The complete and free âout of the boxâ software solution for
+schools, Debian Edu /
+Skolelinux, is used quite a lot in Germany, and one of the people
+involved is Bernd Zeitzen, who show up on the project mailing lists
+from time to time with interesting questions and tips on how to adjust
+the setup. I managed to interview him this summer.
Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
-
My name is Roger Marsal, I'm 27 years old (1986 generation) and I
-live in Barcelona, Spain. I've got a strong business background and I
-work as a patrimony manager and as a real estate agent. Additionally,
-I've co-founded a British based tech company that is nowadays on the
-last development phase of a new social networking concept.
-
-
I'm a Linux enthusiast that started its journey with Ubuntu four years
-ago and have recently switched to Debian seeking rock solid stability
-and as a necessary step to gain expertise.
-
-
In a nutshell, I spend my days working and learning as much as I
-can to face both my job, entrepreneur project and feed my Linux
-hunger.
+
My name is Bernd Zeitzen and I'm married with Hedda, a self
+employed physiotherapist. My former profession is tool maker, but I
+haven't worked for 30 years in this job. 30 years ago I started to
+support my wife and become her officeworker and a few years later the
+administrator for a small computer network, today based on Ubuntu
+Server (Samba, OpenVPN). For her daily work she has to use Windows
+Desktops because the software she needs to organize her business only
+works with Windows . :-(
+
+
In 1988 we started with one PC and DOS, then I learned to use
+Windows 98, 2000, XP, â¦, 8, Ubuntu, MacOSX. Today we are running a
+Linux server with 6 Windows clients and 10 persons (teacher of
+children with special needs, speech therapist, occupational therapist,
+psychologist and officeworkers) using our Samba shares via OpenVPN to
+work with the documentations of our patients.
How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
project?
-
I discovered the LTSP advantages
-with "Ubuntu 12.04 alternate install" and after a year of use I
-started looking for an alternative. Even though I highly value and
-respect the Ubuntu project, I thought it was necessary for me to
-change to a more robust and stable alternative. As far as I was using
-Debian on my personal laptop I thought it would be fine to install
-Debian and configure an LTSP server myself. Surprised, I discovered
-that the Debian project also supported a kind of Edubuntu equivalent,
-and after having some pain I obtained a Debian Edu network up and
-running. I just loved it.
+
Two years ago a friend of mine asked me, if I want to get a job in
+his school (Gymnasium
+Harsewinkel). They started with Skolelinux / Debian Edu and they
+were looking for people to give support to the teachers using the
+software and the network and teaching the pupils increasing their
+computer skills in optional lessons. I'm spending 4-6 hours a week
+with this job.
What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
Edu?
-
I found a main advantage in that, once you know "the tips and
-tricks", a new installation just works out of the box. It's the most
-complete alternative I've found to create an LTSP network. All the
-other distributions seems to be made of plastic, Debian Edu seems to
-be made of steel.
+
The independence.
-
What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
-Edu?
+
First: Every person is allowed to use, share and develop the
+software. Even if you are poor, you are allowed to use the software
+included in Skolelinux/Debian Edu and all the other Free Software.
-
I found two main disadvantages.
+
Second: The software runs on old machines and this gives us the
+possibility to recycle computers, weeded out from offices. The
+servers and desktops are running for more than two years and they are
+working reliable.
-
I'm not an expert but I've got notions and I had to spent a considerable
-amount of time trying to bring up a standard network topology. I'm quite
-stubborn and I just worked until I did but I'm sure many people with few
-resources (not big schools, but academies for example) would have switched
-or dropped.
+
We have two servers (one tjener and one terminal server), 45
+workstations in three classrooms and seven laptops as a mobile
+solution for all classrooms. These machines are all booting from the
+terminal server. In the moment we are installing 30 laptops as mobile
+workstations. Then the pupils have the possibility to work with these
+machines in their classrooms. Internet access is realized by a WLAN
+router, connected to the schools network. This is all done without a
+dedicated system administrator or a computer science teacher.
-
It's amazing how such a complex system like Debian Edu has achieved
-this out-of-the-box state. Even though tweaking without breaking gets
-more difficult, as more factors have to be considered. This can
-discourage many people too.
+
What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
+Edu?
-
Which free software do you use daily?
+
Teachers and pupils are Windows users. <Irony on> And Linux
+isn't cool. It's software for freaks using the command line. <Irony
+off> They don't realize the stability of the system.
-
I use Debian, Firefox, Okular, Inkscape, LibreOffice and
-Virtualbox.
+
Which free software do you use daily?
+
Firefox, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, Ubuntu Server 12.04 (Samba,
+Apache, MySQL, Joomla!, ⦠and Skolelinux / Debian Edu)
Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
get schools to use free software?
-
I don't think there is a need for a particular strategy. The free
-attribute in both "freedom" and "no price" meanings is what will
-really bring free software to schools. In my experience I can think of
-the "R" statistical language; a
-few years a ago was an extremely nerd tool for university people.
-Today it's being increasingly used to teach statistics at many
-different level of studies. I believe free and open software will
-increasingly gain popularity, but I'm sure schools will be one of the
-first scenarios where this will happen.
+
In Germany we have the situation: every school is free to decide
+which software they want to use. This decision is influenced by
+teachers who learned to use Windows and MS Office. They buy a PC with
+Windows preinstalled and an additional testing version of MS
+Office. They don't know about the possibility to use Free Software
+instead. Another problem are the publisher of school books. They
+develop their software, added to the school books, for Windows.