Just been asked.....

[Guest]

"Sir can we have linux on our PCs please?"

 

Not bad from a Year 5 8O Any relation to Geoff?

[Geoff]

[localzuk]

I wish we had that happening here!!

[_Bat_]

Wow... I wonder what their brother/father/sister does for a living/has a hobby in?

[Geoff]

His surname isn't 'Dell' is it?

[webman]

But what was your reply?

[Disease]

What's Linux?

[webman]

An operating system - like windows but better.

[localzuk]

An operating system - like windows but better.

 

Much, much better

[Netman]

Could have been worse...

 

They might have asked for MACs... 8O 8O

[CyberNerd]

I know of several kids who run linux at home, even had parents complain about problems with teacher putting windows only coursework on the VLE

"do a mspowerpoint of such and such for homework" !

I've been doing an extended schools club that is focused mostly on linux and that has helped to a certain extent, word travels fast.

[Geoff]

I think the youngest attendee of my local LUG is 12 (comes with his father some times).

[tom_newton]

LiveCD may be an option for one or 2 PCs?

[webman]

Or an Edubuntu server + PXE boot - the educational software may be very beneficial.

[enjay]

had parents complain about problems with teacher putting windows only coursework on the VLE

"do a mspowerpoint of such and such for homework"

They make a good point, no? Why should we assume that all the families have PCs with Microsoft Office installed?

 

For a while, we have had a couple of copies of MS Works around the school for those people who save stuff in the wrong format by mistake. I also recently installed Open Office for similar reasons.

[Disease]

Better how?

[webman]

Nor the time nor the thread for that discussion Disease

[_Bat_]

had parents complain about problems with teacher putting windows only coursework on the VLE

"do a mspowerpoint of such and such for homework"

They make a good point, no? Why should we assume that all the families have PCs with Microsoft Office installed?

 

For a while, we have had a couple of copies of MS Works around the school for those people who save stuff in the wrong format by mistake. I also recently installed Open Office for similar reasons.

 

Microsoft just love it when people generically call a word processor, "microsoft word" or "word".

 

I think more people should complain about it. The more complaints schools receive, the more like they are to start using popular alternatives alongside the usual microsoft stuff therefore raising awareness of its exisance.

[Disease]

[GrumbleDook]

Could have been worse...

 

They might have asked for MACs... 8O 8O

 

Erm ... why would they want Media Access Control ... that is something that would be on all computers nowadays as Bluetooth, WiFi and wired NICs all have MAC addresses ...

 

oh ... you mean Apple Macs?

 

Nah ... FreeBSD would be wasted on the littluns.

[Andrew_C]

I wonder when the monopolies commission will spot that in only one area of education, a closed, monopolistic, software suite and OS are being REQUIRED to gain a public qualification.

[enjay]

I wonder when the monopolies commission will spot that in only one area of education, a closed, monopolistic, software suite and OS are being REQUIRED to gain a public qualification.

The exam boards' defence will be that all they require of students is to use word processors and spreadsheets, 99.9% of schools decide to use MS Word and Excel for these tasks, but there's nothing saying that they we HAVE to use MS. They (allegedly) use vendor-independent phrases although it is very clear which application they had in mind.

[webman]

The old Thomas Telford GNVQ ICT course material always referred to MS Office products by their name.

[Guest Guest]

^ Im 99% sure ive seen "Use MS powerpoint to...."

 

 

You know what the arguement it though (well what i get when i mention opensource anyway);

 

"Well thats what they use in industry" - Err no they dont, never seen anyone use access for a serious database before.

 

"Open source is free so it must be crap" - Err no *nix is free, mysql is free, apache is free...

 

 

Problem is theresd to many idiots running the show who dont have any technical knowledge whatsoever and think the flashyest wesite/presentation must mean teh softwares good

[webman]

I think it's called "Cash incentives"