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OSS Use Increasing in UK Education Institutions

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the wising-up dept.

zrq writes "OSS Watch has recently concluded its 2006 survey of UK Higher Education and Further Education institutions. From the report conclusion: A positive picture of the use of OSS (Open Source Software) emerges in both HEs (Higher Education institutions) and FEs (Further Education institutions). Although there are considerable differences between the two types of institutions, in general OSS is used more often than in 2003 and institutions have higher levels of skills and experience of OSS compared to 2003. This survey shows that it is likely that, in the future, use of OSS will continue and expand alongside the use of PS (Proprietary Software)."

9 of 118 comments (clear)

  1. Acronyms... by Doches · · Score: 4, Informative

    Why use the acronyms if you're just going to waste further space by defining them? Either use the acronyms, or don't.

    Or, for a change, define them correctly, putting the redundant acronym (RA) after the definition so we can read the summary without those ridiculous stumbling blocks.

    1. Re:Acronyms... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      TA (The Article) GO (goes on) to DNT (define new terms) that might be used for HE purposes, which TCL (the common layman) JWFU (just wont understand).

  2. I could be wrong... by bogaboga · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I could be wrong, but I find that Europeans are more pragmatic than we Americans. Heck they have the following items as better than what we can offer:

    • Better and more capable cell phones,

    • Better television experience,

    • Are way ahead when it comes to stanards, (think about their take on IE and ODF)

    • Seem to be ahead in auto technology,

    • Are way ahead in meeting the Kyoto Protocol goals,

    • Seem to get results when it comes to diplomacy arround the world

    • They were the first to propose and even act on eliminating `third world debt'

    • And now comes this OSS issue. Once again, these Europeans appear to be a bit ahead.

    But I could be wrong...though I firmly believe all the above points are correct.

    1. Re:I could be wrong... by Zackbass · · Score: 3, Interesting
      # And now comes this OSS issue. Once again, these Europeans appear to be a bit ahead.


      And here I thought that my school was firmly planted in the United States. I mean it's not like we've had a whole lot to do with this OSS thing, but we've been at it for a pretty long time.
      --
      You gotta find first gear in your giant robot car
  3. 2 track approach best-Linux + Windows-centric apps by hguorbray · · Score: 5, Insightful

    IMHO any state school that isn't using Linux and OpenOffice at least for general purpose computing (ie. web browsing, paper writing, etc) is wasting the taxpayer's money. Properly locked down Linux machines should be virtually bulletproof.

    Likewise, Java dev and Oracle, MySQL and PHP can all be done on Linux, as well as some school infrastructure (forums, webpages, etc)

    The only place that Windows should be needed is for windows-based multimedia and graphics applications like Dreamweaver, Flash, AutoCAD, Automedia, Digidesign, etc

    And many of those are also available on the Mac.

    Other than that it seem like only Powerpoint, VBA, VisualStudio and SQL Server as well as Windows Admin classes (Active Directory, etc) would really require Windows machines or Applications.

    -What's the speed of dark?

  4. More interesting use in education by QuantumFTL · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I think it's great that OSS is being employed in educational fascilities, but what I'd really like to see is more educators teaching programming/software engineering via examination of the source code. There's more than a few projects that are actually coded very well, I know I sure learn something whenever I look at the sources.

  5. wish it was like that here by bcrowell · · Score: 3, Informative

    I teach physics at a community college in California, and I wish I saw some evidence of the kind of progress the report describes in the UK. My school is virtually 100% MS. I bought my own Linux box to put on my desk, but the latest news is that IT is trying to push through a policy that would make it against the rules (and punishable by firing) to connect your own box to their network. If that happens, then I guess it's Windows or nothing for my desktop. I also have a couple of Linux boxes I use for labs, paid for with my own money, and I guess I'd have to pull the plug on those and take them home, too. All servers at my school are Windows boxes. The catalog has tons of MS-specific vocational courses. They seem to rely on Windows for pretty much all the real CS courses as well; there is one small Linux lab, run by a CS guy who is interested in Linux, but the upshot of this latest policy seems to be that he'd be forced to shut it down. Basically they seem to be so uptight about lawsuits, filesharing, MySpace, etc., that they want to lock down everything super-tight, which means MS only. Linux isn't even on the radar, really; the only people on the faculty who are kicking up any fuss are the Mac users.

    --
    Find free books.
    1. Re:wish it was like that here by Antique+Geekmeister · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I've seen what you describe. The people behind such policies tend to see alternative configurations as timesinks and distractions, rather than as amazingly useful education for their staff about how things really work and what tools are available. Also, I've noticed that competent Linux and open source admins at small sites tend to get hired away as their skills grow. We also tend to embarass the heck out of the Windows IT staff by bringing better knowledge of the underlying problems and protocols to the staff meetings, and pointing out fixes that they may not have been aware of.

      This is particularly true of middle managers who are worried about their jobs: the open source people tend to scare the tar out of them by blowing their pet projects sky high. It's incredibly frustrating to try and get them to loosen their grip: it takes presenting them, and especially their managers, with hard numbers on the benefits of open source software to their productivity and especially to their costs.

  6. Education issues by skinfitz · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Let me tell you how UK educational establishments think. Firstly they get whopping discounts from Microsoft on site licenses. ~£17K per year for a reasonably large organisation (~2000 desktops) and they can install whatever is the current version of Windows and Office on all desktops, and CALs are effectively free.

    Most courses (and software used in courses) are written for Windows and Office. We still use Office 2000 because every time we try to upgrade you would think the sky is falling because a menu option has changed or the window looks slightly different. Lecturers are whiners and lazy when it comes to updating course material.

    Where Linux is mainly used in UK education is basically anything that the staff and students don't get their hands on and where you need reliability - in other words servers. Firewalls, proxies, email relays, DNS, DHCP, web servers, moodle, storage, network managment, spam filtering, web filtering, streaming media - you name it, if it runs on Linux it will get used as quite frankly it's free, and there are no stupid user license issues. User licenses can kill a project at a University or large college for one simple reason - an organisation with say 2000 desktops will have around 20,000 students enrolled. Many commercial systems will actually expect you to buy a license for every user rather than every desktop. For example a commercial web filtering system like Websense expects a license for every user, regardless of how many can actually use the web at once - simply not going to happen, especially when there are just as good free solutions like the superb Dans Guardian.