Debiosk

Kiosks on Live CDs

Debiosk is a completely open source solution for kiosk design. Utilizing Debian Live and Debiosk as a starting point, a person with intermediate technical Linux knowledge can create a kiosk to their liking. Whether it be as simple as a web kiosk or as complex as a Library computer station, with Debiosk you are well on your way!

Building with the default configuration of Debiosk without changing it will create a usable web kiosk. Utilizing developer documentation, a little bit of elbow grease and that thing we call a brain, a whole plethora of solutions are at your disposal.

What is a framelate?

A Framelate is not quite a framework, and not quite a template. It is something in between. As such, Debiosk is not a framework and is not a template. It has qualities of both, but is not exclusively either.

Features

Debiosk is very secure, blazing fast, and purposeful.

• Great care has been taken to ensure nothing gets saved between loads, so a machine running a recent release of the Debiosk framework is pretty darn secure.
• Debiosk is suitable to be run on a machine as old as a Pentium III with 128MB of RAM. More memory is preferable, but not entirely necessary.
• The latest stable release of Debiosk is meant as a secure kiosk solution for those who need to deploy a free-to-use public Internet kiosk.
• You are allowed to modify and re-distribute Debiosk under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 2.
• ALL configuration is available free of charge (custom configurations at a price).

For the Future

Debiosk v0.1 is currently in a release candidate stage (RC3, to be exact) and is ready for testing. See the link to the left entitled "Download Stable". For future releases past 0.1, here is what could and ought to be accomplished:

• As soon as possible, create a new branch for examples on the barebones capability of a kiosk desktop.
  • This will become the new developement branch: "DEVEL"
  • Aim: To show developers how the Debiosk framelate works.
  • Programs: xterm, links, JWM ... or icewm
  • Notes: Will not be suitable for the general public, but everyone will be welcome to download it.
  • Goal: Move "throwaway home directory" to pam-mount with a combination tempfs and unionfs.
  • Goal: Make it less bulky, perhaps completely removing apt and perl, if it is possible.
• In the far future, this is what will probably become of Debiosk:
  • Create a new branch for Public Library and School Library use.
  • Create a new branch for School Computer Lab use.
• These two branches (library and lab) will most likely not be distributed as ISO images, as this would not give a justice to the potential needs for each individual situation. Additionally, Debiosk is meant to be a starting point for developers, not a destination for end-users.