Re: [IAEP] [Sugar-devel] netbook as terminology
I need to get more sleep (^through^threw ^come^came). The unnamed person was Yves Behar (ir someone on his team). -walter On Sat, Jul 4, 2009 at 2:03 AM, Bill Kerr billk...@gmail.com wrote: On Sat, Jul 4, 2009 at 12:06 AM, Walter Bender walter.ben...@gmail.comwrote: When we began the project, I lobbied to call it a Children's Machine (CM) in reference both to Seymour Papert's book and as a reference to the CM series of connection machines that Danny Hillis created at Thinking Machines, another effort where they through away the rules to make a solution to fit a class of problems rather than make the problem fit the solution. Of course, XO is a brilliant name, that come from our design team as I recall, and I don't doubt that it was the correct decision for OLPC at the time. I agree that xo is a brilliant name. Congratulalions to the un-named person who thought it up. Some of these names convey functionality and purpose far better than the others. I have broken them into three categories based on how it feels to me. PURPOSE: Childrens Machine xo FUNCTION: Connection Machine Dynabook smartbook TECHNO CENTRIC: netbook MID thin-and-light low cost small notebook PC low cost ultra-portable notebook computers (Microsoft mouthfulhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/06/03/microsoft-wants-new-term-for-netbooks-unhappy-with-other-5-ch/ ) ultra-portable mini notebooks I don't know that we should decide to push a name change on the market. The point I will make at the Desktop Summit is that the marketing of netbooks with 3G set an expectation that they are part of the cloud and that the push for bigger, fatter, faster netbooks has eroded the opportunity to think about new approaches to computing that smaller and lighter afford. But there remain opportunities to redefine the desktop, keeping it relevant, in many areas, ours being K-6. Even in the developed world, the Internet is not everywhere, e.g., most classrooms, and as much as it has been good for the service providers to pitch it as true, the cloud is not right solution to every problem. Would a good description of the sugar desktop be community user interface stressing F1 and F2 over the more traditional F3? That was my interpretation from reading the OLPC Human interface guidelines: Most developers are familiar with the desktop metaphorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desktop_metaphorthat dominates the modern-day computer experience. This metaphor has evolved over the past 30 years, giving rise to distinct classes of interface elements that we expect to find in every OS: desktop, icons, files, folders, windows, etc. While this metaphor makes sense at the office—and perhaps even at home—it does not translate well into a collaborative environment such as the one that the OLPC laptops will embody. Therefore, we have adopted a new set of metaphors that emphasize community. While there are some correlations between the Sugar UI and those of traditional desktops, there are also clear distinctions. It is these distinctions that are the subject of the remainder of this section. We highlight the reasoning behind our shift in perspective and detail functionality with respect to the overall laptop experience http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Human_Interface_Guidelines/The_Laptop_Experience/Introduction This article more or less persuaded me that cloud computing was an inevitable (long term) trend http://asc-parc.blogspot.com/2009/01/cloud-computing-science20-and-social.html The main value proposition is further abstraction that reduces management costs. For example, backup storage is abstracted into the cloud, so you don't have to worry about your hard disk failing. Computation is abstracted into the cloud, so you don't have to worry about not having enough computational nodes for your data analysis job. It is an inevitable trend in computing, because of the need to reduce complexity and data-management/computation-management costs. It's clear that, in the near future, the backup storage and computation will continue to evolve into collaborative workspaces that you never have to administer, nor would you have to worry about backing up your work Meanwhile back in the real world a huge problem in schools is filtering of the internet which ends up making many useful sites not accessible to most in school time (and in practice slows things down) - some students now by pass the filter using smart phones, smart phones as modems, 3G USB devices etc. - expensive for them but good to see the internet routing around this damage Education Departments don't seem capable of providing fast untrammelled internet access in my experience -walter -- Walter Bender Sugar Labs http://www.sugarlabs.org ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] [Sugar-devel] netbook as terminology
