Restrictive Environment From School

[Steve W]

I MUST agree with Dave. Before I had even finished reading the post I was getting ready to respond. It seems that some here feel that it is OK to do what they wish as long as it suits their needs. Some of these people are the same ones that say GP is alive and well and that teams should be trusted to follow the rules and given the benefit of the doubt.

When ever someone trusts us with their property we should handle that property better that we would our own. On our team I have been loaned some laptops. I was given permission to erase the hard drives and put what ever I want on them. I must return them with the same operating system on them when they were given to me. The team has been instructed to make sure that the laptops are locked up at all times. These are conditions that were given to me at the time they were loaned. I even use my work laptop with a few more restrictions. We as a team are thankful for what we have been entrusted with and we don't want to lose the privilege of using these laptops.

To encourage someone to "break the rules" is NEVER a good solution. We should always work within the rules and not look for ways to "legally" break them.

[GeorgeTheEng]

Originally Posted by dlavery

Wow. This is possibly one of the most inappropriate and ill-conceived pieces of advice I have seen on these forums in quite a while.

While I can't disagree with Dave, I think he is missing an even bigger issue. Not only could the school punish the offending students, but you are potentially committing crimes that could have very serious consequences.

If you talk to your IT folks and can't get anywhere, contact Paul Kloberg and I know he'll help. Contact other teams in your area and see if you can someone to demo thier robot to the powers that be and emphasize the importance of being able to program the robot to do what it does. If that doesn't work, go to that administration.

At that point, there are still a few options. Find someone to donate/lend a laptop. Work at home and find someone that can lend a laptop long enough to download code. Find a local team that will let you borrow thier laptop. Finally, if absolutely necessary, go to the parents and sponsors, explain the situation and have them go to the school board.

[Mike]

As far as the legality of doing what was suggested by Rickertsen, I point you to the Klutztown incident.

Basically, the Klutztown school district issued iBooks to all high school students. Naturally, they had a lot of restrictions. However, the password they had used for the administration system was written on every single serial number label (on the bottom of the iBook.) Naturally, about 80-100 students abused this and removed all administration software from their iBooks.

These students were charged with Computer Trespassing (a third-degree felony) and were suspended/expelled from school. Whether or not the punishment fit the crime, i'm out of my jurisdiction to decide. After a flood of media came in questioning the school board, the charges were eventually dropped. To be honest, I think the school district should've been charged with Criminal Negligence if the students were charged...

Couple links about it
Local news article about Klutztown Computer Scandal
Slashdot | Felony Charges For H.S. Hacking
Slashdot | Klutztown Students get Felony Charges
Slashdot | Charges Against High School Hackers Dropped

[BrianBSL]

In the end, you aren't really any worse off than any other team, but I understand that it sucks to have the technology right there in front of you, but not be able to use it. (As most other teams likely don't have school provided PC's) Like others have said, you really only need 1 PC to actually program. As long as you can use notepad on your school laptops, you can write the code there and then transfer it to an old pc that has mplab, c18, and ifiloader to actually program. You won't get the syntax highlighting that mplab provides, but you aren't missing much there.

[meaubry]

Notice to all posters -
DO NOT recommend solutions that even come close to borderline illegal activities on this forum sight. (No debating what is and isn't illegal - it doesn't belong here on our websight)
Please provide ONLY appropriate responses and behaviors to all situations discussed here. There are many alternative solutions that do not include some of the things I have read in this thread!
As always, those that wish to offer positive suggestions are always welcome, those that choose the alternative - are not.

Mike Aubry
Team 47
Engineering Lead

[dubious elise]

Originally Posted by GeorgeTheEng

Not only could the school punish the offending students, but you are potentially committing crimes that could have very serious consequences.

Dave and George, thank you very much for your comments.

Our school district has been set up the same way for the past two years as a district-wide punishment for a crime that was committed with one of the school computers. Though we do not have the privilege of laptop usage, we use the same "Novell Box" that nukem mentioned - limited programs and no Start menu.

We have obtained our own computers, via random donations of older machines from the School District and our own team members, that we use for programming. They are not connected to the district network and they are used exclusively for robotics (they are locked in a separate room during school hours).

When we need to perform operations that require extra access or usage of a Start menu, we are usually able to work out an agreement between either a teacher (since their accounts allow for normal desktop operation and a greater variety of program usage) or the school's technology resource guru (in the form of a separate computer usage agreement resulting in modified account settings for an account). If we cannot get approval either way, the operation is left out or performed on the students' own computers at home.

We do not want to take risks with our school district. Because we are present at the school so often after normal operation hours and on weekends, we are often blamed for mishaps and occurances that are beyond our own control (setting off alarms in other parts of the school, leaving classroom doors that are not a part of our workspace unlocked, etc). Obviously, all of these are security concerns and someone has to be blamed, though we usually take these accusations with a grain of salt - making sure to cross all of our own "t"s and dot all of our own "i"s whenever we are working.

