Re: Edu howto idea.

["Pete St. Onge" <pete@seul.org>]

EAMorical@aol.com wrote:
> Wil,
> I took a look at "Pointers and Wishes". Excellent Job. Thanks.
     Couldn't have said it better myself, Bob. :-)

     I know I've been lurking a lot lately, but I'm glad to say that I
can see the light at the end of the tunnel as far as the thesis goes (at
least I _think_ it's the light at the end of the tunnel, as I don't hear
anything anything remotely train-like in the distance :-) and I expect
to be more active in the new year.
     That said, I'm playing around more with Linux to get stuff running;
I've been remarkably successful in setting up Webmin on my small box;
seems to me this would be a good management tool for many educational
folks who may not be too comfortable with the 'raised shirt-sleeve'
approach which appears common to the management of Linux boxen. This
approach could be extended to the management of a clas computer lab so
that the teacher could manage all of the machines from one web-based
console on the server, f'rinstance.
      From a hardware perspective, 'smart' switches which allow one
computer to turn computers on and off are already available (APC has one
for servers and such) but these tend to be expensive as far as I know.
But if these were available, it seems to me that everything from start
up to services to file serving / sharing to shutdown could be managed
from one central server (Picture this sort of thing with multiple
Beowulf clusters!).

     Also, I noticed that there are a few links on Wil's page to higher
end apps for science. Seems this is where I seem to find myself - I'm
currently working with a couple of colleagues on a talk for early
January in Edmonton at a scientific conference on the importance /
utility of GPL-based development efforts. 15 minutes is not a lot of
time to really give a good idea of all that GPL and Linux has to offer,
so I think I may spend more time talking about (a) GPL and (b) what is
already freely available for apps. One of the better sources for
software I found was the Software Apps for Linux site mentioned in a few
previous emails as well as on Wil's page. I'm playing with a few of
these apps, and will be happy to submit info for the links page as I
become proficient with the packages. 

     Anyhow, just a thought.

     Pete (last seen, Nov '98) :-)

-- 
Pete St. Onge - McGill U.  Limnology - Fun with Ropes & Buckets
pete@seul.org                  http://wwp.mirabilis.com/4322052