Saturday, August 4, 2007

Getting ready for the roll-out of Edubuntu

Well, the summer is beginning to wear on and I have to get back to work at getting things ready for the upcoming school year. I've been in to school a couple times, but for the most part I've stayed away. No longer. I must return and begin another adventure. I'm actually looking forward to it. This year I am rolling out Edubuntu (click here for more info) throughout the entire school. I'm also taking a major step at breaking our dependence on Windows (even more). Up until now each classroom has had a Windows machine (or a Mac in some cases) in addition to a "mini-lab" of Linux thin-clients". This year I'm replacing them with Edubuntu machines. Now...before you gasp too loudly...Windows will still be available in two forms. One is via our Windows Terminal Server and the other is quite unique if you ask me (go ahead...ask me) Ok I'll tell ya'. I'm installing the free VMWare Player on the Edubuntu desktops and creating a Windows XP Pro virtual machine to push out to these desktops. So...if the users MUST use Windows, they can. My hope is that by having the base operating system as Edubuntu...they will see that they can do more than 90% of their tasks right there without having to go to Windows. I will also be using Edubuntu on all of the thin-clients...so the transition around school will be effortless for the users. I also will be using Samba/LDAP as my central point of authentication regardless of platform. Matt Oquist has created a fantastic installer for Samba/LDAP called "smbldap-installer" (click here for more info) which makes it a snap to install and configure a Samba/LDAP server in minutes. I'll be running mine on an Ubuntu server so it'll be nice and stable...and lightweight. My mind is racing with new ideas and that's kind of exciting. I'll keep ya'll posted on my progress!


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FOSSED 2008 Conference Schedule!

The 2008 FOSSED Conference schedule is now posted...get it here CLICK HERE

Conference Sessions listed here

Great sessions! Great presenters! ALL driven by YOU! Check the session descriptions (always a document in progress) here:

Click here to view the Session descriptions

NOTE: This session list is currently in development...some sessions may be added and a couple may disappear, but for the most part things will give you a very good idea of what is being offered at FOSSED 2008