2012 December Newsletter

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The Freekbox Gets a Makeover

If you visited Free Geek on December 4 and heard disco music blaring while volunteers and staff competed head-to-head on Super Tux Kart in the classroom (yes, it’s an open source game very similar to Super Mario Kart), you luckily stumbled into the Holi-Distro party. Generally, our holiday party is a chance to unwind with other Free Geek community members, perhaps participate in a white elephant gift exchange, and celebrate the many accomplishments of the year. This year though, things were a little different as we were also celebrating the release of a new Linux distribution on Free Geek computers.

Linux, an open-source operating system, has many different distributions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_distros#Popular_distributions), or distros, maintained by various groups throughout the world. Each of these distros is updated, much like you see on other proprietary operating systems, on a regular basis. Since 2006, Free Geek has used Ubuntu (http://www.ubuntu.com/), currently the most widely-adopted version of Linux, on all of our computers with an operating system. We chose this version for its ease of use and the robust support afforded by the greater Linux community and Canonical, the company responsible for Ubuntu Linux. Unfortunately, the version of Ubuntu we’ve been using since 2010, 10.04 Lucid Lynx, will only be officially supported until April, 2013. To plan for this transition, several Free Geek staff and interns formed the Distro Committee to research, test, de-bug, and document the next version of Linux for our computers.

First, the committee set out to define priorities for the new operating system. We talked to representatives of various areas of Free Geek including Tech Support, the Build Program, Education, and the Thrift Store. We also polled a wide cross-section of our computer users to discover what was important to them and how they use their computers. Major priorities for this new distro included a long support cycle (so we wouldn’t have to go through this process too often), compatibility with a wide range of old and new computer systems, and ease of use for both beginners and experienced computer users. Armed with these criteria, our intrepid Distro Interns began exploring and testing many of the various available Linux distributions. (Find out more about one of the lead Distro Interns, Ben Koening, in this newsletter’s Volunteer Spotlight (http://www.freegeek.org/newsletter/2012/12/volunteer-spotlight-ben-koenig/.))

After collecting tons of data on various distributions, the intern team ultimately recommended that Free Geek adopt Xubuntu 12.04 (http://xubuntu.org/) (although it’s officially pronounced “zoo-bun-too”, plenty of people call it “ex-oo-bun-too”.) As you can likely tell from the name, this is a branch of the original Ubuntu distro. Unlike Ubuntu 12.04, which comes with the new-to-users Unity Interface (http://unity.ubuntu.com/), Xubuntu uses Xfce (http://www.xfce.org/) to control the way the operating system looks. This version was selected for many reasons including the same five-year support of Ubuntu 12.04, speed on both old and new systems, and an interface very similar to the one our users became familiar with in Ubuntu 10.04.

Although this new distro is officially supported for the next five years, that doesn’t mean you’re necessarily going to see it on our computers for that long. The Distro Interns will continue to work on documentation for Free Geek and look to new developments in the world of Linux computing in order to facilitate further changes as needed. Free Geek would like to thank our Distro Interns for all the hard work they continue to put into ensuring a satisfying computing experience for all Free Geek community members. If you happen to come across one of our Distro Interns (they’re hard to spot unless you know the secret Distro handshake…kidding!), please do the same!


Free Geek Charitable Contributions 101

Every day at the Free Geek Donations desk, our visitors ask all kinds of questions about our volunteer programs and our organizational structure. We love questions! They show that our patrons are interested in being informed about their chosen causes, and in spending their dollars wisely. Read on for responses to some of the questions we hear most frequently.

  • Q: “If Free Geek makes money from selling electronics in the Thrift Store, why do you also ask for contributions at the Donations Desk?”
  • A: First of all, we are incredibly grateful to you, our donors, for your support of technology reuse in the larger community. If you choose not to contribute funds, your hardware donation is no less valuable or appreciated as a result. However, as a 501(c)3 nonprofit, Free Geek relies on a variety of revenue streams, one of them being charitable contributions, to support our volunteer programs and operating expenses. The suggested values we offer at the Donations Desk are based on the costs we incur from processing materials through Receiving. These costs are the same whether a donated item ends up in the Thrift Store or the Recycling Warehouse.
  • Q: “How can I stay informed about how Free Geek is using the contributions and other revenue you receive?”
  • A: There are various ways to keep tabs on our operations, programs and financials. You can obtain a free copy of our most recent IRS 990 forms on the NCSS website (http://nccsdataweb.urban.org/orgs/profile/931292010#forms). If you want to follow the progress of our projects and programs on the ground, look no further than our meeting minutes. Minutes from all Free Geek committees and working groups (short of confidential business and executive sessions) are available to the public via subscription to our Minutes email list (http://lists.freegeek.org/listinfo/minutes). Our board of directors is also receptive to answering questions from the public; inquiries about board business and the steering of Free Geek as a whole can be directed to board-discuss AT lists DOT freegeek DOT org (http://lists.freegeek.org/listinfo/board-discuss). Lastly, if you have a question and aren’t sure where it should be directed, email info AT freegeek DOT org, and a staff member will follow up with you promptly.

Hardware Grants Spotlight: Computers in Schools

What is the value of a Hardware Grant from Free Geek? Current tax code does not allow us to assign monetary value to computers we disburse to nonprofits, schools and community change organizations through our Hardware Grants program. However, a staff person at one of our recent grant recipient organizations did take it upon himself to sum up the value of our hardware grants in terms of additional teaching capacity. Paul Shearer was working as the IBM School Mentor in the Lake Oswego School District when he received a large assortment of computers for his program:

“Five (5) Free Geek grant computers per month can provide sixty (60) computers in 12 months which can provide a school with two (2) student labs of thirty (30) computers each and save the school $42,000 cash. That can be enough savings to help fund one teacher for a full year.

