[K12OSN] K12LTSP missing some important stuff for our school purposes

Thu Nov 2 18:45:17 UTC 2006

No, you don't need a sound card in the server.

When the client boots up, before starting X, you should see some messages about the 
loading of the sound server; are you?  What messages do you see?

Also, have you specified ESD or NASD in lts.conf?  NASD never works for me; ESD does, 
but only under Gnome.

Petre

Tom Wolfe wrote:
> OK,  I've tried a couple of Ensoniq sound cards:
> Ensoniq ES1371 (on board PCI)
> Ensoniq ES5880 (PCI card)
> ... neither is working for me. Both work under DamnSmallLinux.
> 
> Does my server need to have a sound card? Because it doesn't. Sorry if
> that's a stupid question...
> 
> Regards,
> Tom Wolfe
> 
> On Wed, 1 Nov 2006, Robert Arkiletian wrote:
> 
>> On 11/1/06, Tom Wolfe <twolfe at sawback.com> wrote:
>>> ...can you recommend an inexpensive sound card that will work out of the
>>> box?
>>
>>
>> Ensoniq AudioPCI
>> Soundblaster 128 PCI
>>
>>
>> thanks again,
>>> Tom Wolfe
>>> Morley, Alberta
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, 1 Nov 2006, Gentgeen wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 18:24:59 -0700
>>>> "Tom Wolfe" <twolfe at sawback.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hi folks,
>>>>>
>>>>> I've been test driving K12LTSP a little, and have done some looking
>>>>> around the lists and googling to see if any resolutions to some issues
>>>>> I've notice are there... and thought I'd run things by this list.
>>>>>
>>>>> 1. A shortcoming in general with Linux is default support for
>>>>> (proprietary) Internet multimedia formats. The typical response from
>>>>> K12LTSP supporters seems to be "We decided to not support proprietary
>>>>> formats"... but realistically, I need to provide students with *easy*
>>>>> access, for example, to CBC's website (http://cbc.ca) which has
>>>>> windows formats as its default (*very* limited .ogg support) :( Real
>>>>> Player, Shockwave and Flash are other examples.
>>>>>
>>>> This is not a shortcoming of Linux, but a shortcoming (or at least a
>>>> short sightedness of the manufacturers.  Mplayer, and some codecs will
>>>> take care most multimedia files out there but you mentioned some of the
>>>> ones that do not work.
>>>>
>>>> Real Player -- there is Helix, but I have not tried it.  Real Player has
>>>> released a player for Linux, but if I recall it is out of date. You
>>>> would have to check.
>>>>
>>>> Shockwave -- Talk to adobe on this one :-)
>>>>
>>>> Flash -- As you may have noticed, the Linux support here is a full
>>>> version behind. The Linux version has always been a little behind, but
>>>> now you may have noticed it is a full version behind.  It still works
>>>> for many sites, but some insist on you having Flash 8, so that can be a
>>>> pain. The reason it is a full version behind now is that Adobe has
>>>> decided to rewrite the code for Linux Flash.  BIG KUDOS to them for this
>>>> move, but it does put us at a disadvantage over the short run.  (see
>>>>
>>> http://www.crn.com/sections/breakingnews/breakingnews.jhtml;jsessionid=T3KZ3F51SMLPOQSNDLPSKHSCJUNN2JVN?articleId=192501179
>>>> for some details.)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> We can philosophically decide to not support proprietary formats, but
>>>>> in doing so we are also deciding to deny students access to (the bulk
>>>>> of?) internet multimedia information.
>>>>>
>>>> It is not a philosophically issue, but a legal/tech issue.  Distros can
>>>> not ship certain players, so you have to get it yourself (just like in
>>>> the windows world).  Or there just is no player for Linux, and this is
>>>> an issue outside of the communities control.
>>>>
>>>>> I believe that these need to be supported by any OS used in an
>>>>> educational setting. Like pdf files, these are just way too entrenched
>>>>> to dismiss, and they should be supported by default.
>>>> But unlike PDF, they are still CLOSED.  At least PDF is an open format.
>>>> (not as in FLOSS, but as in anyone can use it)
>>>>
>>>>> 2. Sound -- I have about 25 workstations I'd like to use with
>>>>> K12LTSP... but they are all pretty diverse platforms: many different
>>>>> NICs, sound cards, and video cards. Is there any easy way to do
>>>>> this...? Or is it a matter of researching each individual hardware
>>>>> setup to get things rolling? I'm thinking of sinking for a couple
>>>>> dozen $20 network cards so that at least I have that in common.
>>>>> Besides, booting workstations with floppies seems to me to be too much
>>>>> of a hassle.
>>>> I would spend the $20 on standardizing the sound card, assuming your
>>>> network cards are PCI and they are 100Mbps.  Sound is where all your
>>>> "hassle" will be, not with the network card.  As noted, get PCI cards,
>>>> and get ones that are well supported in Linux.
>>>>
>>>> An easy way to do what?  With video and audio, you can use the "auto"
>>>> option in your lts.conf and most will automatically be detected.  (after
>>>> that, I would find out exact what cards the "auto" option did find, and
