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Re: Questions!! Re: [school-discuss] One Day Left for NECC Proposals - Call for Open Source!



On Tuesday 02 October 2007 14:46,  wrote:
[snip]
> This year I am back teaching high school computer animation, desktop
>  publishing, multimedia (video/sound), and webmastering.  We are using
> Ubuntu Studio and the Musix bootable CD.  
>
> Can those fit into the Open Source lab?  My understanding was that
> graphics and multimedia do not fit well into thin-client situations.

Stepping in and offering this since I know a bit about general Thin Client
capabilities and have a few decades of media production experience,
I can start by saying you are correct in your concerns.

Thin Clients are exactly what they say they are -- thin.  Applications that
are memory, storage and/or processor intensive, like most audio, video and
animation production processes, generally need the more generous and
dedicated resources of a workstation. Direct interfacing with the hardware
is often another requirement for media production apps that makes them
inappropriate for Thin Client use; I don't know of any Thin Clients that can 
have OpenGL graphics cards or dedicated multi-channel Firewire
audio interfaces added.

However, the document production applications you mention are another
story and could work very well in a Thin Client environment. Webmastering is 
generally a low overhead process that only involves text, low resolution 
bitmap imaging and compressed media. Desktop Publishing does bring more 
resource demands to the table in terms of rendering for structured objects 
and higher resolution imaging, but if the scope of DTP projects is kept 
within reason then a Thin Client design should be able to handle them 
effectively.

So the short answer is that the Thin Client environment can offer reasonable 
capabilities for multimedia delivery and document production, but cannot be 
expected to address the significant resource demands of audio and video 
production.

> I working on my proposal and need to know if I should ask to be part of
> the Open Source lab, or go off and do my own thing.  What do you think?

I can add the packages you are using are a couple of the best bundles I know
of for Open Source media production - they just need more of an Open Source
Workstation lab than an Open Source Thin Client classroom. 

And I want to add my kudos for taking on the challenge of teaching media 
production with Open Source applications. Due to the proprietary shackles of
most media compression schemes, the "niche" nature of the application arena
and the associated costly hardware demands, the free, Open Source media tools 
are not nearly as sophisticated or capable as high priced commercial 
offerings. However, I see that imbalance shifting rapidly as teachers like 
yourself expand the demand for better freedom friendly media tools!

> Thanks,
> Marilyn 

peace
aaron
==================================================
  "Open Source for Education...
    ...because the Freedom to Share is the Freedom to Learn."
==================================================

> Quoting Steve Hargadon <steve.hargadon@xxxxxxxxx>:
> 
> > The NECC call for proposals closes tomorrow, October 3rd, and I'm just
> > making sure that the Free and Open Source Software folks who would be
> > interested in presenting in San Antonio get those proposal in!
> > 
> > http://center.uoregon.edu/ISTE/NECC2008/program/
> > 
> > Steve
> > 
> > --
> > Steve Hargadon
> > steve@xxxxxxxxxxxx
> > www.SteveHargadon.com
> > 916-899-1400
> > 
> 
> Marilyn Hagle
> marilyn@xxxxxxxxx
> 
> 
>