Free Geek has provided over two hundred (200) grant computers to LOSD in the past three years and that has provided a savings of $140,000 cash which is enough to fund two master high school teachers for one full year and at some schools could help fund up to three starting teachers for a full year.”

Lake Oswego is not the only educational institution to have benefited from Free Geek’s Hardware Grants program. So far in 2012, we have granted out free laptops and computers (http://www.freegeek.org/about/grants/) (along with monitors, keyboards and mouses) to over 45 educational programs. Included in these disbursements were over 526 systems and 69 laptops! That can translate to thousands of saved dollars that, rather than being spent on technical infrastructure, can go directly to educating the youth of the greater Portland area. It’s also a whole lot of computers being reused instead of recycled, or worse, improperly discarded.

Recipients of Free Geek hardware grants this year include (but certainly aren’t limited to): Agia Sophia Academy Ano’s Art Academy Astor K-8 school Atlas Immersion Academy Ballston Community School Bethel Christian School Childswork Learning Center Inc. Conestoga Middle School Emmanuel Christian Academy Escuela Viva FIRST Robotics Competition Team 1432 Forest Grove High School Speech and Debate Grandhaven Elementary Hope Chinese Charter School Lanai High And Elementary Leadership and Entrepreneurship Public Charter High School Lewis and Clark High School Mount Adams School District Northwest Children’s Theater and School Pioneer Montessori School Portland Public Schools Portland Village School Portland Youth Builders Reynolds Learning Academy: East Campus Sunstone Montessori School Tucker-Maxon Oral School Village Free School Wahkiakum School District


Staff Spotlight: Kevin Wright

In this edition of the Free Geek Gnusletter, we profile Kevin Wright, known by many since April 2012 as one of our always hard-working and friendly Receiving and Prebuild Associates. Naturally, the Gnusletter staff was thrilled to sit down with Kevin to find out what makes her tick and how she found her way to Free Geek. Prepare to be delighted and amazed, and say hi to Kevin when you see her around the building!

  • FG: What led or inspired you to get involved with Free Geek, and how did you end up working on the staff?
  • KW: I was in school and realized that after two years as a Computer Science student we had never opened a computer and looked inside! I was having a really hard time connecting the dots between the hardware and what we were learning from labs and books, so I told one of my teachers that I needed some hands-on time with a computer I could break or take apart, and he sent me to Free Geek. I never left. I started as a volunteer, then became an intern, then a temporary employee and finally got hired full-time.
  • FG: What is your favorite thing about your job?
  • KW: I love that at Free Geek we don’t judge people by the way they look, act, or dress. To me it seems like everyone is welcome to come in and try their hand at whatever takes their fancy. We do our best to teach anyone who wants to learn.
  • FG: Can you tell our readers something about you that might surprise them?
  • KW: I love to surf, and usually try to get to some good water a few times a year. My mom was a surfer in the 60′s and she taught my brothers and me. I enjoy Kihei beach, and Kahului Harbor in Maui, but will try any beach. I am also a pretty good bow hunter and try to get out in the field as much as I can. Growing up, my family hunted everything we could eat. I have the most fun hunting with a bow because i think it is the most fair. You can stand across a canyon with a rifle and catch a deer, but with a bow you have to actually hunt.
  • FG: Have you learned any tips about working with computers that you think our readers may want to know?
  • KW: There is no “cheating” in computers! By which I mean that whatever you’re trying to figure out, there is documentation online somewhere that contains the answer, or someone else at Free Geek has had that problem and is usually willing to help. Volunteers who try to speed through the process without asking questions might miss out on important information and end up shooting themselves in the foot. My advice is to take it slow, ask questions and don’t be embarrassed if you don’t already know the answer to the problem you’re trying to solve.
  • FG: Would you rather fight 100 duck-sized horses or one horse-sized duck, and why?
  • KW: If I saw a horse-sized duck I would try to ride it!

Volunteer Spotlight: Ben Koenig

If you came to this year’s HoliDistro disco party, you would have found Ben Koenig in the classroom leading some gaming activities and showcasing Free Geek’s new release of Xubuntu 12.04 free and open source operating system. How did Ben attain this prestigious and important role? He started volunteering at Free Geek about three years ago, quickly advancing through the Build program, and moving on to intern in Tech Support, where he continues to serve today.

Ben’s higher focus since November of 2011 has been the Distribution Committee, or “Distro.” Along with fellow volunteers Larry, Tim, and Tanvi, Ben was tasked with testing and choosing the best Linux OS distribution for Free Geek to replace Ubuntu Lucid 10.04. “Mostly our target has been to find a distro amongst a set of predetermined user-friendly distributions,” says Ben.

In addition to all his great work on the Distro Committee, Ben also teaches the Linux Playground class. In this class, Ben sets up eight laptops with a different Linux distribution on each so volunteers can experiment with them. He describes it as “a lot of fun, and a great way to see and use a particular distro before you install it on your own machine.”

How did Ben become so Linux-savvy? His father is an avid Linux user and got him started at an early age. Ben now has three operating systems on his computer and has even created an app for android called Freedom Zing. He designed it for elections and it comes with 70 random zingers to use against either conservatives or liberals. Equal-opportunity zinging can be accessed via a quick search of “Freedom Zing” on Google Play.

Some fun facts about Ben that you may not know: he has lived in every corner of the US, takes three buses and a Max to Free Geek, and not only teaches chess to youth, he can even play it blindfolded! He told the interviewer that his favorite thing about volunteering at Free Geek is “being around all the computer and open source stuff and talking to people who also know about Linux, and having the community to interact with on that level.” Thanks to Ben for being such a star volunteer!

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