Slashdot Mirror

I am writing this in an internet cafe in Khartoum Sudan. I had to bite into this one. Nicolas Negroponte is a brilliant guy but I think he has been listening too much to RedHat.com executives. They think only in terms of Gnome or KDE desktops which are bloated. After all Red Hat mainly produce for Multinational Businesses who can afford state of the art hardware. You can run lighter desktops such as fluxbox or xfce. Incidentally the Chinese might beat Negroponte to the finish. They are looking like making a linux laptop for US 187 already: http://www.sci-tech-today.com/news/A-Linux-Laptop- for--187-/story.xhtml?story_id=10000B5Y3P5W Plus this: http://cebitvideo.com/?p=20 I can tell you my Local Sudanese Security Officer would give anything to have my HP laptop multi-booting Ubuntu/Fedora/FreeBSD and dare I say it Windows. At the moment teaching him the Linux Professional Institute tutorials from the IBM website. The guy is a sponge for information. Probably try to get him a job at my organisation in The Hague so he can afford an education at Leicester University's Security Management Program by which time he can go back into the UN System as a Professional Grade Officer. He will probably finish up being my boss! I have been surprised by the number of Linux/BSD nerds I have met in the internet cafe! Two sites of interest for Low Resource Linux for the third world or poorly funded non-profits in the developed world: http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/ http://www.rule-project.org/ There seems to be a lot of Americans on this site who think all Africans live in mud huts and are all starving. There are a lot of smart people here and a when the government gets out of the way quite a lot of entrepeneural skill. Africa's problem is predominantly corruption and our Western Governments are pretty much responsible for that. In particular big oil companies. There are a lot of evil people in government here...but the same could be said of the USA, UK and Australia for that matter. For the record I am dual/national Australian/British and if I could I would denationalise altogether.

E.g.: RULE :Run Up-to-date Linux Everywhere. Though (fortunately) this is nmore than one geek. This is a version of Redhat that has all the security of the current version, with a base install that uses minimal RAM and storage.

Might want to take a look here: http://www.rule-project.org/article.php3?id_articl e=1

the only one linux dristro especially designed to run on old computer that i know of is the RULE project.
http://www.rule-project.org/

there's another project called "The RULE Mini-KDE"
http://www.rule-project.org/article.php3?id_articl e=1

It is based on a stripped down version of Red Hat

the only one linux dristro especially designed to run on old computer that i know of is the RULE project.
http://www.rule-project.org/

there's another project called "The RULE Mini-KDE"
http://www.rule-project.org/article.php3?id_articl e=1

It is based on a stripped down version of Red Hat

I was running Fedora Core 2 on my PII 250mhz machine until quite recently when the power supply went pooft. But I had 300 MB RAM in it.

I have also installed Red Hat 9 on less powerful machines (486, P1) with just 32MB RAM using the installer developed by the RULE project http://www.rule-project.org/en/ (old URL, their website appears to be down ATM). The current version of their installer is capable of installing FC3 AFAIK.

The RULE (Run Up-to-date Linux Everywhere) Project http://rule-project.org/en/index_old.php/ have had good success in installing Fedora on old PC's using a custom installer (their main site appears to be down at the moment, the link is to the old site).

http://www.vum.at/ have used the RULE installer to install Linux on computers donated to schools in the Congo.

I'd say those people should take a look at xfce or http://www.rule-project.org/. There are projects that are optimised for low-power machines.

But that cannot be the focus of modern desktop development!

There is also the RULE project: Run Up-to-date Linux Everywhere.

http://www.rule-project.org/

But this seems to mostly be a labor of love for a small group of developers... in other words, it's not progressing quickly.

At the moment you can make a RULE install of Red Hat Linux 8 or 9. What's cool is that they made an installer that can run in 12 MB of RAM!

They said they are working on Fedora Core 2, but I don't know when they will be done.

I am a Debian fan so I found the Red Hat-ness of RULE a bit uncomfortable. But if you like Red Hat then by all means check this out.

steveha

Bloatware -- it's not just for Microsoft anymore. Your typical latest SuSE and RedHats require 64MB of main memory or more, and god forbid you try running OOo on the thing. Still too much!

What to do for your granma's system? You want something with up-to-date kernel, a low-profile windowing system and a nice combination of office apps that don't chew up memory and disk like they were going out of style.

Run Uptodate Linux Everywhere is one place to look.

Vector Linux is another.

RULE

as described here.

We have restarted activity a couple of weeks ago: several LUGs worldwide have already accepted to redistribute by snail mail our CDs locally. The complete list will available monday

Marco F.

You might want to check out the RULE project ("Run Up to date Linux Everywhere).
RULE home page

Try The RULE Project. Their specs are different from yours, but the sentiment is there, & yes, they are trying to create a CD installer, with a gui. Another important factor is that they are trying to create a customized distribution that is up to date. Most small distributions are using old kernels & software that should no longer be used.

