Microsoft is serious about getting Windows XP to work on OLPC’s low-cost laptop, but the company still isn’t sure it will be able to make a go of it. In an interview, James Utzschneider, the general manager of Microsoft’s emerging market unit, says Microsoft has devoted about 40 employees and contractors to work on its effort. However, there are plenty of technical hurdles, he said. One of the biggest is the fact that the XO has no hard drive and only 1GB of built-in memory. The company concluded it needed at least 2GB of memory just for Windows and Office, so it convinced the OLPC folks to include an SD slot on the laptop’s motherboard.
no vista for OLPC.
Crual world.
Putting Vista on the XO would be cruel for the children.
Porting XP and not even trying with Vista makes perfect sense for Microsoft. Even they know that Vista is bloatware, they just wont admit it.
so the basics will load. And from a small CD no less. They are so lame. Can’t even get office down to a CDROM
Be fun to watch what happens when they do… 2GB flash based XP vs Sugar will be amusing to say the least.
The biggest technical challenge for Microsoft is likely the Flash MTD (Memory Technology Device) that serves as persistent storage. It lacks the FTL (Firmware Translation Layer) that typical mass-market Flash devices employ to make them look like ordinary rotating block devices (i.e. hard disks) to the OS.
Therefore, the OS has to be aware of the Flash architecture, such as immutable erase blocks, in the I/O stack, and it must have a copy-on-write filesystem designed for sane metadata maintenance in light of these contraints.
Linux has a device driver for MTDs and a few filesystems specifically designed for Flash MTDs, including JFFS2 and LogFS. Although Windows CE runs on ultra-mobile Flash-based devices, I think that all of them use CF, SD, or some other kind of FTL-based media.
What Microsoft apparently begged OLPC to do was to include an SD slot on the motherboard so that integrators could ship the XO with an FTL-based Flash medium specifically to accommodate Windows. The onboard MTD would not be accessible from Windows.
Any list of key OLPC XO features has to include the MTD. The FTL is just a stopgap, and it’s largely responsible for the lackluster write performance of today’s SSDs. Ultimately, the MTD is the right way to implement solid-state storage, and it takes a project like OLPC to cut through the stagnancy of monoculture.
Microsoft should make their OS work with the hardware rather than make the hardware work with their OS, especially since their approach is clearly regressive. Computers shouldn’t always have to be “Designed for Microsoft(R) Windows(R) XP(TM)”. For once, at least, Microsoft should design their OS for whatever hardware is in demand.
I’d love to see Microsoft implement MTD support in Windows so that we can move toward solid-state storage in a sensible way. But for Microsoft to elbow their way onto the XO by insisting on legacy hardware accommodations is outrageous. How are we ever going to move forward given Microsoft’s interest in holding us back?
Wouldn’t that be nice. A return to OSes designed for specific hardware.
It boggles the mind how far we’ve strayed, to the point where hardware is now designed around software.
Oh, for the good old days. Back when software was re-written to work on older hardware, to eek every little once of performance out of the existing hardware.
Throwing more hardware at crap software is not the way to increase performance.
Really, in my opinion, this is defeating the object of the laptop. It has a customized Linux OS that has a very different user interface. It has been designed with certain goals in mind.
By putting XP on, which is *not* customizable to the same extent, you are removing one of the main parts of the project. The fact that you have to hack it (by placing an extra SD slot) should be your first warning.
Does Microsoft’s greed know no limits? Why not just focus on getting XP on the Eee PC and leave this non-profit project alone?
Does Microsoft’s greed know no limits? Why not just focus on getting XP on the Eee PC and leave this non-profit project alone?
Nope.
All your base are belong to us!
.. Seriously, should I really mention the “Get the facts” campign?
– Gilboa
Edited 2007-12-06 17:54
What, no Judge Ito / Monica Lewinsky joke?
If the OS don’t fit, you must leave it!
+1 for making me laugh.
“””
Nope.
All your base are belong to us!
“””
Indeed. And how many dollars per unit will buyers pay for that otherwise unnecessary SD slot? Multiply that by the number of units and what will it come to? Does the Windows tax know know bounds? Even users of hardware explicitly designed and built for another OS have to pay it!
