| > But the change needs to be led by IT professionals who care about
usability and know better than forcing Linux and LibreOffice down
the throat of elderly office workers. I say there's a fair bit wrong in that sentence that needs unpacking: Sadly, most schools do not have "IT professionals". They get the
person who knew a bit about computers and rose into the role - often
by attending a few week-long Microsoft training sessions pushed at the
school. We need to get more real IT professionals in to schools, those who
have professional chartered status and observe codes of ethical
practice such as those the BCS advocate. Secondly, IT professionals do not necessarily care or know anything
about usability. That suitability is for the teacher to
discern. Administrators care about budgets and ease of administration.
It's their convenience and usability that comes first. Usability is
context dependent. Which leads us to.... There is nothing wrong with the usability of LibreOffice or
Linux. They are both excellent products and in my subjective
experience far superior to those from Microsoft or Google. We are talking about kids who have minimal needs and are working on
school projects, like a 1000 word essay, not important business deals,
safety critical systems or urgent reports with pristine scientific
typesetting that need to be published yesterday in Nature. |
Pay is too low compared to what they can get elsewhere.