From: Sebastian Leske (sleske@enterprise.mathematik.uni-essen.de)
Date: Sun Sep 16 2001 - 18:14:50 CEST
Hi,
> > We have some pre-loved machines and we want to use them. Most are
> > P - I, 166 Mhz / 16 MB / 630 MB. We have installed muLinux on the
> > system.
This will not work, period. Like most office sw, StarOffice does not
need a fast processor (though 166MHz might be rather slow), but it
needs quite a bit of memory. 32MB is the absolute minimum for making it
usable, and only if you don't run it alongside anything else that is
memory hungry (such as KDE or Gnome). Normally 64MB is the minimum for
reasonable work, and 128 MB for being more or less comfortable.
BTW: It seems quite silly to me to install StarOffice under muLinux.
The whole point of muLinux is to use as little ressources as necessary,
both in disk space and in RAM, and it does this very cleverly (kudos to
Michele!).
Still, muLinux is (necessarily) in many ways very restricted compared
to modern Linux distibutions, because of the focus on being small (you
can't do in 5MB what other distros do in 500 MB). StarOffice already
needs 5-10 times the ressources of muLinux (both in RAM and disk),
so you lose the advantage muLinux gives you (low ressource usage), but
keep the disadvantages (somewhat old system, restricted functionality,
no binary compatibility with most modern linuxes [libc.5]).
I hope I won't ge flamed for this, and I very much admire the
minimalistic elegance of muLinux, but if you want StarOffice, choose a
standard distribution that can be cut down well, such as Debian or
Slackware (non-exhaustive list). The ressources muLinux saves for you
will be gobbled up by StarOffice, so using muLinux instead of, say,
Debin, buys you very little but makes the system significantly more
complicated.
Ah, I just realized, SO *cannot* run under muLinux. SO needs a version
of libc >6.1, but muLinux has libc version 5. Even if you managed to
upgrade muLinux to libc.6, above reasons would still apply.
But now for your concrete problem:
> > Is there any (micro) office suite available for muLinux ? We have
> > tried installing starOffice but it is very memory hungry, it
> > *really* takes ages to install and the machine hangs during
> > installation.
I can think of a number of solutions, which may or may not be feasible
for you:
1) Buy more RAM. RAM is dirt cheap these days, and if you don't need to
save money at all cost (pun intended), your best option will be to give
the computers more RAM; at least 64MB, better 128 MB (if they can take
that much).
Then they will be quite usable as office workstations. Even StarOffice
will be usable with 64MB of main memory, albeit somewhat sluggish. You
should not use KDE or Gnome, though, but rather a lightweight
environment such as icewm, Xfce, fvwm95 or similar (Xfce even has a
graphical file manager).
2) Use alternative programs. There are many more lightweight
alternatives to StarOffice:
* Abiword - a wordprocessor, not as featureful as SO, but has all
essentials (except for tables), reads MS-Word-files, UI similar to MS
Word
* gnumeric - spreadsheet, similar to MS Excel, quite featureful
* Ted - another wordprocessor
* xmbase-grok - desktop database
etc.
All those programs need far less ressources than StarOffice, most
should be quite usable with 16 MB.
Depending on you specific needs, you might find small programs that
fulfill them with 16 MB of RAM. I tried to list a few above, but if
those don't suit you, search for yourself (e.g. at freshmeat.net), or
post to this list again, describing what exactly you need.
3) Use your PCs as X-Terminals. Then you will need one powerful server
(for 10 workstations, 800 MHz and 512 MB RAM should be ok, maybe even
less). All programs will run on the server, the PCs will only display
the windows, but to the user, it will seem the programs run on their
computer. The workstation then only needs minimal ressources (a 486
with 8 MB RAM would be quite sufficient). The server & workstations
will need a local network, but 10BaseT Ethernet should be ok (though
100BaseT would be better). That is only feasible, of course, if the PCs
will all be used in one place (at least in the same building).
There's loads of docs on the net on how to do this, but feel free to
ask the list if you need help.
> 1. There is no way to work with StarOffice on a 16MB machine.
Well, yes.
> 2. Did you consider using the lyx?
> It is an easy way to code (La)TeX documents - a good start into
> the world of TeX.
Yes, very much so. LaTeX is actually quite a good wordprocessing
system, it just takes some getting used to. But in exchange, you get a
system that is extremely high quality, practically bug free (not
kidding!), has minimal ressource needs and is available on about every
platform you will ever know, and quite a bit more.
(I use it myself.) Getting started can be a bit confusing, but I can
point you to good introductions if you're interested.
Greetings,
Sebastian
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