Speaking Of Things That Don't Work

My house is crammed with computers, but only two of them (mine and Mrs Username's) are connected to the internet. Which means the kids always want to use them to play games.

The basement is wired, so last night I finally got around to hooking one up. It's got some version of Windows on there and already has a network card, so it should be easy, right? Drivers?? I don't even know what the card is! Not to mention the fact that I'm not too comfortable putting a Windows machine on the internet.

Then I get a crazy idea: I'll make it dual boot Ubuntu¹! Takes me 45 minutes to download the latest disc, i.e. less time than it would have to identify, locate, download and install a NIC driver. Completely easy to install: Other than the fact that I had to adjust a slider to say how much room to leave for the existing Windows partition, I didn't have to tell it anything at all. It even got on the internet all by itself to download updates.

The question is: Is making my kids dual boot into Linux to play games child abuse or child undangerment? Either way, it certainly builds character.

¹Actually, Xubuntu, because this is an older machine. I considered Edubuntu, but I think I'll go with the small, fast one and then add kid-oriented packages.