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How Microsoft Beats GNU/Linux In Schools
twitter writes "Ever wonder why schools still use Windows? Boycott Novell has extracted the details from 2002 Microsoft email presented in the Comes vrs Microsoft case and other leaks. What emerges is Microsoft's desperate battle to 'never lose to Linux.' At stake for Microsoft is more than a billion dollars of annual revenue, vital user conditioning and governmental lock in that excludes competition, and software freedom for the rest of us. Education and Government Incentives [EDGI] and "Microsoft Unlimited Potential" are programs that allows vendors to sell Windows at zero cost. Microsoft's nightmare scenario has already been realized in Indiana and other places. Windows is not really competitive and schools that switch save tens of millions of dollars. Because software is about as expensive as the hardware in these deals, the world could save up to $500 million each year by dumping Microsoft. Now that the cat is out of the bag, it's hard to see what Microsoft can do other than what they did to Peter Quinn."
Microsoft has already been ruled a monopoly... isn't dumping an illegal tactic for monopolies?
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Schools prefer to use Windows because it's what the vast majority of their faculty and staff know, it's what the vast majority of their software runs on, and it's what students will encounter on the vast majority of computers they will use in the real world.
Um, I think one of the perhaps very good reasons they don't use Linux is because the teachers are clueless as to how to use it.
Yeah, mark me as troll, but it's F'in true.
If you can read this... 01110101 01110010 00100000 01100001 00100000 01100111 01100101 01100101 01101011
Some people think so. Paranoia is what leads to things like these (make sure you read the comments there), and makes that blog a rather annoying cesspool which occasionally plops out a useful bit of information.
Stay away from extremists, and get your news from people other than Slashdot's resident joke.
And kudos to ScuttleMonkey, who had to remove all the creative spelling and grammar errors from the submission.
One of my customers is a K-12 school. They have 10K students, and 390 different windows applications.
Most educational software simply isn't written for Linux. Most educational software is poorly written for Windows. Running as a non-admin user is always a hangup. I can't imagine trying to get all these apps to run under Wine. The chorus of "why don't we have windows" would be deafening.
The reason Windows beats Linux in schools is because the apps they need, work under windows. When the superintendent wants an application, he gets it. No matter how poorly written or insecure it is, we always end up installing it. If linux is somehow responsible for it not working, linux gets tossed, 100% of the time.
I clicked the link from the end of the story and was unable to find anything on that page referring to "Peter Quinn", "Quinn", or even just "Pete".
What information are we supposed to glean from that link?
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
because MS have more experience of wining and dining (and bribing) than generally less dishonest Linux companies?
A couple or so years ago, I asked a university lecturer why they used so much MS software, when the obviously had knowledge of Linux and Unix -- the reply was something like "we get it free" (or perhaps "almost free").
In this case, it is free as in beer trumping free as in speech.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
At the High School I volunteer at there are key applications that teachers feel they can not do without. One such example is Microsoft Publisher. This is a loathsome application that does not export to any other known publishing application, but is used to teach publishing in the school. :-(
We are making progress though. The school switched to Open Office this year for all but the business lab. I am working with the business lab teachers to get them familiar with Open Office so they can make an informed decision about what software to use in the future.
Being a monopoly is neither illegal nor I would argue immoral. It's what you do with your monopolistic power that makes that determination. In this context it is also important to mention that MS is the original 'give it away for free or close to free' people. This was true even way before Windows had a lock on PCs.
I would agree with the comments above about Windows being what the student will encounter and add further that this reasoning extends to the OLPC and similar products, which is why we are seeing Windows on those platforms instead of a free OS.
Have you finished censoring the comments in your story so that people don't know what a bix axe you have to grind? It should be apparent from the story itself, but people were nice enough to point out the details.
Maybe its because office suite is simple, easy to use and works very well with graphics embedded within documents.
lol at "the world could save up to $500 million each year".
They wouldn't save money..!! You'd see more principals with the words PIMP in crystal with gold chains hanging around their necks. And happy admins after they move to linux. Ahh... Bliss.
User maintains more than a dozen sockpuppet accounts on Slashdot.
The reality is a lot of computers run Windows and it's not going to be detrimental for kids to learn Microsoft OS, tools and technologies even if it's fun for us to talk about evil tactics and dumping Microsoft. I think a lot of the time Windows gets into schools because it's a consistent and familiar GUI experience. Kids can learn on it -- they have lots of time to make up their own minds when they get old enough, reaching college and university, etc. all kinds of OS's and tools are used. Cost-wise if the budget can support it, then the budge can support it. I'm not going to stop buying Dempster's whole wheat bread for no-name brand until I actually run short on money.
Hell even 50%+ is considered a monopoly for all intents and purposes in most jurisdictions.
A couple or so years ago, I asked a university lecturer why they used so much MS software, when the obviously had knowledge of Linux and Unix -- the reply was something like "we get it free" (or perhaps "almost free").
So they were using it because it was better ? Because they certainly wouldn't have been paying more for Linux or UNIX...
A couple or so years ago, I asked a university lecturer why they used so much MS software, when the obviously had knowledge of Linux and Unix -- the reply was something like "we get it free" (or perhaps "almost free").
Don't forget that in the early days (Windows 3 / 3.1), MS tended to turn a blind eye to copying, as it increased mindshare.
(Also, at the same time, some organisations were still on DOS, but the new machines came with Windows disks. Those installing the company setup used to keep the Windows disks, or give them away. Of course, once they had all the copies of Windows that they and their friends could possibly use, a quick re-format of the floppy disks allowed their re-use - disks were expensive)
"She's furniture with a pulse"
Now that the cat is out of the bag, it's hard to see what Microsoft can do other than what they did to ...
I like Linux as much as the next guy ( I run it almost exclusively) But seriously how many times do I have to read M$ is doomed! DOOOMMED!
Windows is popular in schools (as is mac) because the experience is more seamless then it is in a flavour of Linux. Schools are not trying to just teach computers to kids, their trying to get them to read, write, perform arithmetical, or other tasks that are SEEN as separate from the computing experience. As soon as you have to explain to teaching staff that Gnome isn't Linux isn't GNU isn't RedHat ... you've lost the case because the teachers are just going to say "This isn't a computer class! Why do I have to learn this!?"
I think Linux would be great is schools but until you have a reasonably seamless experience your not going to get anywhere.
The arguments always come down to cost: "Linux will save you money". Sure it will. But these institutions are used to spending money to get what they think they need. Your not going to win this argument with cost benefits alone, you have to convince them that Linux will do a better job then Windows and Mac and as of right now I don't think that's an easy case to make.
Couldn't be that this is the tool (I repeat, the TOOL, not the religion) that is, for good or bad, the defacto standard out there in the real world? Couldn't be a good think that you are preparing your students to use the tools (I repeat, not the religion) that could help them to face the real world market?
Sure, it could be a cool think to get Basquian language to be obligatory for all schools in Sweden, but I think (and correct me if I'm wrong) that students would be more happy having a good English language education, just for their future sake. Basquian? Sure, be my guest, get a book and learn.
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
First they ignore you, then laugh at you and then hate you. Then they fight you and then you win. When the truth dies, very bad things happen...
- After a song by Robbie Williams
Here be signatures
Believe me, after a couple of free beers I no longer care for freedom of speech. I use a lot of software that is "free as in beer" and I'm absolutely happy with it. And non-free software? I use a lot more (including the OS, development tools, etc), and I'm delighted with what I use as well. I'll never understand the ideological "free as in speech" fixation.
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
And so it continues.... The "Slashdot" that I have come to know and love over the past 9 years continues to degrade itself by linking to publications such as Boycot Novell, an amature looking troll-bait website preceded in it's ridiculousness only by one of it's founding authors, Roy Schestowitz. A man who, along with his well known counterpart who wrote the submission above, has been pretty accurately summerized in a previous posting.
"When you see a unixer brainwashed beyond saving, kick him out of the door." - Xah Lee
When your contract with Microsoft is about to run out, just tell them you're switching to Linux. Then you can get more Microsoft products for free.
When Microsoft stops offering freebies, then switch to Linux.
Problem solved.
Saving money through fund raisers etc is seen to be low risk and a proven way to get money to flow the right way. An experiment in Linux is perceived to be a lot more risky and harder. The school's computers are often seen to be very high expense items and there is a preception that running Linux lowers their value or might even cause damage. Don't want to take any risks with that!
