS Office in 5. Even died in the wool MS types at work are looking seriously at OpenOffice, and that's only the 1.0 release.

Re:Thin client using Linux...

[Arker]

Proprietary software one can use to wean yourself off proprietary software. Hmm.

Methadone for your computer eh?

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

The best way to get linux into schools...

[TyrranzzX]

Is to build, configure, test, and give them 1-2 machines running linux and offer to support it (the 1 machine) for them, as well as providing texts for their IT department.

Most schools need computers bad, and if you donate an internet computer or 2 to them on the basis they keep linux on it to setup on their network, they'll most likely be happy as hamsters to accept. Just make sure to give them boxes and lisencing, they like boxes and lisencing as most schools are paranoid about these things.

Re:now lets hope that they will 'get it'

[fitten]

Again, IMO, focusing on the OS is the wrong thing. Do you spend more time worrying/fiddling with the OS that is inside your car or simply using your car? Do you have to dork with the OS that is in your cell phone or do you just use the cell phone?

IMO, if you are spending time worried about your OS, you are wasting time. The applications are what matter. Most folks don't care what OS they are running but are more concerned with it being familiar and not getting in the way of doing their work (at this time, I've found my Windows boxes to be as stable as my Linux boxes - seeing about the same number of kernel panics as I have seen Windows box crashes in the past year). Being able to pick up a new (to you) application and getting something done within a few minutes of installing the thing is important. Becoming a wizard at the app can take a long time but being able to do simple things real fast is important. In this regard, I still rate OSS apps behind Windows behind Apple.

Consistency is very important. I can't tell you the number of times I've run some new OSS app and had difficulty getting it to do anything and eventually leaving the app because of it. To make it even more funny, the Exit menu option (not the close window box) isn't even in a consistent place. It's almost as if every tool (as in wrenches, saws, etc.) manufacturer made their own unique tools. You'd be able to use Craftsman wrenches to work on your car engine after spending time figuring them out. However, switching to Snap-On tools would cause many delays because you have to figure out how to use the thing before you can get any work done at all.

As far as configurability and such, I gave up on that a long time ago. I use the defaults for the window managers that I use. Years ago I realized how much time I wasted dorking with custom configuration stuff only to confound anyone who was sitting down using my configuration trying to show me something or me sitting down with their custom setting trying to do something. Consistency is good from both the OS and from applications (and across applications). Many OSS apps I've seen seem to have interfaces designed by either engineers who simply wanted the options available somewhere and didn't care where, just add to the end of the menu or by folks who seem to want to show off that they can do better than anyone else with their own bizarro interface. Spare me and stop wasting my time. Make it easy to use and consistent with other apps so I don't have to spend 3 minutes (out of spite) trying to find the menu option that exits the program.

Re:This won't be taken up in any quantity

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you even get the point of what these guys are trying to do? They are trojan horsing Linux into the system by offering the provision of Windows applications on Linux - ergo cheaper than on Windows servers. And in the meantime, the schools will now have Linux in-house and can expand the use and familiarity. The Win4Lin system does not exclude remote displaying Linux apps to the desktop, it only adds Windows apps - and in the UK, Microsoft has total monopoly on education software. There is no other way to get Linux in wide use in the schools unless you start by having Linux run the mandatory Windows applications.