[K12OSN] Database for school desktop use

[Terrell Prude', Jr.]

Tom Haynes wrote:

>We got an official CD of the StarOffice for schools at one point. I can't
>remember what the cost was, but it seemed like it was a nominal charge for
>media and handling. I am remembering $25 for the kit, and it could be
>installed on multiple school machines. We decided to stay with the MS Office
>Suite, but I could make the move tomorrow.
>
>Essentially the administration is fond of calendaring in Exchange/Outlook.
>Maybe 10% of the teachers use the fancy features in Outlook. Almost
>everything else could be done in SO or OO. One of the irritants for me as a
>math teacher is the lack of integration with MathType. I corresponded with
>the Design Science folks, and they had no interest in the SO/OO market.
>  
>

Have you ever considered using LaTeX for doing your math typesetting?  A 
friend of mine at the University of Washington converted the entire Math 
Dept. there over to using LaTeX--remember, these are all ego-maniac Ph. 
D. professors here--and not only did they convert to using LaTeX, but 
they now swear by it and won't consider anything that isn't as good.  
Before that, they'd used Microsoft Office for this purpose, and their 
attitude was, "I don't have time to learn any 'new technology'; I have 
to do my research and teach!  I've got a *job* to do!"

Here's how my friend did it.  He, being a math instructor himself, made 
up some student worksheets for the calculus classes, and he showed them 
to a couple of math professors.  The profs said, "Wow, that's pretty 
cool.  How long did it take you?"  My friend said, "Oh, about 5 
minutes."  Then he went and showed them how he did it.  Sure enough, 
five minutes later, he'd made another worksheet with some good calculus 
problems (definite integrals and such).  After picking up their jaws, 
the profs said, "Can you show us how?"  He again did, and the rest is 
history.

I just don't see the need to stay with Microsoft Office, be it on the 
Windows OS or a Free OS, for any educational function.
 
--TP
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