OLPC mass production started

> A colleague of mine is trying to order one (err... a pair ;-)), but it
> seems that the Give One, Get One program is only geared towards
> US&Canada?
>
> Dying to get my hands on one...

  What I heard was that to distribute such a unit, you need to get
radio device approval and other kind of approval (for instance, the AC
and (I think) the battery need government approval in Japan.)  It is
not as simple as sending units to overseas customers...

-- Yoshiki

> I just ordered 12 of them (on the buy one give one program).  They are planned for my kids, as well as Christmas
> presents for some other kids (relatives).  My kid's school will have
> to wait.  :-)

  Great!  

-- Yoshiki

Ah. Makes sense.

damn.... :P

On Nov 12, 2007 5:19 PM, Yoshiki Ohshima <[hidden email]> wrote:


--
"Human beings make life so interesting. Do you know, that in a
universe so full of wonders, they have managed to invent boredom. " -
Death, in "The Hogfather"

I hear EU certification is almost done. To quote the latest OLPC  
community news letter:

"Safety Certification: Behind the scenes another team (from UL,
Quanta, and OLPC) has been quietly working for nearly two years on XO
safety certification. The XO laptop is now fully compliant with UL
safety requirements and has been thus certified. We have also been
awarded radio, power, and system certification at national levels in
several countries. We can now legally ship in US, Canada, Uruguay, and
Peru, as well as many other countries. EU-wide approval is due in
approximately a week. We are still in the process of applying for
certification in countries on each continent with the most stringent
safety standards.

Among many tests, we have passed Ul/IEC 60950-1 (notebook computer),
ASTM F693 (electronic toys for children), UL 1301 (mechanical assembly
requirements, including larger face dimension requirements for child
safety) and UL 2054 (batteries), as well as a passing UL on-site
inspection of the Quanta's factory. We have formal RoHS (low toxicity)
certification from Quanta, and independent testing of RoHS compliance
by UL. Also, we have been safety approved for lap use—XO is the first
"laptop" approved for usage on one's lap in many years. (The reason
that most laptops are now called "notebook computers" is that they run
too hot for safe lap use.)"

Also, it may be possible to order via a mail-forwarding service. See

http://www.olpcnews.com/sales_talk/g1g1/give_one_get_one_globally.html

- Bert -

On Nov 12, 2007, at 17:40 , Cees de Groot wrote:

I can't agree more Alan. There is no match for the sincere team work. And
I'm pretty sure there are something special in the experience of a team work
that prioritizes braincells instead of muscle (not to mention bullets, etc).
Without doubt efforts to maintain empowering that priority is virtuous.

        cheers !

Sebastian Sastre

>
>   As far as I know, it is not a job.  Making PSA usually means that it
> is done at no charge.
>

I don't know what to say.
To the best of my knowledge there are different kinds of jobs:

1/- Paid jobs (paid with salary, wages, commission...)
2/- Volunteer jobs (not materially compensated)
3/- Paying jobs (one has to pay to accomplish the job oneself)

Paid jobs as Smalltalk programming, consulting, sales, marketing...

Volunteer job is still a job. There is a job to be done for a public service
announcer(PSA?) or a volunteer global ambassador (GA). This begs the question,
how many volunteered for this GA job?

Now, for the paying job, those who care about ANSI Smalltalk and want to
actively shape it, they have to pay to accomplish that job themselves ;-)

There is a "paying job" that almost all of human being sooner or later will have
to pay to accomplish it oneself.

Here is an anecdote of an aspect of this job (please be warned of crude words
ahead, a lot of F words, viewer's discretion is advised and for adults only):

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Nn5jlrxcpkI


Cheers,

PhiHo.

This is especially true for children mind.


> and is a favorite trope in stories.


Children stories are filled with all kinds of heroes.

Many a child brings her unfulfilled wishes into her dreams where the heroes come
along to give her "dream come true", in the dreams.

Think of the scenario where tens of millions of these children are empowered
with those XO (pre-loaded with all those 'dream come true'.) One wouldn't be
surprised to see them invoking the incantation "Google, Google on the screen,
who is the Hero for OLPC".



That sounds like what's described in this ancient Oriental proverb:
"Following The Elephant's footsteps".


> Cheers.
>
> Alan
>


Cheers,

PhiHo.


P.S:

There is also another proverb, to reflect the facts of life:
"Following The Elephant's footsteps, to collect bagasse".

And it's so hard to separate the wheat from the chaff!


P.P.S:

>From your point of view (I am assuming that XO is a PC), how far is that OLPC XO
going with the vision:

"The PC Must Be Revamped-Now"  (February 14, 2007)

http://www.cioinsight.com/print_article2/0,1217,a=200162,00.asp

OLPC XO must be your best bet to see your dream come true, yes ?

In that article, there was a mention to Squeak as "an object-oriented operating
system" and another "operating system for children" :

<QUOTE>

Squeak, an object-oriented operating system and authoring environment, is
actually the Xerox PARC Smalltalk operating system, upgraded to 32-bit graphics
with other things added. My research group at Apple did it about ten years ago,
because we were afraid that Java wasn't going to be compatible from computer to
computer. Because we made our own software tools at Xerox PARC, and we had some
of the same people who had done these tools, we decided we'd be much safer if we
just made our own vehicle. At Viewpoints and Hewlett-Packard, we built an
operating system for children, and also did many experiments in user-interface
design and built new kinds of object models and other kinds of things called
Etoys.

</QUOTE>

I am utterly confused with the terminology here.

Squeak is an OOOS, built on top of SOS?
What makes it so?
(or did you mean SqueakNOS, NOT Squeak ?)

What is this "Children Operating System" ?
Is it built on top of Squeak OOOS ?
(It isn't Etoys, is it?)

Was it your original vision that Smalltalk
be Children Programming Language ?

Is this COS written in the CPL ?

Would you please elaborate on this COS.
It sounds very interesting.
It is especially so in the context of OLPC.

P.P.P.S:

SOS stands for  Suckers' Operating Systems
(like Bluebottle, Fedora, Leopard, Vista ... ;-)