I should point out, though, that a gui should not be the only way to install. The important thing is whether or not there is feed back. I'm open to using a BASH script that explains why you have to do such-n-such or can't use this or that. I think that as long as the feed back is meaningful & much of it is automated, then they should be okay.

I must say, though, whether we're talking about MS or Linux, I can't imagine getting useful wordprocessors on those old computers. Browsers & email, maybe, but I don't know of any good Linux word processors for small computers. Maybe Corel would help?

If anybody creates a distro for small computers, then please put aside your GPL religion for a moment, & install Opera. It's faster, smaller & better than Mozilla. It's also allows users to customize style sheets for the web sites that they visit.

Don't give up completely yet!

There are people who agree with you, and are working on something similar to what you are asking for. Note that I am not an expert on this, but I thought it was an interesting and valid question, as I have a penchant for running Linux on old/retired (mostly non-x86 though) hardware. I am a professional sysadmin, so I don't think too much about getting something up and running on a weird machine, as that is what interests me. But I am also aware of the ease of use/installation issue, because I have supported Macs and Windows machines for years, and used Macs at home for years as well. You can't beat the "stick a CD in the drive, click a button, walk away, and when you come back there is a working system" model of installation.

Anyway, for a project that seems to be aligned to what you are asking for, you might want to check out the RULE project. I just found out about them recently, and I don't know how up to date they are, but they seem to have similar goals to what you have described. They claim that one of their installers can run in 12Mb of RAM, and the other in 6Mb. They install mainly a stock copy of Redhat, but with the package list stripped down to make a smaller profile. In addition, it appears that they are doing some work on the Kdrive X server, which is a very small XFree86 replacement.

Unfortunately, my lowest spec Intel machine (a p133 laptop), that I used to test and run things to make sure it worked on slower machines, was stolen when somebody broke into my house, so I have no way at the moment to test the RULE project out. Most of my other machines are SPARCs or Powerpcs, so they don't work with this project. You might want to check out your local Linux user group, as in my experience they are usually packrats, and have lots of old machines, and a willingness to help.

Don't give up just yet. Do you know about the RULE Project? (an up to date yet lightweight version of RH made for just this sort of application) And then there are the distros like Crux, Peanut and Vector etc. My own systems were stock standard Mandrake, all I did was select the appropriate packages. In fact I'm still using those lightweight tools under Mdk 9.2 - IceWm/Sylpheed/Firebird/OO.org etc are all included on the install CDs. I'm not sure how hard it would be to create a customised reinstall-CD for such a system, but I am sure it can be done. You can see examples of a lightweight Mdk at The Lofat Linux page.

"Hardware is only as old as the SW it runs"
You can and should make "old" PCs new again with projects like RULE (temporarily on idle, will come back for Fedora Core 2)

This is why I said you can run a text environment using redhat packages on less, not that you can install with less. However, you can use the installers or anaconda patches provided by RULE if you want to try RedHat on such a system.

Sure, compare a 2002 distribution to a 1995 distribution -- real fair. How do your systems handle Windows XP?

Maybe instead of whining, perhaps you could actually contribute. this site would probably be a good place to start.

The RULE Project provides a simple installer using Bash scripts. It is highly modifiable. It uses very little RAM, which allows it to fulfill its primary purpose, that being to enable the most recent Red Hat Linux distributions to be installed on low-end hardware. They call their lean 'n' mean installer Slinky. It is currently under active development and probably could still use some usability improvements, but it is a fully-functional installer with minimal overhead.

The RULE Project provides a simple installer using Bash scripts. It is highly modifiable. It uses very little RAM, which allows it to fulfill its primary purpose, that being to enable the most recent Red Hat Linux distributions to be installed on low-end hardware. They call their lean 'n' mean installer Slinky. It is currently under active development and probably could still use some usability improvements, but it is a fully-functional installer with minimal overhead.

Replacement installers that put the latest Red Hat distributions on older systems (~Pentium w/ 32MB RAM). It installs light-weight X-Server, called TinyX (formerly kdrive) and desktop.

See their software database for some applications with low resource requirements.

Well, this isn't exactly getting rid of X but it would silence all the people who screaming about X's supposed bloat.

I just stumbled across Kdrive (not related to KDE) which is a _TINY_ X server written by well know X hacker Keith Packard.

Here's a listing of top from the RULE (another cool minimal Linux project) web site running Kdrive and Moz. Kind of a funny contrast really. :-)

792 mfratoni 15 0 22756 22M 12384 S 15.3 59.8 1:19 mozilla-bin
720 root 15 0 7192 3600 1148 S 10.0 9.5 0:27 X

Awww... look at the little X server. He's so cute!

Here's a pic
of kdrive running the Gimp, Xfce (svelt file manager), some random apps and some pagers. That's just very cool to have all those apps running in such a mimimalistic environment.

