This post’s goal: To beat the record length on the longest post here on the site. I’m not really sure what the record is, but I am guessing that it’s up there. So what are we going to do? We’re going to write a lot, not all of it visible, but we will write a lot. That way the post gets really long *duh* and then everyone will spend hours reading it and come back probably feeling really smart because they know how stupid the post is. Either way, let’s get started with the basics.
To update from yesterday’s post, John beat me in what I would call a rushed finished game. I almost had him on time, but he got a little lucky and I missed a move. Either way, that puts us at 1 and 1 for the year. Hopefully he will enter the computer lab here shortly and be able to play me in a few games so that I can add to my score. If that happens, you’ll hear about it shortly because I am sure that I will take the stats from the game and post them in here. What else would I do with them?
I am supposed to go into work this afternoon. I will go into work this afternoon. Probably need to fix a few laptops and computers as well as do some web work for the teachers. I might try to do some of that web-work after I finish the web-work I wanted to do for myself as well. I am sure there will be a nice conversation that will continue from yesterday. Mr. Minsley and Dan would like to switch from having one static and one mobile lab to 4 mobile labs +/- 1. I told Dan that I wouldn’t support this idea, but I wouldn’t be against it either. Here’s why I don’t support it (and I am going to do this in the style of Dan’s post about the president).
It’s a fairly equal trade-off when it comes to computing power. The laptops will have just slightly less processor speed and ram than any desktop the school would buy. Therefore: the student’s aren’t losing out on the quality of the computer.
To me, static (desktop) computers will save us money in the long run. Laptops run us at least 200$ if not more than the average desktop we buy. Knowing this we have a trade off between either the number of computers or the quality of computers. I can accept the trade-off in number’s if it means that more computer’s can be in use around the building at various times. *In other words, I think having 24 to distribute around the building is about equal to having 30 in one room. However, this is my point of view, and there are situations where having just 1 more computer might save our butts.*
Also, I believe desktop PC’s are easier to work on. If given two identical computers in the same room to work on. One full size computer, and one laptop, which one would you rather work on? On the laptop you get a not standard keyboard. The monitor is probably a little to close or your hand’s are to far away, and the mouse isn’t a mouse on the laptop, it’s a touchpad or thumbpad. Again, I think the tradeoff of portability comes into factor here, but if we eliminate that, I’d take the desktop.
Desktops are maintainable. If something breaks on a desktop, I can find a part in our server room and generally repair it. If a laptop breaks, we have to send it to Dell, have them fix it, and send it back. Now there’s a fairly equal tradeoff here as well. Dell will repair our laptops for free. They will be the ones repairing them, so they have all the tools at their disposal. On the other hand, there are times where I have to accept defeat and say this computer is ‘beyond repair’. Knowing this, I’m not sure if the fact I can get a computer fix next day is better than Dell being able to fix it 5 days later. Again, it could matter in a tight jam, but not on a day to day basis.
Desktops are scrapable. That might not be a word, but let me explain. If we deem a desktop scrapable, we can take the parts out of it, put them in something else, and build a better computer. With laptops we will never be able to do that. They are sealed shut and the parts can’t be moved around. Again, this is more of a reapir issue like the last one, but either way, I think the scrapability of our desktops has proven to be useful over the last 3 years.
Desktops are upgradable. This again isn’t that big of a deal assuming our rotation plan works well. If our computers are never old enough to be considered out-of-date then we should never need to upgrade them. But let’s look at the Compaqs at MSA. Yes they are horrible machines. We have all come to that conclusion. But with a few upgrades such as ram, we were able to extend their life long enough to allow us to buy our first set of laptops. I must attribute some of that to the work that we put into them at MSA, but still… Had they been laptops, there would have been no small cost solution to making them run longer.
Speaking of costs again, and this is probably the reason I refuse to support it. To pull this off with the rotation Dan and Minsley want, it sounds as iff we would need a budget increase of $5000. We already get $40,000, which is high enough and more on a percentage base than I think 833 or most other school districts put into technology. The fact that we put a lot of money there isn’t that big of a deal to me, what bothers me is that I know the finicial situation of the school. I know we are stable, I know we won’t be closed down. I also know we will probably have to take out a loan to cover our debt over the summer until Minnesota get us our cash. I also know that the bond holders want us to have 10% of our loan in our fund balance. In other words, they want us to show a stable fund balance so that the school could stay operating if say Minnesota cut our funding again for an even longer period of time. When this issue first came up, they gave us 5 years. It was a loose 5 years and we just had to be showing we were making progess towards that goal. however, year 4 is approaching it’s end and its looking like we haven’t moved it at all. As a matter of fact, it looks more like we have been moving almost in the opposite direction. Knowing this, I don’t think a budget increase in technology is something we need, especially when we have been operating above standard *new computers ever year for students, what district has that other than us?* As a matter of fact, I think if we tried, we could maintain the same quality of computers in the building with a budget of $35,000. Either way, This is my sticking point for not supporting it. If we stick to our budget of 40k, I might support it and go with it, but I don’t want it increased, and hopefully the board will agree with me.
I think I should probably mention here why I am not against laptops. I really think the portability would be a good gain for the school. It would be nice to know that any room could be serviced and that instead of moving more towards
So that’s my list and reasoning for not supporting, but not being dead against the laptops. I truly believe its a toss up that really comes down to a few key decisions that can be answered by these questions:
What do the students need?
What can we afford?
What are our trade-off’s worth?