>>>> then change your config file.  This will make the boot process faster,
>>>> and you don't have to do all the leg work in finding all the card info).
>>>>
>>>> With the booting from floppies... guess that depends on what you are
>>>> doing.  If your clients have a hard drive, you could use this:
>>>> http://www.wizzy.org.za/article/articlestatic/14/1/2/
>>>> This is what I do here.  Another option would be buy NICs with bootroms,
>>>> but I am pretty sure that is more then 20 buck each.  You could also
>>>> check the BOIS of the machines, some might be able to boot from the
>>>> network to start with (if they have the NIC on board I assume).
>>>>
>>>> As for booting from Floppy (if that is the road you must use) -- But the
>>>> Universal boot floppy in the drive, then pull the drive back 1 set of
>>>> holes.  Put a cover plate over the hole(s) (or maybe some duct tape).
>>>> Hassle gone.  Now just like haveing a Hard Drive.
>>>>
>>>>> 3. rdesktop -- why isn't this standard with K12LTSP installation?
>>>>> Sure, it's easy enough to yum install rdesktop, but...??
>>>>>
>>>> Why doesn't Windows come with Quicktime standard?  Sure it's easy enough
>>>> to exe install Quicktime, but...??
>>>>
>>>> Come on, is this really an issue for you?
>>>>
>>>>> 4. K12LTSP on Pentium I & II / 10 Mbps networks -- slow and unusable!
>>>>> I see lots of people talking about using old hardware with K12LTSP but
>>>>> I'm only getting acceptable performance from PIII/500+ MHz 100 Mbps
>>>>> NIC, and this seems to me to be a minimum hardware requirement. Even
>>>>> then, something like Celestia crawls compared to the way it does with
>>>>> a local hard drive installation. Any tips? Am I missing something?
>>>> I have a PI client, 64 MB RAM and a 2MB RAM Sis Video card.  Not the
>>>> fastest of my clients, but for email, web, abiword, solitaire, and it
>>>> does just as well as the others. Now I am useing IceWM and ROX and not
>>>> Gnome/KDE but that is more a user decision then a hardware decision.
>>>>
>>>> Another client is a 233MHz processor, 128MB RAM and a 4MB RAM video
>>>> card.  Works just as well as my fastest client.  That one is the same as
>>>> above, but has a 500MHz processor.
>>>>
>>>> Your real issue here is the network speed.  You REALLY need to use
>>>> 100Mbps - 10 is just TOO slow.  I've done it, and it works, but I would
>>>> not want to do it for a long time and with 20+ clients. (I did it as a
>>>> proof of concept with 1 off the shelf PC as the server, and 10 old PCs
>>>> as the clients.  Then as we got the money, we did the various upgrades
>>>> needed.  STARTING with the network backbone.)  And if you are going to
>>>> have 20 clients, you need Gig at the switch.
>>>>
>>>> Have you tried Celestria on the PII as a native app (i.e. not LTSP).
>>>> I am pretty sure that 90% of distros out there on a PII or less will
>>>> choke.  Believe me, I have tried.  It talks a special distro to may
>>>> my PI work as a stand alone.
>>>>
>>>>> BTW, my Dell SC1425 server works fine so long as I don't use it as an
>>>>> X terminal itself... something to do with the video card, but I'm not
>>>>> worrying about it for now.
>>>>>
>>>>> ...and if any of this has been over-discussed already my apologies,
>>>>> please ignore or refer me off list to the right place for answers.
>>>>>
>>>>> Despite the hurdles I'm pretty interested and optimistic. It seems
>>>>> like an amazing project, though certainly NOT "easy and working, duh?"
>>>>> yet.
>>>> K12LTSP has to be one of the most "easy and working" distros I have
>>>> seen. (And I have worked with all of the big names, and many of the
>>>> little guys as well).  But you have to come at it with the right
>>>> knowledge and equipment.  Would you send an American football player
>>>> into an Australian Rules Football game?  Nope.  They are both football,
>>>> both sports, but each require a different set of knowledge and/or
>>>> special equipment. Same with the Windows World and the Linux world.
>>>> Both are OS's, both use i386 architecture, but they require a different
>>>> set of knowledge and/or special equipment.
>>>>
>>>>> Regards,
>>>>> Tom Wolfe
>>>>> Morley, Alberta
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> K12OSN mailing list
>>>>> K12OSN at redhat.com
>>>>> https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/k12osn
>>>>> For more info see <http://www.k12os.org>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> http://gentgeen.homelinux.org
>>>>
>>>> #############################################################
>>>>  Associate yourself with men of good quality if you esteem
>>>>  your own reputation; for 'tis better to be alone then in bad
>>>>  company.        - George Washington, Rules of Civility
>>>>
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>>
>>
>> --
>> Robert Arkiletian
>> Eric Hamber Secondary, Vancouver, Canada
>> Fl_TeacherTool http://www3.telus.net/public/robark/Fl_TeacherTool/
>> C++ GUI tutorial http://www3.telus.net/public/robark/
>>
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