This is a brief report on the third OLPC meet [1] that happened at SF State on March 15. Its a bit late, but I figured, better late than never. It is, after all, Spring break, so work seems like a distant memory. Ah, the joys of selective amnesia!
Coming back to the report. We met on March 15, in a conference room. Attendance was somewhere between 25 and 30 people. What continues to surprise me is that we seem to keep up that number and have different groups rotate through. Some repeat attendees, of course, but majority of the crowd was new.
[2]Among the items discussed, the more important and interesting one was that we don't seem to have much by way of end-user participation. That is, we hardly have any groups with children as the focus. We have XO enthusiasts who are Linux fans, hardware fans, networking fans, but very few who have looked at how children react to the XO or how they play with it. A couple of people have suggested alternative meetings with that specific focus. Either ping us on the list [3] or write to me [4] and I'll patch you through to the folks who are interested in doing so.
The group coalesced around these different interests:
- Mesh-based sustainable networks
- Linux and programming interests, mostly Python.
- Translation for the XO
- Solar and alternative power interests
- Media on the XO
Bruce Baikie of Green Wi-Fi [5] introduced himself and his non-profit outfit. He had with him a prototype of a self-sustained solar (photovoltaic) based wi-fi mesh repeater [6]. Think of this thing as a small box that you can place on your rooftop or hang from a flagpole. Solar (which charges a battery) makes it sustainable over long periods of time. Such units can be used to improve mesh densities in areas off the grid or with unreliable power. I wouldn't mind putting on on my roof!
[7]There are now a few good examples of how to write basic apps (activities in XO parlance) using Python. Some examples can be found at http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Sugar_Activity_Tutorial [8]. There was the mention of a simple activity called Flashlight (as far as I can remember) but I didn't get a chance to see it .If someone who was there can send me a note or link, I'll post it here. Somewhat related to the application development topic is the topic of translation, an area that non-programming types can help with. (Sidenote: I find that many people simply assume that because it is a computer, only computer programmers can contribute. Of course the notion is not true, but the perception lives on.)
Translation for the XO laptop is rather simple. Activities in XO use PO files [9] for language translation. However, OLPC provides a web-based front end to the PO file subsystem via an application called Pootle. Go to http://opensource.sfsu.edu/node/452 [10] to see how to get started with translation for the XO (look for the attached PDF on that page). The minimum prerequisite is that you know enough about a language other than English to be able to translate words and phrases.
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Three of us at the meeting had solar panels with us. Bruce Baikie's panel was attached to his mesh repeater, so we couldn't do much with it. I have a 4 watt VW Solar panel (an interesting product. See details at http://lists.laptop.org/pipermail/olpc-open/2008-March/000634.html [12]) that has been retrofitted with plugs to power the XO directly. Dan Perez had a much fancier messenger bag with the solar panel built right in! We took these panels out to the quad to see what we could glean from the readings. XOs come with a script called olpc-logbat which automatically logs battery statistics to screen and file. Simply open the terminal activity and type "olpc-logbat" at the prompt. Ctrl C when done with logging. This will leave you with a .csv (comma separated value) file with all the logs in comma separated columns.Import into OpenOffice (or Excel if you haven't kicked the habit...yet) and plot away! Dan's messenger bag solar panel outputs 6.5 watts at peak performance, but the connector on the panel was loose, so it wouldn't charge reliably. My laptop would keep discharging but at a slower rate, because the input (solar panel) is approximately 4 watts, while the usage (laptop) is anywhere between 7 and 10 watts. See http://lists.laptop.org/pipermail/olpc-open/2008-March/000635.html [13] for details.
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In all, it was a fun meeting. Photos are at http://joachimp.fotki.com/events/olpcevents/20080315olpcmeet/ [19]
The next one will be at the LUG Radio Live USA event (April 12 and 13) at the Metreon, San Francisco. This is a weekend event. We have a table at the event to show off XO laptops. We need volunteers for the event (event is free for volunteers, but I need a definitive list soon). Attendees pay $10 for the entire weekend. That's less than the price of two of those super drink thingies at Starbucks! If you are interested in volunteering for the XO table, please let me know. sverma@sfsu.edu [20]