A Proud Moment

I’ve mentioned (here and here) my “safe environment” for my children to access the internet. This moved on to the second stage the other day when Schwuklet #2 (my 5 year old son) finally got his own computer.

I took a bit of a different tack this time. With Schwuklet #1’s computer I took the easy path of Windows XP because a) I was in a hurry and didn’t have the time to dedicate to customising a Linux install to my requirements and b) she had a Bratz game that required Windows. I know, I copped out. This time – primarily because I was going to be (re)using much older hardware – I decided to invest the time in getting Linux to suit my needs. I started off, as always, with Ubuntu 5.10. I know Dapper is almost here, but Breezy will suffice for now. Because of the machine’s poor spec, I passed over GNOME and instead used Xfce which is much ‘lighter’. I also installed Tux Paint, GCompris and Childsplay then customised the menus so only those apps, Firefox, Thunderbird and Gaim were available to him.

Internet access – as previously discussed – is well restricted. Email is a non-published address and heavily filtered anyway, and Gaim is there so he can chat to me, his mother and his sister (how sad!) when we’re online (which I am most of the day).

This brings onto my “proud moment”: my first IM conversation with my son. How cool is that!