Doing the Right Thing (revisited)

[Tom Emerson]

Jim, regarding educational software intended for use by school age 
children, have you reviewed what is available today?  (... I speak 
without having looked too closely myself!!)  Recall that there are a 
handful of public school districts around the country switching over to a 
Linux dominated desktop computing environment this summer.

In my opinion, you are spot-on about the better platform, at least 
regarding the desktop.  I use a basic KDE most of the day, and am an 
advocate.  Trouble is, the MS desktop just plain looks better.

Look & feel issues still dampen the urge to switch to a Linux desktop.  
It's getting closer, maybe next quarter it'll be more evenly matched?  At 
least maybe the darn fonts will improve sometime soon, this seems to be 
the most in-your-face issue.  My linux desktop fonts look great (my 
desktop installs have been 'adjusted'), but, fresh from the red box, the 
fonts are quite ragged.

Back to the use of Linux desktop systems in schools.  My wife and I were 
required to sign an agreement at my son's school regarding his use of 
school computer systems.  Taking what was on that agreement to an almost 
silly maximum, it leaves us with a civil liability exposure should our son 
inadvertantly open a virus-ladened email which in turn infects school 
computers.

I am quite certain that if my son were to inadvertently open a virus 
ladended email and subsequently infect school computers, there would not 
be any consequenses (other than the school IT department scrambling to 
clean the infected systems!), but the agreement we signed doesn't 
quite read that way.

Point is, I know that Linux desktops can be tightly locked down to 
prevent curious kids from exploring into an area where they might get 
themselves into trouble.  Contrast this to Windows desktop systems that 
are trivial to comprimise by simply clicking on a URL!  My nightmare is 
that my kid is found to be culpable for comprimising school systems, 
without intentionally doing something he knows he should not do.

 - tom e.
----------

On Wed, 26 Jun 2002, Jiva DeVoe wrote:

Sacred cows about to be slaughtered!  Beware!

Perhaps instead of spending all this energy on trying to come up with ways
to fight MS legally (which MS will win anyway) why not spend this energy
making Linux the better platform to choose for the applications instead of
MS?  Then you win for the *right reason*.

Frankly, I for one cannot in good conscience recommend that Linux is the
right platform for my children to use in school until Linux has better
educational games and is easier to use.  And forcing a choice on someone
because of political motivations is no better than what MS does.

On 6/26/02 1:55 PM, "der.hans" <PLUGd@LuftHans.com> wrote:

> Am 25. Jun, 2002 schwätzte George Toft so:
> 
>> While searching for more debarment guidelines, I came across these
>> tidbits:
>> ===================================================================
>> Title 7, Ch. 2 Arizona Administrative Code
>> State Board of Education
>> 
>> R7-2-1161. Authority to debar or suspend
>> A. The governing board has the authority to debar or suspend a
>> person from participating in school district procurements.
> 
> OK, this says they can debar a company, but doesn't require them to do so.
> 
> Just looked at your earlier post about Maricopa County rules as well. Those
> also don't require debarment :(.
> 
> I would presume this means that m$ isn't automagically debarred, rather only
> that the gov't now has cause to debar m$ if the gov't so chose. Now we have
> to convince them to debar m$ for their illegal activities. That's something
> that should've happened more than 10 years ago the first time m$ was on
> trial for anti-trust violations. Were they actually convicted that time or
> did they plea bargain out of it?
> 
> ciao,
> 
> der.hans
> 
>> B. The causes for debarment or suspension include the following:
>> 3. Conviction or civil judgment finding a violation by any
>> person or any subsidiary or affiliate of any person under
>> state or federal antitrust statutes.
>> 
>> www.mpsaz.org/purchasing/protest.pdf
>> 
>> Same as before - Schools may debar anti-trust violators.
>> 
>> ===================================================================
>> Same thing for ASU:
>> www.abor.asu.edu/1_the_regents/policymanual/chap3/3-809.pdf (page 11)
>> 
>> ===================================================================
>> Same thing for the State:
>> http://sporas.ad.state.az.us/AZPolicy_art9.htm#Debarment
>> 
>> ===================================================================
>> 
>> 
>> Tom Emerson is right - there is not much originality from one government
>> agency to the next in Arizona - they all pretty much copy the same text
>> and format.
>> 
>> Let the letter writing begin!!!
>> 
>> George
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