Engineering is the art of compromise.
When you almost always win.
Check his posting history (with all his 40 sock accounts), the guy does nothing but paste links to that blog. Recent example. Look at his comments, submissions and journal entries. Aside from "M$" what you'll see are links to that blog. And surprise, it's AdSense-enabled!
I think someone just figured out:
Lame, lame lame.
it shows that nothing has changed at Microsoft in the past 20 years. There is no "new Microsoft", there is no "kinder, gentler Microsoft", and there is no "Microsoft is a friend to open source".
It's all a lie for the purpose of furthering their goal of making sure Windows is the only OS for the vast majority of the populations.
surprise!
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
You want a better OS; STFU and build one!
Nope, not really surprised or shocked at all.
No more than a leopard or cheetah could change their spots does MS change their behaviors...
Who says they Microsoft has the edge? Where I work we hire a number of kids out of college, *all* of them have higher degree of comfort implementing various solutions on a Linux/BSD platform then Windows. That tells me they are getting a tremendous amount of exposure to these platforms during their college years.
Quite frankly I manage to do my own job quite effectively without having to rely on Microsoft products at all, this includes technical aspects as well communicating, documenting, etc.
So by all means use the tools you are comfortable with, but do not imply that they are the only choice for the *real world* when that is not even close to being the case.
how is this different from what Apple has done since....there was an Apple?
And what the fuck is this, Comrade?
the world could save up to $500 million each year by dumping Microsoft
Imagine the money we could save if we dumped all commercially-produced products? We could totally save a ton of money if we just worked on collective farms and no-one ever made a profit. Way to tie FLOSS to the socialist agenda.
Letting kids into the workplace without MS training is a non-starter. Here's a better idea: Kids well rounded in MS, Mac, and a Linux distro?
THL phish sticks
Look at what's happening across the world:
http://knowledge.oscc.org.my/newsletters/first-quarterly-e-newsletter-jan-2009/at_download/file
the government's documented savings is US$10mil last year. And there are numerous undocumented savings, as well as followons, schools are now putting OSS in, etc etc.
While I admit the GP is a troll you are just as offbase. Your anecdotal evidance does not disprove that Windows is still dominant. Does it suck? Heck yeah, but schools only have so much time and sadly windows skills are crucial many industries. I hope that changes, but until then your 10 person shop does little to change the trend.
Couldn't be that this is the tool (I repeat, the TOOL, not the religion) that is, for good or bad, the defacto standard out there in the real world?
Or it could be that the manufacturer of the tool gives their tools away to educational institutions and maybe offers a scholarship or other financial incentive in addition to make sure any of them thinking about an alternative gets a reminder of how much money is on the line. And the reps of that tool manufacturer phone the local politicians and senior administrators and remind them how much money and how many jobs the proprietary software circle jerk provides.
So if you mean that influence peddling and bribery are the de facto standard in the "real world" then, sadly, you are quite right. And it certainly explains how Windows could have an edge in academia that has nothing to do with the relative merits of the tool itself.
You couldn't hit the real world in the butt with a base fiddle.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
The real reason that schools don't switch from Windows is because it is sooo much easier to keep a Windows network running seamlessly than a Linux network. I am the administrator for a small school (about 52 systems). When I want to install software or manage settings, I use group policies combined with active directory to control deployment. It took me about 1 day to get this all running initially. Updates are managed through WSUS. Has anyone on slashdot ever tried to set up ldap or fedora directory server. It is very difficult to get everything up and running. If something were to go down, only I could get it back up. With Windows Server, I have several people in the faculty who could fix it if there was a problem. Due to school discounts, price is not a huge issue. For an example, look at http://cdwg.com/ for the "Academic Discount" licenses. I considered installing OO.o instead of MS Office. However, with the release of Office 2007, there is real insentive to upgrade. It is much easier to teach and use the new "ribbon" interface than the old menu/toolbar interface. OO.o would have a difficult time switching to a ribbon and keeping their credibility as an innovator. To summarise: MS provides real value for the money. They provide a well integrated system that is seamless, stable, and easy to maintain. They have shown that they will continue to innovate and have shown current and future products such as groove, sharepoint, and Windows 7 (I am typing this from W7) that continue to raise the bar.
Linux is the Jesus of the Tech World: "Have you accepted Linux as your personal computer savior?..." Everyone just knows it is the One True Way, and that if everyone adopted it (Jesus, Linux, no difference) that all of our problems would simply disappear.
Christians who have seriously tried evangelization sees remarkable parallels between Linux and Christianity. Yes, we know of the one true way, but convincing others remains quite a challenge:
The most successful evangelists of this century were not those who called people to a high and distant summit, but met people right where they were. If Linux is going to be adopted by schools and other non-technical people, it has to meet the challenges of ordinary users:
When you consider that a substantial portion of the FOSS community won't run closed source software on philosophical grounds alone - and that there are distros which cater to this mentality - creating a school-friendly Linux would be to create a distro that no idealist would want to maintain. It has never been a question of capability, and always a questions of philosophy; schools tend to be pragmatic rather than intelligent. As a branch of government, they tend to draw the risk-averse politicians; as an institution, they tend to draw people with a greater interest in educating children than the means by which same is accomplished. That is, the computer is not the reason for their existence, but rather a means of getting a greater job done.
To get Linux into schools, you're going to have to address the school's expectations of an operating system. You might not like the result.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Tens of millions? It's more than that by far. The financial relationship between school districts and Microsoft is immense.
The very notion on free software is under constant attack day in and day out in the school precisely because the school administrations are already so bought out.
The only reason Microsoft even exists is because of their insistence that everybody owes them something.
How does Microsoft beat Linux in schools? The answers are vast. But what is partly missing in the analysis is the fact that the education "market" is not isolated to the United States. These are global issues in the here and now.
Where I work we hire a number of kids out of college, *all* of them have higher degree of comfort implementing various solutions on a Linux/BSD platform then Windows.
Maybe they (or their resume) tells you that to get the job? I'm not doubting their Linux/BSD skills, but people tailor their resumes to the specific job they are applying for.
The issue is that desktop Linux is only recently stable enough to be viable option for education. I agree whole-heartedly that Linux should be used in every school. but the cost to install Linux(by this I mean the labor costs, not the software costs). Right now the windows PC's are free in a sense that they have already been payed for, plus the incompatibilities with certain mainstream hardware make Linux a very young OS in the market. I could see if a school was getting a new computer lab, but how often does that happen.
The majority of *market domincance* surveys boil to little more than highly slanted, carefully filtered marketing campaigns. Given that, why do you feel anecdotal experience is essentially worthless?
I have worked for many companies, I have seen a tremendous amount of Linux/BSD on the back-end, and now I am seeing it on the client-side as well.
None of the organizations for which I have worked have been ten person shops but rather larger enterprises looking to maximize their investment in infrastructure from initial purchase to full depreciation. All of them recognized open source as a viable means of achieving these goals in some form or another.
Oh No!! Not Peter Quinn!! LOL!!
Maybe they (or their resume) tells you that to get the job? I'm not doubting their Linux/BSD skills, but people tailor their resumes to the specific job they are applying for.
I am sure they did tailor their resume, that is exactly what people interested in getting a job do!
The fact is they landed the position because when we interviewed them they demonstrated strong Linux/UNIX skills.
I work with these folks daily, as they continue to demonstrate strong Linux/UNIX skills, and knowledge.
Are you a programmer?
If you're not, you're not likely to understand the "free as in speech" fixation.
Well, if Linuzzz can be installed for free at schools and Windows cost a little bit (MS Select and Campus contracts are really a good deal at schools and universities), how do you explain the fact that Windows and Macs still have the edge in education over GNU/Linuzzz?
Couldn't be that this is the tool (I repeat, the TOOL, not the religion) that is, for good or bad, the defacto standard out there in the real world? Couldn't be a good think that you are preparing your students to use the tools (I repeat, not the religion) that could help them to face the real world market?
Sure, it could be a cool think to get Basquian language to be obligatory for all schools in Sweden, but I think (and correct me if I'm wrong) that students would be more happy having a good English language education, just for their future sake. Basquian? Sure, be my guest, get a book and learn.