On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 12:26 PM, Bill Kerrbillk...@gmail.com wrote: Also noticed recently that NN reacted against the netbook terminology: http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2009/07/xo-is-not-netbook.html Negroponte: Kids in Ethiopia don't have the internet in a nearby cloud ... I like the phrase. We just found the perfect icon for the XS ;-) cheers, m -- martin.langh...@gmail.com mar...@laptop.org -- School Server Architect - ask interesting questions - don't get distracted with shiny stuff - working code first - http://wiki.laptop.org/go/User:Martinlanghoff ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] [Sugar-devel] netbook as terminology
Netbook is not a neutral word and as such is a very useful one. It's important however to make a context distinction: the word makes no sense in developing countries which lack Internet infrastructure let alone electricity in rural areas. So it's perfectly understandable that Professor Negroponte opposes it. There's another reason: it describes a class of machines, while the XO is in a class by itself. Although Asus is often credited with starting the netbook craze, the EeePC's direct technical predecessor was the XO-1. And the XO-1 was and is superior in many ways (bimodal screen, mesh networking, robustness). Finally, OLPC is a nonprofit education project, not a laptop project; competition with OEMs is not OLPC's goal. So, three good reasons for OLPC's founder to oppose the word. And I agree that at this point we shouldn't call the XO-1 a netbook. Why don't we ask Christian (when he has time) to put in: ... the One Laptop per Child XO-1, predecessor of today's netbooks. Since there is indeed at this time a new class of small, light laptops, often with solid-state disk, without optical media drive, with keyboards running from cosy to very cramped. Generally speaking, they run GNU/Linux well and Windows XP poorly (Windows Vista not at all). Although initially conceived for grownups on the go as satellite machines to big laptops and desktops, OEMs have discovered that their small form factor and low price make them suitable for children. They are less robust than the XO-1, but that is less of an issue in the developed countries. As Microsoft has a very weak offer on these machines, they are doing everything they can to block the word. So they rebaptize them Ultra Low Cost Personal Computers (this is from the sticker underneath my Dell Latitude 2100 education netbook). They put pressure on OEMs to beef up the specs (faster processors, HDD instead of SSD, larger screen, larger form factor) so Windows XP can run a little better (and increase the chances Windows 7 will run). This strategy will actually be catastrophic for OEMs, because the result will be a blurring of the boundary between big trad laptops and netbooks, and in the curent economic climate many people will choose smaller units instead. A new class of ARM-based nertbooks is arriving and Microsoft has no version of Windows available for it except the very limited Windows CE; this has them very worried, witness what happened at Computex with Asus a month ago when Microsoft had them remove their ARM netbook from the booth. The netbook category by the way is the only growing PC category, and is growing very quickly according to NPD. All this creates a real opportunity for OEMs and distros to take over the entry level of the market. But, as it happens, that entry level remains suitable for children who don't need a more powerful machine. Now for Sugar. Sugar is a nonprofit education project too, but with potentially much wider reach than OLPC since thanks to its Linux underpinnings, it can run on almost everything. This is a key strength of Sugar and it serves us to mention that Sugar can run on old PCs, netbooks, and Macs as well as new laptops and PCs... and the XO. thanks Sean On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 12:26 PM, Bill Kerrbillk...@gmail.com wrote: On Thu, Jul 2, 2009 at 1:51 AM, Walter Bender walter.ben...@gmail.com wrote: 7. I'll be giving a keynote at GUADEC [http://www.grancanariadesktopsummit.org/]; my plan is to both introduce Sugar to the broader desktop community (with the goal of recruiting more contributors), to sing the praises of the desktop—the cloud is not the solution to all problem—but also .articulate the need for more simplicity along the entire spectrum from developers to end users at least three interesting points there from walter sing the praises of the desktop the cloud is not the solution to all problem the need for more simplicity along the entire spectrum from developers to end users I'd love to hear an expansion of these positions Also noticed recently that NN reacted against the netbook terminology: http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2009/07/xo-is-not-netbook.html Negroponte: Kids in Ethiopia don't have the internet in a nearby cloud ... And just noticed that the sugar labs home page describes the xo as a netbook: http://www.sugarlabs.org/ -- Bill Kerr http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/ ___ Sugar-devel mailing list sugar-de...@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] [Sugar-devel] netbook as terminology
