[Localization] German and French keyboard layouts

[Nicholas Bodley]

{NB, from previous message}

I'd love to know what was done for French and German keyboard countries;  
an off-list reply is OK with me, but might be of interest to the whole  
list.

Edward Cherlin said, off-list:
> G1G1 shipped with US International keyboards only. They couldn't manage  
> the SKUs.

Without more information, that seems strange. Afaik, we have a Nepalese  
keyboard layout, yet we couldn't manage a German layout, which might be  
standard in roughly 15 countries?  Good grief! I surely have no dislike at  
all for Nepal; it's a developing country, but, I'm sure, has a much  
smaller number of people than are in countries that use the German layout.  
(From what I know about Nepal, some really-encouraging things are  
happening there. It's lookiung like a significant success story.  
Naturally, I'm well aware of Uruguay, also inspiring.)

Something's missing. Surely this decision was not due to marginal  
competence, ineptness, or misjudgment? Desperation is even more unlikely,  
but, failure to properly plan ahead, maybe?

===

Following is an off-list reply to Bert Freudenberg; he suggested I post to  
the List.

I do appreciate your telling me about this. Despite OLPC's basic intent, I  
get the feeling that these decisions were made by monolingual Americans  
with only superficial awareness of other cultures and languages, even  
major ones in Europe. For the record, I'm really, truly disappointed.

[Removing markings]
It might be possible to dissolve the markings on an XO keyboard, but  
anything that would do that would (very likely) be quite hazardous, and no  
children should be nearby. (Brake fluid might work, though?) Just how  
deeply the ink penetrates into the silicone rubber, I really don't know.

[Blank keyboards:]
Printing on such surfaces properly is not for the unaware, imho. The inks  
are very likely to be quite special, and might even require an unusual  
curing scheme.

[Slicing off tops?]
I wonder about a metal overlay of a carefully-considered thickness, with  
precision-machined holes (made by CAM) that would permit a quite-thin  
layer to be sliced off the tops of the key pads. {Late addition: Think  
traditional hand-operated microtomes, used in microscopy for preparing  
specimens. Of course, a thicker layer would need to be sliced off a  
keytop.}

{End quote from private reply}

Surely, this does not make OLPC appear in Europe to be an organization  
that, as we say in English, really has its act together (referring to show  
business). This sort of thing is what one witnesses when an organization  
is starting to come apart --to fail. I don't think that's the case, though.

As we say in English, this is (mostly) water over the dam (it seems).

I'm prepared to be scolded for my comments, if they are really out of line  
and very un-informed.

===

It's possible to design and create a production system that easily  
accommodates changes without stopping production for any significant  
amount of time.  Check into Saturn cars; afaik, each car was made to the  
customer's detailed needs.

Afaik, our keyboards are made by Alps, and that company might well not  
have the mindset required for flexible manufacturing. (On the other hand,  
though, they make some excellent products, and have been in business for  
quite a while.)

Not too far back, I worked in a modern ISO 9000 production shop that made  
frequent changeovers of its electronic products; I think in some cases, as  
few as five of a kind were made. These changeovers involved many internal  
changes, although the basic plastic housings were the same. These devices  
were sensors used where objects (such as those on a conveyor belt) broke a  
beam of light, or related situations. Each was marked with durable ink,  
and the markings differed for each particular product.

In the rare cases when markings needed to be re-applied, a special  
higher-molecular-weight ether (iirc) dissolved the ink. It was not  
particularly toxic. True, the ink was fresh. The ink on our keyboards  
might be quite resistant to unusual industrial solvents, however; perhaps  
it's cured by heat?  Surely, our keyboard manufacturer would know.

It's likely that if the markings are printed with special ink, it's  
probably offset printing, and when the markings are to be changed, only  
the printing plate needs changing. That should take only a minute or two  
in any competently-designed production line, and a test impression another  
minute or less. The accompanying physical documents would probably be more  
"trouble" to deal with than changing a printing plate.

Again, mostly water over the dam, but what with the fantastic financial  
irresponsibility of recent months, companies should welcome more business,  
and sensible managers should be willing to accommodate reasonable requests.

I do wish you all well.

-- 
Nicholas Bodley /|*|\ Waltham, Mass.
Amateur internationalist
Dilettante linguist and "Unicode hobbyist"