[K12OSN] Centos?

[Jeff Davis <jdavis standard k12 ca us>]

I've been getting a lot of questions lately re: thin clients for 
classroom deployment - Given that we use linux almost exclusively on the 
back end, it seems to me that this may be a good opportunity to get 
linux in front of teachers and students.  I have a couple of questions 
that hopefully have been answered previously.  I'm trying to mitigate 
the inevitable "it's what I have at home" push-back as much as possible, 
esp from teachers.

1) We anticipate needing a few basics, such as web browsing, email, and 
productivity apps.  I assume in this environment we're talking firefox, 
tbird, and OOo.

2) We also use some hosted apps that will not run under linux due to 
plugin issues.  The vendor does not appear to be willing to budge on 
this (big surprise there...)  I've been able to get firefox for windows 
installed on my linux box at home using WINE, and from there get the 
plugins installed.  Are there any pitfalls I should be aware of?

3) We are planning to do a very limited pilot using some older (p4-xeon) 
dual cpu servers (proliant ml530).  Realistically, what is the maximum 
number of clients I should attempt to connect to them.  The cpus are 
800mhz, with 2-4gb ram.  Hard drive space is in the neighborhood of 
80gb.  We're looking at cannibalizing several of these older servers to 
make one higher-capacity unit for the pilot

4)  Has anyone got this running under Centos or other 
longer-service-life distro?  If this takes off I would prefer not to 
have to upgrade every 6 months or so.

5)  We have an existing OpenLDAP/autofs infrastructure.  Should I 
anticipate any issues with integrating this system with existing 
services for authentication and home directory provisioning?

Thanks, and my apologies if these issues have been dealt with already.

-Jeff

begin:vcard
fn:Jeff Davis
n:Davis;Jeff
org:Standard School District
adr:;;1200 North Chester Ave;Bakersfield;CA;93308;usa
email;internet:jdavis standard k12 ca us
title:Technology and Information Systems Mgr
tel;work:661.392.2110
tel;fax:661.392.0681
x-mozilla-html:TRUE
url:http://www.standard.k12.ca.us
version:2.1
end:vcard