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Gtaylor
June 23rd, 2005, 04:12 PM
Ok, a multi-tiered thread here that needs multiple response. Please try to address both subjects in your response.

Thing #1
Does anyone know of any universities out there that have adopted Ubuntu officially/semi-officially and/or are supporting it with university-funded resources? If so, what is Ubuntu being used for (Students, University-Owned Computers, etc.)

Thing #2
Why (or why wouldn't) Ubuntu be well-suited for the University setting?

To give a little background, my University's LUG has been asked to prepare a report on why Ubuntu should be adopted as the semi-officially supported linux distro. We're working on giving incoming freshmen next year the choice between a Windows laptop or a dual-booted Win/Ubuntu laptop. This would definitely be a big victory for Ubuntu and Linux in general, but we need some ideas to give the university staff some re-assurance.

So...any ideas? :)

Karl S.
June 23rd, 2005, 04:20 PM
Thing #2
Why (or why wouldn't) Ubuntu be well-suited for the University setting?

I'm a grad student just about to go on the market for a university position. The only thing that Ubuntu lacks from my perspective is decent bibliographic software. OpenOffice isn't planning to have (http://bibliographic.openoffice.org/) bibliographic enhancements until OpenOffice 3, which, as all of us who have been waiting for OpenOffice 2 know, probably won't be for a long, long time. In the meanwhile, BIbus (http://bibus-biblio.sourceforge.net/) looks good, since it has cite-and-write integration with OpenOffice (like Refworks and Endnote with MS Word), but I can't get it to work (http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=43144&highlight=bibus). If that were fixed, so far as I know, Ubuntu would be perfect for a university setting, at least for people in the humanities.

Gtaylor
June 23rd, 2005, 04:26 PM
I'm a grad student just about to go on the market for a university position. The only thing that Ubuntu lacks from my perspective is decent bibliographic software. OpenOffice isn't planning to have (http://bibliographic.openoffice.org/) bibliographic enhancements until OpenOffice 3, which, as all of us who have been waiting for OpenOffice 2 know, probably won't be for a long, long time. In the meanwhile, BIbus (http://bibus-biblio.sourceforge.net/) looks good, since it has cite-and-write integration with OpenOffice (like Refworks and Endnote with MS Word), but I can't get it to work (http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=43144&highlight=bibus). If that were fixed, so far as I know, Ubuntu would be perfect for a university setting, at least for people in the humanities.
That sounds great and I like hearing how you appreciate Ubuntu, but I'm looking for more reason than compliments for Ubuntu :) What exactly makes you think Ubuntu is better than Fedora or SuSe or any other Desktop distro in a university setting for the students? I'm not being so picky just to be obnoxious, we really need some acute, specific reasons :)

WildTangent
June 23rd, 2005, 04:41 PM
What exactly makes you think Ubuntu is better than Fedora or SuSe or any other Desktop distro in a university setting for the students?:)
ease of use. .deb based distros tend to be easier to use for people who arent experienced with linux. also, ease of maintainence should be given some thought. if a student has a problem, who fixes it? the university of course. but if its difficult to diagnose and solve problems, then thats bad. this is where the community comes in with Ubuntu, if you have a problem you cant fix, them someone here most certainly will help.

-Wild

Alexander Kirillov
June 23rd, 2005, 05:34 PM
Ok, a multi-tiered thread here that needs multiple response. Please try to address both subjects in your response.

Thing #1
Does anyone know of any universities out there that have adopted Ubuntu officially/semi-officially and/or are supporting it with university-funded resources? If so, what is Ubuntu being used for (Students, University-Owned Computers, etc.)

Thing #2
Why (or why wouldn't) Ubuntu be well-suited for the University setting?

To give a little background, my University's LUG has been asked to prepare a report on why Ubuntu should be adopted as the semi-officially supported linux distro. We're working on giving incoming freshmen next year the choice between a Windows laptop or a dual-booted Win/Ubuntu laptop. This would definitely be a big victory for Ubuntu and Linux in general, but we need some ideas to give the university staff some re-assurance.

So...any ideas? :)
Our department uses Ubuntu semi-officailly - we have installed it on several computers. But this is a private inititative of our sysadmin and several faculyt (like myself), not something approved by the university administration.

And the main reason administration may balk at this: they need something which is officially supported by a large and well-known commercial company - at least as large as RedHat, so that updates and technical support are guaranteed.

And then, of course, it is quite new as a distro and has no track record.
Do not tell me about all the nice features of Ubuntu - I know them. Tell this to the administration.