[Year 12 IT Apps] apology

[Bell, Cameron P]

(I would reply to Michael direct if I had his email) 
I take your point that not all Technicians are out to empire build it was not meant to be a generalisiation, the trouble is that all too often, ok- not in your case, but in many situations I have had to deal with, that technicians often use "technical reasons" to deny a program simply because:
1) It was too hard to implement
2) It was an area that they were unfamiliar with
When push came to shove, it was simply a case of the technician trying to take the easy way out. Bit like simply ghosting a lab than trying to find the source of the problem and correcting that. I have had too many cases where educational programs were dictated by the school technical team as to what was allowed and what wasn't. The trouble was that there were very few people in the school who could see both sides of the argument and often I saw technical arguments hold sway over teachers who were not in a position to argue about what was really feasible with a bit of extra training for the tech.
My response was based on years of this sort of thing and I am sorry that it came across as anti-techie, I am not, I have a great team of technicians who do everything in their power to enable whatever it is that a teacher/student needs. We have an ongong conflict to manage here, trying to keep a network running smoothly balanced against the need to explore, try new programs and above all, enable and facilitate the education of our students.
No I don't know the situation there, and yes I jumped the gun, but it was a response that I have had to use on many occasions to actually get something done.
I am glad that you don't seem to have the same attitude that I have had to deal with over the years. ;)
Cheers
Cameron

________________________________

From: itapps-bounces at edulists.com.au on behalf of Michael Walker
Sent: Wed 1/08/2007 1:16 PM
To: 'Year 12 IT Applications Teachers' Mailing List'
Subject: RE: [Year 12 IT Apps] apology



Normally I respect all contributions to this list, and respect those making the contributions. However, you can tell it must be full moon because the following took place (apologies in advance for the large amount of reading and techspeak):

>>Robyn Dunn sayeth:

>>We are also a govt school and have edumail. My TSSP says we can't have Outlook because we would all have to maintain our individual profiles which we would find too complicated to manage. Is he spinning me a line? What has edumail got to do with outlook?

>>To which Cameron Bell replied in part:

> Nonsense. Techies setting the agenda- they are there to support you, not deny you!

>> To which I say:

Cameron, how do you know he isn't? Are you so familiar with the setup at Camberwell and Robyn's situation in particular that you can make the judgement you have? Maybe there are other aspects to Robyn's situation that warrant not using Outlook. Here for example we have the Groupwise client installed on all curriculum workstations for much the same reasons as you use Thunderbird. I might note that after your anti-techie tirade, you fundamentally agree that Outlook is probably not the best email client to use in many situations. Other reasons we use Groupwise is that when we first installed it, Outlook security issues were fairly prominent and we decided we weren't going to accept the potential problems that using Outlook created. In addition I have done teaching rounds in several schools where they were using individual profiles and it took forever to log in, something we don't have problems with here due to having a small customised single profile for each user group (studen!
 ts, staff and support). Another benefit to having common profiles and a standard operating environment is that when staff come to the IT office here wanting a piece of software loaded on the network ASAP so they can use it period 5 tomorrow, there is only one lot of registry settings to modify. There is no need for additional scripts, scripting packages to patch registries or anything like that. I have enough problems with Outlook users in admin (all 5 of them) without trying to support the package across the school. After some initial training, I rarely have problems with supporting others use of Groupwise.

In this case we don't encourage use of Outlook, although we don't deny those who wish to do so contrary to our suggestions and explanation of reasons why, BECAUSE we are trying to support all 1060 users and their use of the network.

>>Cameron continued on:

>Outlook is simply a client that displays the data held on the edumail exchange server. In my opinion it is an insecure, over-featured piece of bloatware, but it works well if you want to sync with pda's and other devices (every device has to be able to sync with Outlook).Are you being told to use web-access only?
If you want to use Outlook make it happen! Whose running the show?? If you want to use a PDA, then you really have no option but to use Outlook as the client. There is no reason to be denied access to using Outlook if it is going to make *your* job easier.
My thoughts are that for 90% of teaching staff, Thunderbird is a better option as most teachers have no use for the collaboration/groupware aspects of Outlook. Outlook is more bandwidth heavy syncing lots of calendars, address books, tasks, journals etc etc. Just go a simple email client like Thunderbird if you don't need the
groupware. I use it with the optional calendar (sunbird) and have set it up to access the global address list in edumail. All my backup consists of is copying my thunderbird folder to another location periodically and all the local folders are saved with all the emails. Easy-peasy.

>>Again I am silly enough to chip in with:

Where does Robyn say she is web access only on her email? Where does she imply she is using a PDA?

Sorry Cameron, but as a tech, I certainly don't empire build, if I wasn't interested in schools and education I could be earning more money "building my empire" elsewhere. With respect I might advise you to reconsider your apparent stance that all technicians try to run the show and tell teachers where to get off whereas most techs I know do their damnedest to try and support education in schools despite some pretty unrealistic requests at times. I find your attitude towards people like me trying to do my job to the best of my ability most offensive.

>>> Then "Stephen Digby" <digby.stephen.p at edumail.vic.gov.au> 31/07/2007 8:03 pm chipped in with>>>
>Touchy !
>Usually, when someone gets upset at a query, it is not because of the insult but rather that they may wish to curtail any future questioning....
>Your TSSP works for YOU.
>You were not insulting him/her.  You were getting a "second opinion".
>Perhaps that was perceived as an insult.

You mean apart from implying that her tech was "spinning her a line". As someone else replied, that usually implies they were being deliberately deceitful. I read Robyn's email as being that her technician was feeding her BS  about Outlook to avoid doing work or for some other nefarious reason. I'm not sure that unless you know how Camberwell has set their network up and for what reasons that anyone can judge that until Robyn gives the list more information about her particular set up.

>In answer....
>Outlook is the preferred email client for all DEET users as it allows MUCH faster email reception, easier user management of email, much easier access and maintenance of contact lists; offline access to received emails(depending on your settings).

Here we pop it into Groupwise along with every other account the user wishes to use. Groupwise is then available online from anywhere in the world or from the client within the school or on the staff member's laptop. It loads much faster than Outlook does here and does everything Outlook does and a bit more (viewing of documents from within the client by simply clicking on the icon of the document, etc)

>I setup all staff emails as plain pop3 connections so that all email content is retained on the local machine for offline reading and composition. Setting the option so that email is left on the EduMail server until deleted from the local machine allows emails to be accessible via browser as well.

>Using the Exchange settings IS confusing as users often see duplicate folder sets for the remote copies as well as for the local copies.

>Suggest that staff who have access to personal computers (e.g. notebooks) should always use a local mail client (even if it is simply Outlook express or an integrated browser client).

Where does Robyn say she doesn't use a local mail client?

>Only people who should stick to web based access are those with no personal computer and thus would not benefit from its ability to deliver a faster more efficient connection.

Where does Robyn say she is limited to Web Access?

>>Then Robyn replies on Tuesday:

My TSSP was very offended by my questions to this list last Frday. I would like to unreservedly apologise to anyone who I have offended by any comments or queries I have made to this list

>>My last word (if you've read this far:

And thank you to Robyn for being gracious enough to do so. It would be interesting to know though for the sake of the list and furthering everyone's knowledge what Robyn's set up actually was and what reasons her tech gave for not using Outlook. Given some of the animosity towards others shown here and preparedness to assume the worst based on very little information, perhaps that's a discussion for the next time the list sees fit to publically criticise those responsible for maintaining and improving the computer systems they rely on. Shall we all make a date for August 28?

Michael Walker
Computer Technician Canterbury Girls Secondary College (another government school who also uses Edumail but not Outlook)



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