Re: [design] Lack of built-in serial and // port ?

2007-10-23 Thread John Watlington 

Samir,
 You are ignoring the economics of the situation.
A full USB/serial interface now costs about the same as the
voltage level shifter necessary to interface to RS-232, due to
economies of scale.

OLPC is not in the business of shipping old, obsolete, computer
equipment to the developing world.   We are in the business of
providing them with a high volume, reasonable quality, low cost
computing platform for education.   And USB is the low cost serial
interface for anything being built today.

I love the old RS-232 interface as much as anyone out there, but
it is time to declare it obsolete.   If you want to use some old piece
of RS-232 equipment, a serial cable with a USB adapter built in is
approaching the price of a plain serial cable, 'cause no one is
buying plain serial cables anymore.

John

On Oct 23, 2007, at 6:37 PM, Ian Daniher wrote:

> Samir,
> IIRC, there *is* a serial port, but due to constraints I have not  
> been made aware of, It isn't exposed, instead it is buried inside  
> the case.
> Sorry I can't help more,
> -- 
> Ian Daniher
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Skype : it.daniher
> irc.freenode.com: DyDisMe
>
> On 10/23/07, Samir Saidani < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:Hi,
>
> I have heard about the OLPC initiative a while ago, and recently
> I have decided to take a further look at this very interesting
> initiative... Here are first thoughts about it...
>
> I'm quite new to this project, and one thing that strikes me was the
> lack of built-in serial and parallel port.  Why ? When you don't have
> a lot of money, you tend to use obsolete technology which are cheaper
> than the newer one, like parallel printers, serial modem, serial  
> mouse,
> parallel scanner, etc ... This obsolete technology are easily  
> available
> on poor countries, because it's easy for an non profit organization
> to send this kind of technology that almost nobody wants anymore (at
> least the enterprises, and the schools of rich countries update quite
> often their hardware and throw the old one to the garbage or donate it
> to a NPO).
>
> So you can have the old tech for free, because they often end into the
> gargage while they are still working great. And this is not a theory,
> we have founded here in France a npo which locally is working to give
> One Computer Per Child for 0 $. We have already a lot of computers,
> and we are slowing down the process to avoid a computer hardware
> overload... Recycling is an ecologic approach to the environment,  
> and it
> seems that it is a concern of the whole OLPC initiative. Recycling  
> allows
> you to do things by yourself with little money (or none at all). I  
> know
> that there is a serial/USB interface, but I'm not sure that it  
> would be
> as easy to use as built-in ports (possibility to lost it, unable to  
> do it
> by yourself due to the complex USB electronics component...). So  
> when you
> consider the target audience (poor countries, rural zone, poor  
> people),
> I think this is a design mistake. Or at least it's reducing a lot the
> possibility of hacking and recycling obsolete hardware lying around.
>
> Maybe and probably do you have already talk about this matter ?
>
> Thanks !
> Samir
> ___
> Design mailing list
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/design
>
>
>
>
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Re: [design] Lack of built-in serial and // port ?

2007-10-23 Thread Mike C. Fletcher 
Ian Daniher wrote:
> On 10/23/07, *Samir Saidani* < [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
> > wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I have heard about the OLPC initiative a while ago, and recently
> I have decided to take a further look at this very interesting
> initiative... Here are first thoughts about it...
>
> I'm quite new to this project, and one thing that strikes me was the
> lack of built-in serial and parallel port.  Why ? When you don't have
> a lot of money, you tend to use obsolete technology which are cheaper
> than the newer one, like parallel printers, serial modem, serial
> mouse,
> parallel scanner, etc ... This obsolete technology are easily
> available
> on poor countries, because it's easy for an non profit organization
> to send this kind of technology that almost nobody wants anymore (at
> least the enterprises, and the schools of rich countries update quite
> often their hardware and throw the old one to the garbage or donate it
> to a NPO).
>
If I read correctly we have a serial port on the XSX school server, so a 
school-wide (or 1/3 of school, or whatever) serial service would be 
possible for any serial-port-using technology (e.g. modems and the like).

Shipping old serial mice to the children doesn't really sound like it 
would be all that useful, USB mice are already well into the replacement 
cycle in most areas, so they'd be just as easy to source in large 
quantities if you wanted to send them.  Shipping costs for thousands of 
ancient ball-based serial mice are probably going to dwarf the costs of 
buying a few thousand new usb "laser" mice from China and having them 
shipped directly to the country.

There is a parallel-port header on the XSX boards, but no parallel port 
in the back-plane of the server.  Parallel ports/wires are reasonably 
cheap (pretty much free if you have a lot of old machines around, I 
think I have 5 or 6 sitting unused in my closet).  You could easily pack 
a few with each printer to allow schools to connect a printer up for 
each school server.  I'm not sure how useful it would be in the areas 
without power sources, paper, access to toner/ink and the like (keeping 
in mind that most printers require insanely expensive ink/toner these 
days), but more urban areas with higher incomes might find them usable.

