Excellent points and information Kevin...sounds like you have really thought it through. Kepe up the excellent work!
----- Original Message ----- From: Kevin Anderson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Tuesday, September 23, 2003 11:27 am Subject: Re: (clug-talk) CBE Wants to hear from us - it's a start at least. > One benefit for the "when it breaks" that I thought of is that > they could > use "distro on a disk" type solutions. I think Cluggix would be > the best > bet, simply because home-grown means alot. Rebuilding the box > means "shut > machine off - turn on again". It wouldn't work for the servers, > but it > would easily work for the desktops. Further, upgrades would be a > matter of > shipping out new CDs. > > LTSP would work too, but it seemed a bit ugly to get it going for each > different machine. It certainly worked and it worked well once it was > running, but with CDs, you're immediately ready to go with > anything that's > donated and brought in. This school currently does not even accept > donations due to the level of maintenance they require to get them > runninginitially. With a CD, they could just ask, does it have a > CDrom, does it > have a NIC (not even neccessary for some uses). > > Further, if a student needs help with some assignment, they could > simply be > given or lent a CD identical to the ones used in the classroom. > Parentswould be free to keep a copy for their own home use. > Currently, if a > student is learning to use Word (publisher, XL, whatever), and > they need a > copy at home, they face 2 options. 1) the school can implicitly > encouragethe parents to pirate a copy. 2) the school can expect > the parents to cough > up several hundred dollars for a legit copy. > > Heck, the School could even accept donated computers, even if they > won't use > them internally, and then offer them to parents who can't afford a > PC of > their own. or partner with a Computer Recycler, and give the > recycler all > the donations with the understanding that CBE would be able to > allocate used > PCs at a 10 to 1 ratio (or whatever). I'm still thinking it > through, but > there are far more possibilities when building the machine > involves "put in > the disk, turn it on". > > Kev. > > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Mahlah Hansen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Sent: Monday, September 22, 2003 3:00 PM > Subject: Re: (clug-talk) CBE Wants to hear from us - it's a start > at least. > > > > On September 22, 2003 02:50 pm, you wrote: > > > This is an excellent idea. The schools are always talking to > Microsoftbut, > > > the schools are always crying about cash. The ROI for them > with Linux > would > > > be a huge annual savings even with their educational discounts. > > > > I think a fair argument for this would be how much would it cost > them to > train > > their staff to use it? sometimes the cost of training is far > greater then > the > > cost of the licenses. They would have to know they would be > guaranteedfree > > or low cost consulting until their staff are completely trained and > > comfortable with the system. Offering help through certain > mailing lists > etc > > would not be enough support for them to start at least. I just > couldn't> imagine they would have the time in the day to be > searching the internet > on > > how to fix their system if something breaks. You also have to > realize some > > people don't know how to use search engines efficiently, and > they might > not > > even know what they are suppose to be looking for. Putting > together some > > sort of 6 month to 1 year support group for the school may be > helpful, at > > least this way one person wouldn't have to be on call 24/7.. > > > > just a thought.. > > > > > >
