[Valarauko]

My school has a laptop program where everyone uses laptops. We all have acess to a huge online network. How would I be able to connect to a MUD at school?

I also realize that the netowork has a firewall, so how would I find out what ports are blocked/non-blocked?

[Loremaster]

In order to bypass the firewall, you need to speak to the network administrator; ask whoever this person is in your school to set up the laptop to connect to the mud of your choice.

Of course, I personally prefer that you use the laptop for schoolwork rather than exploiting taxpayer supplied technology to play games.

No. I have never once played solitaire, hearts, tetris, or any other game on a machine not owned by me or 'on company time'. Be a responsible and honest person; do your mudding at home.

[Valarauko]

Whoa, hold on. This school is catholic, taxpayer's money doesn't even graze the school's treasury.

I know that some ports are open, because I can use AIM, and if i'm correct, AIM uses some form of a port.

My mudding at home is severely restricted. I'm asking you to help a MUD addict enable himself to play on what he loves to play.

[Santrilla]

So what you're saying is that heroin addicts should be allowed to shoot up at school? School is for schoolwork, and its equipment is the same. Work hard at school, get good grades and a well-paid job, buy yourself a flat with a snazzy computer and a t2 connection, and MUD to your heart's content

[Valarauko]

I see your point, well made.

[Yui Unifex]

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ foo) Of course, I personally prefer that you use the laptop for schoolwork rather than exploiting taxpayer supplied technology to play games.

Originally Posted by (Santrilla @ bar) School is for schoolwork, and its equipment is the same.

I always loved this silly argument. Perhaps one needs to play a game every once in a while to clear their mind so that they can continue with their schoolwork more efficiently? Precedence for this is pretty easy to find two days of every week. One is not a slave, even on company / school time. Do you put a picture of your family on your desk at work?

Furthermore, you both assume this is something that the administrators of the network want to actively restrict. Many, many times they simply setup a firewall and leave it alone because they don't know how to configure it for much else. Why do you think so many poorly configured firewalls drop ICMP?

To the OP:
You can try to find Java mud clients to get around output restrictions. If you have a friend that runs a server, you can have him setup a shell to listen on the AIM port, and from there you can telnet or use a unix mudclient. My preferred method is to use ssh, which has port forwarding facilities, and encrypts all text. You need a shell account that has ssh however. You can also setup a system at home to forward your connections. Let me know what your options are.

[KaVir]

Speaking as moderator: This has nothing to do with Advanced Mud Concepts, and has been moved accordingly.

[Loremaster]

Originally Posted by (Yui Unifex @ Feb. 02 2003,09:12) Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ foo) Of course, I personally prefer that you use the laptop for schoolwork rather than exploiting taxpayer supplied technology to play games. Originally Posted by (Santrilla @ bar) School is for schoolwork, and its equipment is the same. I always loved this silly argument.  Perhaps one needs to play a game every once in a while to clear their mind so that they can continue with their schoolwork more efficiently?

That you disagree does not, ipso facto, make it a silly argument.

The benefits of taking an occasional break are well-documented; this does not entitle employees, or in this case, students to consume company (or school) resources without permission.

Employees are not slaves because they are paid for their labor. I have worked at more than one job where there were strict rules forbidding such things as family photos or other items commonly used to personalize workspaces. More and more firms are making use of spy-ware to document the unauthorized use of computer resources for gaming, web browsing, instant messaging and other activities not related to an employee's responsibilities.

Though students going to a school are not being paid wages or salary as employees of a businesses are; it may be said that the benefits package is 'an education'.

The point is that the computers exist in the business to perform BUSINESS related tasks; the laptops provided to the school are for SCHOOL related tasks. Any attempts to use them without prior permission for any other use is stealing.

I attended a college where several machines were set aside every Friday afternoon for networked gaming sessions; perhaps if enough students at the catholic school joined together and requested that a time and means for using the laptops for mudding, the administrator(s) could be persuaded to set it up.

[Yui Unifex]

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ foo) That you disagree does not, ipso facto, make it a silly argument.

When did I say that my disagreement was enough to make the argument silly? My disagreement is not what makes something silly; the qualifying text following my statement should've been enough to show that it wasn't 'ipso facto'.

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ bar) The benefits of taking an occasional break are well-documented; this does not entitle employees, or in this case, students to consume company (or school) resources without permission.

And where did I say that this was an 'entitlement'? Do you get permission to use the restroom, or grab a cup of coffee from the break room? Do you get permission to step outside for a smoke? Do you get permission to call your spouse at home? Why would you get permission to pop on a mud or respond to an IM? Do you honestly believe every employer is a micromanager?

