Linux-related job postings - Hopkinton NH School District

[Dan Jenkins]

Fred wrote:
> On Tue, 2005-01-11 at 21:43 -0500, Dan Jenkins wrote:
> 
>>>Of course, any workstations that don't have CD drives or can't boot from
>>>CD are SOL. I've run into that situation before. I forget that people
>>>sometimes *still* have computers back from the dinosaur era...
>
>>That's another client, and another story...
> 
> Yup. I find it all to tempting to tell them to just stop being
> cheapskates and fork up the $500 or so for a modern minimal system. Of
> course, even that's not cheap if you're talking 100 systems.
> 
> I suppose in that case you could put a REALLY scaled-down Linux on a
> floppy, which would only serve as a bootstrap to download the real
> system off the network. But that would probably be much more trouble
> than it's worth unless you can find a canned solution somewhere. 

Our particular client with the CD-less systems doesn't allow Linux or 
Netscape higher than 4.x. No reason other than "corporate policy." (That 
doesn't stop us from using it when appropriate - albeit invisibly.) The 
owner was a large corporation (which then owned a major TV network). We 
support a cluster of newspapers which are part of it. (We're sort of 
grandfathered in - we were there way before the corporations bought them 
out.)

The CD-less systems are from '98 or '99 and were originally spec'd with 
CDs,  128-256 MB RAM, 4-6 GB Hard Drives, Windows 98 desktops with 
WordPerfect, antivirus software, Linux file/email/web servers for each 
paper with a shared Postscript laser and a copy of Quark, leased lines 
at each paper and a Wide Area Network with Internet connectivity. Once 
corporate finished with the bid, the systems had no CDs, no floppy 
drives, only 32 MB RAM, 2 GB Hard Drives, Windows 95, no servers, no 
wide area network, no Internet, Microsoft Word, no antivirus software, 
no printers, no Quark and monochrome monitors. To transmit stories we 
had to put together a BBS and use 2400 baud modems, using old, surplus 
equipment.

Oddly enough, they never had a problem with paying well for support. We 
made several times more installing the systems than we sold them for and 
ongoing maintenance since. But any capital purchase was eviscerated. The 
new corporate owners are about the same though a bit more reasonable.

Oh, and their in-house IT support department consisted of 6 people to 
support 150 newspapers (with an average of 25 computers each) all across 
the Eastern seaboard.

So, it is not just education that has these issues.

-- 
Dan Jenkins (dan at rastech.com)
Rastech Inc., Bedford, NH, USA --- 1-603-206-9951
*** Technical Support for over a Quarter Century