blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Klaus_Knopper.html

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   6     <title>Petter Reinholdtsen: Debian Edu interview: Klaus Knopper</title>
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  14  <h1>
  15      <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/">Petter Reinholdtsen</a>
  16
  17  </h1>
  18
  19 </div>
  20
  21
  22     <div class="entry">
  23       <div class="title">Debian Edu interview: Klaus Knopper</div>
  24       <div class="date"> 6th December 2013</div>
  25       <div class="body"><p>It has been a while since I managed to publish the last interview,
  26 but the <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
  27 Skolelinux</a> community is still going strong, and yesterday we even
  28 had a new school administrator show up on
  29 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-edu">#debian-edu</a> to share
  30 his success story with installing Debian Edu at their school.  This
  31 time I have been able to get some helpful comments from the creator of
  32 Knoppix, Klaus Knopper, who was involved in a Skolelinux project in
  33 Germany a few years ago.</p>
  34
  35 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
  36
  37 <p>I am Klaus Knopper.  I have a master degree in electrical
  38 engineering, and is currently professor in information management at
  39 the university of applied sciences Kaiserslautern / Germany and
  40 freelance Open Source software developer and consultant.</p>
  41
  42 <p>All of this is pretty much of the work I spend my days with. Apart
  43 from teaching, I'm also conducting some more or less experimental
  44 projects like the <a href="http://www.knoppix.org">Knoppix GNU/Linux live
  45 system</a> (Debian-based like Skolelinux),
  46 <a href="http://www.knopper.net/knoppix-adriane/index-en.html">ADRIANE</a>
  47 (a blind-friendly talking desktop system) and
  48 <a href="http://www.knopper.net/linbo/index-en.html">LINBO</a>
  49 (Linux-based network boot console, a fast remote install and repair
  50 system supporting various operating systems).</p>
  51
  52 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
  53 project?</strong></p>
  54
  55 <p>The credit for this have to go to Kurt Gramlich, who is the German
  56 coordinator for Skolelinux.  We were looking for an all-in-one open
  57 source community-supported distribution for schools, and Kurt
  58 introduced us to Skolelinux for this purpose.</p>
  59
  60 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
  61 Edu?</strong></p>
  62
  63 <ul>
  64   <li>Quick installation,</li>
  65   <li>works (almost) out of the box,</li>
  66   <li>contains many useful software packages for teaching and learning,</li>
  67   <li>is a purely community-based distro and not controlled by a
  68     single company,</li>
  69   <li>has a large number of supporters and teachers who share their
  70     experience and problem solutions.</li>
  71 </ul>
  72
  73 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
  74 Edu?</strong></p>
  75
  76 <ul>
  77   <li>Skolelinux is - as we had to learn - not easily upgradable to
  78   the next version.  Opposed to its genuine Debian base, upgrading to
  79   a new version means a full new installation from scratch to get it
  80   working again reliably.
  81
  82   <li>Skolelinux is based on Debian/stable, and therefore always a
  83   little outdated in terms of program versions compared to Edubuntu or
  84   similar educational Linux distros, which rather use Debian/testing
  85   as their base.
  86
  87   <li>Skolelinux has some very self-opinionated and stubborn default
  88   configuration which in my opinion adds unnecessary complexity and is
  89   not always suitable for a schools needs, the preset network
  90   configuration is actually a core definition feature of Skolelinux
  91   and not easy to change, so schools sometimes have to change their
  92   network configuration to make it "Skolelinux-compatible".
