Canadian British Columbia's School District #73 opts for Debian GNU / Linux

Kamloops Thompson School District #73, British Columbia, Canada, with 55 elementary and secondary schools, chose a majority of open source software on Debian GNU / Linux as it is easier to maintain and in their experience offers better support.

Dean Montgomery, network support technician and programmer for District #73, stated in an interview:
"In 15 minutes I can update OpenOffice[.org] on thousands of diskless workstations. This beats ghosting [proprietary Operating Systems (OS)] hard drives."
Having used other proprietary OS and Linux distributions before, in mid 2006 they moved over to Debian GNU / Linux because it is significantly easier to keep up-to-date.
"We get better support with open source software: online wiki's, forums, mailing lists, etc, are much faster and better to get support than phoning up to [a proprietary OS company] and listening to someone read off answers from flash cards."
Even older kids get their work done on Debian GNU / Linux.
"Once the students see how much they can customize and tweak KDE desktop and play with Beryl 3D [(nowCompiz-Fusion)] desktop, they like Debian GNU / Linux more than [proprietary OS]."
"We give everyone FreeNX access to their Debian GNU / Linux desktop from home so they can get all the same programs without having to install [Debian GNU /] Linux at home."
Montgomery believes a crucial aspect of migrating to Linux or open sourced based software is training. And that student kids learn faster than technicians, secretaries and librarians. "If you don't know how to do something in Linux - just ask the students," he advised.
Read the complete interview at this page. Watch a sample video of Debian with Compiz-Fusion.
Read the original text at Debian Times.

About the Debian Project
Debian GNU / Linux is one of the free libre operating systems (GNU/Linux, GNU/Hurd, GNU/NetBSD,GNU/kFreeBSD), running 18733+ officially maintained packages on 15 hardware platforms, from cell phonesand network devices to mainframes and supercomputers, developed by more than two thousand volunteers from all over the world who collaborate via the internet
on the Debian Project.
Debian's dedication to Free Libre Open Source Software, its constitutional non-profit nature, its open andmeritocratic development model, organization and social governance make it a first among free libre operating system distributions.
The Debian project's key strengths are its volunteer base, its dedication to the Debian Social Contract and theDebian Constitution, and its commitment to provide the best operating systems attainable, following a strict quality policy, working with an established QA Team and helpful users reporting bugs, suggestions,exchanging ideas, and registering experiences.
You can help Debian Project without joining it and even not being a programmer, or being a development and or service partner company or institution at the Debian Partner Program, or simply making various donations to the Debian Project.
Debian Project news, press releases and press coverage can be found from the official Debian wiki page. PR contact at
debian-publicity list.