Talk:OLPC FAQ

'Others have already started a website that sells our laptop for $300, so the balance of money can be used to support the poorest children.'

Where is this website? It might be good to have a link so interested parties can sign up. -206.58.200.30 19:35, 12 February 2006 (EST)

Which countries are confirmed?

Why not have the product available to poverty level children in the USA? We have an art project for low income kids that could use this. http://www.riversidenet.info/

I remember reading something about Costa Rica, is this Central Anmerican country at the project? --Dagoflores 02:57, 19 March 2006 (EST) Answer: ___

Where/how should interested parties ask questions about OLPC?

I think it would be useful to put that question in the FAQ (aka "What if my question isn't listed here in the FAQ?")

A very nice idea. --Walter

In addition to the FAQ, I wonder if an "AQ"--Asked Questions, i.e. not necessarily frequent--area might be useful, since many people might come with a specific question or two, but might not easily find what they want by browsing the wiki.

Perhaps we can use this Talk page for these sorts of things. --Walter

Here are some questions of mine (Qwertie):

• I've heard that individuals won't be allowed to buy OLPC laptops, or that it won't be available to the public. If so, why not? Wouldn't it be good for the project? You can sell them without having to provide a general-purpose OS preinstalled, after all.
• OLPC relies on economy of scale to reach low prices. To improve scale, why not sell important parts separately from the laptop? For example, the screen technology could be sold for use in home theatre remotes and in-car computers at higher prices to subsidize OLPC somewhat. Assuming there is some central OLPC organization with employees, I would suggest creating a few non-laptop departments focused on other mass-market uses of the technology--then again, attempting to find companies that would be interesting in buying a million or two units might be a better strategy.

I feel like restricting the laptop and its components to one purpose is unnecessary--then again, I haven't studied the problem. Maybe someone can explain why it's necessary, but I wonder if it's just a lack of managerial resources.

The bottom line is that our mission is learning, not laptops. While we will be working with a commercial partner at some point for both machines and interesting parts--we've been looking at models where by the commercial side can help drive down the cost for the kids--our immediate priority is the non-commercial machine. --Walter

What is the $100 Laptop, really?

I moved these discussions from the article page to this discussion page. Walter 01:57, 5 May 2006 (EDT)

Hello. Wouldn't it be better to have a small HD instead? As far as I know, Flash memory has a much higher Gb cost than that of a standard HD. I also know that there are ridiculously small HDs with really large storage capacity, at least in comparison to the meager 512Mb you currently propose. Wouldn't a larger capacity storage help to extend the life of such a machine?

The biggest single point of failure of laptops is the HD. We are opting for robustness over more on-board storage. Synchronization with the "school server" should help mitigate some of the capacity challenges raised. Walter 02:03, 5 May 2006 (EDT)

Somewhere in this wiki (in the discussion of system software), the starting paragraph "seriously questions" Linux for OLPC. But in this FAQ, it starts off by saying it will be Linux-based. To cut short the argument, why not try PuppyLinux now so that the project can move forward to content, training and localization concerns?

The Fedora kernel[1] is sufficiently far-enough along that developers can start exploring some of these higher-level issues. Also, we hope that many of these issues will be addressed upstream such that they benefit the entire community, not just those using this particular platform. Walter 02:03, 5 May 2006 (EDT)

How do I request an answer?

How do I request an answer? --Dagoflores 01:45, 24 May 2006 (EDT)

What is the question in question? Walter 06:37, 24 May 2006 (EDT)

Cambodia test?

The FAQ mentions Cambodia twice. Can you link to more information about the pilot in Cambodia? Or provide details about it in the FAQ? When? How many devices? What hardware? What ages? What type of network access? What software was used? What operating systems?

*BSD operating systems

Has there been work with using any BSD operating systems on the hardware? journaling flash file system for any BSD?

Inclusion of BASIC / easy to learn programming?

The inclusion of BASIC in the early home computers in the west created a generation of children who could program, many of whom turned into professional programmers. The UK IT industry for one owes a lot to these early home computers. Will a language, such as BASIC, be included with these laptops? - Dan Huby, dan at huby dot me dot uk.

We will ship with at least three "Turing machines": Python, Javascript, and Logo. Walter 14:44, 24 May 2006 (EDT)