Since the e-mail is fairly long, I am going to reply to it in a Newsgroups sort of manner.
-Karan --- Leo Fernandez <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > which their syllabus can be covered. An environment > with which the teachers > are familiar. It is not yet a conscious decision on > the part of the school I can assure you that this is going to be a very hard job, depending on what school you are trying to perform the installation. Most of the lower school computer teachers I have seen are not at all comfortable with any change and like most people are not open to any change at all. Like most Windows users, change one start menu entry and they will freak out. They will not know what hit them and they will do anything to make you "fix their computer". I would suggest that you make sure that the teachers themselves are comfortable with the change. If they are not comfortable at all then there is no use to install a Linux server and have it emulate different enviornments. You might as well have them run the real thing. Less problems and easier on resources. > following syllabus (I have removed the theory-part Well, it is the theory part of the syllabus that is going to kill us. I mean the examination as such. If you guys have seen one of the kids preparing for a computer examination you will know what I mean. The focus of the tests and exam is not what the students learnt with practice but if they crammed the keystokes and shortcuts down. In such a situation we will need to find replacements that will not only match the UI exactly but rather the menus and keystrokes are similar too. As far as the Class 4 and 5 are concerned there are a lot of text based and simple graphical games available in Linux. I dont know about the kinda stuff they do now but when I was at school playing these kinds of games their basic motive was to strengthen what the students had learnt in their other subjects. Stuff like simple fill in the blank games and crosswords written in languages like C, C++ and the likes. I am sure you could use dosemu for that sort of stuff, since they do not use a lot of libraries. > Class 6: Fun with computers: Games > in Windows (mine sweeper) You have minesweeper like game for Linux, also one of my students made an exact replica of Minesweeper in Java. I am not sure if I will be allowed to use that copy or not but I am sure we could work something out there. > Introduction to Windows > (Operating System) > Components of Windows > (Desktop, icons, menu bar > etc...) > Introduction to mouse > (selection, drag and drop, > click, double click) Its imperative that this stuff be done in Windows first and then we show students that what would be the *nix conterparts and how we have each of these no matter what OS we are using or what Window Manager. This will also be a good place to give students first hand experience Linux and tell them what an OS actually is. > PC paint > Introduction to Qbasic > Basic character sets > Statements (let, > input/output) > Commands (CLS, SAVE, RUN, > NEW) I am not sure how similar or different qbasic or gwbasic are but again these are dos based programs and running them under anything like dosemu should be pretty easy to do. > Class 7: Introduction to Windows You have win4lin, wine and vmware. > Game in Windows (Solitare) > PC Paint > Introduction to programming > in Qbasic > Windows (write - word > processor) > Class 8: MS Office and MS-Word > MS Excel > Power point > Qbasic I am pretty sure using star office or open office is not going to be the same as using MS-office. But thats just my opinion. > Apart form providing a platform to cover the school > syllabus, I intend to > setup a intranet web server with an internet > gateway(if the school agrees). > The intranet web could host notice boards, > time-tables, java applets > simulating physics, mathematics, chemistry concepts > etc..etc.. The access to these resources will be monitored and heavily restricted to prevent any malicious users from causing trouble which I think would defeat the purpose. I think this is a very excellent idea, but I don't think stuffing the penguin down the user's throat is really the way to go. Wherever you get a chance, do a dual boot. We have about 400 machines in the College of Computing in my university and I dont think that any of them (except for the Solaris machines) have just Linux on them. Either its just windows or a dual boot between windows and RH 7.2 We should strive towards acceptance and then use and not just forcing the users to use Linux. Oh! and BTW please fix your line wrap. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com ================================================ To subscribe, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with subscribe in subject header To unsubscribe, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with unsubscribe in subject header Archives are available at http://www.mail-archive.com/ilugd%40wpaa.org =================================================
