The School of Geek

[treehead]

Well I could just start typing away and hope it did something but theres a lot of combinations of keys. I could look at some source code and guess and see what does what but with coding its easier to have the explainations of each command handed to you. I guess if I had enough time I could figure it out but it isn't like another program where the options are listed in front of you with a GUI (guess thats why GUI's are supposedly better for noobies).

;yeah... i wasn't trying to be sarcastic or anything. i was trying to draw out some of the reasons that more advanced (read: complex) topics require more than just documentation or how-tos in order to be understood properly.

;treehead

[Aaron X]

As I remember it I am no good at spelling (without the spellchecker) because I re-wrote the BASIC code in my spelling program when I was 6 on my Commodore 64....

I think it went downhill from there...

[jamathis]

I learned from a combination of hacking, books, college, and the internet. I started really getting into computers at about the age of 10 (I'm 27 now) when I started learning to program in BASIC from a book that came with the Atari XE we had at the time (basically Atari's version of the C64). It was fun and I was hooked.

[treehead]

;there's additional (pedagogical) discussion at the sister lugradio forums.

;i'm looking for additional concrete input on how to build the project. what building blocks are needed, what programs, what process for backend, what kind of programmers, hackers, designers, writers, what classes or modules would you like to see, etc?

;go check it out.

;treehead

[treehead]

;i have posted a very limited outline of "school of geek" at the lugradio forums: the school of geek, so far....

;i would appreciate any and all comments (here or there) on the proposed tree. i intend on making this a community project and would like the input of as many knowledgable people as possible.

;treehead

[doublejoon]

I never learned computers

[treehead]

;for some reason, i just can't let this idea die. i've made some additions recently.

;recap: i've divided it into four "schools" which will have their own learning tracks. each track will have "courses" and each course, "modules." a module can be thought of as a single chapter in a textbook, suitable for a single class, podcast, or video segment.

;please add/remove/revise as you see fit. i am open to any and all suggestions....

;treehead

Code: Select all

School of Geek Master Plan v0.02

SCHOOLS
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Primary Goals:
* School of Systems Engineering
* School of Systems Administration
* School of Systems Programming

Secondary Goals:
* School of Systems Documentation / School of Technical Writing

Distributions Covered
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The following distributions will be used in each topic.  The choice of distributions is predicated on a number of factors.  The primary motivation here is to include enough distributions so as give students as comprehensive an understanding of free operating system architectures as possible, but few enough so as to make the creation of modules manageable and avoid leaving students overwhelmed.  Namely distributions were chosen based on a combination of their seniority (the longevity of their useful standing in the community) and form of software management (package management system) used.  Given these distributions students should finish each module understanding the underlying concept, how it is implemented via different distribution methodologies, and how to impliment the concept (if applicable) on said distributions and their subsidiary offshoots.

* Linux
	+ Debian GNU/Linux
	+ Red Hat (RHEL/Fedora/CentOS)
	+ Slackware

	For possible inclusion:
	+ SuSE (SLED/OpenSuSE)
	+ Gentoo

* BSD UNIX
	+ NetBSD

School of Systems Engineering (SSE)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Major Subjects Addressed:
* Networking Hardware
	+ Hubs & Switches
	+ Routers (Gateways)
	+ Structured Cabling
* Networking Protocols
	+ OSI 7 Layer Model
	+ TCP 3 Layer Model
	+ Ethernet MAC (802.3)
	+ Internet Protocol (IP)
	  - Public & Private Addressing (Address Classes)
	  - Subnetting & Supernetting
	  - IPv4
	  - IPv6
	+ Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)
	+ User Datagram Protocol (UDP)
	+ Wireless MAC (802.11)
	+ Spanning Tree Protocol (STP) and Rapid Spanning Tree Protocol (RSTP)
* Computer Hardware (Basic Engineering, Installation, & Configuration)
	+ Basic Computer Hardware Engineering
	  - Motherboard/Bus
	  - Random Access Memory (RAM)
	  - Expansion Slots: ISA, PCI, AGP
	  - Hard Disk Drives
	    = Physical Media
	    = Cylinder Head Sector (CHS)
	    = Logical Block Addressing (LBA)
	  - Floppy Disk Drives
	  - Optical Disk Drives
	    = CD-ROM/ATAPI
	    = DVD-ROM
	  - Input/Output
	    = Serial
	    = Parallel
	    = PS/2
	    = USB (v1, v2)
* Operating Systems (Basic Engineering, Comparitive History, Installation, & Configuration)
	+ Basic Operating System Engineering
	  - Basic Input/Output System (BIOS)
	  - Bootstrapping
	  - Master Boot Record (MBR)
	+ Comparitive History of Operating System Design
	  - Multix
	  - UNIX
	  - DOS
	  - OS/2
	  - Windows
	  - Macintosh
	  - Linux
	+ Operating System Design in Detail
	+ Comparison of Linux Distribution Architectures
	+ Operating System Installation & Configuration

School of Systems Administration (SSA)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Major Subjects Addressed:
* Software (Installation & Configuration)
(Utilizing: Slackware, Debian GNU/Linux, CentOS/Red Hat/Fedora Core, FreeBSD, and NetBSD)
	+ Linux Package Management
	  - Red Hat Package Management (RPM)
	  - Debian Package Management (DEB/Apt-get)
	  - Source Compiled Software Management
	+ Desktop Software Installation & Configuration
	  - X Windows
	  - Desktop/Window Managers
	    = GNOME
	    = KDE
	    = XFCE
	    = Fluxbox
	    = GNU Screen
	+ Server Software Installation & Configuration
	  - Apache 
	  - BIND
	  - lpr, CUPS
	  - named
	  - Sendmail
	  - Samba

* Operating Systems (Administration & Maintenance)
	+ Operating System Administration
	  - Linux (by distribution, see "Distributions Covered")
	  - BSD UNIX (by distribution, see "Distributions Covered")
	+ Operating System Maintenance
	  - Linux (by distribution, see "Distributions Covered")
	  - BSD UNIX (by distribution, see "Distributions Covered")
	+ Systems Administration Best Practices
	  - Linux
	  - BSD UNIX

School of Systems Programming (SSP)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Major Subjects Addressed:
* Hardware (Advanced Engineering & Abstraction)
	+ Processes & Threads
* Operating Systems (Design, Advanced Engineering, & Programming)
* Software (Design, Programming, Debugging)
* Programming Logic
* Comparitive History of Programming Language Design
* Programming Languages in Detail

========================================================================
The following schools are second-tier project goals and will not be started immediately.


School of Systems Documentation (SSD)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Major Subjects Addressed:
* Technical Writing/Documentation
* Software Project Management