[OLPC India] Feedback in question and answer format

Thu Jun 22 13:28:48 EDT 2006

FEEDBACK IN QUESTION AND ANSWER FORMAT   

   What is your view of the laptop?    
  INTRODUCTION         The first thing that came to my mind when I read the reviews of the $100 laptop was that “Can it really be true?” It is rather unbelievable that laptops would be available to every child when some years back the idea of having a laptop seemed farfetched, at least for the Indian community.
  A BOOST FOR THE INDIAN COMMUNITY
         It might not sound impressive to many in the developed nations, but for us, only the mere idea of is thrilling. It is not our mind block but our inability to raise funds for an expensive thing that costs around $1000 that we often end up living without them. Despite the best effort of most colleges and high schools, education in India is textbook oriented which makes it monotonous and uninteresting. This new innovation might change the approach of most of these institutions with education becoming interactive and advanced. With the introduction of the $100 laptops, we could well witness a revolution in our stale and orthodox education system since laptops would available to children at the grass root level along with all their toys. Since India is also in the list of countries where they will be made available it gives me great pleasure to congratulate all involved in this noble cause for the uplift of the developing sections of the society.
  THE FEATURE THAT I LIKED THE MOST:   
  ·        WIRELESS BLUETOOTH TECHNOLOGY:     
  The first feature is the wireless blue tooth, which will create an interactive environment amongst the peers, and all-important discussions that you may have otherwise missed would just be a click away. The idea that we could be in touch with our professors even if they are not teaching would help us a great deal in getting through the problems which might have taken hours without any progress.
  ·        LIGHT WEIGHT 
  It seems that most laptops seem to forget this basic feature in their attempts of claiming to provide the best of technology. What is the use of having a laptop if it is too heavy to carry?
  This feature is of greater significance in developing countries like India. This laptop would be preferred over the more expensive counterparts by the students since traveling by the public transport to college daily is certainly the most stressful task in our daily routine .The long and painful journey with a heavy bag on our shoulders seems unending. With this little pc life would be much better for the entire student community and me.
  ·        LOW POWER CONSUMPTION
  This feature is probably of greater significance in countries where there is hardly any power. The rural villages in India seem to be a perfect example. With this unique feature, the laptop would not only aid in studies, but would also engage the entire family with a source of entertainment and of course, light. Thus it will solve more problems than it was intended to.
  ·        USE OF OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE
  This is an innovative feature, which will give the students an opportunity to decide for themselves what to place on the machines. The students could choose the software, hardware and content giving them the sense of owning the computer in every sense.
  ·        THE DURABILITY
  The laptop being rugged goes to show that it is essentially targeted to suit the needs of the children. The use of flash ensures it to be free from common failures that most laptops seem to have (fans, connectors, backlights). The use of bumpers is another unique feature, which will protect the laptop even if it is mishandled.

  2. What type of features do you suggest should be added considering the Indian community as a larger picture?
  ·        THE LANGUAGE BARRIER:
              The laptop will reach out communities having diverse cultures and languages.  So the mode of communication being English would put additional burden on the children for whom English is entirely an alien language and one, which they might never use. Although it will help in bridging the communication gap, but it might not be suited for all communities having varied sentiments. Take for example India; we have 18 regional languages and numerous dialects. It is my request to provide me with more information regarding your choice of languages because it might be pretty difficult to include all.
  Also I propose that even if English would be the medium of learning you should present it in a very elementary form because the level of English is not up to the mark in developing countries like India.
  ·      THE HURDLES IN CONNECTIVITY:  
  a)      On going through the specifications, although the idea of a mesh network seems flattering on one look, I feel I have my reservations about its implementation. The places where telecommunications might take decades to establish the idea of village being wi-fi enabled seems an upheaval task and requires volunteers with dedication and finance. Even the concept of motomen seems to offer a cheaper substitute, but this seems to be time consuming in case of emergencies. I also feel that an entire village should not be at the mercy of a single individual and there should be an organization to regulate the actions of the motomen. I feel that in villages quite far away from urban areas, wi-fi hubs should be installed rather than the motomen carrying information. Thus the implementation of this project in rural areas is a daunting task for this noble organization.
  b)      Another thing that I may like to point out is the idea that these mesh networks will complement the Internet. In countries like India where Internet service providers are few and far between and provide slow connection speed at a very high cost, I feel this might not be as successful. I also have a query as to who will bear the cost of the service that is going to be provided by the service provider. If the Internet is going to be provided to the schools in villages at a cost (even if it is subsidized), I feel hardly any of the students may be able to opt for it considering the frequent finances that they may have to bear. 
  c)      There is one more thing that keeps me pondering. I think that since it is an interconnection between neighboring computers, I have little knowledge as to who will regulate the data transfer and the internal security system of the computer. Since these computers would be available in huge numbers the security of the system is an essential aspect.
  ·      THE POWER GENERATION:
                 While I do not know the final design, the idea of human power has left me wondering about its pros and cons. Although it just seems to fit in perfectly considering the shortage of electricity in developing countries, the use of hand crank by children is a tough task (especially for children for whom it is targeted). Even the idea of external voltage being used for charging the laptop seems farfetched since most places don’t have power for many days. So I feel that power generation for the laptop should be manual with an electrical substitute, which could be used at places where electricity is available.
  3. What type of software do you suggest can help in establishing the vision with respect to India?
  This is one area where I have insufficient information available at the site to make any comments. The use of open source software is an outstanding feature, which gives the user an option of modifying the software. 
  ·      Considering India, I feel that Linux environment would be something quite alien to the people. Since most are quite familiar with Windows as an operating system. Even most high schools and colleges don’t use Linux as an alternative to Windows. So the student fraternity would find it hard to adjust to an entirely new operating system. I strongly recommend that the laptop should be as user friendly and self-explanatory as possible considering that it is targeted for the children of the developing countries.
  ·      Although the open source software would give the privilege to the user to build his machine (as one may say), I have my doubts regarding the relaxation being given as far as these privileges are concerned. (It would lead to utter chaos if every child would want his own modifications). I feel that local areas as a whole would be given the choice because content sharing could then become a problem.