I don’t think the three of us are the ones to answer these questions either. I think it would need to go to the board before we made any attempts to decide what we were doing.
Ok, enough on that. John still isn’t here, which is kinda a bummer. I really wanted to play chess with him. Class is now roughly 2 hours away, so there is still time. Hope he get’s here soon.
Today’s another one of those day’s where I have decided to clean out my email inbox. I again will post a few of the more interesting emails that I have sent or received. Let’s start with this one on some religious readings I have been doing into the Gospel of St. Thomas:
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From: JJ Doughboy (justin@jrcorps.com) Hey –Edit–, (Carboned to –Edit–) Yeah, didn’t get your email yesterday, so I’ll try to drop it off sometime today, probably on my way to church. Just to make sure I can find your house again, can I have the street address? I think I know the rest… Here’s what I know about the movie/story: I suppose I should jump back a little more… The priest was a father that left the church with a full copy of a new gospel found by the church. He took it so that he could translate it all in one piece and so that the the church couldn’t cover it up. He supposidly had translated it but not gotten the message out. Since only the most faithful believers *i guess thats the best way to put it* exhibit the signs of christ, the idea is that this priest is then trying to deliver the message through the girl, and the girl is therefor exhibiting the signs he would have…. That’s fictional side of the story… The side that actually has a basis in reality is the idea that the Catholic Church/Other main branches like the Missouri Synouge or however its spell, are hiding documents from the time to keep the public uninformed about things christ said. The movie presents the Gospel of St. Thomas as being one of these books… Now, according to some websites I have found, most from this portal site at:http://home.epix.net/~miser17/Thomas.html, there is no evidence that the church is doing this. The only way it could be seen as this is by their refusal to include them in the bible as a book. This I guess makes some sense in sort, but to me this sounds like they don’t want us to have all the information. Why would the church not want the public to easily be able to read the sayings of Jesus? Maybe it’s better phrased, why would the church not do everything they can to promote the reading of these books? I just thought the whole idea is intreging and I would think that there is an extreme amount to be learned by anything Jesus spoke. So I started reading the translation they have online… Most of them sound like there might be another version of the verse in various other gospels… `Jesus said, “Know what is in front of your face, and what is hidden from you will be disclosed to you. For there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed. [And there is nothing buried that will not be raised.”]` 7″Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: 8For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.” But others seems kind of interesting when you think about it… Jesus said, “I have cast fire upon the world, and look, I’m guarding it until it blazes.” If I read that wrong, it sounds like Jesus is taking credit for letting sin enter the world. If I read it right, it sounds like Jesus set a fire in the hearts of the people and is going to help it until it blazes in all of us. This one really gets me… ‘The disciples said to Jesus, “We know that you are going to leave us. Who will be our leader?” Jesus said to them, “No matter where you are you are to go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being.”‘ A refrence to the trinity?: Jesus said, “Where there are three deities, they are divine. Where there are two or one, I am with that one.” Another really good retelling – Thomas 64 Thomas 77 is the verse that is modified and used throughout the movie Why the price for sin is death: Jesus said, “Adam came from great power and great wealth, but he was not worthy of you. For had he been worthy, [he would] not [have tasted] death.” That’s just some of the stuff that I found really curious while reading it. I suppose I will be talking with Derek about this sometime soon because really, there is a lot of stuff here that has both good and bad meanings for all of us. Perhaps another reason for it to be hidden? -Justin “[Jesus Said] Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there.” – Thomas 77b |
See what I mean… Interesting stuff there. I could probably write a whole post just on that one email alone, but I won’t. I will let you guys read it and comes to your own conclusions about it. You might want to check out that site I link to at the beginning of the email. There is a lot of interesting stuff there.
I just discovered that emacs doesn’t have a word counter. That’s kind of annoying. I want to know what the word count is of all that I have typed in. Oh well. I will just paste it into something else that can count words, either that, or just ignore the fact that I have no easy way to compare how many words this post is in comparision with the others. Maybe I should just do file size. I think the database can tell me that. That would be cool. So now onto otherthings.
Last night I went to a play with Nikki and Maria. The play was ok. They did a pretty good job with the time they had and the acting by some of my old friends was very good. I think they needed a little work on the humour, but other than that, it was just fine.
We also went to Mapplewood and went clothes shopping. I’m starting to find clothes shopping relaxing. Especially when I don’t have to do anything. I just wander the halls with the girls talking about clothes and the such and basically, that leaves my mind to think about whatever it wants. Some of the stuff it thinks is kind of funny if you could hear it. Things like, why do fake men wearing clothes not get inventoried, or why are there so many different flavors of ice cream that all taste so good. Other stuff is typical guy stuff like ‘did she smile at me?’, ‘She’s pretty hot’, ‘I want you now on the cold hard floor’. Ok, so I’m exagerating for the sake of my post. My mind isn’t quite that bad anymore. It used to be back in the days of old when Justin could be as sick as the next person at lunch. Ah yes, we call those ‘the lost years’. Either way, it was fun.
Ah yes. BMW came up last night as well. Two good episodes. The first one has to probably be one of my favorite episodes. It’s the one where Topanga runs away from home to be with Cory after she moves away. She stood in the rain for him. She cuddled with him. She rubbed his tummy. They were in love, and Feenie believed it! Such a good episode. The second one was good as well with Cory trying to learn how to make-out.
Ok, so I don’t know how long this post is, but I have to get to Csci then off to work, then perhaps something else, then church. Cool cOoL, I’m Out.