Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbatt!cwruecmp!nitrex!rbl From: rbl@nitrex.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.edu Subject: Re: edu'ing new UNIX users Message-ID: <416@nitrex.UUCP> Date: Wed, 4-Feb-87 12:41:39 EST Article-I.D.: nitrex.416 Posted: Wed Feb 4 12:41:39 1987 Date-Received: Thu, 5-Feb-87 06:51:22 EST References: <1097@msudoc.UUCP> Reply-To: rbl@nitrex.UUCP ( Dr. Robin Lake ) Organization: The Standard Oil Co., Cleveland Lines: 124 Keywords: UNIX, education, training, introduction Summary: Converting the unaware (LONG) In: Message-ID: <1097@msudoc.UUCP> John asks: >I would appreciate hearing what others have done to educate new users. >Post to the net for the information of others. > >-- >John H. Lawitzke UUCP ...ihnp4!msudoc!eecae!lawitzke >Division of Engineering Research >Michigan State University Office: (517) 355-3769 >E. Lansing, MI, 48824 Home: (517) 332-3610 > > For about 10 years before joining industry, I taught UNIX to graduate students. Most of these students were M.D.s and nurses, but their computer literacy varied quite a bit. For 5 years in industry, I've been asked to present UNIX seminars within the corporation a number of times. These (typically) are to information systems managers and technical types. Assume computer literacy here, but with a strong IBM/DEC-VMS/COBOL-FORTRAN perspective and to be considered as new UNIX users. Two lines of thought here --- one on UNIX for new-to-UNIX professionals; one on UNIX for students. Maybe neither one really hits the UNIX-for- general-users problem, but VMS is the prevailing culture here. Guidelines for successful UNIX presentations to new-to-UNIX users: o NEVER try to get very technical. A little bit of why UNIX is better might be backed up with diagrams explaining some deeper technology, such as how the I/O and disk block caching work, but it will never be well understood. Cartoons help get a fuzzy understanding across. (I use a Macintosh to do the diagrams/figures/comics.) o For a {IBM, DEC, other vendor}-oriented audience, explain why UNIX "works better" for the user. Here I focus on: - Software tools and use of the shell for putting prototypes together very quickly. I note that this breaks the classic 18-month system development cycle and tends to produce systems that better meet client needs. (Apparently this is now being picked up by some of the higher-priced guru/consulting groups. Management's perception of the value of an idea may be influenced by what they paid for the idea. :=} ) Very receptive audience here. Note that VMS/IBM/... lack a "pipe" construct and that standard input/standard output/pipe/shell are essential to the fast prototype approach. o Explain and demonstrate some commonly used tools. grep against a data file to show that one may NOT require an expensive DBMS to handle data storage/retrieval problems. Show how secondary selections can be done by piping to a second grep, awk, sed or whatever. Stay away from the arcane and obscure, such as nroff, that look much harder than we know they are. You might mention that tools like yacc, lex, awk, sed ... can help convert an application from one vendor/language/4th GL to another vendor/language/4th GL. It seems IS managers are ALWAYS facing conversion problems! o Mention that ALL files in UNIX just look like byte steams. No worry about long lines, embedded new lines, internal file structures. o Show result of an 'ls' and explain the permission codes allowing sharing, superuser permission, read-only, ... o Talk about how dataflow analysis, structured design and fast prototyping fit together in a logical way and show how changes in system requirements can be accomodated easily. o If you want to REALLY impress a group of IS managers, show how a data file retrieved from an IBM system can be combined with a data file from yet-another-vendor's system with a 5 - 10 line shell! For Students: For computer-naive students, John's approach seems to be the one that works best. A little bit at a time, start with some of the easy but interesting commands (ls vs. ls -a vs. ls -l; who; cal; date; ... ) About the 3rd session, explain the output of a ps -elf and talk about how this shows what the operating system is doing to handle all the users (I use color pictures where each user's tasks are one color and move from main memory to disk). This seems to help them understand why the same task takes longer when there are more users. There are now a number of excellent books with good exercises to familiarize students with APPLYING the UNIX features. I only wish there were a better way to edit, as the editor seems to present the major conceptual hurdle for naive students. (No doubt this could be the start of another flaming discussion!) We found (in academia) that an entire M.S. program in Computer Applications could be built around UNIX and structured concepts. We taught: - Introductory computer and information concepts (hardware, software, Shannon, what's an operating system, some data communications, and IMPORTANTLY autopsies on some system disasters.) - C via pseudocode and elementary data structures - Structured system analysis and design - Relational data base management systems - A real project applying these techniques Now, this is not your ACM curriculum, but looking back on what the graduates are doing today, I'm pleased --- but I'm not an objective observer. For our introductory VMS training, we've typically used a half-day of presentation in a room full of terminals and a video projector. The rest of the day is for students to do exercises and try their own thing, with an instructor roaming around and looking over their shoulder. This is an important piece of training, for there appear to be very limited introductory VMS manuals/texts versus the very many UNIX manuals/texts on the market. We also maintain a telephone hotline for users, (which I use a lot) for everything from "how do I change my directory" to "the system won't let me login". DISCLAIMER: These views have not been reviewed/approved for public distribution. However, they are my own personal opinions. They very likely do not reflect the opinion of my employer, nor of anyone else in the corporation. Robin B. Lake (also Adjunct faculty here and there) decvax!cwruecmp!nitrex!rbl ihnp4!cbatt!cwruecmp!nitrex!rbl (216)-581-5976