When we began the project, I lobbied to call it a Children's Machine (CM) in reference both to Seymour Papert's book and as a reference to the CM series of connection machines that Danny Hillis created at Thinking Machines, another effort where they through away the rules to make a solution to fit a class of problems rather than make the problem fit the solution. Of course, XO is a brilliant name, that come from our design team as I recall, and I don't doubt that it was the correct decision for OLPC at the time. I don't know that we should decide to push a name change on the market. The point I will make at the Desktop Summit is that the marketing of netbooks with 3G set an expectation that they are part of the cloud and that the push for bigger, fatter, faster netbooks has eroded the opportunity to think about new approaches to computing that smaller and lighter afford. But there remain opportunities to redefine the desktop, keeping it relevant, in many areas, ours being K-6. Even in the developed world, the Internet is not everywhere, e.g., most classrooms, and as much as it has been good for the service providers to pitch it as true, the cloud is not right solution to every problem. -walter On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 7:10 AM, Sean DALY sdaly...@gmail.com wrote: Netbook is not a neutral word and as such is a very useful one. It's important however to make a context distinction: the word makes no sense in developing countries which lack Internet infrastructure let alone electricity in rural areas. So it's perfectly understandable that Professor Negroponte opposes it. There's another reason: it describes a class of machines, while the XO is in a class by itself. Although Asus is often credited with starting the netbook craze, the EeePC's direct technical predecessor was the XO-1. And the XO-1 was and is superior in many ways (bimodal screen, mesh networking, robustness). Finally, OLPC is a nonprofit education project, not a laptop project; competition with OEMs is not OLPC's goal. So, three good reasons for OLPC's founder to oppose the word. And I agree that at this point we shouldn't call the XO-1 a netbook. Why don't we ask Christian (when he has time) to put in: ... the One Laptop per Child XO-1, predecessor of today's netbooks. Since there is indeed at this time a new class of small, light laptops, often with solid-state disk, without optical media drive, with keyboards running from cosy to very cramped. Generally speaking, they run GNU/Linux well and Windows XP poorly (Windows Vista not at all). Although initially conceived for grownups on the go as satellite machines to big laptops and desktops, OEMs have discovered that their small form factor and low price make them suitable for children. They are less robust than the XO-1, but that is less of an issue in the developed countries. As Microsoft has a very weak offer on these machines, they are doing everything they can to block the word. So they rebaptize them Ultra Low Cost Personal Computers (this is from the sticker underneath my Dell Latitude 2100 education netbook). They put pressure on OEMs to beef up the specs (faster processors, HDD instead of SSD, larger screen, larger form factor) so Windows XP can run a little better (and increase the chances Windows 7 will run). This strategy will actually be catastrophic for OEMs, because the result will be a blurring of the boundary between big trad laptops and netbooks, and in the curent economic climate many people will choose smaller units instead. A new class of ARM-based nertbooks is arriving and Microsoft has no version of Windows available for it except the very limited Windows CE; this has them very worried, witness what happened at Computex with Asus a month ago when Microsoft had them remove their ARM netbook from the booth. The netbook category by the way is the only growing PC category, and is growing very quickly according to NPD. All this creates a real opportunity for OEMs and distros to take over the entry level of the market. But, as it happens, that entry level remains suitable for children who don't need a more powerful machine. Now for Sugar. Sugar is a nonprofit education project too, but with potentially much wider reach than OLPC since thanks to its Linux underpinnings, it can run on almost everything. This is a key strength of Sugar and it serves us to mention that Sugar can run on old PCs, netbooks, and Macs as well as new laptops and PCs... and the XO. thanks Sean On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 12:26 PM, Bill Kerrbillk...@gmail.com wrote: On Thu, Jul 2, 2009 at 1:51 AM, Walter Bender walter.ben...@gmail.com wrote: 7. I'll be giving a keynote at GUADEC [http://www.grancanariadesktopsummit.org/]; my plan is to both introduce Sugar to the broader desktop community (with the goal of recruiting more contributors), to sing the praises of the desktop—the cloud is not the solution to all problem—but also