They are not taught concepts that is for sure. I once installed Open Office for an accounting friend of mine. He had been using Excel for years. Upon showing him how to add columns in OO he cheered and said "Cool I don't have to use my calculator anymore!"
"Most educational software is poorly written for Windows."
Most poorly written educational software is for Windows.
There. All Better.
From years of experience; the most any, average, K-12 student needs from a software standpoint is, a web-browser, a word-processor, and maybe some presentation software. Everything else that is purchased by schools, unless it is for a specialized curriculum/class, is a waste of money. Why? Because unless it is integrated into the curriculum -meaning that it is a tool that must be used to complete course assignments- it is simply employed as a way to keep students busy doing something.
Why education still buys Windows is by-and-large driven by the fact that commodity x86 hardware is sold by major vendors with Windows pre-installed. Most schools that desire technology are interested in getting the most for your tax dollar as they can that still has a familiar 'feel' to it for the adults. The kids; they don't care, as many of them have been exposed to a greater variety of OS/machine combos then the average teacher has, and they are sufficiently adaptable to figure it out for themselves.
Sig this!
Schools are supposed to teach you how to think, not which button to push. Would you allow McDonalds to influence your kids education, by conditioning them to happy meals ?
I don't know about you but I have to think harder to use a linux OS than I do a Windows OS (mainly due to Linux's massive scope for personal influence). And the sad part is people think that's a bad idea. Use it or lose it.
I think the issue with schools is that nobody is selling linux to schools, and schools are doing the minimum teaching they can get away with. Whereas Microsoft is making itself available and has zero real competitors in that market. Given their market dominance the sheep follow along. Who is going to break the cycle ?
Given their market dominance the sheep follow along. Who is going to break the cycle ?
A very full featured and good office suite can do it. OO.o is good but MS Office 2007 is simply light years ahead.
This space for rent.
Take all the computers out of the schools. As far as I can tell, at any given time half of them won't boot or are frozen anyway. The teachers and the schools "IT Staff" (ie, the teacher who was so bad at teaching 3rd graders he now runs the "technology lab") are completely clueless and have no business trying to teach our children about technology. My 11 year-old daughter is *light-years* ahead of ALL of her teachers when it comes to the web, email, word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, video and html/css development. I suggest the schools stick to teaching readin', ritin' & 'rithmetic - and perhaps we'll have kids that know more than how to load a Glock 17...
...investment of time, resources and money into making an operating system marketable, desirable and a household name has resulted in a greater market share; whilst those preoccupied with promoting other operating systems from their basements are lagging by about 20 years behind them in terms of advertising, market appeal and usability. Shocking.
Perhaps a pilot study should be undertaken with one of the above school admins and a class (10-20 PCs) of kids to see if Ubuntu + sugar = fun, educational, inclusive and collaborative computer learning experience!
The one big issue I can see is the near impossibility of getting out of sugar and back to gnome to use open office!!!
like phosphorescent desert buttons singing one familiar song
It's not just the license. It's all the taxes you pay to train your own childs for the benefit of a private company.
How dare the public school system teach students skills they can transfer to the workplace! They should be teaching BeOS!
To arms, men! The fury of a thousand basements shall be with us!
The real reason is simply because the consumer (in this case, schools) chose Windows over Linux. Is not about the price, it's about the cost. And when consumers know Windows but they don't know Linux, guess which is the lower cost? Familiarity is a desired trait. The familiarity extends beyond the school to the students' homes. Most will have Windows systems at home, and like it or not, their parents will want their children learning Windows.
But all of that is a side issue. The heart of the matter is that healthy well-adjusted people do not compete through whining. Stop worrying about what software other people are using and worry about your own life. There are far more important problems to address in life than what OS your neighbor's kids are using.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
It seems you're ignoring Microsoft's exclusive licensing issues with the Major OEMS in the 90's prohibiting the OEMs from either preloading alternative OSes or prohibiting any boot menus which would allow people to choose which OS they want to boot (ref: BeOS).
You seem to also be ignoring Microsoft's practice of deliberating altering their internal APIs to prevent any other software maker from writing their own clone of DOS (ref: DRDOS). Ironically enough it was the rise of hardware PC clone makers that permitted Microsoft to flourish. Apparently Microsoft did not wish that freedom to extend to software as well.
You also seem to be ignoring Microsoft's practice of altering their APIs so certain competing applications fail to work correctly. (ref: "Dos isn't done until Lotus won't run")
And finally, if Microsoft was an inherently better competitor why then tactics like Edgie? Shouldn't their products naturally sell better solely based on their own merits?
.
In a half-dozen or so standard configurations only available from Apple.
The "high-priced spread."
The Windows PC was available from many fiercely competitive suppliers - and could be customized any way you wanted.
Apple had its "killer apps."
The problem was that the Mac was defined almost solely as a graphics powerhouse for the designer and photo editor working at the professional level.
I'll not call the Mac "gay."
But it was never working class.
MSDOS and Windows got down and dirty.
The auto body shop in Anchorage. The office tower in Burbank. The feed lot in Nebraska. The suburban hospital on Long Island.
MSDOS and Windows began as a stand-alone OS.
Microsoft earned its 90% share by building from the ground up and not from the top down.
I work for a business that fabricates steel buildings. A good bit of our sales are to schools.
I've seen the architectural plans for these schools. Insanely complex, filled with "beautifying" crap that adds tremendously to the cost. Complexity means "much more expensive"; I've seen the selling cost on the contract, and it's way up there. $750,000+ isn't uncommon. Clean the building up, remove the cruft, and your talking about a $200,000 building, max. And these are rural district schools, maybe 2000 kids in all K-12 classes. I'd hate to see the selling price of the palaces the well funded districts get.
Schools have a budget given to them by the state. It's spend it or loose it. They spend it. They get nothing by saving $$$ by using Linux. Why save? They have the cash that they HAVE to spend.
I made the switch to Linux with Ubuntu because, for most things, it works just plain better than Windows. But, getting this point across to the people I work with is, well, proving rather difficult.
Why is that? Because:
1) People are gullible. The people that make decisions about purchasing first look at a glossy sales brochure or pick what they saw advertised on TV. Then they then ask "Is this okay?" Linux doesn't have any shiny brochures, we never get asked if it's okay.
2) People are terrified of change, any change. They won't admit it, but they are. It's not that Linux is still harder to use than Windows (honestly, it's the other way around now, and I've proved it to people); it's that people don't want to change, even for the better.
3) People are lazy. I had instructors DEMANDING that I dual-boot to Linux (so I used a VMware image instead) and then they went off to teach MS Office instead of Open-Office... because there's a course-pack/textbook that includes online testing and grading (so they don't have to do any work).
In short, the problem is inertia. Unfortunately, Linux is going to have to get way better than Windows before the Educational "ship" can start to make some course corrections. Dumb, fearful, lazy people have to be beaten over the head with the obvious before they will change direction.
Now, the appropriate tool to beat said people over the head with is a turn-key Linux distribution that integrates into an Active Directory domain, right out of the box. One that includes an image-casting process that allows 100s of computers to be managed (deployed, updated, etc.) from a central console (PXE boot, the works). If I had that (turn-key), I might make some progress around here... though it would still take a while.
FOSS will eventually dominate education. It is inevitable. The Linux distributions out there are making phenomenal strides towards ease-of-use and overall functionality. In most aspects, they have already bested Windows. But, it will take time to overcome the inertia in Education. Honestly, I expect the business world will actually turn first. Education, despite its best efforts, is surprisingly conservative.
David...
The Fine Article has an occasional point, but there are as many flaws. As a school tech director for ten years and now a consultant for a company with a specialty practice in outsourcing K12 IT, the issue isn't how much MS costs. It's the continuing cost of support, and beleive it or not a properly configured Windows system is VERY efficient. My district had nearly 9,000 students with almost 4,000 computers and well above 300 in use applications from K to 12. Our tech to computer ratio was over 1:700 and we resolved most trouble calls in less than 24 hours. If a school has the resources and desires a technology rich environment with a huge range of software using thick clients then a Windows desktop OS makes a lot of sense. The range of educational software is just not there for Linux, and it's only in the last couple years that the management utilities have started to mature for it. Ironically the wild environment of Windows produced excellent management tools early on. As for actual costs, in the U.S. a School License Agreement will provide just about everything MS has to offer to a school for about $50/year per machine. Not cheap, but considering all it includes, not exactly highway robbery, and after 3 years you own whatever the latest version MS has and you can stop paying for a couple years. In the places I've had experience the MS cost is just 5%-6% of the tech budget. In comparison, even for 700:1 and higher support ratios the techs cost 30% or more of the budget. Having said that, I'm currently working mostly with urban schools without the resources of the suburban district where I was tech director. For these districts with extremely limited resources Linux makes a lot more sense, especially in a thin client mode. When the choice is between something and nothing at all, Linux provides the something. Management utilities are still in need of a lot of help. A FOSS app virtualization capability would really help where multi-media requirements, which are big in schools, require "thick" clients. Windows has "dll hell" but Linux suffers from "lib purgatory" among other maladies. And having observed how technology is typically used in schools, I have to say that those who say the way to save money on school technology is to simply remove it have a point in all too many cases.
