Bolshonos

Dear Linux users, please write what you'd like to see in this system, or as they say, your wishes. I'll try to include everything I can in the distribution and make it as convenient as possible — I promise to support it online :-)

The schoolboy became so absorbed in the work that his parents practically had to drag him off to bed by force. But the result was worth it.

— When Denis showed me his development, I was speechless with amazement, — smiles computer science teacher at School No. 55, Efim Shirinkin. — Denis's operating system turned out to be perfect. It includes the full suite of necessary programs, including office applications. On top of that, the new system is faster than Windows and takes up half the disk space. And what's more, my student developed his own Popov's Antivirus for it!

Denis named his invention Bolgenos ("bolgen" (Spanish) — fireball, "os" — Operating System). After a city essay competition where Popov and his program took first place, the Nizhny Tagil Education Department learned about the schoolboy's project. They liked the operating system. And they liked even more Denis's words that he had no intention of selling his brainchild and was ready to share it with anyone who wanted it, free of charge.

— Next year the Windows licenses at all schools in the city expire, and it would take considerable funds to renew them, — the Nizhny Tagil Education Department's press office explained. — In light of this, a decision was made to replace Windows with Denis Popov's operating system in all of the city's general education institutions.

Bolgenos is an operating system built on the basis of Ubuntu Linux. This distribution serves as the base for my operating system. I intend to create a universal operating system containing everything a user of any profile could need. This means the system is suitable for internet users ("chatters"), office workers (spreadsheets, documents), webmasters, designers, and programmers. But the main distinguishing features are:

— Comparative size of the system on the hard disk. After installation, the system takes up only 1.7 gigabytes of free space. (Some people stopped me and suggested using existing distributions like eeeXubuntu, Lubuntu and the like; however, I need a GNOME desktop and the Qt library (some applications require this library, including my own programs — Popov's Antivirus and OgenBrowse (the software package will grow in the near future and will continue to grow until a fully custom kernel and compiler have been created))

— Beautiful design (themes, icons, desktop wallpapers. (Unfortunately some users rated the design negatively, but I'll take this into account, and version 1.5 will feature a fully universal design catering to the tastes of all users)).

— Compared to several Linux distributions as well as third-party systems (Windows and others), Bolgenos is aimed at a simple office suite (since not all users need a full office suite with every feature), though you can also install a full suite,, such as OpenOffice. Currently this simple suite includes: Abiword (a word processor, an alternative to MS Word), Gnumeric (a spreadsheet processor, an alternative to MS Excel).

— In the opinion of most developers and hobbyist programmers, the lightweight development environment Geany is the best tool in this area. Since schools hold programming olympiads, and these are conducted mostly in Pascal, the Bolgenos distribution includes a compiler for that language (fpc — Free Pascal Compiler). For graphical use, users can use the Geany IDE with Pascal syntax highlighting enabled. Users can also use a development environment based on the Qt library.

— Working with the internet has become even faster. Bolgenos now includes OgenBrowse, a web browser developed specifically for the Bolgenos distribution on the basis of the Arora (WebKit) codebase, supporting tabbed browsing, Flash animation playback, JavaScript, password saving, and private browsing mode. Deluge is used as the torrent client.

Plans for the future:

— Create the Popov Office suite (several versions: full and lightweight)

— Finish the existing browser — OgenBrowse — break away from the Arora codebase, switch fully to a custom one. Fix recently discovered browser bugs and optimize the code.

— Popov's Antivirus — create a fully complete antivirus package capable of protecting the computer from viruses, intrusions, and rootkits.

— QuadBDE — a desktop environment that will replace GNOME (almost finished, but currently launches as a regular application). Uses Qt 4.6 and outperforms GNOME in terms of performance.

A new version, Bolgenos Education, will be developed for educational institutions, containing the full range of educational software.

The Bolgenos project — a long-term support project — will let you see the world differently. Ubuntu is good and convenient, but Bolgenos will become a better replacement for that system. Windows is also a good system, but unfortunately it is paid (its license costs no small sum of money), and it also has many errors during operation.

I noticed that the students were engaged — and, strangely enough, not in the sense of disruptive behavior, which surprises nobody these days, but in the sense of their schoolwork.

At the time we were using the textbooks "Information Culture" by Mogilev A.V., which focus mainly on technology. When we reached the topic of the internet and went deeper into website creation, the students responded enthusiastically — they wanted to push beyond the editor's limitations. They tried their hand at programming languages, though not everyone took to it. Five students formed an interest group. Template-based websites were part of the journey, of course, but making something of one's own is more valuable. In this group there was one completely unremarkable student — Denis Popov. He listened more than he spoke, said very little, but kept trying to write small programs.

