Brief project description 2nd Conference on FS/OSS

Debian GNU/ (http://www.debian.org/)

The Debian Project is an association of individuals who have made common cause to create a free operating system. This operating system that we have created is called Debian GNU/Linux, or simply Debian for short.

An operating system is the set of basic programs and utilities that make your computer run. At the core of an operating system is the kernel. The kernel is the most fundamental program on the computer and does all the basic housekeeping and lets you start other programs.

Debian systems currently use the Linux kernel. Linux is a completely free piece of software started by Linus Torvalds and supported by thousands of programmers worldwide.

However, work is in progress to provide Debian for other kernels, primarily for the Hurd. The Hurd is a collection of servers that run on top of a microkernel (such as Mach) to implement different features. The Hurd is produced by the GNU project.

A large part of the basic tools that fill out the operating system come from the GNU project; hence the names: GNU/Linux and GNU/Hurd. These tools are also free.

Of course, the thing that people want is application software: programs to help them get what they want to do done, from editing documents to running a business to playing games to writing more software. Debian comes with over 8710 packages (precompiled software that is bundled up in a nice format for easy installation on your machine) — all of it free.

It's a bit like a tower. At the base is the kernel. On top of that are all the basic tools. Next is all the software that you run on the computer. At the top of the tower is Debian — carefully organizing and fitting everything so it all works together.

FSF Europe (http://fsfeurope.org/)

The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSF Europe) was founded in 2001 as the sister organization of the Free Software Foundation (FSF) in the USA to take care of all aspects of Free Software in Europe.

Several factors made this necessary.

• First of all, Free Software has ceased being an American phenomenon, Europe has one of the strongest communities of Free Software developers and many considerable projects of the recent past have their roots here.

Debian GNU/Linux, FSF Europe, K Desktop Environment, Mozilla, OpenOfffice.org, SkoleLinux Brief project description 2nd Conference on FS/OSS

• Secondly, the dominating perception of software is as a purely economic property, which is why it is being treated this way by politics and press.

But software already transcends daily life in an increasing manner and becomes a deciding factor. Just as other developments in the past of mankind, software develops from being an economic to a cultural property with increasing presence in everyday life.

Other than developments that seem to be comparable at first glance like printing press, car or telephone, software is purely virtual. It can not only be reproduced without loss, this reproduction also serves its evolution.

This makes software have properties that are very different from those of other phenomenons in history; the invention of software probably has the biggest similarities with the discovery of language, writing or science.

It is essential for the future of mankind that software as a cultural property will remain accessible for everyone and is preserved in libraries like other knowledge.

In order to achieve this, a new way of thinking has to be established with the decision-makers of the population, the politicians.

To inspire this new way of thinking is a crucial task for the FSF Europe.

• The third objective is securing Free Software.

The GNU General Public License and GNU Lesser General Public License of the Free Software Foundation are the most-often licenses used for Free Software worldwide.

Therefore it is incumbent on the FSF and FSF Europe to ensure the legal safety of the largest part of Free Software.

• Fourthly the long-term success is based upon the practical realization of Free Software.

Because of this, the FSF Europe and the FSF work together on the organizatory aspects of the GNU Project, assist and maintain the development of Free Software and support companies and people willing to switch to Free Software.

And finally software contains an immense commercial potential. In order to permanently build the awareness for Free Software, it is necessary to also involve the economy.

This means perspectives need to be opened for companies to build their business on or around Free Software.

Debian GNU/Linux, FSF Europe, K Desktop Environment, Mozilla, OpenOfffice.org, SkoleLinux Brief project description 2nd Conference on FS/OSS

Offering these perspectives and counseling in their application is also a task for the FSF Europe.

Further considerations on the topic of Free Software can be found at: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html

K Desktop Environment (http://www.kde.org/)

General Overview

KDE is a network transparent contemporary desktop environment for UNIX . KDE seeks to fill the need for an easy to use desktop for Unix workstations, similar to the desktop environments found under the MacOS or Microsoft Windows. We believe that the UNIX operating system is the best operating system available today. In fact UNIX has been the undisputed choice of the information technology professional for many years. When it comes to stability, scalability and openness there is no competition to UNIX. However, the lack of an easy to use contemporary desktop environment for UNIX has prevented UNIX from finding its way onto the desktops of the typical computer user in offices and homes. UNIX dominates the server market and is the preferred computing platform for computing professional and scientists. Without UNIX the internet would not be. But UNIX did not address the needs of the average computer user. This fact is particularly unfortunate since a number of implementations of UNIX (Debian GNU/Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD etc.) are freely available on the internet. All of which are of exceptional quality and stability.

KDE The Desktop Environment

With KDE there is now an easy to use contemporary desktop environment available for UNIX. Together with a free implementation of UNIX such as GNU/Linux, UNIX/KDE constitutes a completely free and open computing platform available to anyone free of charge including its source code for anyone to modify. While there will always be room for improvement we believe to have delivered a viable alternative to some of the more commonly found and commercial operating systems/desktops combinations available today. It is our hope that the combination UNIX/KDE will finally bring the same open, reliable, stable and monopoly free computing to the average computer user that scientist and computing professionals world-wide have enjoyed for years.

