Education and Virtualization – Oh, the Possibilities

Saw this article the other day. Really good to see the Alma Mater take a plunge into Virtualization. I spent four and half years starting my IT career at USC working while I was studying.
I think amazing things could be done in education with virtualization. That isn’t just Virtual Desktops for computer labs, although that is a good one. Imagine being able to learn programming in a windows environment you could build up and tear down and build up again in an hour?
I remember getting warnings from root for leaving a process running (on accident) on the Unix system for a couple days. Separate virtual machines running linux would be awesome for this.
It has been almost 10 years since I finished at the University. I wonder what ways virtualization is making learning easier. I bet students are coming out now knowing almost all of what it took me the last few years to squire on the job.

Possibilities:
1. Virtual Desktops
2. Dedicated VM’s to learn server OS
3. Research into Malware/Spyware and other Security issues
4. Computer Engineering
5. Application Development and Testing
6. Ease deployment of Apps for teaching.

I am not a huge visionary, I bet there is tons of other ways… Any thoughts?

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