K12LTSP History
From K12LTSP Wiki
K12LTSP is an off-shoot of the Linux in School Project, a.k.a K12Linux.
The roots of the K12Linux project date back to 1995 in the Portland Linux/Unix Group's (PLUG) Linux Clinics. The PLUG Linux Clinics were started by Richard Rutledge, Dan Haskell, among others. The Clinics were designed to help people get Linux up and running on their computers. Richard Rutledge, who provided access to the Archdiocese of Portland, ran into scheduling conflicts in 1997 and it was decided that the Clinics should be moved to another venue.
Paul Nelson, the Technology Coordinator for the Riverdale School District, had been running a Linux file/print server for a year and knew just enough to get himself into trouble. When he saw the request for a new venue for the Linux Clinics, he quickly offered up his school's lab. In exchange for access to a nice lab and a (then) state-of-the-art T1 circuit, Paul got access to a room full of Linux gurus who could help him with his one-and-only Linux server. Linux geeks, easily wooed with big internet connections, quickly took him up on his offer.
In 1998, an Intel engineer who was attending one of the monthly clinics ran into serious hardware problems. It was at the end of the day and there was no time to run to the store, purchase replacement parts, and get the computer back up and running. Paul offered to come in the next day and help this guy out. The Intel engineer was amazed by the generosity, he helped secure donations of server hardware in exchange for the favor. It was decided that the best way to use this hardware was to start up a grant that schools could submit a proposal for a Linux-based server. Interest was very high, both schools and PLUG members jumped in to help. It generated so much email that it was split off the PLUG mailing list. Thus the K12Linux project was officially born. In one crazy day, we built and configured a dozen servers and held a half-day training for the schools who received the new servers. Some of these servers are still in production
Eric Harrison, one of the volunteers for the K12Linux project, decided he had enough of the banking industry and jumped ship to network security consulting. That was fun and exciting, but the hours stunk. Within a couple of months he had managed to talk his way into working at Multnomah Education Service District (MESD), which was the "ISP" for the Riverdale School District (and other school districts that had received donated servers from the K12Linux project).
By late 1999, the K12Linux project had drawn significant attention. Eric was asked to speak at the Education track at the 2000 Linux Expo Toronto (click here for the presentation). One of the bullet points in the summary was that thin clients in schools are inevitable. Jim ~McQuillan, of LTSP fame, was in the audience. Jim talked to Eric after the presentation and asked him to take a look at the LTSP. The LTSP was amazing, but the installition was a bit too hard at that time for the typical school tech to make use of it. Eric took the LTSP and integrated it into Red Hat Linux, making it much easier for schools to deploy. Thus the K12LTSP project was created.
Paul and Eric posted their work to the internet, people from all around the world joined in, and now we are marching down the road to world domination.