I'm a parent rep on a school ICT sub-committee that looked at ICT for the extension of our school that will extend into High School (grades 7-10, current school is only Kinder - 6) here in Australia. They were already heavily into Macs but we looked at equivalent Windows laptops and they came with no additional software and a heavy admin cost. For creativity the iLife software could not be beat. The iWork software was also dirt cheap for edu use. Then when it came to also using iPod Touch as handheld media devices for the students, any Windows solution was nowhere near for the price. Sure - you can get really cheap windows laptops but add on software and admin costs and there was no comparison.
Everyone can get Linux for free. Most people have to pay for Windows, but Microsoft is giving it to you for free. Don't you feel special?
Worked as a Net Admin for 8 years in a wealthy school district. Until the educational apps are written for Linux, they will use Windows or Macs. It's not the big name apps that everyone here uses, it's the technically horrible but educationally brilliant apps that are Windows and Mac only. It's not about Microsoft Office or Publisher. Look at Wiggleworks, or anything made by Scholastic. Ultrakey, Lexia, are just two others. No one in a school district cares about Linux or if it is OSS. If you want to replace the hundreds of educational applications used in a school you have to redevelop curriculum, pay teachers to take inservice classes which will them give them a pay raise as they move up a "step", and retrain students who have used the software since Kindergarten. It has nothing to with Microsoft, Apple, or anything that happens to run a Linux kernel.
Windows is popular in schools (as is mac) because the experience is more seamless then it is in a flavour of Linux.
Evidence that Microsoft abuses its monopoly in order to avoid competing on merit has been surfacing for decades and has repeatedly seen them convicted. In schools this is particularly pernicious for obvious reasons.
you had me at #!
n/t
you had me at #!
> It's also dumping if it's significantly below your costs
But I thought software did not cost anything to write? Or at least
that's the argument I've been hearing from people like you for the
last 10 years. So now I'm confused.
Once the dump is over, the price always comes up and you lose the
> next time because you don't have as many choices - the competitor
> is gone.
You contradict yourself, since FOSS isn't going anywhere, and it's
free. Free. How would you compete with free? By doing things like
these, of course. So while I might not like Microsoft, to a certain
extent I recognize the problems they face and the reasons they do
things like these. In any case, the linked documents are just
internal planning for a corporation, nothing astoundingly new or
exciting, and hardly deserving of the ulterior meanings people seem
to attach to them.
> Realizing zero revenue from a deal if it will help you "never
> lose to Linux"
On Slashdot this might be an effective emotional argument, but
replace "Linux" with "IBM" or "Sybase" or "Oracle" or "Apple"
and it makes more sense and a lot less evil. But then
someone modded you up, so your emotional argument worked. Good
job!
I wanna go to your school!
The iPod touch is seriously nice (I bought one for my girlfriend ... who is now my wife ... I rest my case! :)
you had me at #!
what you save in windows licenses you have to pay out for *nix specialists. Licenses can be claimed on tax, employee incomes cannot. Windows is the all round, lowest energy solution to computing.
Not to point out the obvious, but you are hiring college-educated kids to work at a tech firm.
You must be aware that most people who use computers are not "implementing various solutions." Of course computer science majors know something about Unix. One would expect philosophy majors to know something about Kant. Most people don't spend much time evaluating the Categorical Imperative.
I don't believe in time. It's a grand conspiracy designed to sell watches.
because "teachers" really do get it nearly free... or at least not under per-pupil costs. Of course Universities pay big money in the name of "piracy" for site licensing.. but that goes under the IT or legal funds, not "teachers" funds.... see the difference.
Like the Forrester survey below this article, people use Microsoft software out of habit, not even because they like it. For most people, using even MS Word is really hard, and re-learning it is even worse. MS knows Linux or Mac is better but as long as they keep the price of upgrades less than the price to go some place else, and the pain of upgrades less than the pain of learning Linux they will keep their customers from sheer bureaucratic inertia.
ooohkay..
let's try this then.
Take windows and commercial education suite licenses allocated for next year.
Contract out devs to write equivalent apps for linux during this year.
Switch to linux as the licenses lapse.
Next year's budget now has 25% less required for information technology (to maintain the code)
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
You assume that I asked why the teacher used MS software -- in fact, I did not.
First some context on the person that I asked: The lecturer in this case had been with the university a long time (in the CS department). It was a university in the UK -- had the lecturer been at a US university, she would have been a professor with full tenure.
Secondly, I asked in the context of the CS department's use of MS software, not her personal use.
I'm reasonably certain that her response was on the lines of "the University gets it free", not "I get it free."
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
I know that this isn't going to make me popular on this site, but I still don't think that Linux is ready for the desktop yet...especially for normal users. Being a software developer for 15 years, I am very experienced with linux. For my development environment, I use Ubuntu and I have used Suse and Red Hat. It's fine for me because I know the command line, but for a regular guy, KDE and Gnome with any of the linux distributions just isn't feasible.
I don't need to hear about your stupid-ass grandma who looooves linux... I love linux, I'm just being realistic. If I had a dime for every time that my window decoratio crashed when I'm using Xgl/Compiz Fusion I'd be a rich man. If I have to search my ass off for a freakin wireless card driver anymore, I'm going to crap.
Bottom line... keep crying, but until it is a usable alternative on the desktop, it won't beat microsoft. The day when it is a superior product for non-techies is the day that we'll all love our free (as in beer AND speech) operating systems.
While I admit the GP is a troll you are just as offbase. Your anecdotal evidance does not disprove that Windows is still dominant. Does it suck? Heck yeah, but schools only have so much time and sadly windows skills are crucial many industries. I hope that changes, but until then your 10 person shop does little to change the trend.
So what are Windows skills? As opposed to basic computer use skills.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.
I have not heard of a program for autistic children, but Klaus Knopper, one of the popular Linux engineers over here in Germany (if not the most popular for Knoppix) works on Linux for blind people. His wife is blind. There might be more Linux people out there that are handicapped themsleves or have close relatives that are. That can be a very high incentive to create useful tools.
A quick google will reveal how MS seduced (no other kinder way to put it) MIT egomaniac Negroponte to make a costly switch to XP on the OLPC project.
Worth watching "Yes, Minister" for background on how all of this works...
I worked with an early version of Scribus a couple years ago and was very impressed by it. Since then Scribus evolved a lot. Maybe you should give the Windows version a try:
http://www.scribus.net/?q=taxonomy/term/36
Or just do apt-get install scribus
We should refer to Windows computers as "promiscuous PCs" as they are very loose about security and have a lot of disgusting viruses. Windows is the dirty whore of the software world.
All data is speech. All speech is Free.
The painful part about having Microsoft computers in a special education classroom is the entire Windows interface is wrong for special ed kids.
On a Linux box, a web browser could switch on an age and ability appropriate interface model.
I work in Special Education classrooms with all kinds of disabled kids. The PC interface is awful.
The Linux desktops just shuffle some choices, but Linux could be radically better.
By interface, I mean the mouse, the left button, the right button, the roller, the keystrokes, the cursor, the active area on the screen. The interface is too chopped up, too many choices, and too easy to disrupt. The interface requires too many ideas linked to isolated fine motor actions.
----
The most successful interface for special ed kids is the teletubbies web games on pbs.org (where the youth can play peek-a-boo using a pushbutton wired to the left mouse button). The other success is the Stellaluna kids book on CD. It can be used where the adult holds the mouse and the youth pushes a button wired to the left mouse. It also models the success of musically modulated speech to enhance communication with kids who parse speech slowly.
