Thank you for all replies. I now see that they have their uses. You do see that my question was designed to be provocative, don't you? :-) But then again, I hope you'll agree that public money should not be spent on gadgets just because they're fashionable.
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
no one mentioned wind turbines..
-- Ineptocracy
(in-ep-toc?-ra-cy) ? a system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers.
I wonder why the computers weren't ordered _without_ CD drive.
-- Dipl.-Inform(FH) Peter Heitzer, peter.heitzer@rz.uni-regensburg.de HTML mails will be forwarded to /dev/null.
That's assuming the school actuallly owns the PC's. As some one else mentioned most schools buy in their infrastructure IT provision and support from a third party, quite probably a specialist education sector one. School networks and computers have to be locked down very hard, their will be one bright spark who'll find a way in and then tell their mates...
I wouldn't be surprised if the contract for IT services/support included the kit for classrooms for that period but at the end of the contract the school didn't own very much of it at all. They'd renew, or get a new contract with another supplier and the kit replaced under that contract.
-- Cheers Dave.
None of Dell's off the shelf PCs (that had other capabilities: processor power, thin Ethernet, etc) were sans CD drive.
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
I don't think anyone has actually answered the question you asked. They seem to have answered "why should the Raspberry Pi exist?"
The reason it exists is that its creator was getting fed up of the quality of comp sci graduates who had grown up so far removed from the hardware (as compared to the 8-bit days) that they lacked an understanding of the fundamentals. The Pi is an attempt to put that right by getting a simple device into the hands of kids that gets them back to the bare metal, hence the GPIO pins. I also think there's more to shipping without a case than the just the cost.
This has apparently been changed. For many years, we have ordered several types of Dell Optiplex desktops and all the time you could select to omit the floppy- and CD/DVD drive. It would usually be a 10 euro price difference per item. We have many desktops without them.
Ah, yes, that's a subtle point. (Maybe not very subtle but I had missed it.)
Which requires not just that the Raspberry Pi exists but also that it is got into schools. Mention has been made of the preponderance of Microsoft stuff in ITC (ICT? Whatever.). So a change of syllabus is also needed. Can schools change it, or is the intervention of cabinet ministers required?
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
I think GEC (which had then been renamed as Marconi) disappeared in
2004, so presumably things were different then. I am rather sure that I heard that EASAMS (the bit of GEC that I work for) paid 50 quid per PC to have CD drives removed.-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
Sorry, I think it was 2005.
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
I am VERY SURE that in 2004 it was possible to order without drives, and pay less than with drives. We bought many systems back then. We could even opt for a case with cutouts and blind covers (so drives could later be added), or a case with a completely closed front at the location where the drives would be. In those days every Dell was built to customer order.
Maybe they mistakenly ordered with drives and then later wanted them to be removed.
the
that
ICT: Information and Communications Technology.
Schools can't change much and with league tables to do anything that might not produce the correct results for the league tables is frowned on. I believe HMG is in the process of bringing back more hardware and computing fundementals into the ICT silly bus.
-- Cheers Dave.
---snip---
It sounds like your school does/did a lot more than most. My experience is that ICT was barely more than learning Micro$oft Office with a bit of Adobe thrown in, certainly up to GCSE level. My eldest son was so bored he gave it up.
Things are changing now. Our school will be offerring a new GCSE course, called Computing next year which is more like the old Computer Studies/Science. The kids will learn networking and programming (at last).
I don't know how much influence the RPi has had but it has certainly got people talking. As a platform to run an IDE it is poor compared to a desktop/laptop but it can do things they can't.
--
(\__/) M.
(='.'=) If a man stands in a forest and no woman is around
(")_(") is he still wrong?
at
to
Narrow minded nation notion - "all schools have computers for their pupils" in Africa and India? How about low power requirements and the ability to run a whole classroom on solar power for example. There are narrow margins of the earth where survival is by narrow margin
- where the technological bootstrap of the information age can be wedged into the youth of impoverished society with the rPi.
And here's a bit from a previous UPS thread:
the day the tiny fluorescent tube or line of white LEDs at the bottom can't be augmented or illuminated by a solar lightpipe fiber?
I've got a 110V power mains UPS designed to charge what is essentially a
12V motorcycle battery, and recreates a pseudo-sine AC 120V with an inverter that draws off of the battery as it charges. I hacked it to also charge with solar panels and draw the 12V off an automotive battery directly to operate a 12V display HDTV LCD with tuner, DVD and several inputs - TV, NTSC Video, Component RGB (RCAx3), 2xHDMI and a PC xVGA 1080p. Starting with a full charge, and a two square foot solar panel, I can run just over 5 days and nights continuously in hazy overcast, and indefinitely with two bright sunny days (or more) a week. I haven't plugged it into the mains to charge it since the start of the hack, and it's reassuring I can tap a few minutes of 110V in an emergency with the inverter sockets. I can tinker with rPi (or watch TV,) charge my mobile phone and power the Ethernet/wifi network all while entirely off the power grid. Nobody is burning coal in my proxy to allow me to create digitally. And the setup could work just as easily in Peru and Bolivia as here in the suburbs of California.
--
All ladders in the Temple of the Forbidden Eye have thirteen steps.
There are thirteen steps to the gallows, firing squad or any execution.
The first step is denial... Don't be
bamboozled:
Secrets of the Temple of the Forbidden Eye revealed!
Indiana JonesT Discovers The Jewel of Power!
visit -(o=8> http://disneywizard.com/
Maybe so. My apologies if I misunderstood or have misremembered.
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
Do you mean that schools used to teach a decent computer course and then stopped doing so? Crumbs. Children (girls, anyway) used to learn to cook and now they're not. What do our lords and masters thing education is for?
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
Good point. If I wished to continue pursuing (something like) my original point I would change it to: 'Why is the Raspberry Pi needed in UK schools? But as indicated elsewhere in the thread, I am now beginning to see its value.
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
Teaching them only what they need to pass the exams and do only those projects which count towards the GCSE results. HTH.
Teachers I've spoken to claim that they don't have time to teach anything else, as the curriculum is very tightly specified nowadays. (Read and discuss chapters 3 and 5 of this book, do not read and discuss chapter 4, for example.)
-- Tciao for Now! John.
I must have meant one of
Children (girls, anyway) used to learn to cook and now they don't.
Children (girls, anyway) used to be taught how to cook and now they're not.
-- I think I am an Elephant, Behind another Elephant Behind /another/ Elephant who isn't really there.... A.A. Milne
It seems GEC and Marconi merged in 1919, the GEC part was rebranded (as you said) and later most of it was bought out by Ericsson in 2005.
I remember the old Marconi factory in its heyday, with many hundreds of workers all going for lunch breaks at the same time. It has suffered since then :(
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