I tried at this conference to take a wide variety of different workshops and round tables. The open source sessions were top notch and my hats are off to the presenters. They focused on the benefits of open source software, but also was frank about the realities of open source software.
I was extremely excited to see the Linux desktop in use. In the open source lab I spent a good time looking at all of the educational software availablein the Linux KDE environment.
That night I was trying to figure out how I could get those applications on my laptop with out installing Linux. I then came across a great project from kde.org called KDE on Windows. You download a small install program and then finish the install from a mirror in the Internet. I have not dug in to how they accomplish it but I can describe the results. The program created a new program group in my start menu with all of the KDE programs I chose to install. When I click on one of these applications, Windows launches the application like it was a native Windows application. It is an excellent way to look at these programs right away on existing equipment and software.
KDE on Windows can be found here.
