Cathie: How many times have I told you that your head is in the clouds?
Elliot: How many blades of grass are there? How many different snowflakes?
Cathie: See what I mean!!
Elliot: But FINALLY it is ok to be in the clouds!! At the recent CoSN Conference in Austin, the talk about virtualization and cloud computing was BIG TIME.
Cathie: We know that, but let’s see if we can explain those ideas since they have significant economic and pedagogic importance. But we’ll need to bring the discussion down to earth…
Elliot: And out of the clouds?
Cathie: You aren’t as slow as you look.
Elliot: Ha ha ha…. Here goes. In practical terms, if a district has older PCs that are still physically functional but are slower than molasses, virtualization can extend the life of those devices thereby saving considerable dollars.
Cathie: Via virtualization services of a company like ClassLink, those outdated PC’s actually do their computing on a server in the computer center; in effect, those older PC’s are being used as screens and keyboards.
Elliot: And, via cloud computing services of a company like Stoneware, the storing of files is handled by that big server in the computing center, too.
Cathie: For all intents and purposes, school administrators can see cloud computing and virtualization as the same sort of concept – a way to save money while still providing extensive computing services to schools.
Elliot: We need to do a full Tech Disruptions essay on those two ideas.
Cathie: Put it on the list.
Elliot: And store it in the cloud!
Cathie: Your head is still in the cloud….
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