I see it as just the opposite. The purpose of the OLPC was to have an open platform so that anyone could create an OS for it. By having XP on it will increase the amount of software available for the laptop tremendously. This may even increase sales of the laptop. As for the SD slot, thats one of the best features of the laptop according to those who have it, because they can load their applications onto the card and take it with them or order more cards and have unlimited storage. I see no greed here on Microsoft’s part, just an interested party in working with the OLPC. After all, it is an open platform.
The purpose of the OLPC was to have an open platform so that anyone could create an OS for it. By having XP on it will increase the amount of software available for the laptop tremendously
So, putting XP on it would make it an open platform – how ????
The fact that you *COULD* put XP on it makes it an open platform. Open in the sense that other operating systems can run on it.
No, the fact that the specifications are available for all the hardware makes it open. Everything that’s needed to write an OS from scratch for this device is there.
Basically the OLPC shows off the biggest problem there is out there. Microsoft’s OS’s successes are based on EXCLUSION: proprietary lockin. Now they’re facing a market which is based on INCLUSION and they’re failing miserably.
Now OLPC have to buildin new hardware just to have some crappy OS waste it.
It’s like every shitty terminal around using Windows 95 while a mobile phone from yesterday would have enough power to do the job. No, you need a full blown x86 to have some dubious software running inside Internet Explorer. Be lucky if it runs through the whole year.
Probably the biggest criticism about OLPC is the “crappy OS”. The UI is easy to use, but it is dumbed down and “toy”-ish. If one of the goals is to get kids into computers, it doesn’t make much sense to provide a UI that works nothing like any other UI on the planet. On the flip side, it also makes ALOT of sense to provide the os that is used by 85% of the planet.
Don’t get me wrong, there is alot to like about OLPC. Just not suger.
The point is not to train the next generation of Microsoft techies. The point is to get people access to information and teach them about computers in general, and how to program them to do what you want. Sugar is great for that. XP would be a huge waste.
What I am saying is more praising alternatives to sugar then saying xp is a must. IMHO sticking KDE on there would be best. Linux enourages experamentation, and if you use kde you wont be completely lost when you move to a “real” computer, be it linux, mac, or windows.
Edited 2007-12-06 17:10 UTC
While KDE is a lot more memory efficient than most people credit it for, I would not really want to run it plus several apps (including a web browser) on 256MB with no swap partition, nor sacrifice a large chunk of the puny 1GB flash disk
It’s got some great Educational apps, though.
I think Sugar is on-balance about the best-suited GUI for the project. Also, I (and many people from my generation) grew up with computers that bear practically no resemblance to Windows and I don’t think my generation has been at all disadvantaged by this: Windows is, after all, not particularly hard to use. And who is to say that the KDE or Windows from 10 or 15 years from now will bear any real resemblance to their present-day counterparts?
Don’t underestimate the learning speed of children.
They will start out with the XO at the age of 7, later at high school use a normal PC with Linux or Windows on it.
Some of these kids will become software or hardware engineers, others will become farmers, musicians, medics or whatever.
But all of them will have seen at least two different interfaces! That alone is reason enough to NOT make the XO interface like KDE, Gnome or Windows.
I remember my start into computers: A sharp pocket computer which could be programmed in basic and had 16 kB memory and one line for display. I learned that, and had a start advantage when I later had to learn about PCs and programming. Re-learning gave me the chance to correct my partially wrong assumptions about computers. Re-learning is good for kids.
Compare looking at DaVinci’s Michelangelo only from one side versus getting views from different positions. Which one is better?
You don’t need to teach 7 to 16 year old children “Windows” or “KDE” or “OpenOffice”. You need to teach them “Computers”. And force them to look at the topic from different angles.
Amen, brother.
“The point is not to train the next generation of Microsoft techies. The point is to get people access to information and teach them about computers in general, and how to program them to do what you want. Sugar is great for that. XP would be a huge waste.”
Yeah, because they won’t be exposed to Windows at some point during their lives. And do you seriously think that people want to know how to program computers to do what they want? People would rather pay other folks to do that…not because they aren’t capable of programming, but because they simply aren’t interested.
Yeah. A tragedy, that. It would be like going through life without ever having measles, mumps, or chickenpox. 😉
Yeah, because they won’t be exposed to Windows at some point during their lives
Quite possibly most of them won’t.
And do you seriously think that people want to know how to program computers to do what they want? People would rather pay other folks to do that…not because they aren’t capable of programming, but because they simply aren’t interested.
