Debian Jr. and Debian Jr. Lite
I have been thinking about minimum system requirements. I hope that
we will be able to cater to those with even very basic hardware as
well as those with the latest and greatest 3D whiz-bang all-singing,
dancing uberboxes. My idea is that a subset of Debian Jr. should be
flagged as "Debian Jr. Lite", perhaps assisted by a "task-" package
that omits all the heavy-duty 3D and big memory or CPU hog progs.
There are a few possible minimum platforms to aim for and I'd like to know
if we should go with one or more of these and hear your reasons why:
"Debian Jr. Ultra-light"
CPU: 486dx/33
RAM: 16M
Disk: 200M
Video: 512K unaccelerated, 640x480 VGA
Sound: optional
Comments:
X just barely runs on this system. You might get away with
it for a while if you get something like this, especially while
the kids are still very young and are just playing with "desktop
toys" on it. It makes a decent "second system" to run as an X
terminal connected to a parents' box. Systems like this can be
found for free or dirt cheap if you know where to look. I found
just such a system for a friend for $30 Canadian. You won't
be able to run memory-hungry apps like gimp on this.
"Debian Jr. Light"
CPU: Pentium 100
RAM: 32M
Disk: 1G
Video: 4M 2D accelerated, 1024x768 SVGA
Sound: 16-bit (e.g. SB16)
Comments:
This is a nice, solid box that runs X well. While not exactly
free, it's going to be within the reach of most families as a
system the whole family can use. It will run many more things
than the "Ultra-light" but still won't run gimp or the 3D
hardware-accelerated stuff. Also, with that little memory,
Mozilla will be unusable. If Mozilla is a requirement, use the
"Debian Jr." option instead, or run it on a better box and just
use this as an X server to connect to it.
"Debian Jr."
CPU: K6-2/300
RAM: 64M
Disk: 2G
Video: 16M 3D accelerated, 1024x768 SVGA
Sound: 16-bit (e.g. SB16)
Comments:
This is probably the bottom rung of what is considered "modern".
You can finally run gimp on this. If you're on a strict budget
but still want to be able to try out some of the 3D stuff, it is a
start. Although some of the more high-performance stuff is going
to require some upgrades. This will run pretty well everything in
Debian Jr., (but not everything at once :)
My judgements as to what constitutes "minimum" are rather arbitrary.
I would like to see various different configurations field-tested and
get reports back about what works and what doesn't. I suspect one of the
big questions a parent will have before buying a system for themselves to
use with their children or a system for the kids to use is "how much
system do I need?" I hope that Debian Jr. can offer some help in this
area, at least in the form of a document that records our findings, if not
also in task- packages that help them get started with a sampling of
things that work on their system. There's nothing more frustrating than
to download over a 56K modem a whole mess of stuff only to find that the
coolest looking things won't run on your box at all.
Ben
--
nSLUG http://www.nslug.ns.ca synrg@sanctuary.nslug.ns.ca
Debian http://www.debian.org synrg@debian.org
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