Re: How can we gain more flexibility in debian-edu?
Hi Andreas,
Above all I'd like to express my appreciation for your part in Debian-Edu
development.
On Friday 06 August 2010 05:21:28 Andreas B. Mundt wrote:
> Hi,
>
> ...
> What is needed to make a collaboration possible?
>
> We need to make our system more modularized and flexible. How to do
> that, well, that has still to be figured out. But I think skolelinux
> will profit a lot from a more modularized setup.
>
> To me, the current setup appears to be too complicated and
> specialized, resulting in many 'hacks' which make it unstructured and
> hard to maintain. Perhaps that's the reason why there are only so few
> people around participating in development; it seems like it is only
> possible to either work full time on it or stop at all. Cruft has been
> cumulated over the years, not making it easier to start contributing.
>
I share the opinion that skolelinux is too rigid and that this makes it
fragile, with some cruft adding calcification on top.
I believe the first step towards more flexibility must be an agreement to
abandon the "Out of the Box" concept which has been a fundamental one since
the beginning of Skolelinux.
I'm not going to take side on an 'OtB vs. flexibility' debate but I claim that
these are inherently conflicting.
> What's the alternative? The alternative is a core system that includes
> all components common to all of these systems: users, groups, machines
> and software management, terminals, kerberos, webserver, printers, etc.
>
In line with the above stated view of the problem, I believe the alternative
is a good, simple, easy to use management console/package.
Providing such an alternative is not all that easy and simple, but there are
many tools that could be employed and I assume there are also some using them
to administer Debian-Edu-like systems.
> ...
>
> Hopefully, by offering more flexibility, the 'forks' and re-inventions
> of skolelinux could be unified again and developers motivated to
> participate also to the core project. By enlarging the field of users,
> the burden of developing would be shared on more shoulders and
> synergies could be used to improve the system and not only 'fix'
> issues.
>
> ... I think that
> problems concerning the setup of skolelinux (understood as installing
> from the DVD) are not our problem. A few more questions, perhaps even
> some more actions after installation- this is not what makes schools
> and teachers not to choose skolelinux. I guess most of the people
> having installed the system in the last half year at school started to
> change and modify the installation massively (more or less
> successfully) right after setting it up.
>
I think all this could be achieved within a management framework.
Best regards, Odd.
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