[Server-devel] Server strategy Nauru

[Daniel Drake]

2009/4/24 david <david at leeming-consulting.com>:
> Hello,
>
> I am in Nauru where they have an OLPC program. I need to give some general advice on the strategy for providing server access.
>
> I understand that version 0.5 can only work with 40-50 connected, registered XOs simultaneously (or is it the other way round). Version 0.6 will cater for groups, so one could register XOs in class groups, and theoretically any number of XOs per server.

v0.5 works with 90 laptops in my tests. (90 isn't the limit, thats
just the maximum number of laptops that were on-hand)
but the user experience is not brilliant - the laptops slow down,
especially when looking at the neighborhood view.

> (Question - can laptops be registered to multiple groups but select which group they connect to? I am thinking of an example where teachers used team teaching between two classes using the Chat activity in PNG, so it would be useful if that was possible and not lock the laptops into a single server group)

No, there is no such sugar interface. But maybe it will be possible to
dynamically adjust your group(s) in the moodle interface that martin
is working on.

> Nauru has only a few schools, which can easily be interconnected with point to point wireless links. The main school where the current 200 laptops are being used in 6 year 2 classes, will shortly be expanded to consolidate all year 1-3 students (about 800) on the same site. There will then be about 18 classrooms on the site.
>
> I assume that one server machine with access points or AAs in each of these classes would not be sufficient (and some redundancy would be desirable). With the long term development of the XS in mind, what would be the recommended set up for this school (800 students, 18 classes, fairly small site easily wired up with APs and with reliable power)

I did some investigation on this and I was unable to find any actual
deployments of this scale that use the XS. In Paraguay we are
deploying in some large schools, the largest having 800 laptops but
only 400 at a time (morning/afternoon shifts) and it is appears
largely unknown how the XS will hold up. I think Nepal is in a similar
situation. In Paraguay we only handed out the laptops this week, and
not enough children have registered to the XS to make judgement just
yet.

Daniel