On Mon, Feb 11, 2008 at 08:00:45PM +0100, Steven Locher wrote: > I am an IT instructor with allround experience in Unixes, like Solaris, > FreeBSD, Slackware and Debain - but never had time for LFS. I used to teach C > and Java at the junior level in a university. > > My next subject is going to be Operating Systems where Linux is going to be > the area of application. I got this great idea of starting from scratch: > - students install LFS on VMware-Server on Windows host > - we get a C development environment up > - do the exercises in C on this environment. > > Time frame one semester, starting in Spring! > > I know, I should go through the documents and try it myself. But due to the > limited time available, I would like to ask you whether this is feasible or > advisable. If yes, please post relevant pointers here. > > regards > Steve This is just my personal opinion:
If you have defined your objectives, use those to determine how well LFS measures up to them. If your aim is really "coding linux applications in C", I would suggest LFS on its own will prove a very sparse environment for your students, but is perhaps usable. If you had said this was going to be a course for sysadmins, or about using one of the scripting languages, LFS would probably fit a bit better (although admins would rightly ask why you aren't using something which is easier to deploy). You also need to work out how much time is actually available for your course (do you expect your students to devote all their time to the course, or two hours a week, or what ?), and then work out how much of that will be taken up with building the basic system. Most of the non-interactive applications have already been written, and there is not much demand for new apps written with ncurses. If you are talking graphical, you will not only need xorg (count the packages), but the correct supporting libraries and toolkits. And, of course, whatever debugging tools and any additional editor(s) you plan to use. You might be thinking "but I said this was coding Operating Systems" - but what does that phrase mean ? The OS can be regarded as the kernel and the base applications, but they've already been written. LFS shows you how to run testsuites, but we don't go into the details of upgrading installed packages. I assume you don't intend to teach kernel development, because this certainly isn't a sensible place to ask about that! I get the impression you've heard of LFS, but not looked deeply - many people use it as the base of their systems, but there is a considerable amount to add on before it becomes comfortable. And you have to consider how you will support the problems that come up during your students' builds. If I wanted to write some code on my LFS-based system, I'd be running a number of xterms (actually, they're not xterms) and a graphical browser - that's without using version control - and probably a few other graphical tools. Take a look at what is actually in LFS, how much is in BLFS, and how much is at the edges of BLFS (e.g. mentioned in the 'Other Development Tools' section of http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/general/other-tools.html Plus, you get to do your own security upgrades. If you have never used LFS, and ask questions about using it for a course rather than spending a couple of days looking at how we build, I'm afraid I don't feel confident that the course will achieve anything. Seriously, if you want to run a course to develop application code, get a Live CD, test if it will let you do what you want, and then duplicate it. LFS is about understanding the nuts and bolts of linux, it's probably at a much lower level than your students will be expecting. If someone asked me to spend money so a student could study something that was mostly available online, I'd have a few questions to ask! I know LFS has been used for teaching, but I fear your students will think you've dragged them back to the dark ages. ĸen -- das eine Mal als Tragödie, das andere Mal als Farce -- http://linuxfromscratch.org/mailman/listinfo/lfs-support FAQ: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/faq.html Unsubscribe: See the above information page
