SEUL: Re: Educational OS project

["Bill Stephenson" <bill@secureshopper.com>]

Roger,

Thank you so much for your offer to help.

I was reading at your site yesterday and intended to write you and ask for
advice. I know that time is in short supply for all of us and before I wrote
I wanted to read more about your work at SEUL.

First off, I must explain that I am not a "Linux Guru" or a professional
educator. It is not my intention to position myself as a leader in either
field. I have worked on a few educational related projects and I have
children in school. I used Linux for the first time when I installed it a
few weeks ago. I was astounded at what I found after I installed it. 

What provides my motivation for this project is simply that I see it must be
done. I have started to learn to program and it seems to me that Linux can
be used in K-12 schools right now if someone sets up the computers for them.
This is true for Windows and Macs too.

Since my only real programming experience is limited to perl, I've thought
about how these skills might be applied to this project and I've come to the
conclusion that I can contribute. I also came to the conclusion that I have
to help with this. Teachers need this.

I really don't know if it's possible to convince teachers to use a "free"
software package instead of Windows or Apples, but I have a feeling that
they only need to see it once to agree it may be worth a shot. I do know
it's possible to deliver a quality OS and software package that will meet
their needs for a fraction of what they are spending now.

Support needs to be addressed too. If we can make a convincing case for a
shift in spending from commercial software to supporting "free" software and
its development at the State level (or even the local level) we may be able
to solve that issue.

I hope to officially announce this project in a week or two. I need some
time to acquire some help and partners to see this through properly. So far
the responses have been very encouraging. I'll compile and post a list of
all those who are working with me on this soon.

I'll be needing help with all you've offered and I'll try my best not to
take advantage.

Respectfully,


Bill Stephenson
www.bransonlive.com
1-417-546-5593

----------
>From: Roger Dingledine <arma@seul.org>
>To: bill@edos.org
>Cc: seul-pub@seul.org
>Subject: Re: Educational OS project
>Date: Fri, Oct 30, 1998, 4:47 PM
>

>I noticed your project yesterday, when I saw that you had linked to our
>Whylinux document and several people had followed that link to our site.
>
>I think it looks like a good project to start -- there are many other
>projects working in this area, but I think that actually implementing
>some of the user-friendly software in a demonstration environment is a
>very good way to introduce people to their alternatives.
>
>While I don't have the time currently to help you in your project, I'd
>like to offer the SEUL domain's resources to you if you're in need of
>well-maintained well-connected systems (for majordomo, ftp, web, cvs,
>etc services). If you want help making sure your press releases are
>readable as well as technically accurate, let me know and we can help
>with that as well. In addition, once you have a system set up, I would
>be happy to look through it and assess security problems that might
>cause you trouble later. (In addition to being one of the SEUL leaders,
>I'm also an active member of the MIT network security team.)
>
>As a sidenote, it would be very useful if you put some more contact
>information on your webpage (http://www.edos.org/), so people know who
>this "we" you keep mentioning is. :)
>
>Let me know if I can be of assistance. I'll put a link to your project
>in the SEUL links page (http://www.seul.org/what/links.html) if you want.
>Do you intend to do any large-scale announcements of your project (eg
>to Linux Weekly News, cola, etc), or are you waiting until you've got
>more content?
>
>--Roger
>
>