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ baz) The point is that the computers exist in the business to perform BUSINESS related tasks; the laptops provided to the school are for SCHOOL related tasks. Any attempts to use them without prior permission for any other use is stealing.

Stealing, now? You said yourself that "the benefits of taking an occasional break are well-documented", so why do you presume to judge that this mudding experience is not a small break that will in turn provide benefits to the school or business of which the OP is a part? If there were benefits, your 'advice' here could very well decrease productivity. And the only way that you could truthfully say that it would decrease productivity is if you had far more information on the OP than you had when you made that post.

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ foo) Employees are not slaves because they are paid for their labor.

No, employees are not slaves because they are not owned in servitude. Many of the slaves of times past were paid for their labor.

[Valarauko]

Actually every other day, at the end of the day I have one and a half hours
to burn.

I'm not a genius when it comes to computers, I was just wondering if you could provide a more in-depth explanation of how I could find out what ports I could use, or how I would be able to play my Mud at school.

[Valarauko]

Originally Posted by The point is that the computers exist in the business to perform BUSINESS related tasks; the laptops provided to the school are for SCHOOL related tasks. Any attempts to use them without prior permission for any other use is stealing.

Actually, I rented my computer. The school just configured my computer so that everyone has the same programs to do homework.

[Loremaster]

Going to use the restroom or get a sip of water is NOT the same thing as using the office computer to IM a friend, play solitaire, or engage in other pastimes.

I don't know what your work experience is, I have been working for 35 years; every one of those jobs had rules regarding when you could take a break, and for how long.

There are places I have worked in recent years that the ONLY opportunity during the workday for smokers to have a cigarette was during their half-hour lunch break away from the facility.

Many companys (no hard data at my fingertips to say most, though my experience leads me to believe it is so) have policies that expressly forbid personal calls using office phones. My current work location forbids the use of cell phones except in the break room during scheduled breaks.

An employer pays workers to perform the tasks outlined in their job description, not to play games or engage in other personal activities.

While I acknowledge that an occasional break is beneficial, those breaks need be no more than 30 seconds to do some eye exercises (I work in front of a computer), stand and stretch, get that drink of water, etc. There are studies out that discuss the benefits of these micro-breaks. Not one of them recommends using the company's resources to play games.

Yes. If you are being paid minimum wage to answer phone calls for an answering service, and you sit there playing a game because you 'need a break', then you are stealing (or perhaps, perpetrating a fraud). I know a woman who does this type of work in Virginia; she works for the answering service that fields all the incoming calls for a Cable company. She is required to eat her lunch AT her workstation and she is expected to take calls. The only time she gets away from her screen is to visit the restroom. One young girl was fired a few months ago for constantly going to the restroom when things were really busy because she could not handle the workload. They gave her a permanent 'break'.

I will not make the absolute statement that not a single, solitary business owner would consider un-authorized use of a company-owned computer and bandwidth to play on a mud to be theft, but I believe you would be hard-pressed to find one.

What would you call it if you were paying me an hourly wage to prepare your taxes on your computer, using software that you had purchased, and you found me playing (insert Mud of choice) ?

[Loremaster]

Originally Posted by (Valarauko @ Feb. 03 2003,13:31) Actually, I rented my computer. The school just configured my computer so that everyone has the same programs to do homework.

A rental agreement *does* change the perspective a bit.  Your agreement should cover what is acceptable and what is not.  You need the network resources of the school make the connection.  I still think the honest and straightforward thing to do is ask the network administrator about it.  

Yes, there may be ways to set it up without the administrator's knowledge, and even ways to actively get around what security they may have in place.  Would you want the school or your parents to catch you at it?

The administrator could say "No problem!" and set it up for you; or they could say "that would be okay, but I don't know how to set it up" and you could find someone knowledgeable to step in and help them; or they could flatly refuse, in which case you accept the fact that life does not always give us everything we want when we want it.

Two outta three ain't bad, IMO.

[Yui Unifex]

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ foo) Going to use the restroom or get a sip of water is NOT the same thing as using the office computer to IM a friend, play solitaire, or engage in other pastimes.

However they both have the same effect from the employer's point of view. Without using the restroom or getting a sip of water, you may become uncomfortable and your productivity may decrease. Without IMing a friend you may become uncomfortable and your productivity may decrease. The only difference here is that the former is easily quantifiable, and the latter requires great leaps of logic and data to state definitively that the activities have a net decrease of productivity. And even if you had this data on the average worker, the OP -- and others -- may not be the average worker.

