Excellent approach for discussion! The non-developers can really make a difference here. Experienced users are also very valuable to the whole. I like the ideas you bring forward.
ace Joseph Hartman wrote: > Jordan: I think Ace is right about firefox. It seems to work fine for me > for research purposes, especially since I don't install the flash plugin > so no banner ads slow things down. The problems really reveal themselves > when a bunch of students start working with google docs (which uses a > lot of AJAX I think) to save papers/spreadsheets and manipulate images > in presentations/websites and such. I've heard that native Firefox in > Linux is slow altogether, slower even than Firefox in a virtualized > Windows OS running in a Linux system, but I don't know if that's true > and that's not what my primary trouble is. Mostly I have problems with > flash and google apps. Thanks for the offer of help, I'll see how far I > can get tomorrow and if I run into trouble I'll try to have some > specific questions for you to help me with. Cheers! > > Ace: I think it could be helpful to have an area on the wiki that told > about different setups schools around the world have done. I know there > are some others on the list who also work at schools and have done what > I've done or better. Uwe //Geercken and Asmo Koskinen both come to mind > as I've learned a lot from their posts to the list. You certainly have > my permission to use any and all of my information. > > Scott: when I reflect on my own frustrations with ubuntu and ltsp, I > think they mostly stem from a lack of structure. You say "there has to > be *some* structure, *some* tool that's acting as a gateway." and I > completely agree. The problem I've encountered is that the structure in > place is unclear at best and ambiguous in many cases. Most of the time I > think people just have a problem they want to fix and instead of there > being an obvious or even single destination to get the information or > resources they need there are many different resources of varying > complexity. For example, with this particular issue of local apps, I > follow this list, I follow the wiki (which there are apparently 2 of I > learned today?) I follow this thread on ubuntu forums > <http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=7647569#post7647569>, I follow > a few people's blogs, I randomly google it sometimes, and I can > evidently get on IRC and chat with you. I've never used IRC before but I > could probably figure it out without too much difficulty, but that's a > level of complexity above googling "ltsp local apps ubuntu". > > Additionally I think there is a lack of structure organizationally in > the community itself. Until today I thought Gavin was employed by > Canonical or something just because he posts helpful stuff all the time. > I've been using Ubuntu since Dapper Drake and following this list for > years, but I'm still a complete amateur. Meanwhile there are > professional Linux developers out there who might be on the list for the > first time today, and there is no way to differentiate between the two > of us. Half the reason I post to ubuntuforums and my own blog instead of > the wiki is because I know I'm authorized to do so and won't be screwing > anything up by adding my own information. > > Perhaps this is just the way things have to be for a community shared > distribution, but it seems to contrast with the way much of the rest of > ubuntu is run, such as launchpad, with it's ability to track users and > statistics and permissions. I'm not too familiar with launchpad, so > maybe I'm wrong and it is as much of a rat's nest as what I'm doing now, > but I know from what I've read about it that it's quite respected in > many circles. I noticed that Stephane Graber was made an "official" > developer of Ubuntu or something in Launchpad recently, and at least > that helps to establish a hierarchy of expertise in the community > structure. (Congrats to Stephane BTW) Ubuntuforums does a good job of > this by denoting the number of contributions each member has made as > well as which members are moderators. > > In any case, I think it is confusing that in the edubuntu jaunty release > notes <http://www.edubuntu.org/releasenotes/904> it says "Installing > Firefox inside the LTSP chroot and setting /LOCAL_APPS_MENU=True/ in > |lts.conf| will make Firefox to run locally on the thin client. The XDG > integration takes care of adding the application in the menu or > replacing it by the local application if it's already present." but then > does not include a hyperlink or anything to actually direct a reader to > a place where they can read more about how to actually implement local apps. > > You ask: "So, once again, what's the solution? How can we make things > easier? Ok, lets say we're not going to kick things upstream. Lets > say, starting right now, Edubuntu, the entity, is going to look at every > bug, fix it, and if upstream needs fixing, we'll spearhead it." > > I'm more concerned with documentation than bug fixing and more familiar > with google's tools than I am with forums and wikis, but I'll try to > describe what I would do at my school if I had the problems I've > described above: > > First I would establish a google site to house all things > Ubuntu/Edubuntu LTSP related and divide the site into sections for each > release since many pages on the wiki apply to one release but not > another. Then I would "invite" all the "developers/experts" on this > list, launchpad, or whatever to be "collaborators" on the site. These > collaborators would be able to change the website pages while all other > people would not be able to change the actual documentation pages, but > would be able to leave "comments" at the bottom of the page to suggest > changes for the collaborators to make to the page, bring attention to > outdated/changed information, relate personal experiences, etc. This > would, in my opinion create a hybrid of ubuntuforums and the wiki where > the canon information is in the page while discussions and experiences > about the information on the page took place in the comments section below. > > I would borrow from ubuntuforums' member rating graphic setup to > distinguish between experts and noobs or, since google can't do this, I > would require each member to rate themselves on a scale of 1-20 by > answering questions about how long they've been using ubuntu/ltsp, how > many times per week they post comments to the site, how many hours per > week they spend using Linux, etc. and then put this number in their > avatar or username (probably avatar though since it would have to change > over time). > > I would install a google talk widget on the homepage and bypass IRC > altogether by allowing visitors to click on the homepage to chat with a > collaborator if one were available. (you can see a google sites example > of this here <http://www.kainoshealth.net/>) Another nice feature of > google sites is that it allows the public to follow changes to any given > webpage within the site via email, just like RSS. Therefore, I would > include a widget on the homepage that automatically highlights recent > changes made to the site so anyone could get site updates via email just > by "following" the homepage. > > I would require all collaborators to include information about > themselves, their accomplishments, qualifications, and areas of of > expertise in their profile so that regular lurkers could single out a > collaborator for help with specific issues. I would also give > collaborators titles depending on their tenure so the longest serving > collaborators could be easily recognized. I would divide up the > collaborators by last name and assign A-G last name collaborators to > upkeep the area of the site related to one release, H-N last name > collaborators to the next release, and O-Z collaborators to the release > after that. > > Finally, I would create two google forms to encourage member > participation in the site. The first form would allow members to submit > ideas/walkthroughs/howtos/experiences in written or video or audio or > screencast or whatever form for the collaborators to review and either > include or exclude from the site. The second form would be a nomination > form for the user to nominate either themselves or another member for > collaborator status. > > There's actually a pretty good example of a google site > <http://www.evonypedia.com/> doing much of what I described. (I don't > actually play the game, but I do subscribe to the Google Apps twitter > feed) You'll notice there aren't any comments at the bottom of any > pages, but that's just because they turned them off. > > I don't imagine Canonical is too interested in employing Google for > their support services, but I believe much of what I described is > possible with other FOSS tools like Drupal, (in fact, wasn't launchpad > just opensourced and released?) and as long as the movement is towards > more structure both in terms of the community and the information I > think it would go a long ways towards clarifying where Edubuntu as an > entity and community stands in terms of strengths and weaknesses and > would enable more valuable participation by part-timers and amateurs. -joe > -- edubuntu-users mailing list [email protected] Modify settings or unsubscribe at: https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/edubuntu-users