It is the same with the computer system. The incident in a programming class at our school sparked an enormous, district-wide response involving suspensions and heavily increased computer restrictions. All I ask is that you think before you act. If Mr. Lavery wouldn't be proud of it, just don't do it at all.

[Rickertsen2]

I will admit that some of my points were inappropriate. I apologize for the confusion over my post. I would have interpreted it the same way especially considering the hostile overtone it seems to present now that I read over it. I do not support violating school policies. I think that this miscommunication stemmed from the fact that i did not think my response through and assumed that Nukem's situation is that same as that of the programming class at our school. In the case of our programming class, we had many times requested that restrictions be removed and many times received empty promises that they would. The Novell and deepfreeze password aren’t well guarded secrets at my school. They are openly known by a number of students and non IT faculty (and the IT department knows this yet takes no actions to change them. We have warned them of the danger of this). This year we approached the school administration and asked them if it would be ok we made the changes ourselves since IT failed to take action. They agreed and granted us WRITTEN PERMISSION. The IT department in our county deos not have it’s act together and is often referred to as the Idiot Technology department.

Once I started rambling off about re-flashing the BIOS I was starting to go off into a hypothetical tangent. I once bought a laptop off eBay which the seller failed to communicate had a bios password. I removed it by re-flashing the bios with an EEPROM programmer. I assumed that the people of these forums would have enough sense not to take this suggestion too seriously.

As for my last suggestion of swapping out the hard drives with one of your own, I understand that this might be against the wishes of the IT department, but it is fairly benign. By doing so, you do not circumvent any security measures and do not alter the laptop in any was as long as you put the original hard rive back before you return the laptop. Also I do not see any harm in wiping the computer as long as you make an image of it before you do so and restore the image before you give the computer back. Again I feel such extreme measures should only be used as a last result.

I am sorry for the commotion I have caused

[GeorgeTheEng]

I'd like to get back to the other point of my comments (besides the moral/legal issues) that there are other options.

While pursuing different technical approaches, I would still get someone to talk to the administration and get parents involved. Just because you can solve it this year doesn't mean next year the problem will not be there again.

On the technical side, as many people have said, the programming software runs on older machines. And other then downloading the software initially, there isn't a necessatity for a network connection. Approach one of your sponsors and ask if they have an laptops or PCs they are getting rid of. Most major companies don't actually throw stuff out, it gets stored in a warehouse. It might be old but it will do the job.

And worst case scenario, you're in NJ w/ a large number of teams, someone with a laptop from another team can come over and help you load code. Paul Kloberg will see to that (and probably ask me since I'm mentioning it :> )

BTW, I appologize if some of my other comments came off harsh. I work in the defense industry where getting around security on a computer can sometimes be considered a federal issue. Remember though, even if it is legal, you might damage the team's reputation with the school because it looks bad/sneaky/etc and that isn't good for any team.

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by Rickertsen2

As for my last suggestion of swapping out the hard drives with one of your own, I understand that this might be against the wishes of the IT department, but it is fairly benign. By doing so, you do not circumvent any security measures and do not alter the laptop in any was as long as you put the original hard rive back before you return the laptop.

I am astonished that you are defending this. Removing the software on the hard disk is circumventing the security. Removing the hard disk does alter the laptop. Taking apart a school-owned laptop can hardly be called benign.

You seem to be saying that breaking the rules is okay as long as you don't get caught. I urge you to abandon that idea immediately and start working on more constructive suggestions.

[Jay H 237]

Wow, I was about ready to put on oven mitts to handle this thread!


Now back to the original problem and a suggestion I haven't seen yet.

Has your team tried applying for any grants? We applied for a grant that allowed us to purchase not one but two brand new Compaq computers for team use only. This is an option that may work for you if you can't afford to purchase one outright and can't find anyone to donate or loan one to you. You will have to do some research to see what, if any, grants are available and the conditions to apply for them.

As Ken mentioned, Ebay is a good place also. I purchased a second laptop for myself that I basically carry around and use for robotics only. When needed I've loaned it out to the team. I paid $410 for it shipped to my door, a 650mhz Toshiba Satellite with 2000 Pro on it. It's more than enough for programming and Word, Excel and Powerpoint (we've done several presentations with it). Not something you would do gaming on but that was never the intent I had with it when I bought it anyhow.


Also just get the general word out that you're looking for a (working) laptop. You neven know, someone may be upgrading and trying to decide what to do with the old one. The holidays are coming up and I'm sure someone out there will be getting a new computer which is perfect timing for you since the "six weeks" follow the holiday season. If you're team holds 501(c)3 status then donations should be easier to come by, whether private individual or corporation.

I'm sure you'll find a solution.

