Ask HN: How would you set up a child’s first Linux computer?
We went together and bought a second hand desktop (exciting the people selling to us also) and when I got home I pulled out the Ram, HD and CD drive and set them aside; and then together with a screwdriver we “built the computer” over a few days.
In windows when a child goes searching the web for a “movie maker for windows” they are going to be in a world of hurt either finding expensive commercial options or super scammy sites promising the world.
By comparison on Linux if they search the local “app store” they’ll find stacks and stacks of free, useful, open licensed software.
My kids loved the power, freedom and later unexpected community this bought them.
Now my friend wants the same for their daughter who is 8 years old.
I’m planning to do the same and go with her parents and her and buy a second hand desktop together and then put Linux on it.
My question is where would you go from there? What suggestions do you have? What to install? Any mini “curriculums” or ideas?
Would love to hear your ideas and experiences. Linux with free and open software is the goal and focus.
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The Kano was nice, because it was built for kids and had some guided stuff to help get them into it with various software and hardware to play around with.
With the Pi 400 it was stock Raspbian. The kid wasn’t sure where to begin. While it came with a book geared toward kids, I don’t know that he read it. I was trying to find a way to show him around to stuff he might think is fun, without it seeming boring over overwhelming, but I didn’t feel it went that well. I was also living 6 hours away at the time, so there weren’t regular visits for questions or to help things along, and the parents didn’t know anything about Linux.
Ultimately, I don’t think it inspired them as much as I was hoping. All they actually wanted was something to play Minecraft on, and the Pi edition was a very compromised experience for Minecraft. The Kano did have a mode to let people use Scratch type programming to automate aspects of building, which I thought was really cool, but it didn’t totally seem to click… though I did see some limited use after a couple years.
I think not having someone in the house who can guide and field questions really hindered the ability for them to really thrive on Linux. It would probably be worth including a series of lessons to ramp up their skills and knowledge. Doing something like that was difficult for me due to the distance and also not so much parental support on the idea of kids on computers. I was swimming against the current a little with those gifts, because I thought it was important they get access to the main tool they are likely to use throughout their life.
[1] https://scratch.mit.edu/parents/
I gave mine to my son. I figured that my son might want to use the touch screen I went with Gnome because it seemed a little more touch friendly. I told myself it doesn't matter because he is 8 and I can always reinstall.
I chose Debian (Stable) so I wouldn't have to deal with keeping it updated, put a root password to prevent them from going crazy with installing stuff.
I will have to put Scratch on it someday, for the moment he cares about the following:
- the LEGO website to look at instructions - the music player to listen to soundtracks from his favourite games - MyPaint for making drawings
He is starting to figure out the idea of folders, deleting things, undo, etc., but hasn't asked for any other software or even games yet.
I am a professor and would like for my son to learn about word processors, spreadsheets, programming, etc.. If he ever asks, I will give him the root password and let him browse the repos. Right now, I'm just happy to see him enjoy it without doing what lots of his friends do: sit in front of YouTube all afternoon.
In my situation i need some type of "remote admin capability", since we are separated :-(
I would also consider use of Gentoo as your Linux distribution to force learning about building packages and command line. I would avoid Arch as that might be too much of a challenge.
For me the goal would be forcing them to learn how this stuff works. I would emphasize scripting in the shell like bash scripts, JavaScript via node, Python, and possibly even Perl. This will take a lot of guidance to get this started because they will need some real world use cases about why they immediately benefit.
Once you get the OS finally set up create an ISO of it and put it on both a thumb drive and home file server. Give the kiddo root access to their own computer and let them really break stuff because you can restore from backup
Edit:
Immediately downvoted. This comment apparently caused a nerd god to shed a tear.
More than enough to keep them entertained and teach them the basics.
Steam works amazingly well. And you can set up family controls.
Roblox works great using "Sober" I don't recommend letting them play Roblox but I'm stuck with it.
Minecraft and Curseforge work well, too.