Well, this isn't exactly getting rid of X but it would silence all the people who screaming about X's supposed bloat.

I just stumbled across Kdrive (not related to KDE) which is a _TINY_ X server written by well know X hacker Keith Packard.

Here's a listing of top from the RULE (another cool minimal Linux project) web site running Kdrive and Moz. Kind of a funny contrast really. :-)

792 mfratoni 15 0 22756 22M 12384 S 15.3 59.8 1:19 mozilla-bin
720 root 15 0 7192 3600 1148 S 10.0 9.5 0:27 X

Awww... look at the little X server. He's so cute!

Here's a pic
of kdrive running the Gimp, Xfce (svelt file manager), some random apps and some pagers. That's just very cool to have all those apps running in such a mimimalistic environment.

Well, this isn't exactly getting rid of X but it would silence all the people who screaming about X's supposed bloat.

I just stumbled across Kdrive (not related to KDE) which is a _TINY_ X server written by well know X hacker Keith Packard.

Here's a listing of top from the RULE (another cool minimal Linux project) web site running Kdrive and Moz. Kind of a funny contrast really. :-)

792 mfratoni 15 0 22756 22M 12384 S 15.3 59.8 1:19 mozilla-bin
720 root 15 0 7192 3600 1148 S 10.0 9.5 0:27 X

Awww... look at the little X server. He's so cute!

Here's a pic
of kdrive running the Gimp, Xfce (svelt file manager), some random apps and some pagers. That's just very cool to have all those apps running in such a mimimalistic environment.

Have you thought about RULE?

Here's a better one;

Install a minimal distribution on a small machine, grab the image, and install the image on the hard drive of any new systems as needed.

When the system boots the first time, it will configure itself.

What to use as a base is up to you. Consider Peanut Linux, Knoppix (which can be installed to the hard disk), or a very promising distribution named RULE.

What makes RULE interesting is that it is not really a distribution by itself, but a set of packages and an installer that are added to Red Hat 8.0 that allow you to run Red Hat's distribution on more modest hardware. For example, a 486 with 32MB of RAM will use the same kernel with RULE as a stock Red Hat 8.0 system will.

Take a look at the screenshots showing RULE running on 486s with 16MB of RAM. If you want to add other packages, such as OpenOffice, you can just like a full Red Hat 8.0 installation.

Here's a better one;

Install a minimal distribution on a small machine, grab the image, and install the image on the hard drive of any new systems as needed.

When the system boots the first time, it will configure itself.

What to use as a base is up to you. Consider Peanut Linux, Knoppix (which can be installed to the hard disk), or a very promising distribution named RULE.

What makes RULE interesting is that it is not really a distribution by itself, but a set of packages and an installer that are added to Red Hat 8.0 that allow you to run Red Hat's distribution on more modest hardware. For example, a 486 with 32MB of RAM will use the same kernel with RULE as a stock Red Hat 8.0 system will.

Take a look at the screenshots showing RULE running on 486s with 16MB of RAM. If you want to add other packages, such as OpenOffice, you can just like a full Red Hat 8.0 installation.

Here's a better one;

Install a minimal distribution on a small machine, grab the image, and install the image on the hard drive of any new systems as needed.

When the system boots the first time, it will configure itself.

What to use as a base is up to you. Consider Peanut Linux, Knoppix (which can be installed to the hard disk), or a very promising distribution named RULE.

What makes RULE interesting is that it is not really a distribution by itself, but a set of packages and an installer that are added to Red Hat 8.0 that allow you to run Red Hat's distribution on more modest hardware. For example, a 486 with 32MB of RAM will use the same kernel with RULE as a stock Red Hat 8.0 system will.

Take a look at the screenshots showing RULE running on 486s with 16MB of RAM. If you want to add other packages, such as OpenOffice, you can just like a full Red Hat 8.0 installation.

you may want to consider getting a parallel port cdrom drive (i believe there is or was one made by backpack) which would allow you to boot off a floppy and install (slowly) from the parallel port. another place to look for information is the rule project at
http://www.rule-project.org/en/)

where they are trying to allow folks to Run Uptodate Linux Everywhere

The RULE Project was mentioned here on Slashdot back in February. It may not be ready for prime-time yet, but they seem to be trying to do the same thing as you: run an up to date version of Redhat on minimal (486/32MB RAM) hardware.

If you're looking at RedHat and old hardware, you should look at the RULE (Run Up2date Linux Everywhere) project.

You can achieve a very limited install, but still get and keep up to date software.

The Rule Project is what you are looking for. It is based on standard Red Hat installation media. It uses a modified installer (anaconda) to install Red Hat on low end hardware. The project members are already in discussion with Red Hat to get support for their project (ie to integrate their changes into standard Red Hat). It was quite a few months a last saw the project, but that time they were very active.

PS: Does MS Office work on your computer [the 386]? Just curious.