When we moved on to programming in VB 6.0, he took to the language immediately. He tracked down books and materials from the internet and began writing simple programs. But having a conversation with him was nearly impossible: he almost never spoke in any class. With his friends, however, he gradually began to discuss his problems — necessity, it seems, forced him to overcome himself. I suggested he prepare a presentation for his exam. The deputy headmistress was the first to object, in surprise: she already knew him, knew that he didn't speak, and therefore was sure he would not be able to defend anything. I found out that he wanted somehow to show his work. I offered to help him with the verbal presentation of his material. Since spoken language was not developed in him, I first had him memorize prepared texts and present them in class, in front of his classmates — people he knew well, so he was less embarrassed. By the time of the exam, we had gradually learned to talk through all his work together — presenting it, commenting on it, and answering questions simultaneously. The examination panel was impressed. He managed to explain everything well enough for a grade of 4, but since the programming topic was so thoroughly covered, they added one extra point.

In 10th grade Denis began exploring other programming languages, having spent the summer on exactly that subject. He started building his own website and coding in Delphi, but then he heard that all schools were facing a transition to a new operating system. After getting to grips with Windows, he familiarized himself with UBUNTU and UNIX-like operating systems, obtained a solid book on Linux, read up on it in Wikipedia, and decided to quietly start tinkering on his own! He and his friends would often "hang out" in my classroom, hunched over a computer working on his "projects." That's when I suggested to him at the start of 11th grade: "Come on, show your ideas to the world!" Denis thought about it and took the risk. He began developing his project in earnest, consulting with like-minded classmates and in internet forums. The suggestion grew into a desire to test himself on a wider stage, at city-level competitions.

The first consultations with Mayya Vladimirovna Mashchenko proved very useful and were received well by the student. His enthusiasm was ignited! And when I took students to a city seminar on Linux at the Palace of Creativity — led by two major specialists in the field, Nikitin Sergey Vasilyevich and Dmitrievsky Anton Aleksandrovich — they recognized the merit in the student's work, welcomed him into their circle, and began teaching him proper research methods. This further boosted his creative enthusiasm. He worked and reworked his material many times and presented it to his classmates. He began speaking easily, thoughtfully, and fluently. His classmates applauded him more than once! On Mayya Vladimirovna's recommendation, Denis gave a strong presentation of his project at the city defense, and the panel awarded him first place. He continues working to this day, and his online community now has 80 like-minded members.

For inclusion in the IRRO professional development plan for managers of educational institutions. Its introduction is prompted by the following factors: the existence of large information flows within municipal educational institutions; the need for prompt processing of information within educational institutions using modern computer hardware and technology; the need for timely and correct decision-making; the widespread use of computer technologies in various areas of modern life, including management;

Program objective:

To prepare school administrators to work in modern conditions.

Objectives:

Studying the computer as a tool for working with information. Introduction to the basic concepts of systems engineering and techniques for working with various information flows. Implementing modern computer technologies into the management of educational institutions in order to optimize the management process.

The program is designed for school principals, deputy principals for academic affairs, deputy principals for educational work, deputy principals for disruptive behavior, deputy principals for research and methodology, deputy principals for facilities management, medical staff, and other school employees involved in the information environment of the institution.

Materials from the expanded Collegium of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation (January 1996) recommend the use of information technologies to improve the effectiveness of education management, with the school principal as the key figure. The responsibilities of a school principal are complex, varied, and highly demanding. The information flows that a principal deals with are inseparable from those of their deputies and support staff. For this reason, the introduction of computer technologies into school management must be comprehensive and, from the outset, oriented toward the creation of a unified school computer network and a network linking the entities of the education department.

The Sverdlovsk Region Department of Education has certified the first regional professional development program for heads of educational institutions. The program is structured so that administrators gain an initial understanding of the computer as a tool — its main components, safety rules, and maintenance procedures — using the Norton Commander shell and Windows as examples. This section is allocated 34 hours, covering the first two months of instruction: October and November.

Alongside the technical training, lectures are held on the basic concepts of systemology and systems engineering; information flows within the educational institution and with entities in the regional educational space are studied, as well as the technology for collecting and processing incoming information and making decisions. This is allocated 6+6, equaling 12 hours.

Upon completing the initial training, participants will have acquired the basic skills of computer operation and information-handling procedures, and will be ready for the next, main stage of instruction: information technologies for collecting, storing, and processing the primary information flows of educational institutions. To this end, participants study techniques for working with word processors, spreadsheets, and database management systems, as well as the Microsoft Outlook scheduling application from the Microsoft Office suite. This work takes up the main part of the second semester — January, February, and March, that is, 12 weeks or 48 hours. Participants carry out practical assignments to convert their school's documentation into digital and printed form and to systematize the entire document management process of the institution.

The concluding stage consists of studying the means of networking computers within a single school and a single administrative district of the city. Taking into account not only the widespread adoption of computer hardware but also of computer technology, participants are introduced to modem communication, internet-type connectivity, and their broad potential in the educational process and in educational management. Given the insufficient number of telecommunications resources, the initial version of the program allocates 10 hours to this topic.

After a final review and consultation sessions, participants submit a graduation project on the topic of the educational program, based at their own institution, and receive a "Certificate" of program completion and readiness to work under the new conditions of the information environment.

A separate supplementary section is added to the training program as an invariant module, covering issues of pedagogy and the psychology of organizing instruction, as well as the theory of managing the teaching and educational process in schools.