Building PCS
MARC B. ON THE DEPTH OF LINUX “Linux is ‘minutes’, the more time you spend with it, the more you learn and like about it.”
Students in every computer science class seem to believe that they are going to learn hacking techniques. “Are you going to teach us how to DDOS?” is something heard on multiple occasions. Students with some background knowledge of the internet get excited when hearing that they are going to explore how TCP/IP works.
Most high school computer science curriculums introduce networking concepts through unplugged activities (students use printed materials and toys such as whistles to introduce the concepts behind signalling and protocols) or they use web-based simulators to demonstrate how internet addressing is used. While useful as an introduction, it was felt that using a real network with actual packets and diagnostic tools would be a better learning experience. The way IP addresses are represented in some lessons are often simplified. My students are shown how to use ping, ip addr
show, and /sbin/ifconfig among other command-line utilities to learn how computers communicate with TPC/IP. While anyone could run these commands from their own command line, typically students log into the server and run these commands from a secure shell account. Since each student is running the commands on the same networking card in the server, they get consistent results. This is also demonstrated using my own computer, connected to the classroom projector.
One of the favourite activities for students is assembling complete computer systems from parts they order themselves. There is a special satisfaction gained from putting together a working computer with your own hands. Students most often use a website such as PC Parts Picker (https://pcpartpicker.com) to select what they need. When removing the cost of the Windows operating system from their purchase, students can purchase more memory or a faster CPU. My students have built many computers for teachers and members of the community.
There is a steady stream of old computers that find their way to my classroom. Some come from community members who want to donate their unwanted hardware to a school. Students benefit from learning how to troubleshoot hardware with Linux. In most cases, a USB drive with the appropriate distribution can verify if the hardware is working correctly. Since most people want to make sure that any data left on their systems is erased, installation of a new operating system takes care of this situation.
Neil’s classroom has a fairly large collection of different Linux distributions. Most are Debian-based to help minimise the number of commands the students have to learn. For the oldest systems we work on, a 32-bit version of Wattos (http://planetwatt.com/new) is typically used. For 64-bit systems, the students use Lubuntu (https://lubuntu.net) and Manjaro (https:// manjaro.org) for the majority of installations.
Starting in the autumn of 2019, the teaching of a new course began, focusing on cybersecurity. The curriculum from Project Lead the Way (www.pltw.org) uses a web portal supported by AWS to host virtual machines running both Windows and Linux Oses. This is a great option for schools that don’t want to install Linux on their computers. Some curriculum providers also rely on hosted environments. Many schools that teach cybersecurity participate in Capture the Flag competitions. One of the most popular is Cyber Patriot (www.uscyberpatriot. org) run by the National Youth Cyber Education Program created by the Air Force Association to inspire K-12 students to pursue careers in cybersecurity. Participants use Vmware to run Windows and Linux.
My school, like many others, is determining how to expand the computer science learning opportunities. The aim is for students to learn the skills they will need to be successful in higher education and careers. We have no doubt that understanding Linux will provide them the tools for working in tech for years to come.