I'm thinking of putting up a linux internet cafe, I've read suggestions from other forums to use LTSP or make a linux as a thin client, managed by a central linux server.

I've found a variety of management tools and might help me out:

http://www.xpde.com/shots.php -- xp-looking desktop
http://sourceforge.net/project/shown...lease_id=37407 --
metermaid & ltsp
http://www.enzolutions.com/gcafe/ -- gcafe, not english
http://zeiberbude.sourceforge.net/ -- cafe solution
http://quozl.us.netrek.org/ppa/ -- cafe solution
http://freshmeat.net/projects/ajicafe/ -- cafe solution
http://freshmeat.net/projects/clubmanager/ -- cafe solution
http://freshmeat.net/projects/openkiosk/ -- cafe solution
http://freshmeat.net/projects/cyborgproject/ -- cafe solution


The Xp-look might attract non-linux customers and all others can help manage the cafe. I've thought of adding some other services like:
- Fax
- Printing
- Scanning
- Webcam
- Gaming


The fax, printing, etc part should be easy but I might need some advice on the setup & gaming license ... what other services my customers may need? and do I need a license to operate ... say UT2004 for commercial use?

Any piece of advice is appreciated, especially from cafe owners themeselves

sounds interesting but is it a necessity? Unless you're trying to save money on liscensing fees I cant see reasons why you would want to run an all Linux Internet Cafe. What about people who want to bring their floppies or CD roms with their school homework on it?

licensing is costly and there are windows software with linux alternatives for most of them(ex. openoffice, scribus, gimp, ymessenger). That was plan A. If that fails I could always switch back OS's and add some more hardware for the thin clients

I could also set everything up for internet use only ... lower the fees a little to remain competitive with all the other cafe's using windows. Lots of things and possibilities to think about here ... it's worth a try

have a charge by the hour fee. If you don't you'll have 16 year olds coming in for a cup of coffee and then fragging away on the computer for 3 hours.

Fax, Print, Scan, Email and browse is all you really need. Maybe have 3 computers set aside for gaming otherwise like I said you'd have a cafe full of teens using up all the time on the LAN with others waiting impatiently for what they need to do.

I would worry that this is a dying business model. Well dunno how the Phillipines are on Compi penetration. But Always on compi access will get cheaper so you only end up on the long run with those customers trying to be anonymous.

If you mean the internet cafe altogether ... well, not everyone here in the Philippines could afford a computer, even the middle class.

you might consider a mixed enviroment, with the linux clients being a dollar cheaper to use


some peope will just NEED windows, exp gamers. Unless you can get games to perform well uder wine or winx, but that gets expensive (with winx) and requires alot of extra work for a iffy- configuration.



Try to get your proudctivity users on linux, but chances are your going to be stuck with windows for the gamers.

Hmmm... maybe I should just remove the games and make it into a non-gaming net cafe, office/productivity apps included.

Agree with this... I still cant find a linux program that does the same job as powerpoint. And also I found that eventhough you can get word docs to work with open office, if you have something like tables, it gets all messed up.
And also, when was the last time a *good* popular game came with native linux port, other than UT?

I wouldn't use XPde. Just use a regular Window Manager.
As far as I know, XPde isn't ready yet!

XPde is very poor and unstable. Try a KDE theme if needs be.

I read an article on cyber cafes and the only ones that are making money in the UK seem to be the one that offer gaming. I am not a gamer but i know gamers like fast connections and there is none better than a LAN so they like using cafes. I would have some computers that have a nice selection of popular games and linked to each other. I would offer by the hour rates for these machines. And oh yeah...they will need windows. No doubt about it. Hardly any games will work well on linux.

Boffy

Actually, if you are prepared to run winex/cedega then you might find that there are in fact enough games to run on an internet cafe/lan. I found warcraft3, Diablo2 and Black and White will mutiplay over my lan in Linux with winex/cedega. Doom3 is also suposed to go but I haven't tried it and I'm sure other "big" commercial mutiplayer run as well. Combine those with the Quakes, UT's which run natively and then add a few opensource mutiplayer games such as BZflag and Cube which are also great fun, then I think you have a fairly serious gaming linux lan system on your hands. You could even run Xmame for some retro arcade fun but you would need to get licenses first.

azraelder

WineX can work well, but if your going to try it make sure you can get everything working well on one machine before you dump cash into the other 30.

I was just thinking of setting up a similar thing in zimbabwe, so I'm gonna go through some of the sites you listed above. I agree that you don't really need many gaming machines and I wouldn't recommend XPDE. If you decide to use, the KDE Kiosk tool can be used to lockup some aspects of your desktops that you do not want visitors to your net cafe to change.

be sure to have java available for the web browsers, i know a lot of kids and such over here love to play games like runescape (online java based) with any computers they get there hands on

and why does no one think there are good linux games, you are either to obsessed with the newest fancy whatnot games that wont even work in linux, why not try to find some good linux games

vega strike
tux racer
solar wolf
penguin command
concentration
track balls
chickens (ok, this one might not be for children )
pathological
armagetron (and the ones like it)
atanks (and other ones like it, like scorched earth)
xboard (gnuchess front)
toppler (eeh, its still fun)
crack-attack (yes, again, lots of other ones like this)
formido
xprired
xlincity (sucky graphics)
kiki (ummmm... this ones a bit fun, until you get stuck)
raptor (other ones like this to)
excido (diffidently one that might not belong in a Internet cafe, it gets really fast)

then theres the coped games (the fun ones from a few years ago), like

abuse-sdl
rott
wolf-3d

then the rouge like games ... (nethack, and some gui based ones)

theres still one that i haven't tried out that i just cant seem to get installed (ok, well crystalspace (its dependency) errors at when i try to install ...) .. looks good tho ...

planeshift

then don't forget the web based games people like to play ...

and thats just a small list ..