Yes, you’re a low class troll and yes I’m going to respond anyway. This laptop is not for the next generation of dipshit PHBs. It’s for the next generation of folks who the dipshit PHBs will be giving all their money to.
I don’t know where you’ve worked, but every place I’ve ever been, the PHBs were making substantially more of the money than the people below them.
I think MeatLoaf said it best when he sung, “you took the words right out of my mouth”. I’ve seen a whole generation of people who have gone backwards in terms of IT know how. Anyone who has worked on an IT help desk can tell you that people, rather than learning how to use a computer have simply got ‘macro’s’ programmed in their brain to get a task accomplished.
When things go wrong, when the software is changed, since they don’t have the underlying fundamental understanding of what they’re doing – they’re confused, they can’t do anything. When they move office suites, operating systems and so forth, rather than simply adapting, they have to learn everything again. It is the equivalent of changing ones shoes and having to relearn how to walk again – its stupid.
For those who will reply to me and exaggerate “oh, end users aren’t meant to need to know all the technology behind it” and “oh, people aren’t interested in programming” (god knows why jayson.knight has to ride on that hyperbole – learning programming has nothing to do with what people like me are trying to say) – that isn’t what I am saying. What I am saying is that when they do something in a given piece of software – what is actually happening. It is about knowing the terms; what is an icon, what is the desktop, what is a menu – I’ve come across users who don’t even know those basic concepts. I see them using computers and I wonder whether or not they’re simply randomly clicking in locations on the screen in the hope of actually clicking on the thing they need.
What the world needs is for those people who do get the technology by way of OLPC to learn the technology the correct way. When their nation moves forward, the IT educated population is agile of the mind so that when changes to the IT infrastructure, there isn’t major disruption and costly retraining.
Edited 2007-12-06 20:19
This is what really pisses me off about “computer courses” in high school and college. They don’t teach people concepts (how to structer a document, how to structure a memo or a letter, how to do things). Instead, they teach you the combination of button clicks that will perform an operation (click here to bold, click here to center, click here to create bullets). It annoys the piss out of me how many people know how to use MS Word, but could writer a letter in WordPerfect to save their lives since the menu structure is different.
What is wrong with learning concepts that can be applied to any piece of software?
Why are people so lazy that they need to learn the magic button sequence for doing something, instead of learning the concept behind the “something” such that they can transfer that knowledge to any software application, OS, device, or whatnot?
Try getting a teacher to teach a course on document structure, and you’ll get a bunch of teachers asking you where the MS Word step-by-step instructions are. It’s shameful, to say the least.
phoenix Said: “This is what really pisses me off about “computer courses” in high school and college. They don’t teach people concepts (how to structer a document, how to structure a memo or a letter, how to do things). Instead, they teach you the combination of button clicks that will perform an operation (click here to bold, click here to center, click here to create bullets). It annoys the piss out of me how many people know how to use MS Word, but could writer a letter in WordPerfect to save their lives since the menu structure is different. “
HERE HERE! I have said this so many time to different people that argue that we need to pay for Vista and MS Office at a grade school that I help out at.
1. The OS – MS, KDE, Sugar . . . should be transparent enough once it is set up that I can launch an application. 2. Teach the kids how to create a document, its structure, how spread sheets works, how to make a presentation, i.e. how to convey information. 3. Now teach the kids to read and work with documentation associated with the software, so ten years from now no mater what the software of the day is they are comfortable reading the documentation and poking around so they can learn that particular software package.
I don’t know how many times I have to help people out and all they want to know is what series of buttons to push to do something. My response is what do you want to do, lets look in the menu system to see if we see something that might be what you are looking for . . . still not clear lets fire up the help system and drill down until we can find what you are looking for . . . The people that can embrace this exploration need a lot less help and are much more comfortable working with the systems then those that just insist that you show them what buttons to push.
Indeed. Who is to say that Microsoft will be behind the dominant user interface ten or twenty years from now, when the kids using these laptops will be productive adults? In time everything changes, and Microsoft’s domination of the OS market will come to an end one day. Personally I’m hoping that either there is no monopoly after that day, or if there is, it is something like OSX that is based upon open software concepts. Even if the actual user interface is patented and closed, perhaps the hardware itself and the software backend will remain open and able to be changed by the users to suit their wants and needs.
Hello? It is designed for little children. It is way way better to have a open OS where kids can learn EVERYTHING about it than to have a nearly obsolete 7 year old crippled CLOSED OS.
