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Linux Desktops Catching On In Education
digihome writes to point us to an appreciation of the state of Indiana's project of moving students from Windows desktops to Linux. In about a year, 22,000 students have made the switch, using a variety of Linux distributions. The crn.com writer tried switching his own two children to Linux laptops. From the article: "'So Dad,' [the 10-year-old son] asked. 'What is the difference between Linux and Windows?' I tried to explain but it was a waste of breath. 'What difference do you see?' I asked back. 'Nothing, really.'"
Reminds me of the time I loaned a thinkpad running ubuntu to a roomate of mine, who I would say was a garden variety computer user. She had no idea what linux or ubuntu was. I showed her how to launch firefox and openoffice. She was working on term papers that same day, no need for me to do anything at all. That said, I still think even ubuntu has some ground to cover when it comes to interoperability with windows and I do think that ground will have to be covered in the desktop arena by linux rather then MS (who won't/can't do it). Still, it seem that for about 95% or so of the things the average home users does with a computer, the differences between linux and windows seem to be fading fast.
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I don't see how exposing them to another operating system isn't going to help prepare them for the real world. The more OS's they are exposed to early on, the better. Windows is everywhere, so why not give them the opportunity to use something that may not be as mainstream (in homes) now, but could be in the future? I use a windows laptop at work, help with the Linux servers, and have a Mac at home. In my opinion, the more you know, the better off you will be.
``Way to set them up for computer litterate jobs in the real world. :rolleyes:''
You mean like system administration, web development, software development, high performance computing, physics simulation, embedded systems development, etc. etc.?
I and others seem to have no problems getting and performing these jobs with our *nix experience.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
These kind of articles are just dumb. Of course, you're not going to see issues in the first half-hour, if people are just using a browser. The issue comes when the kids wants to load on some Windows software that all their friends are using, then suddenly the operating system matters dramatically. "I put in the CD that came with my iPod, but the computer isn't working." "I got this cool game for my birthday, but it's not working."
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Let me get this straight: He claims Linux is equal to Windows by using web-based email, web-based chat clients, web-based music stations, and web-based text processing.
I fail to see how this article has anything to do with the pro's and cons of a Linux desktop, since you can do any of those same things on any platform with a web connection and browser with a flash plugin (for pandora).
Let's see what his 10 year old has to say about it when he wants to play the latest PC games, copy music to his iPod using iTMS, and/or run software his friends are running.
I'm sorry, I AM a K-12 admin for a fairly large school system (10,000 desktops) and we use Windows for several non-linux bashing reasons: Exchange, AD, compatibility with other districts, and price/support to staying the course as opposed to rebuilding everything.
My sysadmin desktop of choice? I use FreeBSD and Ubuntu with remote desktop. Just because I can handle it, doesn't mean everyone here can, especially when they use Windows at home. One thing about teachers, you don't rock their boat. Let their classroom be about them and their students and all is well.
If you're half as beautiful naked, you'd be 4 times as beautiful with twice as many clothes on.
It appears that most of the /. community doesn't really remember desktop computing before, say about Windows95?
/. such things would be important... guess not
All the derisive comments about Linux used to apply to Windows... for a very long time. One of the good things
about that problem is that it taught many of us to work with computers, rather than simply use applications.
Learning to use Excel or Word is not learning to use a computer. Figuring out how to run Doom on a pc is not
learning about computers.
Linux is a GOOD way to learn about computers... Things like network configurations and why you need them, what
is HAL anyway? What are all those programs in the 'running processes' list? Why do I need to block ports?
I would have thought that here on
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I work in the real world, and I use Linux all day.
I bought my wife a Toshiba, which came with WinXP (despite my protestations). I thought I'd just let her use XP (non-administrator) until it got too messed up, then reformat using Linux. To my surprise, she complained the first day. She hated all of the preinstalled software asking her to buy this and that. She didn't even know what McAfee was, let alone want to deal with the SUBSCRIBE NOW!! popups.
I told her I could fix it, and put Ubuntu Edgy (pre-release, even!) on there. She's perfectly happy with it now. I asked her if she likes it better or worse than the other (XP), and she replied that it was exactly the same, but without the annoying popups.
As an aside, my 6-year-old is a whiz with XUbuntu on his Dell 700MHz machine.
I think we Linux geeks have "failure to launch" syndrome. We worry about every little detail and think that everyone's going to hate our product, find it buggy/insufficient/unfamiliar, yadda yadda. The fact of the matter is that your average person probably won't notice much of a difference in most cases, and will usually just cope with the ones they do, just like they've always done with Windows.
Windows isn't better or bug free. It's just a different set of annoyances and insufficiencies that people have learned to ignore and work around. If people are going to learn to ignore bugs, maybe they can ignore ones that will be fixed quicker. If they're going to work around inadequacies, maybe they can work around ones that they have the potential to implement themselves, given the aptitude.
