Well, here I am at another Ubuntu Developers Summit (UDS) where folks from all over the world come and work together to prepare and develop specs/features for the next release of Ubuntu (Hardy Heron or Ubuntu 8.04). You may recall from previous posts on my own blog "Ramblings of a Digital Educator" that I have been lucky to have been able to attend past UDS's in exotic locales such as Montreal, Google headquarters in California, and Seville Spain. Where am I now? The wonderful exotic locale of BOSTON. Ok, for me it's hardly exotic. In fact, I get down here several times a year for business, pleasure, and most of all...Red Sox games! Don't get me wrong, I'm honored to be here and excited about the work to be done. I'm here representing all of you as an educator, making sure that features we need such as user management, classroom applications, easy configuration...etc. are discussed and included. I'm not a programmer, but I understand "programmer-speak" or "geek-speak" so I'm able to bridge the gap and help out in that manner. I'm happy to report that Ubuntu/Edubuntu has matured to the point where most of the features with regard to the operating system, are complete...now it's time to focus on creating and implementing GUI tools to make the lives of system administrators and teachers much easier. Tools to manage classrooms, manage users, manage servers, and much more are in the pipeline and slated for discussion and development. It's an exciting time. Linux in education is poised for major adoption. Access to technology will become much more commonplace worldwide...for very little investment. Imagine...kids...showing the world what they can do...regardless of where they are and what their circumstances may be. Very cool.
David, thanks for the update. These are exciting times! :)
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