ÜberStudent, Ubuntu-Based OS for Students

[ÜberStudent]

I wanted to announce the availability of a new Ubuntu-based distro, ÜberStudent aimed at higher ed and high school students, and ask for testers since this is a 0.9 version. Suggestions are also welcomed, of course. :)

To find out more go to http://uberstudent.org

[venator260]

http://uberstudent.org/features.html

Under the Messaging heading, the name of Pidgin is spelled Pidgen.

[dragos240]

Ooh..... big iso file 3GB.

[ÜberStudent]

Version 0.9.1 is now available. Faster, more features, smaller download, fixes. http://uberstudent.org

[MasterNetra]

Looks interesting.

[crlang13]

looks interesting, but I think a question you may get is why wouldn't I use edubuntu?

Are you looking at trying to integrate this system into highschools and universities? In this, are you then going to be trying to offer support for the integration of this system into schools. If so, it has potential.

[MasterNetra]

looks interesting, but I think a question you may get is why wouldn't I use edubuntu? ...

Sure why wouldn't teenagers want to use a distro aimed at younger children instead of a more cooler looking one that has them and higher education in mind. hmm...who knows.

[koleoptero]

Looks like there's been some work on this. Well done. I hope it catches on. :)

[ÜberStudent]

looks interesting, but I think a question you may get is why wouldn't I use edubuntu?.


I'd definitely recommend EduBuntu over UberStudent...for people who've yet to enter high school. ;-)

[d3v1150m471c]

http://uberstudent.org/features.html

Under the Messaging heading, the name of Pidgin is spelled Pidgen.

Negative, the chat client is spelled pidgin. http://www.pidgin.im/

[DeadSuperHero]

It's a nice idea, but I sort of have to ask: what is the point of all this?

These are all pieces of software readily available in the Ubuntu repos, why not just make a meta-package?

[ÜberStudent]

It's a nice idea, but I sort of have to ask: what is the point of all this?

These are all pieces of software readily available in the Ubuntu repos, why not just make a meta-package?

You're factually incorrect about everything being available in the Ubuntu repos.

And you know, Ubuntu is a nice idea, but I sort of have to ask: what is the point of it all?

I mean, let's take a look back at the announcement for the first release: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-announce/2004-October/000003.html

I mean, really, what had they truly added? They re-branded a bunch of Gnome and Debian packages, monetized Firefox with Ubufox and their own referrer codes, hacked some Debian customizations to take them over for themselves, picked and chose a bunch of python stuff made by RedHat for themselves, added some extra debian packages for hardware detection, wrapped it in what some call a ghastly orange-and-barf-brown theme, etc.

I mean, couldn't they just have made a meta-package and let people install it over top of Debian?

Obviously, I'm being facetious to make an underlying point. ;-)

[earthpigg]

These are all pieces of software readily available in the Ubuntu repos, why not just make a meta-package?

or release a meta-package in addition to the 3gb .iso.

[ÜberStudent]

or release a meta-package in addition to the 3gb .iso.

2.2 gb.

[Mr. Picklesworth]

The navigation on your site really renders oddly for me. When I hover over the links in Firefox, the text is offset both vertically and horizontally.
In Chromium, that happens but it isn't the end of it; the links hit the boundary of the navigation bar and end up wrapping to the next line!
“Contact us” is especially unclickable.

The sub menu options appear to hover in mid-air - looks kind of odd to me. Are there maybe some missing graphics?

Also, I must protest against dropdown menus in web sites, especially those that appear on hover. (I always do this). If you really want that style of navigation, check out how the new kde.org (http://kde.org/) does it.

There's a box that says “Invite us to present Uberstudent at your campus.” It's positioned absolutely to avoid a collision with the fixed width container, but the position of that box isn't reliable! Since it's in the middle of the page, simply stretching my browser window (to anything over ~1300 pixels wide) reveals a rather ugly overlap.

Where does the version number come from? 0.9.1 sounds oddly like 9.10 divided by 10. Just curious :)

[RiceMonster]

2.2 gb.

That's still pretty big, to be honest.

[koleoptero]

That's still pretty big, to be honest.

It's a lot of stuff.

[ÜberStudent]

Thanks, Picklesworth (http://ubuntuforums.org/member.php?u=68780). :-) Just when I thought I'd worked out most of those issues, looks like more stuff to do. :)

The KDE site is indeed gorgeous.

[ÜberStudent]

@ w.cain

Absolutely! This is stated very clearly at uberstudent.org, but perhaps not clearly enough, which needs to remedied. Have a look at http://www.k12opensourceclassroom.org/?p=264


@Mr. Picklesworth

I think I've fixed the website bugs you pointed out. Does it appear so to you? To others?

[bryncoles]

On this (http://www.uberstudent.org/features.html#programs) page, your link to Mendeley actually takes me to Thunderbird. Also, for obstinate bleeders like me who use noscript, your site doesn't render well. Looks fine if i allow scripts though.

Can I ask, does this distribution come with LaTeX and R as standard? Perhaps it should (yes I know people have already commented that it needs to lose weight, but these might be useful tools for scientists!)

*edit*

I forgot to say, This actually looks like a nice re-packaging. Good work!

[Mr. Picklesworth]

@Mr. Picklesworth

I think I've fixed the website bugs you pointed out. Does it appear so to you? To others?

Yep, that looks fixed to me :)

PS: Just found your use of ubiquity-slideshow. Cool! (I made it; always warms my heart to see it in action — especially with original content).

Just so you know, you can get that nifty reflection as seen on the Ubuntu image, for any image, by putting it inside the images-source/ubuntu directory and running make. (Or manually running the gimp .scm script that's in there).

Otherwise, the actual source images are also in that directory (may be icons-source depending on which version you're basing this on), so you can turn the SVGs straight into PNGs and work from there, applying your own style for consistency.

[ÜberStudent]

Thanks @bryncoles and @Picklesworth for the website point-outs.

@bryncoles - The goal with UberStudent is to provide a core of programs common (or that should be common) to highered and high school students of all academic disciplines (hopefully for HS students, that is, some high schools are just so behind with things). From there, users then use the Academic Software Installer, which categorizes programs by academic discipline. That way, the OS can be very conveniently extended by students for their specific majors and disciplines. Since LaTeX and such is principally for science students, it would go in a Science category in the installer.

There's lots to do to get the Academic Software Installer going. A lot of free programs for academics lack debs, while others have dependency issues. I think it will be best as a webapp that uses apt links, one reason is that a lot of academic software for Linux just is not free, e.g., Mathematica (http://www.wolfram.com/products/student/mathforstudents/index.html). Providing a place for people to explore all academic software that runs on Linux would be an awesome service, I think. They'd install with apt links when possible, and otherwise follow links to do what they need to do to get non-free software.

@Picklesworth - I'm really glad you made the slideshow! It seriously took up the professionalism of ubiquity and the Ubuntu install experience by a huge order of magnitude, IMHO. And thanks for the point-outs using make. :)

[Megaptera]

Downloaded & installed and enjoying exploring!!

Thanks.

[ÜberStudent]

Glad. :D