-------
But for these applications, the adult interface surrounding the application is still the problem.
------------
What I would like to see is research based interface protocols for specific levels of receptive language (like 1 year old), visual processing and motor ability (like can use hand but can't isolate finger).
The interface protocol would be like a style sheet, it masks and configures the user's mouse, display, speakers, and keyboard.
This would be great as a web app. You could search the web for apps that can be presented to your student with ability appropriate interface.
Applications for special ed kids are very few in number, the ones I know are 1990 vintage Windows/MacIntosh programs implemented with a slide show toolkit.
An example is "Teen Tunes". It is still a "CD must be in the drive" program with a '90's copyright date. It sells for over $100. Like other special ed programs, this one is a frozen experiment in interface simplification. The aide still has to hold the mouse and center the cursor while the student pushes a button.
With support they would.
I work for a non-profit organization, and MS practically gives software away to use. CALs are dirt cheap, and we get pretty much any version of any software dirt cheap from MS. We just upgraded to XP from 2000 (and ditched Novell for AD). Compared to migrations of the scale we did (we've got about 3000 users) that I've done with other organizations, the software cost was really, really low. Again, it was from gratuitous discounts from MS for being a non-profit org.
Believe it or not it's surprisingly hard to have a player/OS combination that will play ALL the types of video out there. I think the most complete combination is some version of Windows with Quicktime, RealPlayer and VLC installed (and that probably won't play everything) with Flash installed for typical web video.
It's another case of "if someone hasn't done it for you then it's a pain".
Linux stays competing with whom? IBM? What would convince IBM and others to contribute to free software development now that Windows is gone?
In my opinion, Linux should not play the role of an "handy idiot" in hands of Big $ to kill M$, M$ is Linux's guarantee of being supported by Big $, at least to some degree.
Yeah, I've been wondering why my university is filled with Exchange/Outlook mailserver (accessible in FF for Windows or FF for Linux, haha), Microsoft Office 2007 Ultimate (or 2008 for Mac) all over the place, computers with Windows and 18 bazillion gigs of ram and multicore processors and...
The client-side stuff like Windows and Office I can kinda see due to familiarity reasons. But Exchange, back end of email system, I had previous never understood why that kind of thing was MS
The IT/compsci/etc. departments may have Linux and Unix boxes somewhere, but I haven't seen 'em. Tricked-out Macs and CS4/whatever - those kinds of computers I *do* see a lot of
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Linux is pretty bad when it comes to central management.
Its possible to roll a managed solution for a mixed Windows/Linux network with authentication based on LDAP and file sharing based on NFS and SAMBA, web apps authing back to LDAP, homedirs shared by NFS with a single client image installed from USB.
But its pretty ugly, insecure and requires a hell of a lot of application-specific configuration to get it to work seamlessly.
I know this, because I am responsible for administering a school network using Linux for servers and desktops (I inherited the system after a former disgruntled sysadmin left), and it is a hell of a lot more tricky than it could be.
Everything we have pretty much works, but i'm the only one associated with the organisation who can come remotely close to knowing how stuff works or what to do when stuff breaks. At least my business model is 'recession-proof', but frankly, the people running the school are powerless, and disenfranchised, and i find it pretty difficult to articulate any actual benefits of keeping the system on Linux beyond the expense involved in switching back to Windows - this is not the picture a lot of OSS advocates paint, or the way it should be.
It's been nothing but pain setting the system up - Its a good deal for me as they're kind of stuck paying me to admin the system, but does it really have to be this complex?
I'm a huge linux geek with a lot of real world programming and admin experiences, and the bottom line is if i had to do it again for another school, i'd pass and suggest they use Windows.
Thats why Windows wins in schools.
I gots ta ding a ding dang my dang a long ling long
"schools that switch save tens of millions of dollars"
"the world could save up to $500 million each year"
Bribe.
I have seen M$ bribing gullible government officials in developing nations.
I'd like to buy homeland for our 10 million people. http://twitter.com/mahadiga
I AM a programmer, and guess what...? I am the producer of one of those free as beer projects. Now I could tell you: "if you re not a programmer you cannot understand the free as beer concept" , but no, I'm not THAT arrogant as , for example, you.
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
And why did you get modded informative with that shit?
Dumping means you sell below cost. The cost of the product you're selling. The price of a competitor product is irrelevant.
After all, if your oil costs more than someone else whose come up with a new cheaper way of refining it, it's still dumping when you sell your oil below cost so that the newcomer goes out of business. That you sold at your competitor's profitless cost is irrelevant: you dumped below cost.
Our company competes in the electronic medical records market and we've done the same thing as Microsoft in order to get our software and services into new clinics.
Depending on the clinic, it's often more important to add them to our client list than it is to make a huge profit from the initial software sale. There's a lot to consider when you're competitively pricing software and/or services. Outright profit is just one very small item on that list.
It's popular to hate on Microsoft because of their past behavior. But there's nothing 'unethical' or 'monopolistic' about it. It's normal business competition. You can bet Oracle does it, IBM does it, and just about every other software/services vendor does it.
Anthony Papillion
Advanced Data Concepts, Inc.
"Quality Custom Software and IT Services"
O RLY?
What the fuck is wrong with Microsofties now? Office 2007 toolbar has the very same UI model that Microsoft trolls dissed tirelessly in OLPC Sugar interface -- except, of course, with more tab menu navigation and none of the consistency.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
I learned the real-world meaning of "promiscuous" in 2008.
Before that, I learned the network meaning in the 1990s.
I didn't get the chance to make lots of jokes!
3) People are lazy. I had instructors DEMANDING that I ... (so they don't have to do any work).
I once taught music to three classes of young students. I created all my own lecture notes. Trust me, it was very tedious work creating quality materials, that were "easy to understand, easy to grasp the concept".
Students requested to know how to play songs like She Bangs and Flying Without Wings. I spent so much time transposing scores for them that I didn't have time to learn new stuff.
In the 10th and last lesson, I showed students the existence of software like Cakewalk and Cooledit. Yes, they ran on Windows, because these were the only software I knew.
Moral of the story:
Instructors are not lazy. They had other things to do, like prepare exam notes and mark assignments. Don't fault them for using only Windows software, because these are nothing more than tools for teaching.
http://news.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1089511&cid=26425207
Since you're a "Linuzzz" troll, we all already know what you think about "Free as in speech."
Put identity in the browser.
Looking at Ubuntu 8.10 vs. WinXP and Vista, the following is dawning on me: Sometime in the future, when printing has become a zero fuss issue just like graphics and 3D drivers have now become a zero-fuss issue on Linux, Windows will be steamrolled into insignificance, just like Google did with Altavista. No way MS can compete with that level of quality in the long run if it comes for free.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Jeez - Microsoft is acting just like a corporation facing competition. Who would've thunk it? I'm just glad Gnu/Linux is actually competitive nowadays.
So you react to the Linuzzz word but not to the parent's M$? How convenient.
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
Not ignoring anything. Just calling you what you are. You've been doing "Abble" and "Linuzzz" for probably a year now, maybe longer. They're just as lame and childish as "M$" is. That one of the three is in your sig right now says a lot about you.
You belong in this story with Twitter and his adolescence, though. I'll give you that much.
Put identity in the browser.
I promise you, I'll stop with Abble and Linuzz when no M$ could be found in any post on this site. Happy now? I guess no ;-P
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
Well, my experience is that MS pays to get universities using their software, at least at Brazil.
Together with free Windows there is always some monetary "donation".
Rethinking email
"My small company has done the very same thing .. there's nothing 'unethical' or 'monopolistic' about it. It's normal business competition"
.. and if you believe that's not 'unethical' you've been whoring too long ...
You mean your company went to other peoples customers and lie about their product and sabotage third party apps
I expect Office to get involved in understanding these speedups
I am hard core about trying to find ways to make our applications boot faster
davecb5620@gmail.com
You just need a 32 bits Debian machine, add debian-multimedia to your sources.list, then apt-get install mplayer smplayer w32-codecs.
Unfortunately, some of the w32-codecs aren't available for 64 bits. Smplayer is a good front-end, that you can use instead of the native one. Also, you may not need to add debian-multimedia, I've dowloaded mplayer without it once, but I don't know if it's currently 'non-us', 'main' or simply considered too much pain to be put on main. Although, I can't guarantee the reciprocal if you add debian-multimedia, it will surely work.