Re: [IAEP] [Sugar-devel] netbook as terminology
On Sat, Jul 4, 2009 at 12:06 AM, Walter Bender walter.ben...@gmail.comwrote: When we began the project, I lobbied to call it a Children's Machine (CM) in reference both to Seymour Papert's book and as a reference to the CM series of connection machines that Danny Hillis created at Thinking Machines, another effort where they through away the rules to make a solution to fit a class of problems rather than make the problem fit the solution. Of course, XO is a brilliant name, that come from our design team as I recall, and I don't doubt that it was the correct decision for OLPC at the time. I agree that xo is a brilliant name. Congratulalions to the un-named person who thought it up. Some of these names convey functionality and purpose far better than the others. I have broken them into three categories based on how it feels to me. PURPOSE: Childrens Machine xo FUNCTION: Connection Machine Dynabook smartbook TECHNO CENTRIC: netbook MID thin-and-light low cost small notebook PC low cost ultra-portable notebook computers (Microsoft mouthfulhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/06/03/microsoft-wants-new-term-for-netbooks-unhappy-with-other-5-ch/ ) ultra-portable mini notebooks I don't know that we should decide to push a name change on the market. The point I will make at the Desktop Summit is that the marketing of netbooks with 3G set an expectation that they are part of the cloud and that the push for bigger, fatter, faster netbooks has eroded the opportunity to think about new approaches to computing that smaller and lighter afford. But there remain opportunities to redefine the desktop, keeping it relevant, in many areas, ours being K-6. Even in the developed world, the Internet is not everywhere, e.g., most classrooms, and as much as it has been good for the service providers to pitch it as true, the cloud is not right solution to every problem. Would a good description of the sugar desktop be community user interface stressing F1 and F2 over the more traditional F3? That was my interpretation from reading the OLPC Human interface guidelines: Most developers are familiar with the desktop metaphorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desktop_metaphorthat dominates the modern-day computer experience. This metaphor has evolved over the past 30 years, giving rise to distinct classes of interface elements that we expect to find in every OS: desktop, icons, files, folders, windows, etc. While this metaphor makes sense at the office—and perhaps even at home—it does not translate well into a collaborative environment such as the one that the OLPC laptops will embody. Therefore, we have adopted a new set of metaphors that emphasize community. While there are some correlations between the Sugar UI and those of traditional desktops, there are also clear distinctions. It is these distinctions that are the subject of the remainder of this section. We highlight the reasoning behind our shift in perspective and detail functionality with respect to the overall laptop experience http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Human_Interface_Guidelines/The_Laptop_Experience/Introduction This article more or less persuaded me that cloud computing was an inevitable (long term) trend http://asc-parc.blogspot.com/2009/01/cloud-computing-science20-and-social.html The main value proposition is further abstraction that reduces management costs. For example, backup storage is abstracted into the cloud, so you don't have to worry about your hard disk failing. Computation is abstracted into the cloud, so you don't have to worry about not having enough computational nodes for your data analysis job. It is an inevitable trend in computing, because of the need to reduce complexity and data-management/computation-management costs. It's clear that, in the near future, the backup storage and computation will continue to evolve into collaborative workspaces that you never have to administer, nor would you have to worry about backing up your work Meanwhile back in the real world a huge problem in schools is filtering of the internet which ends up making many useful sites not accessible to most in school time (and in practice slows things down) - some students now by pass the filter using smart phones, smart phones as modems, 3G USB devices etc. - expensive for them but good to see the internet routing around this damage Education Departments don't seem capable of providing fast untrammelled internet access in my experience -walter ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
