ST Helens LEA (fwd) - marketting BSD over Linux to Students

[John O'Farrell]

Hi Kevin, Lee

You might like to take a look at a FreeBSD solution designed entirely
for and in conjunction with Schools called NINAA. There is a full
working demonstration of an early release on http://www.ninaa.net/. I
used to work for Pavilion Internet as the Education Manager and found in
many schools a need for a simple yet reliable low cost server solution.
The systems department loaded FreeBSD and apache and cyrus IMAP mail
server together with a simple web based front end for administration. We
then installed it in a few schools and listened to their feedback. The
NINAA project has been running and growing for about two years now. It
has an install base approaching 100 schools.

I am sure that a Pavilion representative would be happy to visit the St.
Helens LEA.
Try contacting Glen Brackenbury on 0845 333 5000 or glen at pavilion.net

Best regards
John


"L. Cranswick" wrote:
> 
> Forwarded message:
> > From: "Kevin O'Connor  NetWork Support" <kevin at rainford.org.uk>
> >
> > Just a quick one, I've just been to a meeting of the IT users group
> > at ST. helens LEA. Several schools are talking about using Linux
> > would any members of this group be will to address them (maybe a
> > 30 minute presentation and field some questions on FreeBSD) on
> > why they should consider FreeBSD. I'm off to Madrid monday for a
> > few days but if there is any interest I would like to organise it some
> > time in the 4-6 week time frame
> >
> > Kevin
> >
> 
> The big marketting problem I see with FreeBSD over Linux
> for schools/students is ease of installation with respect to
> detection of graphics cards and installation of the
> relevant X-windows.  Linux (Redhat, Mandrake, SuSE, etc)
> seems to have this - FreeBSD does not?  Getting X to work
> is potentially the most painful thing - followed by
> network cards.
> 
> What FreeBSD options exist here compared to Linux and
> how would this be put to schools/students - where ease
> of installation would be an issue(?)
> 
> Lachlan.
> 
> --
> Lachlan M. D. Cranswick
> 
> Collaborative Computational Project No 14 (CCP14)
>     for Single Crystal and Powder Diffraction
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> E-mail: l.cranswick at dl.ac.uk  Ext: 3703  Room C14
>                            http://www.ccp14.ac.uk
> 
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-- 
John O'Farrell | mailto:john at jofa.co.uk
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