Now excuse me, I have to put on the mitts and get the orange flavor Pillsbury rolls out of the oven.

[hoag]

You should really talk to the IT people at your school. If they really won't change any of your settings, ask if you can borrow a loaner laptop with modified settings only for robotics. (If they have them).

My school has a laptop program that started back in the late 90's. It's a voluntary program (but like 90% of the school participates). Everyone has IBM thinkpads. In 10th grade, you can either buy one or make payments on it. Then when you graduate, it's yours to keep.
As for security, everyone is an administrator on their local accounts. I have a school account on the domain that I can log on to with my laptop, or any of the macs or pcs.
If your school has classroom PC's or labs, ask if you can get a robotics account for one of those. My team has our own login just for our robotics stuff.
As for punishment issues that have been brought up, my school is very strict like most are. Students get suspended for abusing the computers often. One student was even expelled last year.

Schools need to be strict. There's a lot of important information that travels across the network. If you have a computer that is connected to the network that may harm or compromise other machines, things could get bad. In my school, all of the security cameras are digital. Our fuel cell uses the network for monitoring information. Heck, even the locks for every door are controlled on the network. These things are vital to building operation; administrators don't want kids to even think about messing with them.
Many times we all get mad at our schools for being so strict, but they need to protect all of their students and staff.

Otherwise, it's great to have a laptop for robot programming. I've heard stories of my team's rookie years involving constant unplugging and moving a desktop computer around the lab. (Ouch) Talk to administrators and tech guys about getting an account on a local machine, or another machine just for programming.

[DonRotolo]

Originally Posted by nukem

Our school district is very closeminded about what students should be allowed to do on their computers. While they have given every student a laptop we are not allowed to do anything with them. <SNIP>

So, you mean there are no applications on the laptop? By "not allowed to do anything with them" do you really mean "not allowed to do whatever I want with them (and I should be able to because I know lots more about this stuff than they do)"? Hmmm.

Nuke, you need to re-examine your basic premise. Those laptops do everything 98% of the students need them to do, and they do it just fine. The other 2% may indeed know more than the IT staff, but that's no excuse. These are not game machines, they are tools like your math textbook, and we don't want anyone messing with them. (I paid for that machine!).

If you really find it so awful, feel free to give the laptop back and do without. Meanwhile, for everything else, find another option. Don't want to be too harsh, but it almost sounds like you are whining. Stop.

(By the way: If you need leverage with the school, let me know. Between your advisers and others, we can get whatever you need for you.)

Don

[russell]

Call me simplistic but if I were the school district I would the most logical approach to the situation would be to charge a fee to "reset" a laptop. You arent furthering anyones education (face it, you can learn all the similes you want in english, but advanced simile identification is worthless compared to technical skills) by not allowing them to mess around on the computer. If they are gonna blow the cash on a laptop for each student they might as well let the students get as much benefit as possible from them.

Now sitting here several thousand miles away (it might be different if it were actually happening to me) I would like to say that if the IT people wont do it for me, il dang well do it myself. The school district didnt spend the taxpayers money on a computer so that they could spend more of the money to pay somebody to prevent me from gaining the maximum benifit from the laptop. On the other hand dont mess up whats on there already. Dont format the hard drive, either swap it out with one of your own, or find a way to use an external drive of some sort. If I asked a lawyer they might tell me that it "is inpermissible" or some nonsense, but this isnt about what lawyers think its about the simple fact that you are going to give back a computer just as functional as the one they gave to you. If you screw it up youd better take responsibility though (as in you personally, not the club/team/etc).

[Cuog]

If you feel that you must run Linux on the school laptops then get a small external HD they are anywhere from 50-100 dollars and install a live boot linux or D@mn small linux so that it runs inside the windows console, adding anything to a school HD is just DUMB if they begin to suspect you which is likely when they notice that you are programming with it and they dont want you to then they will be pissed,

while i agree that what they are doing with all the limitations is unfair and stupid the only thing that would be worse of an idea is going against them by finding hacks around the system

[SpeakerSilenced]

I find it silly how you are all jabbering about the subject bypassing the obvious. What is the schools policy on the laptops. For all we know it could say "Students are allowed to use any remote Live-Cds aslong as school's operating system remains intact at the time of return" That renders most if not all statements made here irrelevant and absurd.

I agree sure most IT departments are full of incompetent people. (mine were nice enough to let me use the internet) Nevertheless, I'm sure now with your personal laptop for the team you can use removable media to transfer text files. (You can do plain text files in word too you know) I hightly doubt school would go as far as not allowing remote media to copy text files.

My recommednation. Now that you have that laptop have your team install the software on their computer, put the code they make in removable media and display it on the laptop and analyze it together an compile it all that other junk.

I was the only person with a laptop in school last year and this is what we did. Sure its a hassle but beats not doing it at all.