>From Knut Yrvin on Wednesday, 2006-04-05 at 16:03:35 +0200: > * Project proposal > > (by Knut Yrvin April 5th 2006) > > Linux has bloated is the message from Nicholas Negroponte, the MIT > professor who launched the "One Laptop Per Child" solution. We need a > fully functional version on a laptop with 500MHz AMD processor, 128 MB > RAM, and 512 MB flash memory "harddrive". We need Linux to be more > lightweight he says at Linux World. This Norwegian articles reports > from Negropontes speech at Linux World April 4th 2006: > > http://www.digi.no/php/art.php?id=298814 > > We have experienced the same thing in the > Skolelinux/DebianEdu-project. Some software programs uses a lot of > memory in runtime, and also when it's installed. The OpenOffice.org > office suite and FireFox demands a lot of memory in runtime. Windows > environment is also "bloated" (GNOME, KDE). When running a lot of thin > clients i a LTSP-nettwork this programs demands more server memory. > My impression is that the amount of RAM is increased from 2 GB to 4 GB > when using OpenOffice.org, FireFox and the most common Windows > managers on 50 thin clients. Because of memory usages and speed issues > some municipalities runs ICEwm as Windows manager on all their thin > clients (500-600 clients in 9 schools).
... but on the other hand people are unwilling to make compromises on functionality. Thus we have the often-heard statement that Skolelinux/Debian-Edu would be nothing without OpenOffice.org -- it is hard to reconcile these points of view. Flash is demanding, but people demand Flash ... > In my view solutions that Damn Small Linux does not give the required > applications for use in an educational environment: > > http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/ This is also my complaint with DSL. It is nice with a small system, but if you really insist on going this direction you should go with Tom's Root/Boot http://www.toms.net/rb/ > Therefore I propose: > > * A project to make a de-bloated OLPC-profile for DebianEdu > > -- It should investigate the memory usage on todays standalone-profile > -- It should de-bloate kwin windows manager and investigate > replacements as xfce and ICEwm. Good choices. > -- It should look to the municipality of Kongsvinger solution with use > of Konqueror as a file-browser and possible replacement for FireFox > as a web-browser > -- Look at Koffice as a replacement for OpenOffice.org (this is meant > for kids, and they do not really need a fully fletched office suite > when they uses computers for learning. Then browser applications > with teaching tools are the thing to use e.g Moodle and > http://mathforum.org/mathtools/cell/a,ALL,ALL,ALL/) Problems. As soon as you introduce any KDE applications, you are going to have 150MB of libraries, and a certain degree of bloat. I would prefer the abiword/gnumeric solution for a minimal system. Abiword has committed itself to supporting .odf as well as .doc, and gnumeric for a long time was considered to be a *better* spreadsheet than Calc -- maybe it still is. Conrad -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