Education is a great stage to get kids acquainted with Linux. By the time these kids are teens and adults, Linux will have progressed immensely, and they probably WILL be using Linux on corporate desktops. You're not thinking fourth-dimensionally, Marty!
No offense, but why would you need training to do a job you were hired to do in the first place?
Oddly enough, I was hired to support some 500 Windows-based PCs. I'm also the only person actively advocating the possibility of moving some of those over to Linux. For that to happen, the OTHER THREE PEOPLE IN MY DEPARTMENT would need training.
I know, I know - it's strange when people do things of their own free will to better themselves and their prospects.
And I'm doing that with Linux. But not everyone wants to spend the time to learn it on their own; they're happy with the status quo if they can't get a crash course in good Linux admin.
Have you ever needed to call tech support on your IT-supported desktops for Windows?
Yes. I've been in contact with a Microsoft rep several times about cleaning up our deployment process so that we can make better use of our time during the summer.
If you answered "yes" for anything other than an RMA, you're either an idiot or - well, an idiot..
Ahh, the famed friendliness of the Linux community strikes again.
make your desktop Linux.
Not possible. I have to use Windows-only apps and don't have the time to spend on the clock making them (maybe) work under Linux, nor can I take them home with me since they're network-based. We don't have the budget to buy me extra computers (and I'd object to tax money being spent that way anyway, it could be better used in a classroom) so I don't get any toys.
I would prefer my children be taught on a very versatile operating system which will keep their interest
Yet you seem determined to put me, the only FOSS-friendly voice in an entire school district, off by calling me an idiot.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
If they're an IT employee then I want them to have experience with multiple platforms or I'm not interested in them. I want to know that they have the kind of mind that drives them crazy until they figure things out. I want people who can't help but think about it when they're at home in the shower.
If they're any other kind of employee, I know that all [credible] operating systems basically do the same things and all of them behave more or less the same way, and they have basically the same things in them, just different places. So I'm trying to hire someone with a brain, as opposed to someone with experience in specific applications. A person who depends on that is not only useless if I switch applications, but may actually require major retraining if I just change versions of the application. I don't want someone who learned by rote, I want someone who figures things out.
Finally, most people clearly do not give a fuck if people have the computer skills the job description calls for. Oh sure, if it's an IT job, you can't get the job unless you have every single bullet point. I don't have any Veritas experience and that has really kicked my ass. But if it's anything else, they don't take the computer requirements seriously anyway. Practically every office job in existence today, including every teaching job for example (the classroom is an office of sorts as well) requires familiarity with Microsoft Office, yet when I have had IT jobs at various places, I have spent an inordinate amount of time explaining to people how to perform basic tasks in Office.
So, no, I do not think there is any significant detriment. And yes, I have thought about it. And no, I am not a Linux fanatic. Although I have used Linux on my primary system at various times (and in fact the only working computer I currently own and used on a regular basis is a laptop running ubuntu) at work I have two Windows XP systems and a Dual G5 on my desk. I could put Linux on a system, and use it; I could use vmware to run any recalcitrant windows programs. I don't because the software I need to use most often is Windows-only and it would make no fucking sense. I do support linux, because I think it has the best chance to give me what I want, at least out of the current list of mainline operating systems.
Application support is a real issue, although frankly 99% of the time there is a working FoSS alternative to whatever one is doing on Windows. There are some real exceptions, such as high-end content creation, but they are gradually going away as software with that functionality is introduced for Linux. Even video editing is finally coming into view.
Driver support, however, is a non-issue. When you purchase hardware for windows, you buy hardware that is windows certified. If you want to purchase hardware for Linux, you should do the same thing. Barring that, you must do your homework. All major computer vendors are happy to provide you systems with hardware known to work with linux, and typically it does not come at a cost premium. You simply must know what you're buying. Any substantially older hardware, as is common in schools and the like, is almost certainly supported already, with the possible exception of some wifi hardware.
TCO is a combination of all of these issues, but Linux requires less maintenance/attention than Windows does. I don't think that's even really an arguable point. Assuming that you have planned intelligently, Linux will pretty much ensure you a lower TCO. Planning is where most things fall down, frankly. Measure twice, cut once...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
My confidence in smooth Linux migrations for ordinary users took a pretty good hit over thanksgiving, when (for kicks mostly) I booted my mother's machine with Austrumi. My mother uses the computer *only for checking her hotmail and clicking the links she's sent by friends. I don't think she could do a google search without help. I set the firefox startup page to her hotmail account, and for good measure invited her to gmail. Well a day later I basically had a mutiny on my hands. My mother was very put off about having to find the "Compose" link in gmail. Incidentally, she's also kinda put off by the 2-3 dozen spam messages in her hotmail box every day. My brother insisted that i "put it back". Near as I can tell, he was looking at his fantasy football web pages and got a dialog about mismatched certificates, and concluded that I had broken the machine. What I'm saying is that there's a class of user for whom change == malfunction. Some of these people are CEOs, btw.
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