[Server-devel] XSCE Sprint

[James Cameron]

On Wed, Jul 10, 2013 at 10:11:14AM +0200, Tony Anderson wrote:
> The 'locked' XO problem derives from XOs distributed in the minimum
> 100 XO purchase - many of these are locked. Also, in Rwanda the
> policy is to keep the laptops locked even though they have
> indefinite leases.

Rwanda probably has a deployment key and should be able to sign builds
with it.  My guess is that the laptops would also have the deployment
keys injected already.  You will need to work with the people who have
the keys.

> My current plans are to visit these schools in December and so I may
> be able to get them unlocked then.

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Collection_stick is perfect for this,
provided the deployment did not remove the OLPC keys.

(I don't have records of what deployments have done).

> What I would really love is a 'Nandblast' capability in the firmware
> that gets it's image from the schoolserver. That probably would work
> (how does an XO know an image is coming over wifi from an XO or a
> school server?).

There is no implementation of NANDblaster for the school server,
because it requires special support in the wireless device.  A typical
access point will not work.  It requires an XO as the sender.

(NANDblaster is implemented in the firmware, not the operating system.
An alternate design could be engineered, but that doesn't seem likely
to be attempted.)

> The normal flash problem is that several XOs need to be reflashed at
> one time, so the usb key approach is time-consuming. My experience
> is that a reflash from usb key takes 15min. Naturally, one key to
> this process is the ability to reload the backed up (hopefully)
> Journal.

Reloading the backed up journal is costing you 10min?  Reflashing an
XO-1 from USB drive 13.2.0-12 costs only 5min.  If the reflash is
taking much longer than that, there may be an endurance or end of life
problem with the internal storage of the XO.

-- 
James Cameron
http://quozl.linux.org.au/