I haven't actually seen a parallel scanner myself, though I've seen SCSI 
and USB quite lot.  SCSI probably won't happen without some serious 
work.  USB would work if the manufacturer has a Linux driver, but that's 
a pretty hit-or-miss thing from my understanding.  I'd be tempted to 
provide a "How to Convert an XO to a page scanner" document before 
trying to ship and connect up such devices.
>
> So you can have the old tech for free, because they often end into the
> gargage while they are still working great. And this is not a theory,
> we have founded here in France a npo which locally is working to give
> One Computer Per Child for 0 $.
>
There's actually quite a few similar operations world-wide.

One thing we'll need to do at some point is to look at how to integrate 
those projects into the OLPC project.  We are an educational project, 
not a laptop project, and we need to get the various educational 
initiatives to take advantage of the massive amounts of development work 
and content collection that's being done for the OLPC.

That said, most such projects take a "lab" approach, rather than a "one 
per child" approach.  The reasons for that are many, but lack of power 
in homes, need for security to prevent theft, and need to use wired 
networking are the most common ones I've heard.  Regular laptops are too 
valuable to hand to kids in most areas (they'd be subject to theft 
almost immediately), so normally kids need to go to a "lab" to use the 
computer.

There are advantages and disadvantages to the lab approach, I won't go 
into them here, suffice it that as a text-book reader (one of the OLPC's 
major use-cases), a lab-based machine is reasonably difficult to use.
>
> We have already a lot of computers,
> and we are slowing down the process to avoid a computer hardware
> overload... Recycling is an ecologic approach to the environment,
> and it
> seems that it is a concern of the whole OLPC initiative. Recycling
> allows
> you to do things by yourself with little money (or none at all). I
> know
> that there is a serial/USB interface, but I'm not sure that it
> would be
> as easy to use as built-in ports (possibility to lost it, unable
> to do it
> by yourself due to the complex USB electronics component...). 
>
"Recycling" (reusing) old technology is not without some significant 
hurdles:

* pollution in the recipient countries (most old machines (indeed,
  even most new ones) are chock full of poisonous chemicals that
  leech into the ground water and trigger nasty medical conditions)
* po

Re: [design] Lack of built-in serial and // port ?

2007-10-23 Thread Mitch Bradley 
Ian Daniher wrote:
> Samir,
> IIRC, there *is* a serial port, but due to constraints I have not been 
> made aware of, It isn't exposed, instead it is buried inside the case.
One primary constraint is that there is absolutely no room left for 
other connectors to come out.

Yes, I know there are places where it looks like it might be possible, 
but there are non-obvious constraints having to do with board layout and 
mechanical design and securing against dust and water.

Another answer is that, while it might seem that obsolete technology is 
cheap because you can get it used, very often the real cost is very high 
because it breaks down, can't be repaired, consumables (ink, etc) aren't 
available, etc.  The support cost for random collections of old stuff 
can be enormous.

> Sorry I can't help more,
> -- 
> Ian Daniher
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
> Skype : it.daniher
> irc.freenode.com : DyDisMe
>
> On 10/23/07, *Samir Saidani* < [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
> > wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I have heard about the OLPC initiative a while ago, and recently
> I have decided to take a further look at this very interesting
> initiative... Here are first thoughts about it...
>
> I'm quite new to this project, and one thing that strikes me was the
> lack of built-in serial and parallel port.  Why ? When you don't have
> a lot of money, you tend to use obsolete technology which are cheaper
> than the newer one, like parallel printers, serial modem, serial
> mouse,
> parallel scanner, etc ... This obsolete technology are easily
> available
> on poor countries, because it's easy for an non profit organization
> to send this kind of technology that almost nobody wants anymore (at
> least the enterprises, and the schools of rich countries update quite
> often their hardware and throw the old one to the garbage or donate it
> to a NPO).
>
> So you can have the old tech for free, because they often end into the
> gargage while they are still working great. And this is not a theory,
> we have founded here in France a npo which locally is working to give
> One Computer Per Child for 0 $. We have already a lot of computers,
> and we are slowing down the process to avoid a computer hardware
> overload... Recycling is an ecologic approach to the environment,
> and it
> seems that it is a concern of the whole OLPC initiative. Recycling
> allows
> you to do things by yourself with little money (or none at all). I
> know
> that there is a serial/USB interface, but I'm not sure that it
> would be
> as easy to use as built-in ports (possibility to lost it, unable
> to do it
> by yourself due to the complex USB electronics component...). So
> when you
> consider the target audience (poor countries, rural zone, poor
> people),
> I think this is a design mistake. Or at least it's reducing a lot the
> possibility of hacking and recycling obsolete hardware lying around.
>
> Maybe and probably do you have already talk about this matter ?
>
> Thanks !
> Samir
> ___
> Design mailing list
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/design
>
>
>
>
>
> 
>
> ___
> Devel mailing list
> Devel@lists.laptop.org
> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/devel
>   

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Re: [design] Lack of built-in serial and // port ?