Rethinking email
"Linux is pretty bad when it comes to central management"
.. :) But what part of the planet are you on, aren't there not any other trained Linux geeks in your area ?
.. ?
.. :)
...
:)
Have you tried to SSH into the machines and running CRON scripts to relieve you of the burden?
What services exactly are you providing to the desktop users? What does this school do that requires such complexity?
"I am responsible for administering a school network using Linux for servers and desktops"
How many servers, what distro, who is your support contract with. Have you contacted other education facilities using Linux? Do you also use Linux on the desktops?
"i'm the only one associated with the organisation who can come remotely close to knowing how stuff works or what to do when stuff breaks"
How exactly does the stuff break? Have you considered documenting how the stuff works, if in the event of, God forbid, you geting run over by a bus ?
"At least my business model is 'recession-proof', but frankly, the people running the school are powerless, and disenfranchised"
Good for you, it's not as if Windows ever made work for anyone
"i find it pretty difficult to articulate any actual benefits of keeping the system on Linux"
In terms of education, what do the teachers and students require that is not being provided by the current system? Web access, email, course material
"Its a good deal for me as they're kind of stuck paying me to admin the system, but does it really have to be this complex?"
I hadn't realized Linux was the way to go to bilk up the overtime
I'm quite frankly puzzled how a Linux sysadmin with real world programming and admin experience can find IT so complex, personally, once I set up some scripts, the system runs itself, and baring hardware failure, it just runs and runs
"Thats why Windows wins in schools"
They why does MS have to expend so much energy is keeping it out of schools. If most peoples experiences were like yours they would all be flying back to the safe arms of MS, you being a huge Linux geek and all
davecb5620@gmail.com
I used to work in a school about 5 years ago when I started getting involved with Linux. I used the desktop, brought in servers, started changing the network backbone to Linux in my school, but when I talked to the neighboring schools, they wanted nothing to do with it. I was a newbie in the tech departments at the time so when we had the regional tech department meetings, they wouldn't listen to me. I'd demo a feature that my school was using, everyone was buying in to it but as soon as I said it ran off of Linux, they all shut down. The existing Linux "expert" was a single person department that had no time to do any testing that said he installed it once, had a problem and never looked back. Being a school and a Novell shop, I found out that he was using SUSE 8 and 10 just came out at the time. He refused to look at it citing the amount of time and his previous Linux experience.
Another big factor is the teaching mentality. I actively tried to push OpenOffice in our school, which I was denied because...and I quote,"The rest of the world uses Microsoft, so thats what we need to teach." They aren't trying to teach word processing, spreadsheet use, database design and management, etc...they are teaching Word, Excel, Access, and all of the other applications. From my experience, people that learn the application are locked in to the Word and Excel, but teaching word processing and how to use a spreadsheet someone can use Word, OpenOffice, Excel, Notes, and pretty much any other office suite out there.
Bottom line what it comes down to is budget strapped school systems can't afford a sizable tech department that can take the time to research and develop new systems to cut costs and do the job better. It is often a single person that is swamped with requests and can also share duties as a teacher, librarian, or some other role and is only concerned with fixing what is broken, upgrading to the newest version, and keeping the status quo. Since Linux is outside of their knowledge and comfort zone, these "admins" are never going to switch to anything outside of Microsoft.
"At the university I went to the linux lab with Red Hat cost more to license than an equivalent sized XP installed lab"
:)
.. one would assume the linux licensing would have a slight edge regardless of the install type"
What was the name of this university and why didn't they go with CentOS or Fedora
"Granted the linux lab was licensed as workstation installs (more expensive, but desktop didn't allow multiple users remoting in)"
Where does it say that ? My understanding is that you pay for a support contract, but as you are in a 'Linux lab' full of huge Linux geeks, you hardly need it
"I vaguely remember there was some weirdness with the RedHat licensing for education
What ?
davecb5620@gmail.com
Schools are not corporate IT training courses where technical material is to be taught and degrees awarded. Schools are meant to make citizens out of children. That is a legally stated aim of schools and a written duty that no school can shy away from.
If you've listened to RMS' speech or if you have been asked by a friend for a copy of Windows that you have purchased because he needed to do a college submission because his teacher only wanted a Word document, then, you would know what I'm talking of.
Sharing code to help your friend makes your act "illegal". It is a moral dilemma which clearly no constitution must allow to be forced on its citizens. And yet it does. It encourages going against your freedom of expression in a sense - you can't talk if you dont send a Word document.
That is straight constitutional stuff, maybe the US constitution is a corporate memo, not here.
Also, unfortunately for businesses, they do not operate in a vacuum, they work in real markets in real countries with real citizens.
Such a license (as MS EULA) should be outlawed in the first place.
Also, either company X adhere to open document formats or fuck the hell off from the software business.
You must write a legal document on Armani(TM) cloth using Coke(TM) stains ONLY.
That is an MS Word document "requirement" which is so common in Government offices.
And Microsoft just standardised a binary, proprietary, closed format through the ISO process!
They committed their biggest mistake EVER.
Shot themselves in the foot, in style, with no scope for rollback. It's an ISO standard lie!
Also, they bribe officials in many countries.
If all those bribes are unearthed, they could stand guilty of subverting the legal process and similar other crimes, because they've also lobbied that lawyers and legal documents be used in their formats.
That means that they cheated the courts, inlcuding but not limited to the Higher State/Province Courts but also the supreme court of every land they operated in.
The law applies to everyone else other than the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court however can pick up anyone for subverting the Court's opinion via "Contempt of Court".
Cheating a Chief Justice is an insult that may go unpunished, but cheating ALL SITTING CHIEF JUSTICES EVER, is something that can never go unpunished and they did exactly that.
In most lands, Microsoft will be serious trouble if they even open their mouths - in this case, it is worth listing the names of the lawyers employed by Microsoft because they can leave Microsoft today, but the fact that they have subverted legal process and cheated their own judicial system cannot be isolated from their identity.
Expert opinions in the US may disagree with this, but in other lands, laws are not written by US lawmakers nor interpreted by US Chief Justices. And to lose the world market is not a minor incident. Microsoft is going. Put your money on Google, IBM, Novell or even Red Hat.
Courts have very funny ways of toppling business regimes, especially those already convicted of massive frauds.
It NSA key is added to the case, and the ACLU get into the business, Microsoft is, well history - mass sabotage of US citizens' privacy and freedom of life, speech and expression.
Note that NSA is not a legal entity outside the US of A, but facts are very much facts.
But price is the oil of the inertia machine.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
... should be moderated as troll.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
What awesome things do they do?
Names please.
I am tired of hearing this but names are never offered.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
"I used to work in a school about 5 years ago when I .. started changing the network backbone to Linux in my school"
.. had a problem and .. refused to look at it citing the amount of time and his previous Linux experience"
.. ?
...
Do you mind providing the name of the school? What do you mean, you changed the switches & routers?, if so what did they run on before and why the need to change ?
"I was a newbie in the tech departments at the time"
But they let you upgrade the 'backbone'?
"The existing Linux "expert"
What was the nature of his problem, what was he tryign to do, give specifics. Did either of you contact other educational facilities involved in Linux migration
"Bottom line what it comes down to is budget strapped school systems can't afford a sizable tech department that can take the time to research and develop new systems"
What research do you need to browse the Internet, email and do word processing, spreadsheets etc, all of which are currently available on Windows
davecb5620@gmail.com
... anybody can.
This lame excuse that users have to fuck around with Linux to make it work is a fantasy.
Last year saw around a dozen machines (maybe more) that come with Linux preinstalled, and frankly Ubuntu can be installed by somebody non technical without any issues (unless you can't tell your time zone, your own language or answer some other mind numbingly challenging questions like those).
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
>> While I admit the GP is a troll you are just as offbase. Your anecdotal evidance does
>> not disprove that Windows is still dominant. Does it suck? Heck yeah, but schools only
>> have so much time and sadly windows skills are crucial many industries. I hope that
>> changes, but until then your 10 person shop does little to change the trend.
>
> So what are Windows skills? As opposed to basic computer use skills.
That's the crux of the matter here.
The relevant computing skills can be taught with Apple II's.
