<p>Was wondering whether UCI had any free software to offer its students? I didn't know colleges do this, but apparently, like with UCB for example, they hand out a lot of different kinds of free software to their students for them to install and use, until they graduate, that is. It includes a lot of stuff like MS Office and most of Adobe's stuff, like Photoshop and Flash and Dreamweaver and stuff. Was wondering whether UCI had anything like this, or did we just not opt out for that, since that just sounds awesome tbh.</p>
<p>Source for UCB: Software</a> Central | UC Berkeley IST
Example:
"Students will have the ability to download and use the Adobe Creative Suite Design Premium edition while faculty and staff will be able to install and use the full Adobe Creative Suite Master Collection. Both suites include Adobe Acrobat X Pro. "</p>
<p>UCI’s Bren School of ICS is affiliated with Microsoft and the MSDN Academic Alliance program. If you take any class under the ICS school, you are given access to create an account and download free Microsoft software from a list of 150+. This means you can take any, even 1 unit (ungraded) courses, and have access. Theoretically, you can add a 1 unit course, download the software you want/need, and then drop the course. </p>
<p>I’ve taken ICS courses at UCI before when I tried to minor in CS. I haven’t looked at the list of software untill now but it seems like it’s all Microsoft exclusive now. I remembered they had all sorts of software from different companies including Adobe before but I could be mistaken. It’s better than nothing. There may be other possible sources to acquire free software at UCI but I haven’t had the chance to encounter them.</p>
<p>Your ICS account (or chance to create one) expires once you stop taking ICS courses. I actually worked at the School of ICS as a work study. While I was working there, I stopped taking ICS courses for a quarter and my account expired (which I needed in order to access the computers at work). I just called the systems admin and they reactivated my account in a jiffy.</p>
<p>In any case, I’m neither taking an ICS course nor working at the ICS department anymore yet I can still access the msdnaa website. It’s very possible that you can call or email support and tell them you took a class before and want access.</p>
<p>FYI, they give out free operating systems like Windows 7 on the site. They typically only give out one specific OS per account but you can call them and request another copy for your laptop, given that you have one for your desktop.</p>