Remote unix Learning Environment (RULE)

Teaching Unix - How RULE makes teaching Unix easier and more effective

As the RULE system takes advantage of preexisting Windows PCs, there is no need to invest in dedicated Unix hardware and software.

Each virtual host has its own file system, this limits damage, intentional or otherwise to the virtual host in question, while other virtual hosts on the primary host remain unaffected. Because it is possible to limit potential damage to a specific RULE host virtual host users can be given administrator rights.

As administrator rights are required for configuring and running most network servers, this in turn allows students the opportunity to learn through `hands-on experience' how to configure and run these services as if they had their own Unix machine.

Running a number of virtual hosts on one machine offers a number of advantages over running the same number of physical machines. The cost of one machine, even with a large hard drive and extra RAM is significantly less than the cost of the number of physical machines that can be configured as virtual hosts on a single primary host.

Having the functionality of multiple Unix hosts available on a single machine, allows firewall and QoS rules to be simplified. One or more RULE primary hosts can be made available to students through a firewall/bridge machine, ensuring that irresponsible behavior by a student or students using the RULE system, does not adversely affect the campus LAN.

The RULE system allows for centralised administration of jailed hosts, with the ability to allow control of groups of jails to lab demonstrators, so they can maintain the jailed hosts used in their labs without time consuming interaction with system administrators. Centralised administration and multiple level access control allow RULE to maximise student exposure to Unix while minimizing the impact on the network administrators.

Because RULE utilises preexisting Windows PCs, increasing the number of virtual hosts available to students is as simple as adding more virtual hosts to an existing RULE primary host server or adding a new RULE primary host server if required. The number of potential RULE `terminals' available for students is limited by the number of Windows PCs on the campus LAN.

How RULE Teaches Unix from Windows

As those who are familiar with Unix will know, Unix is a command line oriented operating system. This means that it is possible to control a Unix machine through a simple text console.

Many people are familiar with the `telnet' application which has been used for many years to gain remote access to Unix machines. In recent years it has been all but replaced by the more secure `Secure Shell' (ssh) which is what RULE uses to allow students access to their jailed hosts.

There are a number of ssh clients available for the Windows platform, one of the most popular free ssh clients is `Putty' which is the ssh client of choice for use with RULE. Students can login to their virtual hosts using Putty from any Windows machine on the campus LAN just as if they were logging into a standalone Unix machine.

While virtual host access to various services (including The Internet) can be configured via the RULE system bridge/firewall. It is possible to configure file copying to and from students Windows PCs through PSCP/PSFTP which are part of Putty or WinSCP another free Windows SCP client.

Why Teach Unix?

Teaching Unix with RULE