how to set up VM, or is there a freeware equivalent to Deep Freeze Software

[Tim]

On Tue, 2007-08-14 at 20:45 -0700, Antonio Olivares wrote:

> I have a colleague that teaches BCIS (Basic Computer Information
> Systems) and has a computer lab.  The computers are Dell Optiplex GX
> 280.  
>
> 
> Administering the Lab is a pain
>
> I told my friend that Linux could save him from many headaches

Yes, it *can*, though it's not a universal panacea.  Most of the
problems are Windows-centric, you can avoid just about all of them with
an OS switch.  Though, now you'll have a new set of problems:
Persuading a change, learning alternatives, and, perhaps, accepting an
inability to do some things.  Though the latter may not be a problem,
the things that you mightn't be able to do may be the things you don't
want the students to be able to do.

> A student logs in, does his/her work on MS Word.  Finishes and starts
> messing with the desktop, ie. changing backgrounds, surfing the web,
> looking for ways to bypass the firewall to visit sites like youtube,
> MySpace, etc.  He/She logs out.  When another student comes in, the
> machine is restored to its original settings, original background, no
> programs installed no stuff.  Is there such an equivalent software
> that is open sourced?

To some degree that isn't necessary.  On a well secured system, a
student can only change their own settings.  They can stuff themselves
up, but nobody else.  That does leave you with dealing with how to make
it so they can't stuff themselves up, or making it easy to recover.  You
couldn't just wipe out all their files at logout, unless you don't allow
students to store any files on the system.  You could make it so default
settings are loaded each time, but some users might have special needs
that need personal settings.  It's a pain to have to keep customising
things, over and over.

Whether they can install software is up to the administration.  You can
prevent that, even on Windows (the problem is that many admins simply
don't lock up the PCs enough, thinking that they need to leave them
somewhat open, rather than ditching crap software that insists on it).
Students would have to write their own software to get around not being
able to "install" something.  ;-)

> One problem here is that the curriculum is based on M$
> Word/Excel/PowerPoint, etc.

That is a two-fold problem:

Teaching word processing, spread sheeting, etc., is different than
teaching how to use Word, Excel, etc.  One is learning the technique of
what word processing and spreadsheeting is, the other is simply learning
how to use particular software.  Quite often schools omit actual
learning, and just use indoctrination.

If they insist on it being based on those applications, they're going to
have to use them.  Of course if you can argue against indoctrination,
you can teach word processing, etc., and do so on whatever tools can do
that job.

Some will argue that you need to teach Word, for the students knowledge
to be applicable to the real world.  But I've seen the teaching of Word
fail miserably.  The students learnt, by rote, how to do something at
school.  But couldn't transfer the knowledge to another version of Word.
All they could manage was using Word like an electric typewriter, and
badly, too.

On the other hand, if they'd learnt word processing, they can apply that
knowledge to any word processor, using the features that they can find,
and reading the help guides to tailor it to the particular
implementation.

Our schools made a big mistake in ditching teaching "commerce" (the
skills of filing, typing, finance, planning, basic legal, etc.) in
exchange for playing with Windows.  We went from having directly
employable high school students, to having poorly skilled students who
needed tertiary education if they want to do anything beyond being a
shop assistant.

-- 
[tim at bigblack ~]$ uname -ipr
2.6.22.1-41.fc7 i686 i386

Using FC 4, 5, 6 & 7, plus CentOS 5.  Today, it's FC7.

Don't send private replies to my address, the mailbox is ignored.
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