NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #1/NN_1993_1.iso/spool/alt/comp/acadfre/talk/3846

Text File | 1993-01-04 | 1.3 KB | 27 lines

Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
Path: sparky!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!eff!eff-gate!usenet
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Subject: Personal Computer requirements
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Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 21:26:03 GMT
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WRT the query last week in these pages on whether a university should require
students to buy personal computers:  it all boils down to whom the university
wants to shift many of the computing costs to, itself or its students.  By
making students shell out hundreds of bucks per capita for the hard-drive-
equipped PC's needed to run the microcomputer releases of many statistical
packages, a school saves itself the cost of maintaining as much hardware and
software on the multiuser system; but the students are therefore deprived of
the additional power and features that reside in the mainframe releases of
this software.  Overall, it is better to give students accounts on a fully
equipped system then to force them to buy and equip microcomputers of their
own.
                                              Mitch Pravatiner
                                              [e-mail]