Linux users

I'm wondering if anybody here uses Linux? My son is a Linux enthusiast and has been using it for over 5 years. He installed the operating system on his own when he was just 13. Shortly afterwards he was writing programs in C.

When he had his college interview just over 2 years ago the computing teacher was astounded with his level of knowledge about both hardware and software. He said that most people starting the course can only use Micro$oft office, play games, and surf the internet. Now here was somebody who could use program compilers and knew how the internet worked despite not having an ICT GCSE.

Rather disappointingly, he hasn't encountered many home educated children and children with AS who use Linux. They all seem to use Windows.

I started using Linux back in 1995 and it has been my main operating system since then. I only use Windows to run applications that won't run under Linux. My computer currently runs SuSE 10.3 but I will upgrade it to the latest version when I find time. Ubuntu seems to be the most popular distro for the masses but I think SuSE is better for more serious users. Modern versions of Linux are miles away from the Slackware distro of 1995. My experience of installing this was very difficult and painful. It was common practice to copy the CD-ROM to a stack of floppies because many CD-ROM drives had funny interfaces that wouldn't work under Linux! Even once you had installed Linux your computer was turned into an awkward toy because you couldn't do much productively with it. Nowadays Linux distros are packed with numerous high quality applications and are easy to install and configure.

I'm very impressed to find a 13 year old C programmer. I taught myself to program in C when I was 13 on an IBM AT 286 running Borland Turbo C for DOS. This was your typical industry standard setup at the turn of the 1990s. One day I was reading The C Programming Language by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie on an underground train in London and a passenger approached me with amazement that a 13 year old could understand something so advanced.

I agree with you that Linux users are quite scarce in the HE community. There are a few Linux users at my local AS support group but they are all over 20 years old. The kids use Windows. One of the speakers at a HantsLUG meeting stated that very few young teenagers really know about the technical sides of computers. It's nice to see college teachers valuing self education and waiving the requirements for (worthless) paper qualifications.

Would it be a good idea to have a section on the website for Linux educational software? Home educators don't have to worry about having to use government approved software packages or those used in schools.

There are proposals in the pipeline for an educational software section on the website. It won't be confined to Linux as HE families use a variety of computer systems. If you know of any particularly good software packages then please tell us about them.

Are you thinking about educational software for subjects like maths, science, English etc. or will it include software useful for HE children such as that used for video editing or graphics design?