        4. What type of content should be developed that can help Indian students?
  ·        IT is what urban India is known for in the rest of the world (consider silicon valley for example where a huge population is of Indian IT professionals) and rural India may follow suit if the implementation of this project succeeds. The one thing that is gaining a lot of popularity is the awareness about programming languages (like c++, java etc). So if it is to reach the Indian community with a big impact, the compatibility of the laptop to serve the needs of budding programmers is one of the foremost objectives.
  Although I feel as far as content is concerned, considering an overview of the laptop’s features I am pretty satisfied and feel the needs of the Indian students would be completely met.

   Any hardware specification that you wish should be added?    
      THE CHANGING WEATHER

         As you have explained the use of a lip to seal the edges in order to prevent it in rain, I would like to have more information about its durability in changing weather. The reason why I am asking this question is that India has diverse climatic conditions with weather ranging from –30degrees Celsius in the north to 50degrees in some parts during summers. Floods are common occurrence in most places. I would like to know whether it would be able to work in these diverse weather conditions. If not the children should be provided with a list of remedies to tackle the hostile weather for the safe working of their laptop. 
  ·        THE SOURCE OF POWER 
  There are pros and cons to the source of power being manual or electrical. If the source is manual (cranks) then it will suit the needs of the children of the developing countries where there is shortage of electricity, but I have some concerns about the efficiency and it’s working. However if the source is electrical, then the efficiency would be very high but the shortage of electricity seems to have foiled this option.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         &nbsp;                                             

   While ultimately, the work on curricula will be done by the ministries of education, there are several efforts underway to explore some of the education potential from this project. Could you hint some ways to scale up the education potential from this project? 
  ·        An Autonomous regulatory body:
  I feel that this is one of the prerequisites for the success of this project. The ministries of education might act, as consultants but the authority should be in the hands of an independent agency. If this is not the case most children in the countries wouldn’t be able to get their laptops and corruption would hamper the efforts of the community that has worked its heart out for the successful implementation of the project.
  ·        Skilled labor:
  This is another very important prerequisite. There should be people trained enough to teach the children or even their teachers the detailed features of the laptops. Volunteers for this noble cause would be available in plenty, so solving this problem might be quite easy. But I think that the volunteers should be willing to help the students at every step and regular information regarding the updates related to the laptop must reach the children directly and not through any intermediaries.
  ·        Part of curriculum:
  Although you might disagree with me, but this is one thing which I may think is necessary especially for children and even teachers in India. Indian students have a very bad habit of neglecting stuff that is not a part of their curriculum. If computers are included as a subject it will push the students to gain knowledge from it rather than playing with it. Although it is an orthodox approach, it seems to work in India’s case.

  To conclude I feel that this project would reshape the future of the children in the developing countries and consider it to be have a bigger impact than a World Bank funding (as an example). I pray for the success of this project and hope that it may succeed to accomplish its goals.
   SULABH ARYA
  (NEW DELHI,
  INDIA)

---------------------------------
 Yahoo! India Answers: Share what you know. Learn something new Click here
Catch all the FIFA World Cup 2006 action on Yahoo! India Click here
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.laptop.org/pipermail/india/attachments/20060622/5a27bc89/attachment-0001.html