LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Richard Russell <richard.russell@bigpond.com>
  To  : <lloy0076@rebel.net.au>
        <sward@trinity.sa.edu.au>
  Date: Sat, 28 Apr 2001 17:54:10 +0930

RE: MS Curriculum at schools and TAFEs ...

<snip>

> Furthermore, since when do system
> administrators or network managers stop teachers/staff/people who use
> the system from helping to run the system.

since they discovered that letting users "help" to run the system is more
trouble than it's worth. Most sysadmins I know would not let users near a
root account. Note that having input into how the system is run is quite
different to running it... Every good sysadmin should be responsive to the
needs of his or her users, and part of this involves being sure that they
know exactly what is happenning on the network, and not allowing other
people to make "unauthorised" changes... Given what you say later, I think
you agree, but that sentence doesn't sit well with me...

> The whole point of having logon's and users is so the network staff can
> allow users to customise their logons to their heart's contents. Are you

I'd also modify that sentence to:

"The whole point of having logon's and users is so the network staff can
allow users to customise their logons to their heart's contents without
affecting any other user of the system."

<snip>

> > Morover, the network manager may have a very different
> > perspective of the network and technical priorities compared to
> the teacher in the
> > classroom.
>
> Are you saying there is a breakdown in communication in school systems?
> Are you saying that system administrators are wholly unable to work with
> their users to create a network that provides a solution to the users
> needs? If you look at any IT course that isn't totally technically
> based, you'll see things like:
>
> * communication
> * gathering user needs
> * working with users
> * creating documentation
>
> I agree that the network manager "may". I don't agree with your implied
> the network manager "will"...

well, certainly when you consider the quality of talent that schools can
afford, their experience is more likely to be of sysadmins who _don't_ focus
on users needs... The ones who do are usually priced beyond affordability
(no dispersions cast on any school sysadmins here -- there are good, cheap
people around, but they usually don't last long)

>
> > We sometimes seem to be moving into 'computing for computing's sake'
> > rather than focussing on the needs of the end-user.
>
> Sometimes. Not now.

?

I think Stephen was saying "we" as in his specific situation... I could be
wrong though...

>
> > Linux is not easy to use.
>
> Oh dear! We have to learn something...

Horses for courses. Learning a lot about computers is unneccessary and often
counterproductive for most people who aren't going to work in the computer
industry... Similarly, if we all learnt a lot about silicon chip fabrication
technology, it would not be neccessary, and could be counterproductive
(think opportunity cost, and the added confusion it could cause for those of
us who can't handle learning it)....... hence, in education, as computers
are a tool, learning about them should be secondary to using them to acheive
other things... (learning objectives in this case)... again, you seem to
agree with this, judging from what you say later...

> > The mnemonic jargon which fills this list is evidence of
> > that.
>
> What mnemonic jargon? Have you suddenly forgotten that this is a Linux
> support list and people who understand the jargon speak on it?

I have a feeling that this could be referring to "ls" and friends... I could
be wrong. It's well known that unices are not intuitive (not that DOS is,
but...), and while moves have been made to imporve this, it's still the case
that in a Windows world, the easiest thing to use is Windows...

> > OK, so network managers will look after all the background
> tasks, but, at the
> > end of the day, where is the software support? The Gimp, Star
> Office, Logo (and a
> > multitude of banner-choked net sites) may be fine, but DTP,
> conventional (non-java)
> > programming, CD-ROM resources, CAD, and general K-12 curriculum
> support seem to be
> > poorly served.
>
> You've got the "desktop" versus "server" confused here. "gcc" supports
> ANSI C and has reasonable support for ANSI C++ (well, it does C++ but
> I'm not savvy enough to know how "conformist" it is). What CD-ROM

As I remember, gcc is one of the most compliant C++ compilers available. The
general state of C++ when I looked at compilers a year or two ago is a
complete mess. None of the commercial implementations are complete, none are
correct, non are compatible... BAH!

> resources? Have you even bothered to look at http://freshmeat.net/ for
> CAD?

I just had a brief look, and found nothing that looks like it may be of
AutoCAD's Calibre.

Although, I just googled this: http://www.cad-forum.com/lcad/lcadtools.asp,
which mentions an AutoCAD replacement... however, it's not free.
http://www.softwareforge.com/ ... and doesn't look that good to me...

>
> Incidentally, I'm not in the education field and I don't know what DTP
> is... [read: don't accuse me of talking mnemonic gibberish when you're
> doing the same yourself].

DeskTop Publishing (not really an education term...)

>
> > Could someone please 'put me right' and point me to some
> resources. Once the server
> > is up, and protected by its firewall, chatting to its clients
> and showering them
> > with easy email and net access, what are students in schools
> going to be doing
> > other than sending each other silly messages and cruising the net?
>
> Learning. Funny that, eh? Incidentally, what's wrong with sending each
> other "silly messages"? And are you prepared to argue that "cruising the
> net [sic: it should be 'net] disbenefits students" when it's slowly
> becoming obvious that a new class of illiterates are emerging - the
> information technology illiterate?

Hmm... The role of computers in schools is something that needs to be
decided _before_ they are installed, and independantly of the choice of OS
(well, in some ways, it should drive the choice of OS). If it's important to
enable unrestricted communication between students, teachers and the outside
world, then you need that. If not, you disable or restrice it in some way.

rr

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