[Localization] localized keyboard

[Jim Gettys]

Ok, this discussion is becoming a bit more useful...

An SKU is a particular build including keyboard, power adapter, and
exact components used to build the system).

In short, the more SKU's necessary, the higher the cost (and risk of
OLPC losing its shirt).

There are a number of issues here, all intertwingled:

1) whether keyboard designs exist.
2) whether those keyboard designs have ever actually been produced, and
therefore the tooling is paid for already (so we might be able to make
another SKU at less delay and cost than when we have to actually do a
new keyboard from scratch). 
3) whether said designs will be "good enough" for a different market
than initially intended.  Note that language != keyboard design:
Portugal uses a very different keyboard than Brazil).
3) lead times to produce new keyboard designs (and demand for those),
and how to pay for the tooling
4) whether whomever we work with for G1G1 fulfillment is able/willing to
undertake to ship multiple SKU's, and how we'll deal with power plug
requirements.
5) number of different SKU's needed to cover what populations of what
size, and being able to predict volumes for that population accurately
enough to forecast the demand (and not lose your shirt). Note that
conventional keyboards on conventional laptops are replaceable easily;
this means if you get the forecasting wrong, at worst, you replace
keyboards and ship to different geographies.  That's not true for us.
If we make a mistake, we can't necessarily do anything to ship the
laptops elsewhere, and we already have at least one example of this
having happened (and a stack of machines in a warehouse, waiting for the
day that keyboard is needed).
6) regulatory requirements to ship into a given country, which may
include power plug type, any printed material, localization
requirements, and possibly keyboard layouts. 

So while I can't hold out hope of *anything* beyond US international
before any analysis is done, if someone wants to start gathering
information more systematically into a wiki page, that would be good, so
that decisions might be based on some data, rather than no data....
                               - Jim


On Wed, 2008-06-11 at 09:04 -0500, Yama Ploskonka wrote:
> Could someone wikifi all this, please?
> Sorry I cannot volunteer.
> 
> "Keyboards" page, or "G1G1 desired keyboard layouts", maybe better.
> 
> Might help other people get involved, and help carry the point across to 
> OLPC G1G1 decision makers...
> 
> BTW, there's some keyboard layouts around, the one in the Bolivia wiki 
> page has the current Spanish keyboard in the borrowed B4 I have been 
> using, so they did make localized keyboards at some point, and of course 
> they are doing so for Uruguay and Peru I should guess, and I wonder 
> what's happening in Colombia, and especially Haiti...
> 
> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Spanish_Keyboard
> 
> Yama
> 
> Holger Levsen wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > I've done some research...
> > 
> > On Tuesday 10 June 2008 21:22, Edward Cherlin wrote:
> >> German Germany
> >> German Austria
> > 
> > Those two are the same, there is no german-austrian keyboard. (confirmed by an 
> > Austrian.)
> > 
> >> German Switzerland
> > 
> > This one is different from the "standard" german layout. (confirmed by a swiss 
> > person.)
> > 
> >> French Switzerland
> > 
> > This one is different from the "standard" french layout. (confirmed by a swiss 
> > person.)
> > 
> >> Italian Switzerland
> >> Italian Italy
> > 
> > Those are the same, or rather, there is no italian-swiss keyboard, they use 
> > the "standard" italian keyboard. (confirmed by a swiss person.)
> > 
> >> and then we can discuss Belgian (French and Flemish/Dutch)
> > 
> > Yup. Belgians (whether flemish or french speaking) use belgium AZERTY 
> > keyboards (which are different from french AZERTY keyboards), while dutch 
> > people use dutch qwerty keyboards. (dutch and flemish are very similar 
> > languages...) (info from a person from Belgium)
> > 
> >> Catalan (Spain)
> > 
> > There are no catalan keyboards (or other regional keyboards in spain), they 
> > all use spanish keyboards. (puh.) (confirmed by several spanish persons.)
> > 
> > 
> > HTH,
> > 	Holger
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-- 
Jim Gettys <jg at laptop.org>
One Laptop Per Child