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SCOOTERDMAN
Holding up his trousers with extension cords
Articles Posted: 91; Links Seeded: 114
Member Since: 1/2006Last Seen: 11/19/2009
Member Since: 1/2006Last Seen: 11/19/2009
153 Comments
PrintMy first Linux experience: Overwhelmingly positive.
News Type: Opinion — Tue Feb 13, 2007 11:25 AM EST
Xubuntu is a great alternative for computers too old or slow to run Windows or OS X.
Here's one in action! Look at it go!
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I am a first-year high school English teacher, and I was looking to get computers in my room so I could have a writing lab. I was temporarily elated when our tech coordinator informed me via email that a dozen iMacs had been donated to the school and I was welcome to take a few for my room.
My excitement dissipated, however, when I learned the iMacs were built around the the turn of the century. 350mhz processors, 128MB or RAM, no firewire or USB 2. OS 9.2 — yuck. These computers couldn't even load cnn.com without flipping out.
So I started thinking. How can I make these computers functional again? While I had never really used a Linux distribution, I was quite familiar with the Linux philosophy. After a day of posting questions to ubuntuforums.com, I settled upon the distribution Xubuntu, which is stripped down OS built for older machines. I now have five previously dead machines resurrected and working again — navigating modern web sites and all.
Xubuntu comes with a host of applications perfect for the classroom, including fully functional graphics editing and word processing software. For my purposes though, I have my students writing in online word processors (Google Documents and wikis, mostly) to keep things simple. I've rearranged the desktops so the only apparent option is the Firefox icon. Once on the web, they are right at home.
I am totally satisfied with my Linux experience to this point. What these computers lack in power, they make up for in simplicity and ease of use. None has crashed, either. It seems to me that Linux is a viable solution for any educator with old, seemingly useless computers, and administrators shackled down by exorbitant licensing costs of running OS X or Windows on dozens or hundreds of machines ought to consider it as an alternative.
My question is: How can I make these systems even more powerful? What open source Linux software can you recommend that would augment my students' experiences?
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10
2.8
{"commentId":533130,"authorDomain":"snarfer"}
Xubuntu is NOT a stripped down OS at all. It is simply using a different X server client, which means that it's windowing shceme and look are different. It just happens that XFCE (which is the client xubuntu uses) is very lightweight and minimal. GNOME is second up. KDE comes in last.
{"commentId":533130,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"snarfer"}
- 4 votes
#51 - Thu Feb 15, 2007 1:31 AM EST{"commentId":533309,"authorDomain":"scooterdman"}
{"commentId":535428,"authorDomain":"geekweek"}
Actually KDE is quite a bit more memory-efficient than Gnome. This is especially true when running KDE apps.
Xfce is not very efficient if you are running apps that use both GTK and KDE/QT. It comes out last in that case.
It really all just comes down to what the computers are used for. If you are using Firefox, Abiword, and Gnumeric then Gnome or possibly Xfce will be best.
{"commentId":535428,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"geekweek"}
- 2 votes
{"commentId":533438,"authorDomain":"drloss"}
I didn't see anyone mention , a community of people working in or interested in the education field who are also using free/open source software. They have a number of resources there, including an active mailing list and some repositories of software that are educationally useful. Take a look!
{"commentId":533438,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"drloss"}
- 3 votes
#52 - Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:16 AM EST{"commentId":533440,"authorDomain":"drloss"}
Hmmm. The link didn't come through. It was for Schoolforge,
{"commentId":533440,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"drloss"}
- 3 votes
#53 - Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:18 AM EST{"commentId":533441,"authorDomain":"drloss"}
Darn it! schoolforge.net
{"commentId":533441,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"drloss"}
- 3 votes
#54 - Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:19 AM EST{"commentId":533831,"authorDomain":"scooterdman"}
{"commentId":533983,"authorDomain":"moogman"}
Installing software is really easy, don't let anyone else tell you any different! There are two ways that you may be interested in:
Way 1 - The easy way.
Click the Applications->Add/Remove... menu. Now just search for some keywords. Maybe "mp3" to list media players), or "learn" to list. Try browsing through the "Education" section on the left :-) Once you have found an application that you want to install, just tick the box and click ok. It's as simple as that.
Way 2 - The more powerful way.
Using Synaptic is much more powerful, if you know exactly what you're searching for. It's the same style as way 1, but the searching needs to be more specific. Click your System->Administration->Synaptic menu, and have a play. Again, if you find an application that you wish to install, tick the box and click "Apply".
By the way, Ubuntu does not by default show you all available software out there. If you want to see everything that's available, just click your System->Administration->Software Sources menu. Tick all of the top four boxes in the first window, and click close. You've now enabled yourself to view literally tens of thousands of applications... this by the way is part of the reason why they're not enabled by default, too much choice can be a bit daunting!
Congratulations for trying Ubuntu, glad you're happy with it so far! If you ever get stuck, you'll find no end of help, and never be too scared to ask a simple question :-)
{"commentId":533983,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"moogman"}
- 3 votes
#55 - Thu Feb 15, 2007 1:45 PM EST{"commentId":534141,"authorDomain":"stites"}
"How can I make these systems even more powerful? What open source Linux software can you recommend that would augment my students' experiences?"