If kids learn linux they wont have any problem using Windows ( they prolly dont want to but if they have to they can ). Children are smart they learn much faster than adults and they can adapt really fast. So there is absolutely no need for XP on OLPC. Everyone who thinks so prolly lost the ability to adapt.
Kids aren’t going to learn linux, they are going to learn sugar, which does its best to keep linux hidden. As I said in a previous comment, kde would be ideal, but even xp will help more in actually developing useful skills. Just because it has linux under the hood doesn’t make it pro.
Sugar has a feature built right into the interface that opens the source code for any application. That’s got to be the most transparent user interface ever devised, trumping “view source” in the web browser.
How does Sugar “keep Linux hidden”? By not being KDE or GNOME? Come on, you’ll have to do better than that on this site…
In any case, the OLPC objective is more about free software than Linux in particular. So if it emphasizes to these kids the importance of choosing free software in general rather than merely choosing a free software kernel, then they’re doing the right thing.
Linux is often the most suitable kernel for any given free software product, but it’s not enough to have the growing and youthful middle classes in developing nations worshiping Linux as the key to achieving independence from the multinational vendors.
The whole stack must be free, end-to-end, in order for these people, their businesses, and their governments to bring themselves into the digital cloud age while retaining their cultural identities and regaining their economic independence.
The kernel probably isn’t the package that will see the most development from the XO community in the short-term. The work is likely to focus on Sugar, the core applications, and other user-visible components.
So it’s important that Sugar is clean and hackable. Although KDE, especially KDE4, is pretty hackable for those who grok C++, it has more of a learning curve. It’s not clear how useful it would be on a machine with such meager hardware and screen real estate.
This is some delusional Western imperialist mindset. Who gave anybody the right to go and define what it means to be a “pro” at doing stuff with computers? Give these people, especially the kids, some time with open hardware and open software, and they will surely develop amazing skills and functionality.
These people deserve better than figurative “Windows” into the conventional wisdom that locks them into the indentured servitude of global capitalism. They deserve an equal playing field that offer limitless possibilities for innovation and empowerment.
KDE and GNOME have a lot of our Windows-tainted conventional wisdom and cultural DNA already baked in. They already have their visions more or less in focus within their development communities. I think it’s better for everyone to give fresh minds a fresh whack at a relatively clean slate.
They will show us that “pro” comes in all shapes, sizes, colors, and income levels. Let us have a little more faith in humanity, and let those of us living in relative comfort resolve for the coming new year to consider the economic, cultural, and spiritual value of bringing hope and opportunity to the lives of the world’s vast underclasses.
Edited 2007-12-06 20:10
Bravo!!!
Ok, that is hela-cool, and I was completely un aware of it.
More then KDE or gnome, it is an incredably specialized interface geared towards children. What I am saying is that by doing that, they learn the specialized interface, not the widgets and concepts that have been common in virtually every PC UI since they have been around (and by personal computer I am refering to the idea, not x86 machines)
I don’t think you are right about that, another earlier poster was talking about how it was meant to get children into a more scientific frameset, not teach them about computers. Quite honestly, if you are right, I don’t agree with it at all. Proselytizing to children is disgusting, I don’t care what religion is doing it.
You do have a point here. I was unaware of how geared towards extendability sugar was.
I completely agree with you. And if you look at the context of what I was replying to, you will see the origional poster was saying that learning windows XP was a waste due to its age and crappyness. My point was more or less what you said, only with the target switched around. I remember as a kid getting in a ton of trouble for racking up a bill because I spent a few hours download the Perl runtimes for my Mac Classic II. I would have loved something in the OLPC mentality, and would have been able to teach myself alot more then I was able to on my mac if I had more then just perl and some shoddy documentation to work with.
As it stands, that download was invaluable. I learned the ideas of variables, arrays, boolean algebra, modular programming, etc (I couldnt wrap my head around OO at the time). All the mac classic really had going for it was the UI, everything else was pretty awful.
Are you seriously implying that learning a niche operating system (looking at the market share) offers you limitless possibilities for innovation, but learning the defacto standard makes you a slave? I can make a shareware app for windows, put it on the web and sell it for 5$ and start making money. It is only a very small segment of the linux userbase that is willing to pay for ANYTHING. When you develop for linux, you are either making a solution for yourself, or working for free. Sure, working for free is altruistic, but I wouldnt exactly called being payed for your efforts to be slavery.
