[ExeterLUG] Exwick Community Centre LTSP - was Re: Fwd: [LUG] Exwick Ark Progress - and do you want to meet up in September in Exeter? Any projects people want to pursue in the area?

Tue Sep 2 20:17:14 UTC 2014

On 2 September 2014 20:33, Daniel Smith <dan at todayintech.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
> On 02/09/2014 17:25, Paul Sutton wrote:

>> So the same people are still running the Exwick community association
>> its just the building is now owned by the council.
>>
>> In which case it should be fine,  I had the idea of some new people
>> coming, in and never having heard of Linux decide its easier to rip
>> everything out and use windows.
>
> From what it sounds like I think the Council are in charge of the building not the ECA otherwise we would get it at a much lower rate or free like we did before.
>
> Guess it is up to them at the end of the day what they want to do with the network, doubt the PCs they have would support Windows very well.
>
> Dan
>>
>>

First of all, apologies if this comes out in HTML with bad formatting,
or klingon or whatever, we're switching to Google Mail for Business at
work and I'm still getting the hang of the interface.

I guess at the end of the day, they've had the Internet Cafe in for 6
years now (or there abouts, IIRC it was finished just after I got
married in 2008... I never knew it would last longer than my marriage
:-P).  If you ask me, the kit has done well, I mean the clients are
circa 2000 Pentium 3 machines and were really slow when we fitted
them, now they're really really old (as old as my eldest daughter) so
they might well be due for replacement, either with newer old kit
(maybe something made in the last 4 or 5 years?) or maybe something
else.

At the time the idea about using old kit was that it meant that the
kit was saved from going to landfill, and I think 14 years is a pretty
good life span for an old machine.  The kit is now getting a bit retro
but might be good for setting up and running old games on (network
Doom anyone?).

If we stuck with LTSP I'd suggest the OS on the server was upgraded to
something supported (maybe not Ubuntu with Unity as I doubt that would
run too well over LTSP), but possibly another *Buntu distro or
something (Mint, Debian, CentOS whatever).  I'd say something with
long term support again (Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and Mint LTS releases are
supported until something like April 2019, I gather Debian is also now
going to be supported long term, can't comment on other distos).
Using a newer PC opens up the options for local apps running on the
PCs but stored on the server (such as Firefox or Chrome with Flash)
which would ease the load on the sever (running Flash over LTSP was
painfully slow and hammered the server's CPU).  The server is a Quad
Core Xeon (2.4GHz I think, equivalent to a Core 2 Quad) with 4GB Ram
and IIRC 2 x 250GB hard drives in a hardware RAID array.  It also has
Dell integrated lights out (although I'd expect as they've replaced
kit down there it's probably not got the port forwarding setup for
external access).

Other than a PC, I don't know how well Raspberry Pi's run LTSP, I
remember seeing someone was working on an LTSP client distro for them.

Or maybe they could have just plain old desktops (or even old laptops
attached to external keyboards and mice and their existing monitors)
running <insert favourite OS here>.

I guess it depends who is going to support it.  Back when I originally
did the LTSP server I committed to it because I was working in Exeter,
now I'm working in Newton and living in Torquay I rarely go to Exeter
and can't warrant the cost of fuel all the time going up there (hence
why I don't always get to LUG meetings or Pi Jams up there).

I'm happy to help out where I can, possibly even arrange a day to go
up and sort it out, but ideally we need the community centre to give
us access to the router to setup port forwarding,and even better if we
can convince them to upgrade to FTTC... the ADSL out there is
painfully slow but I'm pretty certain they have an FTTC cab just a few
metres away, and my god does it make all the difference!

Other option is if they pay to get someone in... would be lovely if
they paid us to help them out (even fuel/pizza expenses), or they
could go to XYZ Windows Company and buy all new singing and dancing
Windows 8.1 machines with Office 20XX, I guess it's up to them what
they want to do :-)

Rob

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