[Inschool] Granger Christian

[randy perry]

Granger Christian school (Granger Indiana just on the Mich border) just
put up a new building.  I was asked to help some Davenport University in
doing evaluation for network needs and such.  It looks like I will put
in the phone system and network.  Regarding Network OS, they have a
couple of church members that were making recommendations.  One of them
owns a small PC company (larger than mine, but less service and
knowledge), and in being members adds weight to their opinions.  

Of course, their recommendation was "we'll setup Windows2000 server,
upgrade the workstations...".  Yeah, looks great on PAPER.  They have no
hardware or money for licenses for all new software.  So how are they to
migrate a Win9x peer-peer clunking network to something useable that
they can teach on?  Ehem...Linux anyone?  At first they were VERY averse
to the idea.  I convince the Prinipal of the school and then met with
the project director this past Saturday.  I brought my laptop along
(which is running RedHat 7.2 now, not debian).  I let them play with
OpenOffice, Evolution and some apps.  They do have a proprietary package
(they just purchased 25 licenses for the week prior).  But, I will see
if Wine will run it.

They were pretty impressed, even if I brought my 9 month old daughter
along (hey, Saturday is not supposed to cut into family time).


Update: they did receive word that AEP will donate 30pcs (no os, of
course)  
The next step here is to setup a couple of PC's on Linux for the staff
to play with.  After I get Linux in there, I am setting them up on LUGs
for support and info.

If anyone cares to lend a hand on network setup (cable pulling, OS
config....) let me know.  I would really like to do this right and set
this up as a template for success..so other schools will follow suite.


Randall Perry
www.domain-logic.com