And just to head you off at the pass, you can pull up a handful of examples of people who do make money off of linux software development. While it is possible, it is only a very small minority of the ecosystem. Remember the bitkeeper fiasco? A linux company which made a fantastic product as was a far from evil as is possible. But since it wasn’t free, a group of fanatics decided to clone it, to deliberately take the small niche that bitkeeper had carved out for itself. The very existance of a business model in linux is offensive to some people.
I am sorry if I am getting a bit inflammatory here, but seriously, you started it 😉 I love the open source ecosystem, and have pitched in with it numerous times. But it makes me pissed off when people imply any other way is immoral. Making money for yourself and protecting your interests is not immoral. It isnt altruistic like giving those interests away for the good of humanity, but there is a vast golf between that and immorality.
I see your point (I wouldn’t call it windows tainted, since MS came up with very few of the ideas and paradigms they use, but whatever). Like I said, I wasn’t aware of the focus on hacking and extensability, and that gives alot more weight to what you are saying. While I still think that a more conventional interface would give the kids better real life skills, it will be really interesting to see what can come out of giving kids the basics, and seeing where they can take it.
Edited 2007-12-06 23:08 UTC
Since when is making money the end-all and be-all of everything in the world?? Since when is it totally undesirable to just learn, to just do things, to just expand one’s knowledge? Have we become so jaded and capitalised that we can’t see the point of doing something if it doesn’t bring up riches beyond our wildest dreams?
There’s a hell of a lot more to life than just making a quick buck. And if you can’t see that, then I am sincerely feeling sorry for you.
I never, ever said that acting from altruism is a bad thing. What I did say is that not acting altruistic doesn’t make you evil. There is a huge difference between writing proprietary software and being evil, even using the word in the way we do in this industry.
How are foreign kids going to benefit from being able to look at obfuscated, ill-documented C code with comments, variable names method names, class names, and library names written in English? And not even full English sentences, mind you, but a horribly contracted version (HorCntrVers) that’s barely readable even to a native English speaker?
If XP is nearly obsolete, then Linux (being based on the 30-year-old Unix model) is long dead and gone.
Besides, being closed-source should be a prerequisite for this project; or, if the source is freely available, it should at least use a modern free software license. Being forced to give up your work may be a choice a fully-informed adult can consent to and live with, but how will those countries who have bought in to OLPC react once they find out that the copyleft licenses Sugar is based on requires them to give up copies of everything their children have made to anyone who asks? It won’t only destroy Mr. Negroponte and his project, but it will wreak havoc with international relations — people will think “Oh, it’s just America preying on weaker nations again.”
Edited 2007-12-06 17:29 UTC
Being forced to give up your work may be a choice a fully-informed adult can consent to and live with, but how will those countries who have bought in to OLPC react once they find out that the copyleft licenses Sugar is based on requires them to give up copies of everything their children have made to anyone who asks?
What?
I must have missed something there, but I wasn’t aware of any free software licenses that extended to any content created with that software. I find it hard to believe I’ll have to give away the .gif animations I’ve made because I created them in the Gimp, or the papers I wrote in OpenOffice.
The GPL, for instance, requires you to make modifications to the software available if asked, or the source code to programs derived from GPL’d code. I don’t recall seeing any notice requiring all content created on an OLPC to be distributable under a Creative Commons license, even.
The OLPC is meant to be a learning tool. Yes, the operating system is open source, and modifications will also have to be open source… but Negroponte’s vision for the OLPC was as a platform for a whole range of interactive educational and developmental* activities, not just computer programming. I’m more worried about how much of those curriculum activities and e-textbook materials actually exist, and I think we’ve been paying too much attention to what OS the hardware is running. Yeah, it’s Linux, get over it.
*in the psychological and sociological sense
Edited 2007-12-06 22:11
He was just trolling, and he is obviously horribly wrong on this topic.
The GPL and copyleft applies ONLY to software that is released under the GPL.
The GPL does not apply to any work you create yourself (unless you want to release your work under the GPL), and it most assuredly does not apply to any content you create with GPL works.
This is very well illustrated by the recent GPL violation case against Monsoon Multimedia. Only the source code of BusyBox, which was GPL software used by Monsoon Multimedia in their product, was at issue. None of Monsoon Multimedia’s own work was at isse.
