One Laptop per child- The hundred dollar laptop has a working prototype.

One Laptop per child- The hundred dollar laptop has a working prototype.- how it is going to change India, if we implement it?

As I read more about this project I am getting more interested. Having a Laptop for every child which can act as a node of a mesh network (The design of the motherboard enable this laptop to work as a node/router even if it is switched off. It creates its own mesh network out of the box. Each machine is a full-time wireless router.

Here’s the point- A state like Kerala can run their own VoIP telecommunication network through this mesh network. How cool is that?
Children in the most remote regions of the globe—as well as their teachers and families—will be connected both to one another and to the Internet.

More about XO
XO has no hard drive to crash and only two internal cables.(To reduce the failure rate)
The laptop has about 512 MB of internal Flash memory similar to the inexpensive thumb drives sold at many computer stores. Operating systems can be installed and/or files can be saved on this memory. The laptop also has USB ports for external hard drives; so internal Flash storage can be used for the OS and some file storage, and common external USB drives can take up the slack if needed.

It features a 7.5 inch, 1200×900 pixel, TFT screen and self-refreshing display with higher resolution (200 DPI) than 95 percent of the laptops on the market today. Two display modes are available: a transmissive, full-color mode, and a reflective, high-resolution mode that is sunlight readable. Both consume very little power: the transmissive mode consumes one watt—about one seventh of the average LCD power consumption in a laptop; the reflective mode consumes a miserly 0.2 watts.

The laptop selectively suspends operation of its CPU, which makes possible even more remarkable power savings. The laptop nominally consumes less than two watts—less than one tenth of what a standard laptop consumes—so little that XO can be recharged by human power. This is a critical advance for the half-billion children who have no access to electricity.

XO is about the size of a textbook and lighter than a lunchbox. Thanks to its flexible design and “transformer" hinge, the laptop easily assumes any of several configurations: standard laptop use, e-book reading, and gaming.(gaming?)

The laptop has rounded edges. The integrated handle is kid-sized, as is the sealed, rubber-membrane keyboard. The novel, dual-mode, extra-wide touchpad supports pointing, as well as drawing and writing.

In addition, —for use at home and where power is not available—the XO can be hand powered. It will come with at least two of three options: a crank, a pedal, or a pull-cord.
END NOTE

MIT Technology review is reporting that India's Secretary of education (who is that?) icily rejected the proposal for the study of effect of this laptop in economy!.

Dhun - Folk tune on Bansuri..just listen

A Little sugar- Will that save the world?

They say-
a $100 laptop—a technology that could revolutionize how we educate the world's children.
The XO Laptop will bring children technology as a means to freedom and empowerment. The success of the project in the face of overwhelming global diversity will only be possible by embracing openness and by providing the laptop's users and developers a profound level of freedom.
As the children grow and pursue new ideas, the software and the tools need to be able to grow with them and provide a gateway to other technology.

They assume-

the creation and widespread distribution of a single type of computer will solve the problem of the “digital divide” in the developing world. By creating a laptop computer priced at $100 each (when sold in quantities of millions), the thinking goes, schoolchildren throughout the developing world will all be equipped with powerful tools for learning and exploration.


They call the interface "SUGAR"- the light weight version of fedora linux.

..and they think that this will save the world?

I was a 91-year-old man with so much love to give and so much life to live

After a long struggle to get back in to reading, when i found this book in the library,it was easy to make the decision to select the book. When i started reading I felt like the the main character in the book - a 91-year-old man with so much love to give and so much life to live. I felt the book like Delgadina.
"I preferred her asleep," he admits, and further confesses that "seeing and touching her in the flesh, she seemed less real to me than in my memory." Yes, the young virgin - whom the old man calls Delgadina, after a girl in a song - is an abstraction.
"the improbable pleasure of contemplating the body of a sleeping woman without the urgencies of desire or the obstacles of modesty".
At the end of the story when he try to sell his mother's jewels(for this girl?) and he discovers that years ago his own mother replaced the precious stones with imitations.
Delgadina leaves something pure and very human.She is a frightened child. I can see her eyes.

The simplicity of the book demands re reading