I have spent some time studying an IT related degree and I am surprised about the lack of adoption or conversation about the GNU Linux operating system. Even friends from the Bachelor of IT or software engineering degrees are reluctant to experiment with Open Source applications.

As university degrees attempt to become more workforce oriented and practical there is an enourmous bias towards the Windows operating system and all of its applications.

At our faculty there were around 4 windows computer labs to 1 linux lab. I did have some Linux interaction in a operating systems unit but the tasks were centered around process scheduling, forks and threads.

In another unit I was lucky to make a presentation about Linux as a desktop system . Most of the class listened with amazement as if I were introducing mircrowaves for the first time. My teacher knew more than the rest about Linux however, I got the impression that his knowledge had come more from magazines than first hand experience. Continue reading →