
When every student has a laptop, why run computer labs? - hko
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/03/whats-the-point-of-running.ars
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motoko
Because lab computers can be configured with all the necessary software and
support students need to do work in an environment conducive to doing work.
It's the software, support, licensing, environment, configuration,
maintenance, convenience, peripherals, bandwidth, security, environment, and
unity of purpose that's most valuable... not the physical computer itself.

When every student has paper, why print books?

~~~
viraptor
I agree. Especially about the required software. University shouldn't expect
me to install windows, matlab, indesign, full office, visual studio, etc. on
my own box. It's also nice to have a reference machine - it's much easier to
work with "project has to run on the standard uni boxes" than "it has to be
compatible with X, Y, Z and compiled with V". At my university they reduce
energy usage / maintenance costs by using Sun Rays - we can login to a unix,
or windows server, or just get a simple mozilla-only session which loads in a
second or two. Possibility to print something on the network printers (~10) at
any time is also something I find useful. Amazingly, I haven't even found
anything TDWTF-worthy about that setup...

Even though almost everyone has a laptop here, the library / lab (wifi
available) is still full with people using the local computers to study (~200
places).

But now that you mention books... I'd be _really_ happy to get all the books I
need in pdfs, so that:

1\. they're searchable / bookmarkable

2\. I can print out those 2 pages I really need and not carry the whole thing
around

~~~
DTrejo
Gigapedia.org

Log in, search gigapedia.org, click the "links" tab.

Download that book, enjoy.

~~~
alexdas
experiments in physics

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mkelly
I'm surprised no one has mentioned this yet: labs are valuable for the social
atmosphere. At my school, there are grads and undergrads who hold hours at the
labs, so everyone's there for those. The rest of the time, people can help
each other out, shoot the shit, etc.

If you're stuck, you can talk to your neighbor. Maybe they're stuck too.

Unlike some other posters, I found it <i>harder</i> to get things done in the
lab, because of the socialization. But it's a totally different experience to
work on a project in the lab than at home alone or with a small group of
people you know. It's much more like my experiences at work with an open
floor, with people walking around and talking to each other.

[Edit: Ehh, how do you make things italic? I'll have to look that up.]

~~~
Zev
Put things between *'s to italicize them. Its mentioned on
<http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>.

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andyking
I went through university in the UK during the last three years without owning
my own laptop. Had they not had computer labs, I wouldn't have been able to
get any work done at all. We pay enough to study without having to fork out
for compulsory gadgetry on top of that--part of the fees we pay are for the
provision of facilities like computers. It might be OK for those with parental
support, but I had to pay for it all myself and couldn't afford my own laptop
while studying! (I had my own desktop at home in the final year, a hand-me-
down bought from a friend for £20. I'm still using it to type this.)

However, they could perhaps shrink the size of the labs; there were rooms with
50 or 60 PCs all switched on, wasting energy displaying that immensely
irritating advertising screensaver and two or three of us working in them.
Perhaps they could even go as far as to close labs and provide students with
laptops with required study software pre-installed, but that's cloud-cuckoo
land stuff...

~~~
jlees
Stuff seems slightly different here (in the UK), at least based on what I've
heard from students in the US and absorbed through popular culture (ha).

I didn't have my own laptop most of the time I was an undergrad, and although
students these days tend to have them rather than desktops, I don't see that
many carrying them around/taking them to lectures/tutorials. Certainly if a
student I taught whipped out their laptop I'd be amazed.

I was taught computer science at a fairly 'traditional' institution where we
learned from OHPs, Powerpoint and printed notes rather than live code demos
that you could type out on your laptop and play with while the lecturer was
talking. (I recently went to a tutorial day that was run like this and it was
amazing; I'm not necessarily advocating learning to code on paper, but it does
help you pass exams where you have to write code on paper..)

Anyway, without computer labs many people out and about on campus wouldn't
have e-mail or 'net access, and as others have pointed out it let us run a
pretty complex setup for teaching (ML and Java through some insane whacked-out
emacs customisation; to this day I use vim as a result of that teaching). I
guess the general 'labs as somewhere the general student body goes to write
essays aren't needed' applies, but a nice quiet room full of the sound of
people typing is a great environment to get work done, and at least at the
universities I'm familiar with in the UK, there's not much room for laptops.
Plus laptops have distractions on, and lab machines don't.

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mtpark
Labs are great for group projects, free printer access, a place to work on a
computer so your backpack isn't 5lb heavier every day, a place away from your
room to check your email(s) quickly, etc.

