Me! Chris Cowsley Head of IT Hitchin Boys' School Hoping to use Linux instead of NT as a SIMS server, to route packets between Ethernet and Token Ring networks, and to cache Internet traffic locally so that we can run full class Internet without squeezing casual users out of the ISDN bandwidth. Evaluating it as an alternative to scores of expensive Windows 95 or Windows 2000 terminals, and Star Office as an alternative to Microsoft Office on scores of terminals - saving thousands of pounds in licence fees! Has anybody been there already?
Ian P. Mills Technical Support Manager Flintshire Education ICT Unit (Providing one-stop-shop IT services to all Schools) We are about to look at Linux basically to do most of the below, as an alternative to Windows 2000 on the networks in the schools of our county....We currently have Windows NT on all our servers, and the impending change to Windows 2000 means there is going to be a big change and much training over 12 to 18 months (if we are to do it properly and provide an adequate level of IT support to our schools), and therefore is a perfect opportunity to look at alternative (and lower cost?) solutions. A couple of my team are really keen on the possibility of Linux - we would also be interested if anyone else has SIMS etc. running on Suse Linux already.....the kinds of problems and support issues involved...... _______________________________________________________________________ In reply to..... Me! Chris Cowsley Head of IT Hitchin Boys' School Hoping to use Linux instead of NT as a SIMS server, to route packets between Ethernet and Token Ring networks, and to cache Internet traffic locally so that we can run full class Internet without squeezing casual users out of the ISDN bandwidth. Evaluating it as an alternative to scores of expensive Windows 95 or Windows 2000 terminals, and Star Office as an alternative to Microsoft Office on scores of terminals - saving thousands of pounds in licence fees! Has anybody been there already?
On Wed, 26 Apr 2000 DrCowsley@aol.com wrote:
Hoping to use Linux instead of NT as a SIMS server, to route packets between Ethernet and Token Ring networks, and to cache Internet traffic locally so that we can run full class Internet without squeezing casual users out of the ISDN bandwidth. Evaluating it as an alternative to scores of expensive
Install squid as a web proxy. That'll maintain a cache of documents resulting in far less traffic over your ISDN line. It can be rather disk intensive, and require rather a lot of space, but the benefits far outweigh the cost of the disk space required.
Windows 95 or Windows 2000 terminals, and Star Office as an alternative to Microsoft Office on scores of terminals - saving thousands of pounds in licence fees! Has anybody been there already?
Although I'd support you wholeheartedly for that decicision you do have to consider what software will be required on those systems. If departments within the school require particular educational software packages then 99.9% of those will only be available for windows machines. You may be able to get around this problem through the use of WINE (a windows emulator), dosemu (a dos emulator), or if you're really pushed a copy of VMWare (which will allow you to run Windows on top of Linux), but then you've obviously negated some of the benefits of installing Linux in the first place (Mainly stability & cost). I can't praise staroffice highly enough. I find it extremely useful when people insist on attaching MS Office files to email. The cross compatibility is great, and you don't have to worry about all those nasty macro viruses. -- ___ _ In a world without fences - who needs Gates? | (_' M1CHW ._|on ._)tockill <jon@ops-wing.demon.co.uk>
participants (3)
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DrCowsley＠aol.com -
Ian P. Mills (Technical Support Manager) -
Jon Stockill