KDE The Application Development Framework

Authoring applications under UNIX/X11 used to be an extremely difficult and tedious process. KDE recognizes the fact that a computing platform is only as

Debian GNU/Linux, FSF Europe, K Desktop Environment, Mozilla, OpenOfffice.org, SkoleLinux Brief project description 2nd Conference on FS/OSS

good as the amount of first class applications available to the users of that particular platform. In view of these circumstances the KDE Project has developed a first rate compound document application framework, implementing the latest advances in framework technology and thus positioning itself in direct competition to such popular development frameworks as for example Microsoft's MFC/COM/ActiveX technology. KDE's KParts compound document technology enables developers to quickly create first rate applications implementing cutting edge technology.

KDE The Office Application Suite

Leveraging the KDE application development framework a great number of applications have been built for the K Desktop Environment. A selection of those applications is contained in the KDE base distribution. At this moment KDE is developing an office application suite based on KDE's KParts technology consisting of a spread-sheet, a presentation application, an organizer, a news client and more. KPresenter, KDE's presentation application was successfully used at many presentations.

Mozilla (http://www.mozilla.org/)

Mozilla 1.6

Web-browser built for 2004, advanced e-mail and newsgroup client, IRC chat client, and HTML editing made simple -- all your Internet needs in one application.

Navigator

Tabbed browsing gives you a better way to surf the net. You no longer have to open one page at a time. With tabbed browsing, open several pages at once with one click. And now your homepage can be multiple tabbed pages.

Popup blocker lets you surf the web without intrusion. Advanced popup blocker notifies you when popups are blocked. You can also block pop-ups on a site per site basis.

Image Manager lets you block images to block offensive images or to speed up the rendering of web sites.

Find as you type gives you another way to navigate a page. Just start typing to jump from link to link or to find a word or phrase within a page.

Plus all the features a modern browser should have including: Advanced security settings; Password, Download, and Cookie managers; Themes; multi- language and multi-platform support; and, the latest in Web Standards.

Debian GNU/Linux, FSF Europe, K Desktop Environment, Mozilla, OpenOfffice.org, SkoleLinux Brief project description 2nd Conference on FS/OSS

Mail & Newsgroups

Junk mail controls helps you take back control of your e-mail from spammers. Mozilla's adaptive junk mail control gets smarter with use and is personalized to the e-mail that you receive.

Manage your mail with customizable Labels and Mail Views. Color code your e-mail to help you prioritize. Sort your mail with views to help you through your e-mail much faster.

Mozilla supports Multiple Accounts to help you manage all your mail through one interface.

Mozilla Messenger includes Enterprise ready features such as S/MIME, return receipts, LDAP support, and digital signing.

Composer

Mozilla's HTML editor keeps getting better with dynamic image and table resizing, quick insert and delete of table cells, improved CSS support, and support for positioned layers. For all your simple documents and website projects, Composer is all you need.

OpenOffice.org (http://www.openoffice.org/)

Mission Statement

To create, as a community, the leading international office suite that will run on all major platforms and provide access to all functionality and data through open-component based APIs and an XML-based file format.

Product Description

OpenOffice.org is both an Open Source product and a project. The product is a multi-platform office productivity suite. It includes the key desktop applications, such as a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation manager, and drawing program, with a user interface and feature set similar to other office suites. Sophisticated and flexible, OpenOffice.org also works transparently with a variety of file formats, including those of Microsoft Office.

Available in 25 languages with more being constantly added by the community. OpenOffice.org runs stably and natively on Solaris, Linux (including PPC Linux), and Windows. Additional ports, such as for FreeBSD, IRIX, and Mac OS X, are in various stages of completion.

Debian GNU/Linux, FSF Europe, K Desktop Environment, Mozilla, OpenOfffice.org, SkoleLinux Brief project description 2nd Conference on FS/OSS

Written in C++ and with documented APIs licensed under the LGPL and SISSL Open Source licenses, OpenOffice.org allows any knowledgeable developer to benefit from the source. And, because the file format for OpenOffice.org is XML, interoperability is easy, making future development and adoption more certain.

SkoleLinux (http://www.skolelinux.no/)

"Skole" is Norwegian for "school", so Skolelinux is a GNU/ which has been customized for schools. The project was launched in Norway in 2002 and has later been applied to German and other languages. Skolelinux provides applications in more than 15 native languages, including Greek since some weeks ago.

Skolelinux consists of approximately 900 packages of Free Software and includes Debian-edu, a Custom Debian Distribution (CDD). This way, it belongs to the worldwide Debian Community with more than 1,000 official developers.

Skolelinux is sustainable: installation, upgrading, maintenance and support over the internet is guaranteed today and in future times (esp. fast security fixes).

Skolelinux is gratis. This means no cost for licences and no worries for teachers, pupils and parents. It contains a lot of educational software, office applications, browsers and email-clients.

One of the main advantages of Skolelinux is the preconfigured scalable network with more than 15 services out of the box. Because of this, you can use it in primary schools, e.g. with 1 server and 30 thin clients or up to many servers and computers in universities.

Skolelinux is easy to install and delivers a main-server, a thin client server and also a on a single CD.

Skolelinux reduces the needs for system administration and increases the computer availability while demonstrating the qualities of Free Software.

Sharing software is sharing knowledge. Software has to be free!

Please spread Skolelinux, the international schoolserver.

Debian GNU/Linux, FSF Europe, K Desktop Environment, Mozilla, OpenOfffice.org, SkoleLinux