~~~
catz
> free printer access

Did you get free printer access? That is unfair - we had to pay for everything
- bandwidth and printer access.

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blahblahblah
Laptops are nice for light computing tasks such as word processing, but there
are a lot of applications that just aren't going to run well on a cheap
laptop. There's also the issue of hardware failure, malware disasters, etc.
Students are not, in general, competent sysadmins. The computer lab is
critically important when your laptop's hard drive crashes two days before the
due date of an important project. On a university supported filesystem, your
data is backed up and the failure of one PC is not a problem because you can
just use another one. Also, university site licenses for software can be
cheaper than buying individual licenses (even with an student discount).

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manvsmachine
_Power._ Everyone may have a laptop, but the capabilities of said laptop will
vary greatly. This isn't an issue for everyone, but it can be for anyone
taking a computational / media editing / engineering type of degree. I can
picture tons of students wondering why AutoCAD / Photoshop / Final Cut runs
like crap on their $400 Celeron system.

 _Standardization._ Dedicated labs provide the assurance that every student
has the ability to use the same software on the same platform.

 _Software Licensing._ Even if you could assume that all student were running
the same OS / hardware platform, you'd still have to make necessary software
available to all of them, which would be a licensing nightmare.

Laptop use works for very general purpose / light-duty work, which is what
many college students do. So I could see the argument for making certain areas
more laptop-centric (such as libraries). But at most unis, there will always
be enough demand from those in more "hardcore" majors that getting rid of labs
in general won't work. In fact, I've actually seen an upswing in lab use due
to students buying netbooks.

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tsally
Liability. Teachers always need to be able to tell students they could have
gone to the lab. Otherwise software problems/failures because a real issue for
each class.

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diN0bot
wow. i almost exclusively used mit's athena labs when i was there a few years
back. for computer science.

i have a laptop now and, working from home on my bed, think it's great.

the downside of laptops is that with greater power (and convenience) comes
greater responsibility (and self-restraint).

* laptops are too often used for multitasking to the detriment of the work or social meeting at hand. doing homework while watching tv is less productive/enjoyable than taking each in turn. engaging with people who are alert in the world is easier than engaging with those who are working (or when not engaged with work).

* laptops make it easy to get into a groove and not leave until the wee hours...which is good as long as you're getting work done.

onwards with technology! let's also encourage thoughtful behavior, too.

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timbowen
The utility of computer labs is huge, there's no doubt about that.

What really surprises me is that only six out of over three thousand freshman
ran Linux. Weak sauce! I guess coming from Carnegie Mellon University I'm used
to a higher level of techno-centrism.

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ccamrobertson
Why not create labs without workstations - that is to say, give students big
monitors, keyboards and mice and let them hook their laptops & netbooks in.
Would be a cheap experiment to run, not to mention the much longer upgrade
cycle. I usually bring an RGB cable and hack this setup myself, much to the
ire of lab admins...

~~~
MichaelApproved
Agreed. Instead of getting rid of the lab altogether just remove a few
desktops and leave the rest of the setup in place for the laptops. Though from
what it sounds like it's not the computer itself that's the major cost in the
lab, it's all the support that goes into it.

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endtime
Not everyone runs Linux on his laptop. We have several Linux clusters here
that are useful for schoolwork.

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grinich
Solidworks is reeeeally expensive.

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carterschonwald
easy: for ease of installation of site license softare such as matlab and for
those times when their computer is down

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chiffonade
Because part of being in school is being around other people.

Plus you need all the right software.