Nevermind the "everyone runs Windows" BS. A kid coming out of
school these days should be able to adequately deal with the
pervasive sorts of consumer network gear like cable modem
routers. (basic network skills and the abstract understanding
to apply that to ANY UI)
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Why the children, their parents and the teachers don't know about the ethics of the company whose software they are using?
It is all great and good to use the best tool for the job, but if that tool is made by somebody I find distasteful to make business with I will change to another tool.
Talk about ethics is sorely lacking in all this debate about the benefits of using MS's software.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I have never found a public school anywhere in the world that could buy whatever they needed.
They had to mind the pennies and often have to organize events to obtain money from charitable people.
And I am talking about the UK, the 4th biggest economy in the world, not a 3rd world backwater place, I have lived close to 2 primary schools and they often have "fairs" and car boot sales in order to raise money.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
A call to save money is a call to become more efficient, to use your money more wisely.
That has nothing to do with Socialism, as a matter of fact capitalism assumes that you will always look for the better deal, but this self interest is distorted by the monopolistic nature of the computing market.
If anything choosing anything but MS software is a service to the capitlist way of living.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
We are supposed to worry about issues that matter to us.
Your suggestion would be in place if we were in a website discussing fashion, sports or a complete non related issue.
IT in schools is one of the most important topics we can worry about in this website.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
"As a school tech director for ten years and now a consultant for a company with a specialty practice in outsourcing K12 IT"
.. :)
..
...
:)
...
Now that we've established you credentials
"the issue isn't how much MS costs. It's the continuing cost of support, and beleive it or not a properly configured Windows system is VERY efficient"
From personal experience Windows (heavy use by game players) I find the opposite to be true. Windows requires a total reinstall at about the four month mark. It just sloooows down so much, defrag cleaning out the registry and so on, has no effect. So by the time I get to the last one, the first one requires a reinstall. There was even a company selling a utility to keep your heavy apps on different Windows partitions so as the machine won't slow down over time. The utility provided a hot key to switch between apps
With Linux, and baring upgrades, it just runs and runs
"Our tech to computer ratio was over 1:700 and we resolved most trouble calls in less than 24 hours"
Well the tech to computer ratio at a f400 company I worked for was 12:400 so all I can say is, you must be drinking different koolaid.
"The range of educational software is just not there for Linux, and it's only in the last couple years that the management utilities have started to mature for it" Generally, learning to use the desktop is the best tutorial a kid can have. What educational software are you referring to. What functionality in Linux 'management utilities' has been immature these last couple of years?
"Ironically the wild environment of Windows produced excellent management tools early on"
I don't understand this bit, define 'wild environment' and what management tools are you referring to, 'Active Directory'? I understand that there was a market in tools to manage the 'management' tools in 'Active Directory'
"Windows has "dll hell" but Linux suffers from "lib purgatory" among other maladies"
The whole world is familiar with the former, but personally I've never heard of the latter
davecb5620@gmail.com
While working as a volunteer teaching in south east asia, I got to witness this first hand.
Through intensive wining and dining, Microsoft convinced the federal government to require every municipality to use MSWin based accounting software, meaning that every municipality had to have $30,0000 worth of hardware and Windows Server 2003 in all its negative glory to run it. So these small towns were forced to choose between complying with the accounting law, and -buying an ambulance-. I personally heard such conversations occur.
Wouldnt it be awesome to have a stroke and have to walk to the hospital?
One of the institutions introduced an open source version of the accounting software that could be run on Linux on commodity hardware. It followed the same government mandated spec to the letter. Predictably, the same government that MS bought, ruled it incompatible. No money in it for them!
Congratulations MS folks, this is the company you work for.
Most educational software isn't worth the bits it's written in, best just let them have at the desktop or use the
davecb5620@gmail.com
Because software is about as expensive as the hardware in these deals, the world could save up to $500 million each year by dumping Microsoft.
Why $500 million/year? Isn't it closer to $12.2 billion--the revenue generated by Microsoft's software licenses?
"We reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." --The American President (20.1.2009)
I would argue that, from a corporate standpoint, the reason that Windows is still dominant is because of the control given to management and IT. Programs like Websense, CarbonCopy, and even Windows' own Active Directory give control and the ability to impose limitations on the end user (this is where the line between access and security comes into play).
Linux, as far as I can tell, still lacks that sort of structure. To install software, I need the root password. I can also create gaping security holes with the root password. I *could* start up an unsecure web server and point it to project files, since I need access to work at home (say). Or any other number of no-brain scenarios that IT normally has to deal with. While any IT person certainly could remotely check and configure a machine, it is simply much more work than a few clicks in AD to push new software to the masses.
I agree that it has to do with a certain comfort level. I recently switched a friend from a virus-riddled, hardware configuration nightmare XP installation to Ubunto 8.10. Older machine, and she (yes... she) was happy that everything "just worked". Fortunately, she understood how things worked well enough to make the change. In many regards, she liked Ubuntu better.
Same situation with some co-workers, not a chance. We're talking people that are terrified to go out of their comfort zone. They know the inner workings of the software they use (primarily Office), but once you take them out of the bubble a bit, they lose their minds. We use SQL server as a database back-end to an application *only* because these guys can connect to that with Access. Nevermind the fact that pgAdmin III is not much different, or that it's free vs the $200/license of SQL Server (plus whatever for Office).
That's the crux of the matter here.
The relevant computing skills can be taught with Apple II's.
Couldn't have put it better myself.
Teach someone Office, and they learn Office. Teach them word processing, and they can learn any word processor.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.
Thanks for your opinion - way to create extreme irony... hopefully it was intentional.
If you can read this... 01110101 01110010 00100000 01100001 00100000 01100111 01100101 01100101 01101011
They are not taught concepts that is for sure. I once installed Open Office for an accounting friend of mine. He had been using Excel for years. Upon showing him how to add columns in OO he cheered and said "Cool I don't have to use my calculator anymore!"
Not only have you invented an imaginary friend to quote in arguments about rival office software packages on the internet, that friend is also an accountant.
I think you know what you have to do.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
In part, this may be related to computer illiteracy among faculty, here as researchers or "engineers" rather than teachers : I know very few specialists in my field, and I expect it's the case in autism too, that have acquired the basic skills to take part in a app development project (not to mention coding themselves) - and of course most pro developpers have a symetric lack. This makes cutting-edge scientific apps (whether applied or research-support - or high level teaching support !) for anything but physics, maths and genetics, and particularly in the humanities, rare and often expensive. As a humanities pedant myself, I feel nobody, no matter the specialty, should get a master (not to mention a PhD) without having learned a serious bit of programming. How are we supposed to achieve that on Windows boxes ?
As for the lack of interest, it's once again a vicious circle : older faculty members only get interested in computers when they get exposed to some killer app supporting their research activities (though then they do, a lot) : when apps are still lacking for their field, they just don't imagine the possibility of their usefulness. So they think that learning computer skills would be a loss of time, and that's what they persuade their students of...
NB : While almost computer illiterate myself, I've set up and teach a computer course for humanities PhD students at my alma mater, out of despair that anybody really competent (we have a computer science dep.) would ever find the patience to deal with us dorks. Some responsability there too...
Here's the cool thing though. With Linux/Unix you can use diskless, or semidiskless workstations, where there is only one location where software is installed, making it easier to deal with than heterogenous desktops. If everyone has the same /usr then changes are kept in ONE place. If someone needs more software they request it from the admin, who can then install it on the NFS server. The users have no need to have root access. Ever. Users shouldn't be installing software, even in a Windows environment, that's what admins are for. As for comfort zone, it's a recession, adapt, or get laid off.
That which is done from love exists beyond good and evil
I'm no fanboy, but apparently I get something all you MS haters don't.
We still live in a world where the average person just wants to turn on their PC and have it work. No downloading uncompiled programs so you can tweak them before compiling them, no downloading a "better" GUI, no updates more complicated than "update now", and the ability, if you need to, to just walk into a store and buy some software and it works with your Windows machine.
As a geek, you may not mind, and you may even enjoy that aspect of the computing experience, but most people just want to surf and read email. They don't care if a system is not that "stable" - especially if a reboot usually fixes it.
Linux will never have the adoption of Windows until it is as easy for the average person to use as Windows. Part of that ease of use is in naming things appropriately. Some of the more brilliant moves Bill made was to rename "directories" into "folders" and to create a Word Processing program named "Word". They long ago stopped calling it "version 6.02", and started calling it "2003".
