Welcome!

This is the website for the Staffordshire LUG, or Linux Users Group.

Here you will find a number of articles written by existing group members, details on joining the mailing list, a host of helpful links and regular updates on our meet-ups.

We’re always happy to see new members, so feel free to join-in the activities via the following methods:

Staffslug Mailing List

#staffslug on irc.freenode.net

We strive to be a friendly group of people, and welcome any questions or queries regarding Linux or simply open-source software in general.

Mini Distro review [Sidux]

I recently decided to try something new. I was using ubuntu 9.10 and was really impressed with what the ubuntu team and community have done with bringing Linux to the masses, So much in fact my partner swapped over to ubuntu when she had her new laptop.

I have always been tempted to try Sid, Which is the unstable branch of the Debian distro. but when I think about It come to the conclusion that maybe “unstable” isnt for me. And that it’s just too cutting edge. Well I was wrong.

I downloaded the latest version of Sidux (Sidux-2009-03)and opted for the KDE-lite version, Now I’ve not used KDE4 since it was released and always stuck with what I know which is Gnome. I fired up the live-cd and got to work installing the distro. The install dialogs are very clearly explained and easy to follow. I seemed to be through the process in completely installed in a little under five minutes.

After a quick reboot I logged in with my details and was presented with a tidy looking desktop. The next thing to do was get the wireless up and running and after looking through the applications presented to me I found a program called Ceni after going through a few easy to understand dialogs I had my wireless up and running. This for me has to be the easiest way so far in any distro I’ve tried to get wirless working. It was even easier than ubuntu in this regard. After installing a few necessary applications Iceweasel,Icedove and abiword I was left with a very capable desktop that everything worked fine including sound etc.

One thing for me that sets sidux apart from most distros I’ve tried is the manual. It seems all distro’s have their own manual or documentation but sidux’s really shines for me I quickly found myself making my way through it. It really is written well and is easy to find with a nice link to it on the desktop.

All in all I am very impressed with Sidux and will be keeping it on my main computer. At the time of writing this I have been using Sidux now for well over a week and will post updates after I’ve been using it for a few months.

Ubuntu 9.10

An implementation of Open Source software in a secondary school.

This article is not a suggested template for schools, or evangelism on how schools should be proprietary software free zones. After all, in the work places and further education establishments that our schools are supposed to prepare young people for, many will be expected to have a level of familiarity with popular proprietary operating systems and applications. What this article is intended to do is detail what I have done at Hagley Park Sports College in Rugeley, UK where I work in ICT support.

Briefly, most schools I know of have two distinct networks, curriculum and administrative. Mine follows this model. There is a great deal of freedom for schools in how they deliver educational ICT and MIS systems.

The initial driver for introduction of GNU/Linux was the way the school organised the reservation of facilities like ICT rooms for other faculties’ lessons.  An Excel spreadsheet was used and shared on a MS file server for common access by teaching and support staff. This was inadequate for a number of reasons, not least because only one member of staff could edit the document at one time. No money was available; that and my predisposition to Open Source meant that it was always going to be a FOSS solution!

My familiarity with and the support for the Ubuntu distribution of GNU/Linux meant that the latest “long term support” version of the Ubuntu Server was the distro of choice. A little searching of the internet revealed MRBS (Meeting Room Booking System), a web application (to run in the school intranet) coded in PHP using a MySQL database and running on Apache web server. Crucially, it can “play nice” in a Microsoft network via open LDAP which meant users could log in to MRBS with their Windows domain login credentials. No need to maintain a separate database or file of user logins. The ability to install and configure LAMP software (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) as an option during the installation of Ubuntu Server, meant that the software environment MRBS needed was ready. There is great support for MRBS on the ‘net via an active mailing list which is archived and searchable. Pleasingly, the staff embraced the new system and it was extended for use in booking portable multimedia equipment and other resources.

Initially the system ran on a former curriculum system PIII desktop machine, beefed up with as much RAM as I could cram in and additional hard drives however a server became available after an upgrade and I migrated the services to that.

With that extra processing grunt came extra capacity for more services. There was no software help desk in the school; intranet delivery in mind I found a great deal of choice for help desk software. I decided to trial GLPI. Largely French developed, it is free IT and asset management software. Also well documented and supported via forums it provides for help desk and knowledge base and much more besides. Installed on the Ubuntu server, I trialed it within the support dept and ultimately opened it up to the staff. As with MRBS, GLPI has the facility to talk to the MS Active Directory via open LDAP.

So much for the administrative side. For the students, I installed Audacity, an audio editor and the GIMP for image editing, the former is now fully used in delivering one educational module. Both applications were rolled out via a popular proprietary package manager without any problem to Windows XP desktops.

As you might expect, within ICT support GNU/Linux helps out. Largely with tasks like data recovery from corrupt floppy disks, hard disks and USB pen drives thanks to dd, dd_rescue, mount, fuse and many more wonderful open source apps. Wireshark for network traffic monitoring too.

There is scope for expansion and thanks to the availability of another server and with the continuing support of the head of ICT I’m looking to introduce Asterisk / FreePBX for VoIP telephony and video conferencing. Would be nice to get Open Office in too!

A little further down the line, I’d like to have an Edubuntu server available either working with terminals (curriculum workstations network booted) or a NX session with the free Windows NX client.

Lug Radio 2009

Lugradio Live 2009, 24th October 2009,  Newhampton Arts Centre Wolvehampton