For a word processor I recommend that install abiword. abiword is a small, fast word processor which is not part of an office suite. Other than not having an associated office suite abiword is full-featured and includes ODF support.
------------------
Steve Stites
{"commentId":534141,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"stites"}
- 1 vote
#56 - Thu Feb 15, 2007 2:52 PM EST{"commentId":534901,"authorDomain":"cinodras"}
It's always great to hear about people having a good experience with linux.
If no one else has posted this yet: the command-line program apt-get, or (better yet), aptitude will let you install programs. Type "man apt-get", or "man aptitude" in a shell to get the manual page for either program.
Good luck!
{"commentId":534901,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"cinodras"}
- 2 votes
#57 - Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:29 PM EST{"commentId":535863,"authorDomain":"dave-koerner"}
You asked for fast lightweight distro's checkout "". This is mainly a rescue tool but very fast and lightweight.
I found it on the UBCD 'Ultimate Boot CD' "" this is a very go tool as well.
Dave
{"commentId":535863,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"dave-koerner"}
- 1 vote
#58 - Fri Feb 16, 2007 10:41 AM EST{"commentId":535958,"authorDomain":"dave-koerner"}
I just found out that new users can't post links. In the infamous words of my teenage & preteen daughters.
"What! ever" You can google for the links I was trying to post by looking for INSERT LINUX and/or the Ultimate Boot CD.
{"commentId":535958,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"dave-koerner"}
- 2 votes
#59 - Fri Feb 16, 2007 11:14 AM EST{"commentId":535965,"authorDomain":"scooterdman"}
{"commentId":536696,"authorDomain":"onlineapps"}
Is this it:
http://www.inside-security.de/insert_en.html
?
{"commentId":536696,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"onlineapps"}
- 1 vote
{"commentId":537064,"authorDomain":"dave-koerner"}
Yes, that is it.
{"commentId":537064,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"dave-koerner"}
{"commentId":544238,"authorDomain":"gary-39"}
wanna see something really amazing?
load OpenBSD and configure Tom's Window Manager as your default - not as pretty as KDE, but scalded dog fast...
{"commentId":544238,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"gary-39"}
- 1 vote
#60 - Tue Feb 20, 2007 5:56 PM EST{"commentId":544592,"authorDomain":"scooterdman"}
{"commentId":987182,"authorDomain":"shadowmil"}
ScooterDMan, hey, glad you had a good experience with Xubuntu. For a school setting, Edubuntu is recommended, but Edubuntu also uses gnome (the same desktop as ubuntu). Which is does require more RAM. So instead of installing Edubuntu, I suggest trying to install some of Edubuntu packages on your Xubuntu desktops.
I am not sure what type of package manager Xubuntu has, but normally if you go into the menu, and go to add and remove programs, you can find a section label as educational, which you can find everything from calculators to typing games.
I am sorry if someone has already posted on this, I didn't take the time to read every comment.
I most likely will never visit this site again, if you have any questions or comments, you can email me at:
Shadowmil (at) gmail (dot) com
{"commentId":987182,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"shadowmil"}
- 1 vote
#61 - Thu Aug 30, 2007 1:35 PM EDT{"commentId":1048182,"authorDomain":"thomasgeorge1979"}
We should have more teachers like u -who genuinely care and are willing to go out of the way for their students.Your students are very lucky to have u.
I have been experimenting with linux for 6 months now.I was able to get xubuntu,ubuntu and kubuntu running on my computers with no problems at all.But they dont run all that fast on my 512mb ibm r51 laptop.Same goes for pclinux 2007,sidux.
I currently use puppy linux 2.17 and am quite happy with it.I admit that the interface may not be as pretty as other operating systems but it fulfills my requirements prefectly-SPEED.I am not sure if it works on a powermac but so far the going has been excellent for me.It is just a 86mb download.Since it is so small it loads into ram,so it runs very fast.U have to see it to believe it.One can boot off the cd itself(i have installed ubuntu on one computer but live cd give u the freedom to play around).
I have been using it as my primary os for 3 months now and I have started tinkering with it .My internet connection is too slow to watch the instructional videos online,so I googled everything.
Things u might want to do
1.to get a pretty interface-download easypup
I discoverd this only after I installed icewm on my own.
2.to make installation of new programs easier-install Puppy Software Installer by Mark Ulrich. Gives access to a lot more programs than the standard installer.The standard installer goes to an outdated page for dotpups.
3.Dont forget to start the firewall-one can get complacent in linux.
4.Download mplayer for movies
5.puppybackground desktop can be set to a folder on your harddisk-so one can use any picture as a wallpaper.
6.There are user contributed versions called puplets -go to puppylinux dot org slash wikka slash puplets
I hope this helps.Keep up the good work.
{"commentId":1048182,"threadId":"76296","contentId":"566477","authorDomain":"thomasgeorge1979"}
#62 - Mon Sep 24, 2007 9:23 AM EDT{"canLink":false,"threadId":"76296","isPrivate":false}
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