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Release Announcement: Debian-Edu/Skolelinux 3.0 Terra



Debian-Edu: Skolelinux 3.0 Terra available for free download!

* Oslo - July 22., 2007

Skolelinux 3.0 is ready. 
This is an community release with comprehensive support from regional
and national projects in Germany, Spain, France, Greece and Norway. The
Skolelinux project is now a part of Debian under the name Debian-Edu.
Several other projects have made additional functionality to Skolelinux
tailored for national needs. Skolelinux now supports more than 50
countries.


Whats new in Skolelinux 3.0:

 * based on Debian 4.0 "etch" and therefore compatible to LSB 3.1, using
kernel 2.6.18 and KDE 3.5.5

 * Full support for networked Thin clients, LowFat (diskless) clients,
Workstations and Laptops. With the LowFat clients users got full PC 
functionality with extremely low maintenance cost. The use of LowFat
clients gives full support for sound, video, USB memory stick's and DVDs
without the need for a local installation.

 * Skolelinux now got more than 80 applications selected for pedagogic
uses, supporting more than 50 languages. Many new applications are
introduced in addition to popular classic as GCompris, KDE-Edu,
Iceweasel (unbranded version of Firefox) and OpenOffice.org.

 * Installation is a breeze: Both the installation and source code for
all software are now distributed on a single DVD now supporting three
different processor platforms as i386, PowerPC and AMD64. This makes it
more easy to choose hardware, and to study the recipes behind the
software. Those interested can exercise their freedom to learn,
participate and share knowledge more easily. Installation CDs are also
available, but requires a working Internet connection for installation.

About Skolelinux
Skolelinux is a complete tailored software solution for the needs of
any educational institution or school. It is a ready computer system
were the school does not need to piece together the components.

Skolelinux is the result of the work of the Debian Edu project and
Debian Edu is an official Debian subproject. It is installed in a great
number of schools in Norway, Germany, France and other countries.
Municipalities and Commercial Service Providers run Skolelinux across
multiple schools, operated and maintained centrally. Service providers
report that the "lowfat clients" require half the maintenance cost of
other desktop alternatives.

The next milestone of Skolelinux development will be to merge the 
Debian-based LinEx distro into Debian Edu. Currently LinEx is used
by more than 250,000 students and public employees in the region of 
Extremadura in Spain.


In depth
"Lowfat clients" is also known as Diskless workstations. They run 
applications locally on the client. All software comes from the server 
instead of locally from the client hard drive. Recommended minimum 
requirement for client machines is > 256 MB RAM and 800 MHz CPU. 
Skolelinux now got improved tools for system surveillance and 
maintenance.

 
Roadmap for next merging of LinEx and Debian-Edu:
 - http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/LinEx2DebianEdu-Roadmap

Please note that the documentation for the 3.0 Terra release is only 
available in English at the moment and contains some rough edges. We
have considered releasing before the end of the summer holidays more
important and we will fix those rough edges in the coming weeks, when we
also expect more translations to show up. Those fixes will be included
in the upcoming 3.0 r1 release.


Contact information
 * General information about Debian-Edu or Skolelinux:
   - E-mail: debian-edu AT lists.debian.org

 * Media contacts
   - Norway
     Anders Kringstad Hanssen
     <akai AT skolelinux.no>
     +47 932 82 137 (cellphone)

     Knut Yrvin
     <knuty AT skolelinux.no>
     +47 908 95 765 (cellphone)

  
  - Germany
     Kurt Gramlich
     <kurt AT skolelinux.de>


  - Spain
    José "L. Redrejo" Rodríguez
    <jredrejo AT edu.juntaextremadura.net>

  - France
    Thierry Stauder
    <thierry AT skolelinux.fr>

  - Pakistan
    Tariq Farooqi
    <tariq AT linuxpakistan.net>
    +92-21-6622134 (cellphone)


For more information about Debian-Edu/Skolelinux please see our webpage
at http://www.skolelinux.org.


Download:
http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Download


A complete list of improvements have been made available at
http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/ReleaseNotes

Cheers
Steffen

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