[CS-FSLUG] Webmin for the Desktop?

[Ed Hurst]

I'm exploring ideas about avoiding the X server on Linux for desktop use.  
More importantly, I'm looking at reaching those who aren't yet ready for  
the full commandline life.

On the one hand, we might have any number of GUIs possible, even a TUI,  
but I'm not sure how far anyone is going with this. I won't pretend I can  
understand DirectFB, but I've seen FBUI and a couple of other projects  
designed to replicate some of what X does.

On the other hand, there is some work done to dolly up the console a bit.  
There's the console version of Ubuntu, called INX. Without running it, the  
information is limited, but I think it's quite viable. I could wish to see  
some things added to their menus and scripts, but I suspect those things  
will probably appear in due time.

There are some free-standing configuration tool projects. I believe one  
good one would be essential for a desktop without X, if there is to be any  
wider appeal. A while back, YaST was open sourced, and there is some work  
porting it to Debian. I like that, because I'm familiar with YaST on the  
console. Some of the RedHat console setup tools are also pretty nice.  
FreeBSD does have some useful setup stuff in sysinstall, but again, it's  
server oriented. Here and there I've run across some interesting scripts  
for individual or related tasks, but no particular coherent system which  
covers stuff you might find is someone simply made a distro other than INX.

I am under the impression something like Webmin can be run from the  
console with Lynx, for example. However, scanning their list of modules, I  
see it's naturally all about server admin, and not desktop. Is anyone  
aware of any effort to add them, or to create a similar tool targeting the  
desktop?

-- 
Ed Hurst
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