[ILUG] It's illegal, according to the barrister in PC World

[kevin lyda]

On Wed, May 01, 2002 at 05:19:38PM +0100, Smelly Pooh wrote:
> > it would be like trying to teach automotive engineering with cars that
> > you can either not tinker with, or if you can, you can only tinker
> > with inside your class and can't tell anyone what you saw.
> If you're going to quote or paraphrase somebody you should at least give
> credit where it is due.

first, i've used that example long before i saw it online.  second it's
usually used with relation to consumers, not in terms of the open
communication expected in academia.

> It's badly paraphrased anyway, I can tinker with my windows installation
> and tell everybody about it.  Only the other day I editted a registry
> setting and replaced my shell

editting /etc and running chsh does not a computer science course make.
cs tasks i remember doing with relation to os's:

    scheduler - different alogorithms and how to measure them.
    file systems - write an fs.

and we played with graphics in x, but i'd guess a ui glass would rock
with x.  you have a blank slate if you avoid widget kits.  you could
try out pie menus, various window management techniques.  you can do
all this from scratch or use a variety of free software projects that
could be used as a base.

and even if your uni does have an ms source license, your students and
researchers can't share their discoveries in full - particularly not
with unis that lack such a source license.  with a free os like *bsd or
linux and related apps that is possible.

kevin

-- 
kevin at suberic.net          "Adding manpower to a late software project
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