[ILUG] Re: Basic Into to Linux, need Ideas?

[Andrew Clarke]

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>    1. Re: ILUG Digest, Vol 42, Issue 16 (Tadeusz Cantwell)
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>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
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> Message: 1
> Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 11:44:43 +0100
> From: Tadeusz Cantwell <t4dc4n at gmail.com>
> Subject: [ILUG] Re: ILUG Digest, Vol 42, Issue 16
> To: ilug at linux.ie
> Message-ID:
> 	<3189786a0904160344s6919adeatce2830ea2537f371 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
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>   
>> Message: 4
>> Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 08:24:17 +0100
>> From: "Frank Murphy (Frankly3D)" <frankly3d at gmail.com>
>> Subject: [ILUG] Basic Into to Linux, need Ideas?
>> To: ILUG Users Group <ilug at linux.ie>
>> Message-ID: <49E6DD21.3020404 at gmail.com>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>>
>> Have convinced my local community thingey to allow me organise a
>> "Introduction to Linux" course\lessons.
>>
>> Which have been proprietry focused up to now.
>> Using LiveCD's, what sort of lesson content,
>> should I try include.
>> As I have no "teacher" type experience.
>>
>> Frank
>>
>>     
>
> What area is it in. If its close to me I'd like to go. I just have some
> basic experience, but theres lots I don't know.
>
> As well as doing the wow compiz part at the start, show them its also not
> very different to windows. In that here is your browser, office program,
> etc. People I meet think its really difficult because its new.
>
> Don't go into the kernel, distros, Linus, GNU etc at the start, that will
> loose most people.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
>   
Recently involved in delivering a similar course. Gentle introduction.

We found that Kubuntu 8.04.2 LTS is very accessible for Windows users, 
very stable (KDE 3) and contains almost all expected functionality. 
System Settings is similar to the Control Panel concept. Menu is in the 
expected place etc. KDE 3 is sufficiently mature so that almost 
everything can be done through the GUI keeping new users away from the 
bash shell command line (for now). Install kubuntu-restricted-extras 
straight away to avoid issues later. Hardware support is extremely good 
in this distro.

The software choices for new users can be quite daunting and users 
generally wanted recommendations for software. Sticking with 
Thunderbird, Firefox is a good idea. Songbird is almost a drop in 
replacement for iTunes. KDE's own Kopete works well for all major IM 
accounts in one place. The Kdenlive interface is very similar to Adobe 
Premier Pro for video editing. Digikam is a familiar interface for photo 
management. OpenOffice.org etc.

What I'd suggest is to choose your own software recommendations for 
everyday computing tasks and step users through these. What we found was 
that users could migrate very easily if you provide them with direct 
replacements for their software needs. We had users go away with the 
Live CD after the first day and come back saying they installed on home 
PCs without much trouble. Success!

Migration is the first step on the path to determined Linux users, you 
should aim to keep it simple and based on real-life requirements not 
effects / glitz / smoke and mirrors.

-
Andrew Clarke