Collaboration Requirements

Mon Aug 4 09:35:00 EDT 2008

Hi Edward,

I have not included the case of multiple schools interacting together. 
This is focused on the first step which covers scale, network config and 
basic collaboration within a single school.

I created a new page called collaboration requirements phase 2 linked 
from 9.1.0 page: 
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/9.1.0#Requirement_Definition_Phase_2

Someone can write up a definition or add other ideas there.

Thanks,

Greg S

Edward Cherlin wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 30, 2008 at 2:21 PM, Greg Smith <gregsmitholpc at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Hi All,
>>
>> I wrote up some collaboration requirements to help get us to a
>> definition of collaboration support that teachers can use in schools.
> 
> Thanks. It is not clear to me whether you mean to include the case of
> children at different schools collaborating, even in different
> countries. This will be vital for language learning, and important for
> many other educational and other functions.
> 
>> This is my first somewhat rigorous requirements definition for OLPC so
>> comments on style as well as substance are welcome.
>>
>> I will take one round of comments then I'll find a place for it in the
>> wiki (more comments always welcome after that).
>>
>> Collaboration requirements for OLPC XOs and XS
>> Greg Smith
>> July 30, 2008
>>
>> Background:
>> The concept of "Collaboration" has been around for a long time. I have
>> used cuseeme, MeetingPlace, NetMeeting, WebEx, IRC, AIM, Gobbby,
>> Sametime, PC Anywhere, Cisco HD Video conferencing and others. Our
>> challenge is different in three respects.
>> - wireless
>> - educational use
>> - greater scale
>>
>> Motivation:
>> The goal of this requirement definition is to provide all the information
>> necessary to define tests and fix critical collaboration bugs in 8.2.0
>> and to set a goal for 9.1.0.
>>
>> The best case is that this write up motivates test cases which results
>> in a list of detailed examples of collaboration  that will be supported
>> in 8.2.0. These examples should be deployable and usable by teachers in
>> class. Examples of use cases generated by teachers are at:
>> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Use_Cases#Collaboration_Examples
>>
>> Collaboration is an area where we are on the cutting edge of available
>> technology. It was well promoted and teachers on the "sur" list have
>> repeatedly asked for a definition of how to use it successfully.
>>
>> A list of activities supposedly enabled for collaboration is at:
>> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Collaboration_Central
>>
>> Documentation on previous wireless tests is at:
>> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Test_Config_Notes#Wireless_.26_Network
>>
>> Requirements Definition:
>>
>> I set a high bar but I try to balance between available technology and
>> the desires of the teachers. I hope can at least test to this standard
>> soon, even if we don't close all bugs found by that testing until later.
>>
>> Requirements beginning with "must" are critical to success, "should" are
>> very important but can be deferred and nice to have are "very useful"
>> but likely to be deferred.
>>
>> If a "must" requirement cannot be met, we should still attempt to
>> support as much of it as possible (e.g. if we can't do 50 XOs in N9, 40
>> or 30 should be tested and supported).
>>
>> I - Network Requirements
>>
>> i - Supported Architectures
>> N1 - Must support one of the four network scenarios defined at:
>> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Networking_scenarios
>>
>> The scenarios in priority order are named as follows.
>> S1 - Simple Wifi
>> S2 - School Wifi
>> S3 - Simple Mesh
>> S4 - School mesh (no need to test, just recorded here for completeness)
>>
>> ii - RF Environments
>> N2 - Must support environments where there are no other RF signals
>> beyond the APs as needed by the network scenario.
>>
>> N3 - Must support RF environments where up to 2 other APs are visible in
>> the XO neighborhood.
>>
>> N4 - Should support environments where there are up to 4 other APs
>> visible in the XO neighborhood.
>>
>> II - Scale
>> i - Scale of XOs collaborating
>> N5 - Must support up to 10 XOs collaborating together. See activity
>> examples for exact steps.
>>
>> N6 - Should support up to 20 XOs collaborating together.
>>
>> N7 - Nice to support up to 30 XOs collaborating together.
>>
>> ii - Scale of XOs visible within range of each other
>>
>> N8 - In N5 above must allow up to 1500 XOs within range in the school.
>> Can require that all other XOs aside from those collaborating have their
>> antennas turned off.
>>
>> N9 - Must allow 50 (should allow 100, nice to have 300) other XOs within
>> range in the school where all XOs have their radios turned on. Can
>> require that only those collaborating are using the network (AKA
>> everyone else is verbally asked to stop using the Internet and stop
>> collaborating) but they can leave their XO radios on in scenario S1
>>
>> N10 - Must allow 50 (should allow 100, nice to have 300) XOs within
>> range in the school where all XOs have their radios turned on. Can
>> require that only those collaborating are using the network (AKA no
>> collaboration and no Internet access) in scenario S2.
>>
>> N11 - Must allow 50 (should allow 100, nice to have 300) XOs within
>> range in the school where all XOs have their radios turned on. Can
>> require that only those collaborating are on a given Mesh channel (1,6
>> or 11) while all the other XOs are on different Mesh channels in scenario S3
>>
>> III Types of collaboration
>>
>> In all cases, a single XO starts activity, then shares it, then other
>> XOs join the shared activity.
>>
>> N12 - Must support up to 3 XOs using an activity and all others XOs (as
>> allowed by the scale) watching what happens on that screen.
>>
>> N14 - Should support 10 XOs (as allowed by scale) using an activity
>> simultaneously.
>>
>> N15 - Nice to have all XOs as allowed by scale using an activity
>> simultaneously.
>>
>> N16 - Must support pairs of two XOs collaborating with each other up to
>> the number of XOs supported by scale.
>>
>> N17 - Should support all the partitions of XOs collaborating with each
>> other (e.g. with 6 XOs, allow 2,2,2 and 3,3 and 4,1,1 etc).
>>
>> N16 - Where an activity allows saving, must support saving at any time
>> where the XO which saves gets a current copy of the shared file. If its
>> a "save as" or "save" but not exit action then the XO which saves
>> returns to the shared view. Where its an automatic "save" by leaving the
>> activity, the journal must store a current copy of the shared file. All
>> of these saving actions must not interfere in any way with the saved  or
>> shared file on the other XOs or with the collaboration or network
>> connectivity of any XOs.
>>
>> IV - Activity Level Details
>> N17 - Must support Chat
>>
>> N18 - Must support Write including adding pictures, formatting with
>> tables and other write tasks.
>>
>> N19- Must support record including sharing pictures and recorded video
>> with audio.
>>
>> N20 - Must support Read
>>
>> N21 - Must support eToys
>>
>> N22 - Should support other activities listed at:
>> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Collaboration_Central
>> *******************
>>
>> That's it! Do that and version 10.2 will be coded by kids who grew up
>> sharing activities on an XO :-)
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Greg S
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Devel mailing list
>> Devel at lists.laptop.org
>> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/devel
>>
> 
> 
> 