That's a lot easier than presenting a novice with words like GNU, and kernel, and "unix like" (oh yeah, that's big plus), Perl (that's not even spelled right), etc.
When I buy a car, I don't open the hood and see what's inside. Whatever is or is not there is proven on the test drive. I am much more interested in what's in the cockpit than what's in the engine compartment, and I certainly wouldn't buy it if I had to break out a screwdriver to remove the gas cap.
RE:"Linus is easier to user now" ... "people are lazy"
This is nonsensical. If people are lazy, and Linux was easier to use, then they they would do what's easier and use Linux. QED
Yes, inertia has something to do with it, but to prove my case, look at the Apple adoption. Even though it's built on Unix, as long as you insulate the user from that nastiness, you will increase adoption. I believe the main factor holding Apple back is that it is still much cheaper to buy a PC.
Microsoft wins because they make a better product. Saving $500 million a year is meaningless if you can't get what you need to do done.
It's time to face the facts people, Linux on the desktop just isn't as good as Windows. Windows (and OSX) sell because they are better. Really the only thing Linux on the desktop has going for it is that it doesn't cost anything. Unfortunately free just isn't enough to make the pain worth while.
We've tried nothin' and we're all out of ideas. - Ned's Mom
The problem is not
Dumb, fearful, lazy people
It's workoholic people, at least in the universities. Most teachers-researchers spend all their free time on their stuff, with effective weekly working hours well beyond 60. They won't take even 5 minutes away from their specialty for a chore like documenting themselves on Linux or whatever unless they feel an immediate gain will result for their research productivity. So if they learned nothing but basic Windows use as students, they'll keep using Windows, including for their teaching chores.
So dumping is ok for Teh Lunix and other sub-par FOSSie junk, but not for commercial software? Nice logic there.
There's always some excuse about why Teh Lunix loses in the marketplace, isn't there? Oh boohoo, Microsoft is competing with us! You guys whine that Windows is taught in schools, because it conditions kids blah blah blah... and that business use it, because they are "used to using it", blah blah... and in the meantime, you are trying to dump Teh Lunix onto schools, in order to condition kids to use Teh Lunix, to convert businesses to using it, etc.
FOSSies- hypcrites of the highest order. And the most pathetic thing is, you don't even realize it, or understand why someone would say that.
You mean like Soviet Union, China, North Korea, Vietnam, and Cuba? Those communist countries wew and are very similar to M$, Novell, and Adobe. Just look at the death threats twitter has received from M$. M$ has even created a "college student" to astroturf. This hater of non-free software has even threatened twitter's life. Like communist countries, M$ will use death threats to silence any and all who oppose M$ much like the communist countries have to suppress those who spoke against them.Supporting non-free software is akin to supporting communism. Supporting free software is akin to supporting capitalism and democracy.
--
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Knowing where to find Bonzi Buddy and install it to piss off your IT department ;)
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Removing viruses and reinstalling the OS after failed updates. I can think of little else that's specific to Windows.
Although at least Microsoft doesn't try to push BIOS updates through Windows Update. Nothing is better for bricking a Mac than a failed EFI update.
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
That is not the case in my university at least(Technion, Israel)
When I asked why they use so much MS Software when they have *lots* of Unix(Solaris and Linux as far as I saw) infrastructure the answer was "MS not only gives us the software for free but also books, support and other goodies"
Now you can get Linux for free, but support(Redhat Novell or whatever) will still cost a nice sum, not to mention textbooks and on site support.
My experience:
People who learn on Linux do well with both Linux and Windows.
People who learn on Windows don't do well with either of them.
Apparently you haven't used the new Office with the ribbon from hell.
So all OS's operate the same now? No significant difference at all? Come on man, you know that just isn't true. There are some serious similarities, but you are kidding yourself if you don't think there is a learning curve.
Are you a good programmer?
If you're not, you're not likely to understand how picking up maintenance of some complex software is a waste of your goddamn time, and its much easier to just do your day job and pay someone familiar with the code to fix it.
Why the hell do I need source for my OS? All the problems have been solved in some 70/80's textbook, and any modern algorithm is described in a research paper + patent doc.
3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.
Why, yes I *am* an arrogant bastard. Thanks for noticing.
Be aware that "Free as in beer (anything)" and "Free as in speech (anything)" are two *very* different -often non-overlapping- concepts. "Free of charge" is an attribute that *anyone* can see the benefit of. "Free to modify" is an attribute that Joe Sixpack will never care about. Joe will almost always grab something that's "Free as in beer", but he doesn't care much for enhancing his television set.
Do you understand what I'm trying to say here?
Someone really needs to consult a bestiary. If that's a troll, I'm an elf.
I'm a fair-to-middling programmer who's weak on his maths. Thanks for asking.
I do understand just how long it can take to spin up on a complex project. I also know my hourly rate, and can figure out just how much money I could have made had I not chosen to fuck around with KDE 4.x. (Or Gentoo, or whatever else strikes my fancy today.) You seem to be *really* serious about making money. I'm not. I *really* like playing around with software. *shrug*
Most folks -myself included- have no need for the source to their OS. However, freely available source code ensures that your current systems are always maintainable. (Until the underlying hardware changes too much, that is.)
Does your company depend on a closed-source app? If so, what happens when the current maintainer unexpectedly goes out of business, or stops supporting that app and has no upgrade path for your old data or workflow?
I suppose that *you* would seek out another vendor and purchase their offering. Assuming that I was in charge of purchasing, I probably would as well. (I *know* how much it costs to develop software in-house.) But, what if your app was a one-off product, something that's very specialized, maybe something that you contracted out for in the first place? What then?
So all OS's operate the same now? No significant difference at all? Come on man, you know that just isn't true. There are some serious similarities, but you are kidding yourself if you don't think there is a learning curve.
What level of use are you referring to? Because that is a very important aspect, and very easy to twist to support either point of view if not defined.
For this discussion, we are referring to the basic level of knowledge that someone should have to operate a computer properly. So not maintenance, not servicing, not configuration, but using the computer as a means to an end. Anything outside basic everyday use is irrelevant for the purpose of this conversation. Because, if we are being honest, the aim is to create office workers, not sys admins or tech workers at school level. So when you confine computer use to everyday office tasks, my point is valid.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.
You seem to think Apple, Microsoft and Unix were the only sources of Operating Systems in the 80s and 90s. They weren't. In the 80s, there was the Vic 20/Commodore 64 and the 8bit Ataris (400 to 130XE)...they didn't really have an OS (unless you count Basic), they were really more a hardware platform which programmers often had to hand code.
In the late 80s and early 90s, there was the Amiga, Atari ST, and OS/2. Perhaps others, I can't remember. I think that is also when DR DOS was out too. Late 90s, OS/2 was failing but there was also BeOS.
This may not be all of the consumer OSes, but they are the ones I remember, and they are certainly not limited to just Apple and Microsoft. All of them are completely gone. You have to ask why.
I could go into the reasons why people don't like Microsoft's tactics, but this has been hashed and rehashed on slashdot a thousand times. Wikipedia seems to have a good enough summary of criticisms. No need for me to repeat.
Where I contract for at the moment doesn't really *depend* on a closed source app - which is saying a lot considering we develop using the MS .Net toolchain. We could switch to SharpDevelop and move SVN and the devs onto *nix boxes - which wouldn't be overly difficult. We could probably target Mono - theres a few dependancies that could likely be replaced.
I'd imagine Infrastructure would have the worst time, exporting everything out of Exchange / AD. Say a $250k of peoples time for the switch?
Productivity would be down. Taking Resharper away from the junior developers would probably drop their output 30% straight up.
Bigger companies tend to understand risk mitigation - even if only via natural selection. We make software that is used in automation - people rely on this, and downtime is expensive. The code for any deployed binaries is in escrow.
It would be hard for Windows to end up "unmaintained" anyway. Windows as a property is worth probably around a hundred billion dollars. Any company that ends up owning it would have to be publically listed - and would be obligated by its shareholders and the massive investment in aquiring it to keep developing/selling.
But yeah theres a definite "free as in speech" fixation by some people. I'm not sure where it comes from either - I'm personally sick of reading other people's code - it usually drives me insane. ;)
3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.