Time Keeper Next is a great time limiting control system. If you have a little awareness of docker you can run it in a container and even access it on your phone through an admin gui. If you need help on that get my email from my profile and I'll happily share my details.
My kids 8,10,12 know how to use the command line. I'm really proud of them.
Also it's similar enough to Windows that they don't feel completely out of touch on the school computers.
Killer app is Krita for the older one, even got him a cheap Wacom later on.
Otherwise school work, native Linux games, and YouTube. That last one with the younger one I have to keep an eye on. Honestly thinking about blocking access, we'll see.
Both like gaming, so I set up wine for them on my machine with separate accounts. Learning about email, downloads, files and folders by installing Skyrim mods (using kid friendly settings on Nexus), also an exercise in managing frustration...
Anyway everyone will be different, just set up something they'll enjoy. Already for a kid to know Linux exists is a head start.
I think it is also important to realize/point out that we do a lot of projecting and our child may have very different interests. Not saying that applies to you evolve2k, just wanted to make the general point.
I set up a Linux machine with our daughter and while it was initially ok, she did not have much interest in the power/freedom and it only became a nuisance for her. Her school/friends use PowerPoint - there is a lot of friction trying work with them in LibreOffice. She wanted to do DTP-like things several times and the Linux options are not exactly... user-friendly. Etc.
In the end we got her a Mac Mini. She can still open a terminal, use Homebrew, etc. if she ever develops an interest. Heck, she can use most free software. However, she can also do the stuff she is currently interested in much more easily. E.g., she uses Swift Publisher, which is a very simple/user-friendly DTP program, can collaborate on PowerPoint presentations when needed, etc.
First and foremost listen to what your child is interested in.
I am a teen and so when I had made the switch from windows -> linux, he was a little weirded out and I tried to do things in libreoffice but he just genuinely thought it was excel itself and he was trying to use his old experience for some niche thing and I was trying mine to figure out libreoffice etc.
Um, it was decent, I still use libreoffice but at that time, I just decided to open up google sheets (iirc) and just use google sheets for excel purposes and I think that later he even preferred it since he could then go to someone else and have them open up that excel as well
We never had collaboration on powerpoint presentations or etc., our school work was basically build a presentation and mail it
I live in the east tho so I am not sure how the western world's schooling system is entrenched in powerpoints collaboration etc.
I don't like google generally but atleast their suite is in the web and so I can naturally use it in linux as well without any limitations unlike the web versions of microsoft's monopolistic suite of softwares.
That being said, I am still on mac which my brother gifted me partially because I only have a computer and sometimes I like the portability of a laptop but I genuinely feel annoyed or I do feel limited by what I can do on mac.
Yes I have installed homebrew etc. but linux actually feels more comfy for me to use to be honest, I think I like both but I personally prefer linux more as well.
I would recommend if possible to try to buy them something like a old laptop and boot them linux as well to try to teach them your knowledge and try to bond with them.
There is just this instant sense of gratification I get when I realize that my pc is mostly open source and it has even gotten to the points of being reproducible and bootstrappable so somebody would technically be able to even re-architect or (myself) as well the way I use my computers in this open source manner. All of the things open source.. Wild.
I personally have starred a lot of projects along the way I have found and I am pretty sure that some of these projects could genuinely be useful to people.
I am sure you know some really cool open source projects as well and maybe you can share these softwares which can help them in the process as well. I have found it extremely surprising in how many things can be done by already built open source softwares.
It is not as if I don't use proprietory software, I think there are some trade-offs to be made
I decided to use obsidian partially because I found it to have a better plugin system than logseq (? sorry if this isn't the correct name) and I really like the excalidraw plugin in obsidian.
one thing I have protested, to the point of being obnoxious, is school-managed Chromebooks. I've talked to every principal of every school she's been in since Covid-19 to persistently request I be allowed to furnish a Windows laptop or at least a Chromebook I manage. -and in a bit of a surprise to me, everyone's been accommodating (though never to let her use a Windows laptop; I think maybe providing it as an option makes breaking policy to let her bring a self-managed Chromebook seem reasonable). I argue I operate web services with user information at home and don't want school employees on my network, and I don't want the financial liability of her accidentally damaging school property.
