User:Rostauber

OLPC, you can ignore my email the day after I opened my XO-1. Somewhere in Wiki I thought I read my G1G1 XO-1 was "no longer supported". I emailed for help commenting i felt a little had. Also the XO right off had struck me as tedius in crucial areas ... which frustration I am dutifully overcoming. Naturally we USA softies are concerned about a program determined to put third-world children at a console and cruising the net and funding violent games and porn rather than learning to spear lizards for the pot ... and soccer of course ... in their own real communities and families. It's a toss-up how to imagine things. And their little eyes will suffer. But be that as it may, I feel OLPC people on the ground anywhere will be all to the good regarding progressive efforts of all sorts.

As my little XO-1 works its magic and I am constantly in wiki and went further than expected in Forth lessons one afternoon, let me say I do not intend to spend my remaining years with code. I want to participate however, and I prize these early hours and stages of understanding based on use of the XO-1, and of course wiki and the Community ... what any child or adult would find of most interest, and indispensible to my own usefulness. I am getting to love the keyboard but when the ERASE key gets stuck watch out if you're editing! Why not glo-in-the-dark keys and also the board lit by a single little led? Maybe the XIO can jump cars.

With no power management until January sometime I use hi-contrast lit up one notch. I'm getting shortcuts down. No "alt-left-arrow" to backup and no "alt-right-arrow" to go forward? And what made me think I was getting a touch-screen when I sent off $400 plus? Makes the tablet and wi-fi incentive vanish. Oh and send me a couple of those $10 batteries please. Why can't ERASE delete in every context? And a manageable "Favorites" that survives re-boot. The drop-down list with BACK is nice but I look forward to the Microsoft SD. Glad I made a USB Key.

Just introducing myself. At 71 my short term memory sometimes leaves me blank on what I had just thought to do, sometimes having to do with what I wanted to think about but miost often I notice it when I turn to get a tool or check some thing or some process that comes to mind, when I am doing the physical things which all these years fed me ego and self-esteem. It will be interesting to see if by navigating wiki and becoming adept with XO-1, let alone doing config in Terminal ... if I will see a reduction in these momentary lapses of focus.

I was slow figuring out "Mode" back in DOS. Then didn't use it much. Always enjoyed showing kids how a little d.bat and c.bat file on the root or in \windows made them computer geeks instead of just game goons. However Gorilla is timeless. GET GORILLA ON THE XO-1!! I always fought for the PC rather than the Apple in public schools as keyboarding and shortcuts and commands took the kids into a real self-learning mode in a way the mouse with its separation and delay did't seem to me to do, but the mouse-curser thiong broke the decision cycle. As the Book and Audio-Visual Clerk in a public HS right when the IBM XT hit the scene and nobody knew much about anything I had the time and the manuals where the teachers had a classroom full of of testy kids. I was able to self-teach Lotus and would past up in the halls and up-date sorted lists of the books that had been retrieved from the halls and playground, etc. Students would see that their issued book numver had been returned to inventory and would save $20-35 by showing (from my records) that their book was not lost but found and put back on my shelves. At which time with my slip they could get a new book free. School administration didn't like it 'cause once a year when the kids checked out it brought in quite a bit of cash when they all had each other's books and tried to turn them in. Lotta confusion too. Eventually I became responsible for school-wide inventory worksheets and reports.

So much for the past. What I want to do is participate. My little neighborhood is filled with clubs and restaurants. There's another casino and hotel downtown. Soulard, MO is gentry-fying quite nicely thank you ... more infants, grandparents with them in the coffee house on weekends, most dogs on leashes, lotta laptops. A quarter-million people parade and debauch themselves around Soulard in front of my properties once a year during Mardi Gras. I have great locations for sales, advertizing, petition-signing, exposure of breasts ... once a year for several days and occasionally othertimes as well as most weekends and evenings. I have the time, the commercial and residential property with space therein, to incubate a little OLPC start-up and copy-shop and a co-op of our own. Plus there's a new little pruivate school with a great playground of carefully positioned construction materials including piles of dirt. I presume OLPC is about self-starters who manage their own shit as well as the general mix of well-intentioned dreamers ... oh do I have a lot of good shit I've intended to eBay for years now ... good stuff I won't list here ... which could make suitable learning activity on the XO, would supply cash and make new space at the same time, give people experience in how to make their way financially in a glutted part of the world, as our little starter group seeks to justify, support and debug itself.

I like the idea of a rubber case. Dark grey would be nice. AND an alarm do-dad to locate one's own XO in a pile of 'em. I'm old now and there's less reason for me to get excited about the world. I think how hopeful we are about correcting things in youth and most of our lives. I'll leave the religious opportunity alone. If home-front citizens take a wide-spread role in OLPC with their own hands-on XO as a learning tool neibor-communities, even keeping up each in their own way with code development, it would encourage a realistic confidence in the evolutionary possibilities of the Project. Still singing to the choir, as various modes of resistance and corporate sabotage arise intentionally or not, we oldsters, the teens, and all in-betweens, as we become connected and knowledgable about the hardware and the up-dates and add-ons, especially as real on-the-ground XO classes emerge and new learning activities are designed around if not by them ... this could well be one crucial factor in long-term establishment of the Project by creating eager and able fresh new toilers in the vineyards abroad converting their do-gooder dreams into boots-on-the-ground contributions ... to children and to families, which is where our hearts so easily turn these days.

Hopefully free computers to all students and all homes will sweep the world as recycled electronics leach out of landfills and turn up as courtroom evidence. So will XO and Linux find a place? Hopefully Microsoph, Apple, Palm, whoever will come on strong and noble. XO could one day be a Smartphone wireless to TV with a little roll-out (like a curtain) keyboard as well as the normal input pad.

I was delighted to make my own USB Key and restored 650 for a while then updated to 653. Is 653 stable or just official? MUCH easier to make that USB Key on my XP desktop thank you. Hey how about some ram? Is an inserted SD or USB stick automatically available as XO memory? Just trying to drum up community in STL. A$ I've got a couple of IT geeks (employed doing IT druggery) as tenants and neighbors as well as in my immediate family.

One guy on eBay claims the XO-1 he's selling will USB to a printer. No, right? A single XO-1 gets delivered for $275 regularly on eBay. That's going to be a major source for non-G1G1. When the price hits $150 watch out. But a lot of people will opt back to their XP after an initial effort. We need all the dedicated XO owners stateside we can get just to interest ands inform others. I'm going to get two or three or a bunch more when prices plummet as the word gets out that this is no grown-up N800. All my friends are curious. But its not any kids laptop anymore. Or maybe the kids will get into it most, especially if linked. How about listing those icon items for us? Some folks are eager to make the donation scene. Part of being green.

I'll have to learn to config in Terminal. What a drag. Forth is rough without prior experience in assembly language and syntax. Where'd they get the name? Go forth and multiply? Have to re-wiki and check that spelling. Fourth or Forth? May not get back to whatever it is for a while. I'll shut up now. 314-602-4549