Re: [O] General advice beyond Org

[Yuri Khan]

On Fri, May 18, 2018 at 7:29 AM <address@hidden> wrote:

> _I_ need help. I am in graduate school, and I keep having issues with my
> advisor for my strong inclination to use free software. I am obviously
> not in position to refuse, but she dislikes to have discussions about
> it. She pays a stipend to me every month, and my tuition is wa[i]ved.

> Is anyone here aware of a place where they do computational human
> biomechanics, mechanics, materials or finite elements where I could
> interact with free software? (having github, LaTeX, Python, etc.; avoid
> Micro$oft products, Matlab, Mathematica, etc.). Is there no place where
> one can simply use free software on a daily basis?

Are you required to pay for licenses for proprietary software you are asked
to use? Chances are, your school is getting academic discounts, and you get
to use it for no charge.

Your instructors and professors probably have a lot of experience with
those tools. They are understandably reluctant to switch, because the tools
work well enough for them.

Also, as a student, you do not have sufficient influence to convert
everybody at your school to free software.

> As a student or junior faculty, how do you go about this? Do you just
> nod and wave your freedom good bye?

The point of education is to get exposed to many tools, techniques and
workflows. By limiting yourself to free software only, you will miss out.

Be a scout in the proprietary camp. Learn the tools your instructors are
willing to teach. Learn what it takes to achieve the same results with free
software. Learn the difference in workflows and user experience.

You will find something you can do with free software that you don’t know
how to do with proprietary tools. Ask your teachers. They will either point
you at something you missed (and then you can study it); or they will admit
that feature is nice but their tool doesn’t have it (and then you have
demonstrated the merits of free software); or they will say it’s not
important.

You will also likely find more than a few points where non-free software
delivers better UX. Use that knowledge to improve free software so that it
can compete with proprietary software on UX terms, not only on the issue of
freedom.