  93
  94   <li>Some proposed extensions, which were made available as
  95   contribution, like secure examination mode and lecture material
  96   distribution and collection, were not accepted into the mainline
  97   Skolelinux development and are now not easy to maintain in the
  98   future because of Skolelinux somewhat undeterministic update
  99   schemes.</li>
 100
 101   <li>Skolelinux has only a very tiny number of base developers
 102   compared to Debian.</li>
 103
 104 </ul>
 105
 106 <p>For these reasons and experience from our project, I would now
 107 rather consider using plain Debian for schools next time, until
 108 Skolelinux is more closely integrated into Debian and becomes
 109 upgradeable without reinstallation.</p>
 110
 111 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
 112
 113 <p>GNU/Linux with LXDE desktop, bash for interactive dialog and
 114 programming, texlive for documentation and correspondence,
 115 occasionally LibreOffice for document format conversion. Various
 116 programming languages for teaching.</p>
 117
 118 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
 119 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
 120
 121 <p>Strong arguments are</p>
 122
 123 <ul>
 124
 125   <li>Knowledge is free, and so should be methods and tools for
 126     teaching and learning.</li>
 127
 128   <li>Students can learn with and use the same software at school, at
 129     home, and at their working place without running into license or
 130     conversion problems.</li>
 131
 132   <li>Closed source or proprietary software hides knowledge rather
 133     than exposing it, and proprietary software vendors try to bind
 134     customers to certain products.  But teachers need to teach
 135     science, not products.</li>
 136
 137   <li>If you have everything you for daily work as open source, what
 138     would you need proprietary software for?</li>
 139
 140 </ul>
 141 </div>
 142
 143       <div class="tags">Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.</div>
 144
 145
 146     </div>
 147
 148
 149
 150
 151     <div id="sidebar">
 152
 153
 154
 155 <h2>Archive</h2>
 156 <ul>
 157
 158 <li>2015
 159 <ul>
 160
 161 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
 162
 163 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
 164
 165 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
 166
 167 </ul></li>
 168
 169 <li>2014
 170 <ul>
 171
 172 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 173
 174 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
 175
 176 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
 177
 178 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
 179
 180 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
 181
 182 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
 183
 184 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
 185
 186 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
 187
 188 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
 189
 190 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
 191
 192 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 193
 194 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
 195
 196 </ul></li>
 197
 198 <li>2013
 199 <ul>
 200
 201 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
 202
 203 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
 204
 205 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
 206
 207 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
 208
 209 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 210
 211 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
 212
 213 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 214
 215 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 216
 217 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
 218
 219 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
 220
 221 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
 222
 223 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 224
 225 </ul></li>
 226
 227 <li>2012
 228 <ul>
 229
 230 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
 231
 232 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
 233
 234 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
 235
 236 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
 237
 238 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
 239
 240 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
 241
 242 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
 243
 244 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 245
 246 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
 247
 248 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
 249
 250 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
 251
 252 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 253
 254 </ul></li>
 255
 256 <li>2011
 257 <ul>
 258
 259 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
 260
 261 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
 262
 263 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
 264
 265 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
 266
 267 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
 268
 269 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
 270
 271 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 272
 273 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 274
 275 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
 276
 277 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 278
 279 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 280
 281 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
 282
 283 </ul></li>
 284
 285 <li>2010
 286 <ul>
 287
 288 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 289
 290 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
 291
 292 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
 293
 294 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
 295
 296 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 297
 298 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
 299
 300 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
 301
 302 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
 303
 304 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
 305
 306 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
 307
 308 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
 309
 310 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
 311
 312 </ul></li>
 313
 314 <li>2009
 315 <ul>
 316
 317 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
 318
 319 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
 320
 321 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
 322
 323 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
 324
 325 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 326
 327 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
 328
 329 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
 330
 331 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 332
 333 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
 334
 335 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 336
 337 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 338
 339 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 340
 341 </ul></li>
 342
 343 <li>2008
 344 <ul>
 345
 346 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
 347
 348 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 349
 350 </ul></li>
 351
 352 </ul>
 353
 354
 355
 356 <h2>Tags</h2>
 357 <ul>
 358
 359  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (13)</a></li>
 360
 361  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
 362
 363  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
 364
 365  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
 366
 367  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (8)</a></li>
 368
 369  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (15)</a></li>
 370
 371  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
 372
 373  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
 374
 375  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (109)</a></li>
 376
 377  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (151)</a></li>
 378
 379  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
 380
 381  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (15)</a></li>
 382
 383  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (12)</a></li>
 384
 385  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
 386
 387  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (271)</a></li>
 388
 389  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (22)</a></li>
 390
 391  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (12)</a></li>
 392
 393  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (14)</a></li>
 394
 395  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
 396
 397  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (14)</a></li>
 398
 399  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (41)</a></li>
 400
 401  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (10)</a></li>
 402
 403  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (19)</a></li>
 404
 405  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
 406
 407  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
 408
 409  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
 410
 411  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
 412
 413  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
 414
 415  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (32)</a></li>
 416
 417  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (260)</a></li>
 418
 419  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (175)</a></li>
 420
 421  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (15)</a></li>
 422
 423  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
 424
 425  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (51)</a></li>
 426
 427  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (83)</a></li>
 428
 429  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (1)</a></li>
 430
 431  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
 432
 433  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
 434
 435  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
 436
 437  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (9)</a></li>
 438
 439  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
 440
 441  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (4)</a></li>
 442
 443  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
 444
 445  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (41)</a></li>
 446
 447  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
 448
 449  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (4)</a></li>
 450
 451  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (46)</a></li>
 452
 453  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (3)</a></li>
 454
 455  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (9)</a></li>
 456
 457  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (30)</a></li>
 458
 459  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (2)</a></li>
 460
 461  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
 462
 463  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (8)</a></li>
 464
 465  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (50)</a></li>
 466
 467  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
 468
 469  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (35)</a></li>
 470
 471 </ul>
 472
 473
 474     </div>
 475     <p style="text-align: right">
 476  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
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