> > > Eppidi intha ideas? ;) > > > > Super but I am quite sure such ideas will do no good. > > > > I do agree. But what happened to Bharathi's idea of Conducting Summer > Workshop >
Though my reply to this thread/discussion is not relevant to the subject, I am sure that, this might help us to understand what students/staffs think about Linux/FOSS in colleges. Just I wanted to share my experiences I had during my visit to few districts in Tamilnadu in the past few days (Districts Visited: Namakkal, Erode, Coimbatore, Thanjavur, Trichy) A college in Namakkal decided to conduct summer courses on topics like J2EE, .NET, Multimedia, Soft Skills and finally on Linux Administration too. The no. of registrants were J2EE - above 90, .NET - around 55, multimedia - around 45 and soft skills - around 70 and imagine for linux administration it was just 14. I was requested to take up the Linux administration course (7 full days continously) and myself made a request to the college/dept. authorities to give complete control of the Lab for all sort of experiments by their students who have taken up the Linux Administration course. On the first day, I covered the Fedora-13 installation (via network and kickstart) and asked all the students to install the same via network on their PCs and everyone installed on their own without looking at others (some students tried more than few times) and PULLED OUT all the multimedia packages from the rpmfusion repository (which was part of my install box). The next day, the strength was increased to 18 and many students notebooks from hostel got into dept. lab and now students were busy installing Fedora-13 in all their notebooks and took the complete Fedora-13 everything repository (17,500+) packages and started distributing among themselves. The feedback from a girl student was like this: Sir, I feel working on linux much easier than windows. Second day, the feedback from Dept./Staffs was that, all further lab practicals can be done using FOSS tools for CSE/IT/MCA/MSc.(SE) depts. Next, I moved from Namakkal to Erode and met the principal Dr. Arun Parwate of Erode Sengunthar Engineering College and discussed about Linux/FOSS and he called up the HODs of CSE/MCA/MSc and we discussed about, doing a Faculty Development Program for all dept. staffs. Then, I moved to J.J. College of Engineering and Technology, Trichy and discussed with Director in implementing FOSS in their institutions. Myself, sivabalan, Director, Principal, HODs of CSE/IT/MCA decided to implement FOSS lab setup in all the dept. labs and also to conduct a FOSS awareness program for all the students of CSE/IT/MCA in the next month. Now, @ Periyar Centenary Polytechnic College (Autonomous), Thanjavur, where I have setup a Fedora-13 Everything repository server for remote installation in all client Desktops and the dept. of CT/IT have started doing their practicals using FOSS tools and within a year, they would be completely switching to FOSS environment (thanks to Mr. Karthick-IT/HOD for his co-operation in implementing FOSS throughout the dept.) and also given a talk to IT/CT students about the importance of using FOSS tools for their practicals (as I am one of the Programme Advisory Committe member in this institution for the dept. of CT/IT) It is our strong commitment for education, ensuring that, no Proprietary Softwares / Tools to be used in engineering / technical education and everything need to be done using FOSOSS (Free / Open Source Operating System / Softwares) and we look forward everyone's help/support in conducting FOSOSS workshops/awareness programmes/FDP in all colleges/institutions throughout Tamilnadu. Thanks and regards. S. Baskar CEO/LinuXpert Systems _______________________________________________ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc