HaitiOS

Fun learning activities & projects for OLPC laptops in Haiti and beyond!

Brief Evolution

Starting Sept 2013, HaitiOS 0.5.1 like its successor 0.6 require unsecured OLPC XO-1 laptops. Both are built from OLPC Release 12.1.0 with Fedora 17 and Sugar 0.96.2. We use the Tiny Core Linux installation method, instead of OS Builder for now. HaitiOS 0.6 will contain about 50 Sugar Activities gathered together from experiences across these sources:

• http://sugarlabs.org/~holt/haiti-shalom-activities-2011-2012/
• http://wiki.laptop.org/images/c/c8/GeoQuiz-5HT.xo by Nick Doiron & All -- works on 12.1.0, but mysteriously shows wrong data (Africa & South America data) until you (1) reboot (2) uninstall GeoQuiz-5HT (3) reinstall GeoQuiz-5HT. At this point the geographic quiz of Haiti's 10 departments finally loads properly!
• http://olpc-france.org/download/tuxmath-3.xo packaged by Lionel Laske -- Just Works with 12.1.0!!
• COMPARE to OLPC France's 2013 Madagascar Build https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0ApkC1NVMZoZodEJyNlprMFI3QUFvbE1Wd1pyWUUxcEE

Specifically, beyond the design doc below, here is the more final list of Sugar Activities HaitiOS 0.6 should contain:

• http://xsce.activitycentral.com/downloads/HaitiOS-0.6/bundles/ layered on top of...
• http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Activities/G1G1/12.1 (5 of which we're removed, to save 27MB: HelloWorld, Moon, TamTamSynthLab, Welcome, WorldDigitalLibrary; easily restored under My Settings -> Software update)
• Which is the full list beyond 12.1.0's base activities: http://download.laptop.org/xo-1/os/official/12.1.0-21/21021o0.activities.txt

In summary, HaitiOS 0.6 (design doc) greatly expands on 0.5.1. For lesson plans, it's sometime useful to classify these Sugar activities into 4 categories: Base, Easy, Intermediate, Advanced.

Finally, an Intl version of HaitiOS 0.6 is being installed on Contributors Program XO-1 laptops shipping around the world starting early 2014, including Intl Activities enumerated below.

Download

Instructions follow for HaitiOS 0.6 releases, available since mid-December 2013:

1. Your XO-1 laptop must be unlocked. See how to check if it is locked, how to get a developer key, how to use a developer key, and how to unlock permanently. For groups of laptops, use the collection stick then an unlock stick.
2. Refurbish thoroughly if time,
3. Download the latest HaitiOS 0.6 from http://xsce.activitycentral.com/downloads/ (typically HaitiOS-0.6.tar.gz) which can be unpacked to the root (top) directory of most any FAT32 USB memory stick, EG using http://7-zip.org or http://Win-RAR.com.
4. Optionally customize which Sugar activities you want, in the "bundles" folder on your USB stick, considering intl recommendations below.
5. Plug in the XO-1 and verify its white battery is charged, shown by a green battery indicator. BOTH live charger and full battery are required to proceed!
6. Insert your USB memory stick into the XO-1. Hold down the 'x' game key and power on to upgrade the firmware to q2f19. Visually confirm this firmware upgrade completes (takes ~2 minutes, a 2nd attempt after reboot may be required). Double-check by pushing ESC repeatedly upon turning on the XO-1, to verify its firmware version.
7. Recommended: check the date and time shown at the Ok prompt, and if it is wrong fix it (we hope to largely automate this!)
8. Do a classic clean install, holding down all 4 game keys immediately after powering on. (USB stick must remain inserted into the XO-1)
9. About 15 min later, after an intermediary reboot and many install details proceeding on screen, the install should stop, completed. Hit "Enter" and then type "poweroff". When the XO is off, remove your USB memory stick, Done!

NOTE: if installation ends prematurely with rapid errors shooting down the screen soon after intermediary boot, hit "Enter" and then enter "date 0101000014" and finally enter "reboot", all while keeping the USB stick inserted --- regrettably you may need to try this final recovery/rebooting sequence several times if the clock battery is severely discharged and keeps forgetting its date. It is better to have checked and charged the clock battery first.

Mods for Intl Version

HaitiOS's choice of quick-to-learn Activities is being redistributed outside Haiti too, in countries with less Creole/Kreyòl and French, with the following (suggested) modifications to the installer USB memory stick's "bundles" folder.

Remove These: GeoQuiz-5HT.xo, HaitiDictionary-4.xo, livreshaiti.xol, pippy-fr.xo, Prompt-7.xo, wikipediafr-36.xo

Optionally Remove: i_know_america-9.xo if South/North American geography game ain't interesting to your country :)

Add These: geoquiz-5.xo, pippy-46.xo, wikipediaen-36.xo OR Wikipedia Simple (CAREFUL with all version numbers, Wikipedia Simple 37.1 and prior do not run on HaitiOS!)

In the end, your USB stick's resulting "bundles" folder of add-on activities (beyond 12.1.0) should like this 157MB collection of 29 Sugar activities: http://sugarlabs.org/~holt/HaitiOS-0.6-INTL-EN-addon-bundles/

History

Based on the work of Nick Doiron, Bill Stelzer, Sora Edwards-Thro, Tim Moody and invaluable other OLPC volunteers in Haiti, HaitiOS brings a richer set of Sugar Activities to encourage quick-off-the-mark independent exploration, and deeper "guided discovery" where possible. It continues to be based on OLPC Release 12.1.0, which we've found remains the fastest and most reliable overall operating system for our kids' and teachers' XO-1 laptops.

See blogs http://blog.unleashkids.org, http://haitidreams.org, http://projectrive.wordpress.com and http://ferrierschool.org/blog/ for extensive backstory from 2011, 2012, 2013 and onwards.

Inspiration

Truly great work has gone into Nepal's NEXO software for ~4000 XO-1 laptops, OLPC France's 2013 Madagascar Build and Australia's XO-1 Training Pack, etc! In the free/open tradition, we hope this exchange among all of us only grows in coming years.

Regrettably, we have found Release 13.2.0, Sugar 0.100 and Dextrose 4 are not yet fast enough for XO-1 laptops. In future we hope this changes -- or as the case may be, that a standards-compliant Browse activity can evolve alongside Release OLPC 12.x.x year-by-year!

Contact

George Hunt and Adam Holt (holt @ laptop.org)