2007-10-23 Thread Rafael Enrique Ortiz Guerrero 
Hi all,

The serial port in the XO is designed for low level debugging,

please see

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Serial_adapters.

Cheers!
On 10/23/07, Ian Daniher <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> Samir,
> IIRC, there *is* a serial port, but due to constraints I have not been
> made aware of, It isn't exposed, instead it is buried inside the case.
> Sorry I can't help more,
> --
> Ian Daniher
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Skype : it.daniher
> irc.freenode.com: DyDisMe
>
> On 10/23/07, Samir Saidani < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I have heard about the OLPC initiative a while ago, and recently
> > I have decided to take a further look at this very interesting
> > initiative... Here are first thoughts about it...
> >
> > I'm quite new to this project, and one thing that strikes me was the
> > lack of built-in serial and parallel port.  Why ? When you don't have
> > a lot of money, you tend to use obsolete technology which are cheaper
> > than the newer one, like parallel printers, serial modem, serial mouse,
> > parallel scanner, etc ... This obsolete technology are easily available
> > on poor countries, because it's easy for an non profit organization
> > to send this kind of technology that almost nobody wants anymore (at
> > least the enterprises, and the schools of rich countries update quite
> > often their hardware and throw the old one to the garbage or donate it
> > to a NPO).
> >
> > So you can have the old tech for free, because they often end into the
> > gargage while they are still working great. And this is not a theory,
> > we have founded here in France a npo which locally is working to give
> > One Computer Per Child for 0 $. We have already a lot of computers,
> > and we are slowing down the process to avoid a computer hardware
> > overload... Recycling is an ecologic approach to the environment, and it
> >
> > seems that it is a concern of the whole OLPC initiative. Recycling
> > allows
> > you to do things by yourself with little money (or none at all). I know
> > that there is a serial/USB interface, but I'm not sure that it would be
> > as easy to use as built-in ports (possibility to lost it, unable to do
> > it
> > by yourself due to the complex USB electronics component...). So when
> > you
> > consider the target audience (poor countries, rural zone, poor people),
> > I think this is a design mistake. Or at least it's reducing a lot the
> > possibility of hacking and recycling obsolete hardware lying around.
> >
> > Maybe and probably do you have already talk about this matter ?
> >
> > Thanks !
> > Samir
> > ___
> > Design mailing list
> > [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/design
> >
>
>
>
>
>
> ___
> Devel mailing list
> Devel@lists.laptop.org
> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/devel
>
>


-- 
Rafael Enrique Ortiz Guerrero
One Laptop Per Child
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Re: [design] Lack of built-in serial and // port ?

2007-10-23 Thread Ian Daniher 
Samir,
IIRC, there *is* a serial port, but due to constraints I have not been made
aware of, It isn't exposed, instead it is buried inside the case.
Sorry I can't help more,
-- 
Ian Daniher
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Skype : it.daniher
irc.freenode.com: DyDisMe

On 10/23/07, Samir Saidani <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I have heard about the OLPC initiative a while ago, and recently
> I have decided to take a further look at this very interesting
> initiative... Here are first thoughts about it...
>
> I'm quite new to this project, and one thing that strikes me was the
> lack of built-in serial and parallel port.  Why ? When you don't have
> a lot of money, you tend to use obsolete technology which are cheaper
> than the newer one, like parallel printers, serial modem, serial mouse,
> parallel scanner, etc ... This obsolete technology are easily available
> on poor countries, because it's easy for an non profit organization
> to send this kind of technology that almost nobody wants anymore (at
> least the enterprises, and the schools of rich countries update quite
> often their hardware and throw the old one to the garbage or donate it
> to a NPO).
>
> So you can have the old tech for free, because they often end into the
> gargage while they are still working great. And this is not a theory,
> we have founded here in France a npo which locally is working to give
> One Computer Per Child for 0 $. We have already a lot of computers,
> and we are slowing down the process to avoid a computer hardware
> overload... Recycling is an ecologic approach to the environment, and it
> seems that it is a concern of the whole OLPC initiative. Recycling allows
> you to do things by yourself with little money (or none at all). I know
> that there is a serial/USB interface, but I'm not sure that it would be
> as easy to use as built-in ports (possibility to lost it, unable to do it
> by yourself due to the complex USB electronics component...). So when you
> consider the target audience (poor countries, rural zone, poor people),
> I think this is a design mistake. Or at least it's reducing a lot the
> possibility of hacking and recycling obsolete hardware lying around.
>
> Maybe and probably do you have already talk about this matter ?
>
> Thanks !
> Samir
> ___
> Design mailing list
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/design
>
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