water cooler :: Where did you first hear about DSL?

I was looking for a small enough debian based a-la-knoppix distro to install in low power computers (pent ones) for schools with low budget .
since then I have put together a minilab using skolelinux as a thin client server and DSL as a thinclient back-up-OS in case the network fails (DSL actually runs faster by itself than as a thinclient from the server)

I heard of it from a friends back when I was no to the whole Linux thing. I didn't like windows and I was looking to go into linux and he suggested I get started on D.S.L. Biggest problem was I was used to windows and didn't know what the risks of turning your computer off prematurly were :/

I met Aw Phuch (Brian) on the newbie forum at LinuxLinks when I was setting up my first Linux box, a Dell DimV400, Pentium II, 256 MB RAM, with Mandrake 10.1 and I'm sure I was insufferable; my forum manners leave something to be desired when I get so excited about something I know so little about. I had been wanting to make the switch from Micro$oft™ to Linux for quite awhile, but was afraid so I wound up getting that PII for $30 on eBay for the specific purpose of attempting to run Mandrake and was shocked to find that I prefered it to my year old Compaq Presario S5000NX running XP.

In the course of my excessive chattering, I mentioned my (ir)rational (depending on your attitude towards very old but very solid hardware) attachment to what is now my DSL box, a Gateway P5-166, 48 MB RAM which was my very first internet capable computer and served me heroically running Win98SE when I was too stupid to know any better.

I also mentioned that the abovementioned faithful servant/hunk of old iron is downright modern compared to some of the machines I work on for the more financially disadvantaged residents of my hometown. I was interested in putting older versions of Mandrake on the donations to my local community community college's flea market this summer when Brian mentioned that DSL would be a better idea.

I remained skeptical for awhile but ordered several copies of the CD to be snail mailed to myself and other family members and began lurking on the DSL forums.

Yesterday, I just plain got impatient waiting for the mailman and sucessfully downloaded the ISO on dial-up and burned it. There were no coasters involved at all, just a BIOS problem and another minor issue with my communication skills which Brian cleared right up last night. My Gateway is now on the internet and running DSL beautifully, with no struggles remaining other than minor filesharing issues less than 24 hours after I started the download.

I look foward to putting DSL on even less likely PCs in the future for folks who stand far more to gain and to give than my illustrious self.

i goggled linux minimal and guess what came out??? dsl !!

I first found it with google while fleeing windows -- I was looking to try a linux distro that would be small enough to download over my usually slow connection. 50mB takes about 2-3 hours, so a 600mB Knoppix or something was just out of the question (I get those from someone else's connection).

Perhaps because it was my first and I'm comfortable with the directory structure and emelfm etc, I prefer it to knoppix and kannotix, which seem big and complicated (and too big to boot toram). And I'm not mad about konqueror as a file manager or web browser really.

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