Ten schools in one day

The Schools' Linux Users' Group reached their target of installing over 210 computers using exclusively Open Source software computer labs in ten schools in the Western Cape area. The progress was monitored live on P4 104.9FM radio, broadcasting from Duneside Primary School. The Shuttleworth Foundation, as usual, organised the PCs and provided project management (and played gopher for the groups).

This meeting at 7:30am in the morning is something I'm going to have to get used to. Nevertheless, I arrived to about forty SLUG volunteers willing to brave the morning. A few more people pitched up at a more sensible time.

We split up into groups to head to our schools. I was part of the group installing the lab at JS Klopper Primary School. We were warmly greeted by a few members of staff, and I thought it was a good turnout. Waiting a few minutes and having tea and muffins, the rest of the staff showed up. Like all of them. Wow.

That's when the technical difficulties started. We hadn't brought the necessary equipment to crimp the cables. So, I was left to teach the teachers and a few ex-students how to put together their workstations, and some basic theory and debugging skills. Not a problem. Next, since the guys fetching the tools weren't back yet, I demoed a server installation having never set one up before. No stress, it "Just worked".

By now, the equipment arrived, and I had the rather curious scene of watching twenty different people each crimp a cable for the first time. Second problem - we only had twenty or so RJ45 connectors. So, when we went through to debug the expected errors, we couldn't do much about it. Oh well, we waited for others to come through with more of them, and debugged the school. Even I managed to crimp a cable today (and boy was I out of practise).

Oh, and in-between that, the school put on a huge spread for our volunteers, and generally made us feel very appreciated.

The ordeal over with, and we were off to Peninsuala Technikon for a party and a braai for lunch. It was quite a gathering - a lot of people went straight to the schools in the morning, and they came to the party. Besides insufficient plates, it was a great get-together, and I got to see people I hadn't seen in quite some time.

So, kudos to the SLUG and TSF guys for a well-organised event that brought over 210 PCs to schoolchildren in the Western Cape! Another few tens of thousands of students that are going to have access to modern computing technology (Linux and Open Source!) due to their efforts.