[ale] Linux "course" at GT?

[Rob Butera]

Thanks for the feedback.  Someone added that faculty need to be supportive
of students using non-MS operating systems.  I totally agree, since I
tend to be one of the few "non-MS" faculty.

I try not to impose the "Microsoft paradigm" on my students: I have been
doing my research/writing 90% on Linux (and 98% on UNIX) for the last 5
years.  So all my class handouts/homework are always in PDF or PS files
(done in LaTeX, of course :).  In one case where I put PowerPoint slides
on the WWW, I at least included a link to the free PowerPoint viewer.

In fact, the only reason I use MS is to interface with the rest of my
department: daily I am emailed Excel spreadsheets and Word documents.
Before the masses scream "Star Office", I will point out that I do
have it, and it works, but there are some things it definitely chokes
on, like macro-intensive spreadsheets and anything done in PowerPoint
(at least PPT presentations that I have made).

Which brings me to my "killer app" issue:  there is no Linux/UNIX based
piece of software that comes close to PowerPoint.  I have tried the
presentation managers in Star Office and Applixware, and PowerPoint simply
offers way more features, many more styles, and (most importantly) the fonts
are rendered a lot more cleanly than an out-of-the-box Linux installation
running Star or Applix.  And none of them do a decent job importing
PowerPoint presentations (conversely, MS PowerPoint had no trouble dealing
with a presentation I initially made using Star).


For whatever it is worth, I only run Win98 within VMWare :)


Dr. Robert Butera, Assistant Professor       
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering		
Institute for Bioengineering and Biosciences
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 
contact info --> http://www.ece.gatech.edu/users/rbutera/