OS family Unix-like Source model Open source | Working state Current | |
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Developer Canonical Ltd. and community contributors Initial release 2005; 12 years ago (2005) Latest release 14.04.4 LTS (Trusty Tahr) / 18 February 2016; 12 months ago (2016-02-18) | ||
Edubuntu, previously known as Ubuntu Education Edition, is an official derivative of the Ubuntu operating system designed for use in classrooms inside schools, homes and communities.
Contents
Edubuntu has been developed in collaboration with teachers and technologists in several countries. Edubuntu is built on top of the Ubuntu base, incorporates the LTSP thin client architecture and several education-specific applications, and is aimed at users aged 6 to 18. It is designed for easy installation and ongoing system maintenance.
Features
Included with Edubuntu is the Linux Terminal Server Project and many applications relevant to education including GCompris, KDE Edutainment Suite, Sabayon Profile Manager, Pessulus Lockdown Editor, Edubuntu Menueditor, LibreOffice, Gnome Nanny and iTalc. Edubuntu CDs were previously available free of charge through their Shipit service; since version 8.10 (2008) it is only available as a download in a DVD format.
Edubuntu's default GUI is Unity while GNOME is still available. Unity has been the default GUI since the release of 12.04. Since release 7.10, KDE is also available as Edubuntu KDE. In 2010 Edubuntu and the Qimo 4 Kids project were working on providing Qimo within Edubuntu, but this was not done as it would not have fitted on a CD.
Project goals
The primary goal of Edubuntu is to enable an educator with limited technical knowledge and skills to set up a computer lab or an on-line learning environment in an hour or less and then effectively administer that environment.
The principal design goals of Edubuntu are centralized management of configuration, users and processes, together with facilities for working collaboratively in a classroom setting. Equally important is the gathering together of the best available free software and digital materials for education. According to a statement of goals on the official Edubuntu Website: "Our aim is to put together a system that contains all the best free software available in education and make it easy to install and maintain."
It also aims to allow low income environments to maximize utilisation of their available (older) equipment.
Versions
The first Edubuntu release coincided with the release of Ubuntu 5.10, which was codenamed Breezy Badger on 2005-10-13. With the 8.04 Hardy Heron release of Edubuntu it was given the name of Ubuntu Education Edition and was changed to be an add-on to a standard Ubuntu installation instead of being an installable LiveCD. From version 9.10 onwards, Edubuntu changed to be available as a full system DVD instead of an Add-on CD. Edubuntu is also installable via a selection of "edubuntu" packages for all distributions using the official Ubuntu repositories (Ubuntu and Kubuntu mainly).
Since 14.04, Edubuntu has become LTS-only; Edubuntu have announced that they will skip Ubuntu 16.04 LTS update. And they plan on staying with 14.04 due to lack of contributors.