<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Jun 20, 2008 at 9:40 PM, Geoffrey Myers <<a href="mailto:lists@serioustechnology.com">lists@serioustechnology.com</a>> wrote:<br><br>My apologies, Geoffrey. I seem to be having a mental block at getting people to see the much bigger picture. So I'll try it again and maybe not hit as many nerves :-)<br>
<br>It is a decidedly unrealistic expectation that any general purpose computing environment be expected to perform all things for all people at all times. We don't ask this of any other product so why do we ask it of a pile of software?<br>
<br>Currently schools are facing another round (every year with out fail since 1980) of overall budget cutbacks. The 1970 dollars per pupil budget has dropped precipitously and the trend shows no end in sight.<br><br>Now the schools are expected to to integrate technology into their daily process. While they often get a bit of extra money to fund the initial purchase, the ongoing costs are the continued burden of the schools. <br>
<br>Along the way, schools send people to conferences like NECC where they get schmoozed by the companies that write lock-in software that the only way to improve <insert test score or other parameter here> is with their software. It seems like such a good idea. Spend a few kilobucks and wham! <something> improves. Except they need to get the upgrade and buy a support package and get training and because they paid kilobucks they _have_ to use it. It is a requirement. Even if it doesn't work. Or it's so single purpose they can do anything else with it. In fact, the people with the ability to look at other tools are actively discourage from doing so.<br>
<br>So here we come. The "free software" zealots. Preaching the virtues of stuff that _we_ know works often better than the kilobuck stuff. The demo gets shown and one person pipes up and says "that's all nice but can it do <foo>?". <br>
<br>Remember, this is a general purpose system that has now been tasked with doing a very specific task by someone who probably just learned how to do it on <despicable platform> and barely knows the process at all. They are looking for an easier way to do <foo> without looking <foo>lish (sorry. bad pun :) in front of their peers who probably can't do <foo> at all.<br>
<br>The schools need help. Desperately. They need a top to bottom cleaning of technology. For the most part they need leadership with technical ability. <br><br>I have not found a use for a windows or mac desktop environment in the past 10 years. Yes, I said 10 years. Way before the distro's all started the push towards a desktop environment. The issue for the schools that is not addressed is planning. What do the NEED to use technology for?. Need is not the same as want. <br>
<br>Well, I've got sidetracked and have now lost my train of thought on this. A final closing remark:<br>Everything that any school really needs from computers can be done with a Linux system. What we have to do is focus not on the existing software that will not work in Linux but on the new capabilities that they will have. They will be making a tiny, nearly insignificant sacrifice to make the transition. But the schools are terrified of the unknown. They already know that what they have is unreliable. All we are offering in their mind is another way to have more computers unused because of problems. What they don't understand at any level is the rock-solid stability of the Linux platform will provide a solid infrastructure for the basic technology needs of finding information, writing a synopsis or critic or other evaluation and presenting it to teachers for their evaluation of student learning. The core of education is the use of language skills. Fedora 9 ships with translated environments for about 40 languages. Other distro's do similar. That is a heavy strength. <br>
<br></div><br>-- <br>-- <br>James P. Kinney III <br>