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ bar) (snip examples of company restrictions)

No matter what your experiences may be, it is most certainly not like that everywhere. To assume it is so and denounce a particular activity is ill-informed, as evidenced by Valarauko's recent replies.

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ baz) An employer pays workers to perform the tasks outlined in their job description, not to play games or engage in other personal activities.

Nail and head: An employer pays workers to perform the tasks outlined in their job description. Why should an employer care if your productivity comes from playing games, animal sacrifice, school studies or what? If the employer does care, that shows that he is attempting to cater to a common denominator via an assumption about the average of his workers. Again, they likely have a great deal more data on this you did of the OP.

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ blah) While I acknowledge that an occasional break is beneficial, those breaks need be no more than 30 seconds to do some eye exercises (I work in front of a computer), stand and stretch, get that drink of water, etc.

I highly doubt you are in a position to recommend the optimal break time for every person on the planet. Do you do any creative work at all? Let's say we have two programmers: Joe and Susie, both working on the same feature. Joe works from 8-5, churns out a thousand lines of code, and implements the feature. Susie goes to the park with some printouts to think about the problem, comes back at 12:00. She generalizes a function with a few extra lines of code to implement the feature, then leaves at 1:00. Who here was the most productive? It's obviously Susie: She was able to do something more concisely than Joe, and her work is thus more valuable.

Originally Posted by (Loremaster @ foo) What would you call it if you were paying me an hourly wage to prepare your taxes on your computer, using software that you had purchased, and you found me playing (insert Mud of choice) ?

I don't care *how* you prepare my taxes, so long as 1) the price is right, and 2) it gets done. If you estimate three hours (and I see this as the best price/value), but you get it done in one and decide to play a game for the other two, good for you! Anything else would be an assumption by me as to how you get the job done to achieve those goals, and is thus not accurate in all cases.

[KaVir]

Originally Posted by An employer pays workers to perform the tasks outlined in their job description, not to play games or engage in other personal activities.

They also pay me to work a specified number of hours each week. Working weekends and pulling all-nighters is not part of my job description, but I still do them when the need arises - even though I don't get paid overtime. It's called "give and take". I typically get into work between half an hour and an hour late (unless I have an early meeting) and surf the net from time to time (perhaps just to give my mind a break, or maybe to wait for a compile to finish), but I also work more hours than are required. The company knows that the employees surf the net, and doesn't mind as long as we are reasonable about it and get the job done. My previously company had the same attitude as well.

I don't know what your job is, but in my line of work you cannot just sit down and mindlessly hammer at a keyboard all day. It requires careful thinking and puzzle solving, and that's not something you can just keep doing all day without taking a break every so often to clear your head.

Originally Posted by Many companys (no hard data at my fingertips to say most, though my experience leads me to believe it is so) have policies that expressly forbid personal calls using office phones. My current work location forbids the use of cell phones except in the break room during scheduled breaks.

Once again, it's never been considered a problem at the places I've worked, as long as we're sensible about it. In fact, as my current job involves developing software for mobile phones, we're specifically told that we can use our company mobiles to make personal calls (although once again we're supposed to be responsible about it - for example, we should go easy on international calls).

Originally Posted by What would you call it if you were paying me an hourly wage to prepare your taxes on your computer, using software that you had purchased, and you found me playing (insert Mud of choice)?

If I were paying you an hourly wage and you spent 1.5 hours doing it, then spend half an hour surfing the net, but only charged me for one hour, I would call it a bargain. If I then demanded that you stopped serfing the net, the chances are you'd charge me for the extra half hour next time.

And as an aside, I also mudded a lot when I was at University. That led me on to developing my own mud, and by the time I graduated it had taught me far more about software development, team work and project management than my University course ever had. My qualifications helped me get invited to interviews, but in the end it was the skills I earned through developing a mud that helped me pass the technical interviews and thus earn a decent wage. I went to University to learn. Does it really matter that I didn't follow the "normal" method of doing so - particularly when my method resulted in a better salary, which means more tax going back into the education system?

[Valarauko]

Hey Loremaster, you shouldn't have to worry about breaks at work, you should have a job that you like.

I am forced to go to school, but who said I enjoy it? I have to have breaks even though I "work" less than you do.

Originally Posted by What would you call it if you were paying me an hourly wage to prepare your taxes on your computer, using software that you had purchased, and you found me playing (insert Mud of choice) ?

Unless you had a fixed number of hours a day, i wouldn't really care if you got the job done in time.

[Valarauko]

Heh, we're getting a little off topic.