Arguably you could just put your kids in a high-end private school with other well socialized children who have had significant sums of money invested in their development and haven't even been pacified with tech out of parental laziness/necessity but hey, whatever works...
Secondly, providing a linux based computer or old windows as an intro to technology has one very basic benefit. It teaches mindful interaction with technology. These things are tools. Regardless of how hard many companies try, computers (smartphone, tablet or desktop) remain machines that do exactly what we ask them when you ask them to do it and internalizing this at a young age builds stronger humans.
>In windows when a child goes searching the web for a “movie maker for windows” they are going to be in a world of hurt either finding expensive commercial options or super scammy sites promising the world.
It's funny that you use that example because the state of video editors on Windows have never been better from industry standard free options (DaVinci Resolve) to FOSS options (KDEnlive, Openshot, Shotcut, Avidemux etc).
What you describe is a Google / web / browser problem not an OS one
FWIW this is what I recommend to adults wanting to get into the industry as well, I would just usually direct them from there towards automation, containerisation etc. For kids I would point out that they could host other things instead of WordPress, or even write their own..
Of the important things my father, who definitely is a "tech parent", did for me none of them have anything to do with him teaching me some piece of technology.
To be very frank, if the best thing you have done for your children is getting them to use Linux you are a total failure as a parent. To be fair to you, I do not believe you at all when you say this.
>Now my friend wants the same for their daughter who is 8 years old.
One of the actually most valuable thing my father did for me, definitely in terms of education outcome and career. Was getting me interested and spending time with me and explaining me things. The particulars do not matter, I can not remember them. It is totally irrelevant whether what Linux distro you use or what you teach them. What matters is that the parent is there, explains and encourages.
>Linux with free and open software is the goal and focus.
This is about an 8 year old.
Be careful - even the most obvious things (to us) won't be to a small child. They'll need a bit of a guiding hand and/or someone to ask questions to. Linux isn't obvious and I wouldn't be too surprised if they run into hard edges at some point (sound driver stops working), without someone to actually go to for help the computer just becomes a brick.
- Someone who installed Linux on his beat-up laptop when he was 12 (*), and faced endless frustration with it. (My parents confiscated the laptop because I started hitting it lmao - later got a Windows desktop that "just worked")
* - I don't remember if it stopped being able to run windows (hardware too weak) or, if the windows partition had corrupted itself and I couldn't afford a new copy of windows.
In both school and work it’s overwhelmingly likely they will either be asked to do things in MacOS or Windows only. Make sure they’re proficient there first.
Linux as a personal OS, regardless of how passionate you are about it, is still a hobbyist platform. If your child becomes super into computers, then you can help them dive deeper down the rabbit hole.
But I wouldn’t drop them at the bottom of the rabbit hole prematurely. Just because your kid liked listening to an AC/DC song doesn’t mean they will want to dive immediately into the world of Brutal Deathcore.
maybe a USB stick with a few distros on it, experimenting with installing them, including dual-booting.. a mix of distros spanning debian/redhat types, and kde/gnome types.. maybe a couple of live distros on their own USB stick.. having a virtual machine in the main install and learning about installing into them..
scratch and python..
preloaded with tons of stuff my kid might find cool (depends on his or her interests which nobody knows better than I do), and with completely disabled internet access if kid will be using it without my supervision.
Why ZFS? So that backups are easy, snapshots are cheap, and when the inevitable happens, it takes a few minutes to reboot and roll back.
Why Debian Stable? Because it will continue to work and get security updates for years, without changing out from underneath them without notice.
I would also recommend that any computer for an 8 year old be placed in the living room or a similar easy-to-watch-over place. Kids need guidance; if they didn't, they wouldn't be kids.
Adblocking, obviously. Everyone needs that.
Ununtu (non root) and timekeeper plus. I work with them when they want to install something or do updates.
They have steam, minecraft, OpenRA for games and are happy.
They create music, program arduinos, edit videos they make with friends.