[Leaplist] The School Project Work Sessions

[patrick]

I expect the LEAP-CF executives will be mentioning the work at the
Wilford Woodruff Academy, but, as an attendee I offer my first hand report.

Work Sessions were held on both Saturdays past, plus, today, Sunday.

First of all, lets all thank the folks who contributed precious time to
help in this project.

There are many who contributed their skills and labor, and I hope I
don't miss anyone: Jack, Fred, Doug, Phil, Alex, and I were there.

If I missed your name, please forgive and let me explain that all my
upper teeth were removed on Tuesday, so possibly some of my brains
leaked out... And, the new plate is not well fitted yet, and causes me
some pain distraction.

Deserving of appreciation are all of the members and supporters of
LEAP-CF whose attendance, contributions, support, advise, and membership
through the years help to make this a successful work.

Everyone is included in the success of this project.

Children appreciate every effort to help them learn and grow into
competent adults.  We have all helped them this past year, and now, with
the current successful achievements, will see continued success in the
next school year, that begins on Monday.

"Ms. June" expressed her heartfelt thanks to everyone for the great
amount of support, skill, and effort, contributed.  You are all "awesome".

Today, Sunday, August 19th, the following tasks were completed in 4
hours of work by Fred, Doug, and I:
Wifi was bridged to the high school classroom, and all systems tested.
Ping rate out to servers was in the 80ms range.  When several systems
were using the Internet, ping latency went to about 128 ms.  Tolerable
numbers for this system.

One WRT54G turned out to be a 'brick' in trying to get it to flash the
firmware.  Fred said that this unit had seen minor problems since
purchase.  He had a DLink unite that worked in it's stead.

We identified an AC outlet in that Bldg. C classroom that mysteriously
caused the explosion of MOVs (Metal Oxide Varistors) in surge suppressor
extension cables.  Plugged in a polarity tester and it shows proper
wiring of Hot, Neutral, and Ground.

Checked the AC voltage and it is 117 volts AC.  The Vacuum cleaner runs
great on it, but, Surge Suppressors smoke, bang, burn instantly!  I'm
stumped!  Any electricians out there?  Anyone ever experience this type
problem?   We have placed a blue tape seal, covered with red tape, over
the outlet, and requested Ms. June to get a commercial contractor to fix
it.

There are four laptops for use by teachers, that we intended to install
the FC7 + image on, but, it just didn't happen.

The two Compaqs hard drives were hooked up with adapters, and were ready
to be cloned, when we realized that they are 12Gb and 15Gb drives, and a
20 GB partition table and the 3.7Gb of image data couldn't be done in
the form of "DD BS+1000000 if=/dev/sda | of=/dev/sdb" and would need to
be partitioned and each folder copied, or, CPIO or some other solution
applied.

In attempting to clone the Compaqs, we got errors, then figured out why.
So, they need to have FC7 installed or copied. Notes are on them.

The two IBM Thinkpads are unaffected and work.  But, batteries were low
so they are plugged in and charging over night.

Saturday, August 18th, all the cloned Fedora Core 7 hard drives were
installed in all systems, and powered up, checked for Internet access,
and worked well.  Systems were shuffled around to the various
classrooms, and routers set up, along with all cables.

Jack also located a local USB printer near to the new computer in the
Secretary office.  His attempts to get that new computer to connect to
the Print Server HP 3550 Laser failed.

That new computer doesn't run Linux, or any sane OS.  It's there at
behest of the accountant, running Vista, which is a miserable dog that
continues to prove it won't hunt.  So, we are happy to plug in a local
printer, and next week will advise Ms. June that they use the Tech.
support that should be available from the computer vendor, or Microsnot.

Saturday, August 11th, all the units got DVD ROM units, with two teacher
units getting DVD RW units.  Due to the failure of the Master hard
drive,  Phil built and cloned all drives over the course of the week,
and delivered them for install on the 18th.

Thank you, everyone!

Patrick Berry