Club Linux Coffs Harbour

This year I ran a trial at a primary school in Lismore where all the year Year 5 and 6 students had a HP 2140 Netbook running Ubuntu. The trial has been a huge hit and will be continued next year. All computers in the school are now running Ubuntu KK. I have been asked to role out the same system at SFX Woolgoolga next year. Please let me know if you would like to know more about the pilot program.

Corrections are now available to address security problems to the stable distribution Debian GNU/Linux 5.0 (codename lenny). Also offered are a few adjustment to serious problems in the Debian project's third update. However, the update does not translate into a new version of Debian GNU/Linux 5.0 instead users can expect updates from some of the packages.

Riding around Northern Chiang Mai today I passed this:

I woke the owner up, he spoke a little english and said that we open source people should stick together and share the knowledge. He looked a bit sleepy so I let him toddle back to bed.

Yes it's genuine, and utterly incomprehensible. Must lose something in the translation.

(via BoingBoing)

It's just been brought to my attention that the Coffs Coast Community College is offering courses this semester in OpenOffice.org and the GIMP, led by one David Bryant, a familiar face to ClubLinux regulars. Well done David! I would advise anybody interested to enrol ASAP.

Earlier this month the Free Software Foundation (FSF) announced a "reboot" of it's High Priority list, a list of projects critical to allowing people to use their computers in freedom. I've finally had a look at the revised list, and think it's right on the money.

Oh the irony of reading about this on a Microsoft site - link
This bit was particularly interesting -

Microsoft Netherlands spokesman Hans Bos noted that its Word documents were still allowed as equal alternatives to ODF for the moment, and added he expects the company will soon receive approval for its Open Office XML to qualify as "open source."

But he said the company was worried about and opposed other aspects of the Dutch policy.

Specifically, he said, the provision that government agencies should prefer open source was overly proscriptive.

Overly proscriptive?! Now hang on a minute....

You Got ME Matthew, I don't how long I spent trying to close that window!!!!!!

Gnome fanatics should read no further. (If they have a point, it escapes me.) The release of KOffice 2.0.0 is expected next year. The developers are aiming for cross-platform use and are challenging the dominance of the (free open source ?) office software with no legal name. KWord, evidently, has already run on Windows.

Yours truly has been (and is continuing to be) instrumental in setting up a site for KOffice users. Help of any kind is welcome.

This development makes me think of all those years reading HOWTOs and editing modelines and want to weep tears of joy: