RE: [Sheflug] FYI: Migrating Education Desktops to Linux

["Chris Johnson" <chris [at] xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> Remote X as used in LTSP style is pretty sucky over low bandwidth
> connections (<10Mb)  There is a more bandwidth friendly version NX -
> http://www.nomachine.com but i'm not sure if its FLOSS though :-(
>
I had a play on Tarantella the other day.  Not sure about the licensing or
the technology but it was almost workable despite being over a 512k internet
connection.

Did a search for ltsp low bandwidth
and came up with
http://network.gouldacademy.org/misc/sshvnc/sshvnc.html which looks
promising....
I was also talking to a co. at the BETT show last week that have thin client
solutions optimised for a 28.8k (or was it 33.3k can't remember but v slow)
connections so it can be done.  Having a demo on 7th Feb at our office.

>
> > Sounds interesting.  Any suggestions as to where to look to
> > find out more?
> >
>
> I always liked the idea of the debian apt repository.  You
> could have all
> the packages for your standard build in your local
> apt-repository,

And presumably you can create entries in the apt repository that just change
settings files?
(ie so desktop settings can be restored to defaults after boot and network
services and before graphical user login.

>and all
> the workstations doing a "apt-get upgrade" via cron, or at
> boot.

Application install at login was a big eeeek at SHU as it slowed down the
machine even if you weren't intending on using the new app.  We used
zenworks which installed applications on demand.  It was set to use most of
the files from the main server but to make only the necessary changes to the
local machine minimising the delay of the installation.  That way the
machine was never loaded up with software unless someone wanted to use it on
that machine.  So you'd have to set the application icon to trigger an
apt-get for that application and then run it to get a similar sort of
functionailty.  Does yum do the same (I'm playing with fedora atm?).



Then you
> can distribute new packages/ updates etc just by changing
> version numbers on
> the central repository.  Not that I've ever done it though ;-)
>
It would be good to see whether install on demand could work with apt-get.
Boot up aptget resets config files and adds new icons to desktop/menus.
Icons on menus and desktops get the applications / updates only if they are
required on that PC.  It would probably work better on open access PCs where
access to applications is pretty random as opposed to in the classroom where
you may end up with 30 PC all asking for OOo updates at the same time.

Does apt-get check for enough free drive space before proceding?

ChrisJ

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