I don't know if there's a distro made specifically with libraries in mind, but I would lean toward the Cinnamon DE because it's the easiest to fool people into thinking it's Windows out of the box.
The main issue would be folks coming in to use MS Office. LibreOffice compatibility with MS office's formats isn't perfect and sometimes it'll mangle formatting.
The public library in my city uses OpenSuse
I believe you want to look into libki. Works on Windows and Linux.
Linux Mint with this serves our local library.
Libraries are not companies, they don’t need to make a profit. They are supported by taxes. The computers they have are old because they work perfectly fine.
They probably don’t pay for licensing, and the cost to maintain non-windows OS would be more due to having to hire people with that skill set.
Libraries do pay for licensing of all MS software, as well as many other databases.
And any IT person working in a library usually is managing a Unix server so Linux is not something they are unfamiliar with, they even use linux servers.
The computers they have are old because they work perfectly fine.
Until they're no longer secure, because Windows stops supporting them with security updates.
They probably don’t pay for licensing
Based on what? They aren't magically exempt because they're a library. Licensing costs are a huge part of a library's expenses.
That's basic skillset of managing an OS. If IT person cannot setup guest accounts on Linux better not to hire him at all.
Puppy Linux and easyos have those options... It's been a bit since I've used them tho..
They could do a thin client type of deal and just virtual desktops that get deleted at the end of the session. If they are on 32bit hardware that really limits options on operating systems but a single backend computer hosting virtual desktops can be a donated 64bit PC/Server.
The sad part is it seems that there isn't much of any thin client solutions that don't require a gigantic licensing fee that negates the savings of doing the thin clients
Also from my experience working helpdesk at an organization that was all thin clients, they're a pain to support because if anything happens the first thing people try to do is reboot it which tends to cause orphaned sessions on the server. For the public computers at the library that would matter less since very few people would need their profile that got disconnected, but it's still extra friction
Does it need more then a webbrowser and a rfid card reader? I dont know how those library backend systen work but most systems save data in a plain ol database.
I don’t see a reason why they cant already use a limux based OS except that someone will need an employee or volunteer to set it all up and support.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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