This is for all the people from here who are at college/university especially those in the UK.
What’s the policy for internet access for people in college, are people allowed their own PC’s etc there?
Most places I’ve heard of let you, though they also have public labs for those who don’t own a computer. Different places have vastly different policies on internet access. SMSU (where I’m going) allows people to get on their network from their dorms and has internet access factored into the room and board, but some places aren’t as nice.
It completely depends on the college itself. Ask the college you’re applying to for info, not us.
Thanks man, that sounds pretty good.
I know at the school im going to, they reccomend computers for everyone. For me, its required, as im going to be an engineer. Several other bits at the school also require it. They also have public labs, but most are for specific classes. Also they are slowly makeing the whole campus wireless (already is wired).
Most schools have broadband in residence. Almost all schools have public access labs. Well, not public. Usually it’s in the library, and you need a student ID, but public to students.
I can’t see a school disallowing you from taking your PC into your residence. It’s your property. I can see them not giving you internet access through your room, or giving you conditions to use the internet access in your room. For instance, I won’t be allowed to boot *nix in my res.
In the US its to your advantage to have your own. Particularly, a laptop.
In my college we log into the labs’ computers with our student ID numbers as usernames. We are free to roam the web, as long as we don’t download and install programs without asking first. Browsing porn results in unconditional, permanent ban. There is no residence here, though.
Man my campus is stingy. You get charged for printing [that I understand] as well as browsing the regular non uni sites!!
As for owning your own PC, I don’t see why you can’t. If you’re going to live in a dorm/flat/somewhere with others, make sure you get permission to use the power/phone lines first.
Any major campus will have net access at the labs somewhere.
Lol. The internet access at my school is more or less unlimited unless you are caught doing something blatantly illegal.
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Proxy =)
No, Dev, it’s not that they catch you watching logs or whatever. there is a person at all moments at the lab who watches for people downloading warez/porn/hacking tools. If someone sees porn in your screen, you’re fucked anyway. We call this lab guard ‘the monitor’. I have already been the monitor for a semester, and thankfully I never had anyone browsing through porn while I was there, but I id catch a boy with a hacking tool meant for bypassing some age verification systems in the net with fake credit card numbers. I told him I wouldn’t bother banning him from the lab, but instead would take the case to the federal police. He went bleak and the problem was solved, I never even saw him again after that day. A colleague of mine did catch a guy browsing through porn once, and said guy was pwned.
We don’t glue to people’s backs and put our chins on their shoulders to see what they’re brwosing. We just stay with the computers at the back of the room, and from there we have a general view of the room. We can browse the net and work with whatever we want in the computers just ok, we only check what people are doing every few minutes. Actually, it’s not really a watching job, for simply our presence is enough to settle malicious users down. Keeping their browsing clean is our task of fourth highest priority. the three most important tasks are keeping the machines functional, doing system and network maintenance & installing new software when recquired by the coordination, and above all, helping users who are having trouble using the computers to get what they want done. This last one mostly involves teaching people how to save their Word files in a floppy disk, how to log in, how to use Google etc. (it’s really frustrating because there is a legion of computer-illiterate people in the college).
Where I am they’ll let you surf the internet but anything else (IRC etc) requires some tunnelling (I love you TD).
On the school computers, you have to use a username and pass, and you can’t use internet for anything but for study. Not supposed to d/l games, music, etc., but students do it anyway. 
<img src=“http://www.rpgclassics.com/subsites/twistedrpg/images/hero/rirse.gif”> At Ivy Tech, the computer labs are open to the any student, with unlimited internet use. Of course you can’t look at porn and only if the lab is full will they kick you off for looking at pointless sites. Also printing paper cost 5 cents, even so the writing lab and the computer classes are free. And yes you can bring your computer there, as I seen people there with laptops all the time.
When I was in college, the rules for computer use were pretty much the same as Rirse’s university. Only it was really difficult to get on a computer because another college had recently closed down and all of their students kind of “immigrated” to our school, and as a result, the workstations were always packed. Mind you, not a lot of the people were actually working…
They’re pretty unrestricitive at my university: we’re allowed to browse anything as long as it doesn’t violate any national laws and we’re allowed to use ftp, ssh, smtp, http, pop3, imap, msn and scype in the wireless lan and next to everything in the wired lan. We’re supposedly not allowed to install anything on the computers, bt everyone does it anyway and there’s not a single one without the Yahoo or Google Toolbar or Bonzai. I use my private laptop and the wireless lan.
definitely bring a computer to college, and depending on what you use it for make the laptop/desktop decision.
also, more and more schools these days seem to be signing deals with computer manufacturers to offer you discounts on a computer purchase, check to see if your college has a deal with Dell or something.
And to further on what Merl said, make sure your campus is giving you a deal and isn’t just ‘endorsing’ it. My sister’s university endorses IBM laptops, but students still pay full price. Mine endorses Toshiba laptops, and I get full software packages almost free of charge for buying one.