I felt angry enough to consider modding the OP down for trolling, but the OSNews moderation policy says that only insults & off-topic posts should be modded down, so I’ll stay with that policy.
Unfortunately, Almafeta has decided to believe that the GPL requires any data or documents that come into contact with GPL’d software to be released to the public domain.
Noone knows where he got this idea, and he has done the equivalent of putting his fingers in his ears and bawling when people have tried to educate him about this.
It is no longer a matter of opinion, there are now several cases in the US where there have been complaints about GPL violations, and in each case the vendor has agreed to release the source code, as required by the GPL. The two most visible recent cases have been Parallels and Monsoon Multimedia.
In the case of Parrallels, the complaint was Parallels use of GRUB. That complaint went away when Parallels agreed to release the source code of GRUB as they had used it. In the case of Monsoon Multimedia, the complaint was use of BusyBox. That complaint went away when Monsoon Multimedia agreed to release the source code of BusyBox as they had used it.
BusyBox and GRUB are both open source (GPL) software projects.
Neither Parallels nor Monsoon Multimedia were at any point even asked to publish their own source code (for their part of their products), let alone forced to reveal it. There was not even a hint of that.
Almafeta is clearly wrong on this topic, without a doubt.
Edited 2007-12-07 02:20
Almafeta believes, for example, that if you create a document in openoffice.org, then that document must be GPL’d. [ disclaim: I do NOT ] . This is not the case, and would never be brought to court.
What exactly does any of that belief have to do with reality?
The author of the work is the copyright holder to that work according to the law. If you write a document using the openoffice.org tool, then you are clearly the copyright holder for that work you authored.
You are not the copyright holder of the source code to the openoffice.org tool however, since you did not write that source code. You simply used it.
If someone includes code from the tool openoffice.org in another work, then they must have permission from the copyright holder … the authors of the tool.
If someone includes text from a work written using the tool openoffice.org, then they must have permission from the copyright holder … the author of the text.
It is pretty clear. Almost everyone on the planet is bright enough to follow this simple rule. The rule of copyright law has been this way for centuries.
I can’t really see how even Almafeta could have confused it.
Not into the public domain; the GPL requies any data or documents that are contacted by it to be released under the GPL, just like it explicitly says in the license (versions 2 and 3).
The GPLv2
From Section 0:
…
Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the Program (independent of having been made by running the Program) Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.
…
From Section 2:
2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
…
b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.
…
Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program.
——————-
Emphases mine. Actually, just read that entire last snippet there.
I think that rather explicitly ties up the GPLv2. I don’t see anything requiring any of the kids to give up their pictures they drew, unless you want to disregard the parts about what constitutes a derived work.
Feel free to check my quotations here:
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.txt
—————-
The GPLv3
Section 0:
…
To “modify” a work means to copy from or adapt all or part of the work in a fashion requiring copyright permission, other than the making of an exact copy. The resulting work is called a “modified version” of the earlier work or a work “based on” the earlier work.
A “covered work” means either the unmodified Program or a work based on the Program.
…
————–
And the rest of the license talks about covered works. Somehow I doubt keeping a diary would be considered modifying a GPL’d work.
GPLv3: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.txt
Edited 2007-12-07 04:55
Please quote the section of the GPL that states this.
before posting, look up the definition of the word ‘derived’
Utter rubbish. If you don’t actually understand the GPL, and are unwilling to learn about it, please refrain from commenting on it.
I have had to read your anti GPL tripe in the past and every time you come out with a new line of attack, you end up showing just how ignorant you are about it.
Not liking the GPL, even for your seemingly irrational reasons, is your own business but if your going to attack it, at least do the rest of us a favor and actually try and understand the license so that we don’t have to waste time pointing out your inaccuracies.
Something to keep in mind, know your enemy.
Utterly incorrect. 100% wrong.
The license says this:
“the output from the Program is covered (by the GPL) only if its contents constitute a work based on the Program”.
If I write a romance novel using openoffice.org … clearly the romance novel text has absolutely nothing to do with the source code of openoffice.org.
The GPL license covers ONLY the source code of “the Program” (in this case, the source code of openoffice.org). If you use any of that openoffice.org source code in another program, then (as required by law) you must have permission from the copyright holders. The GPL is your permission … provided that you stick to its terms.
Anything that you write yourself … then you are the copyright holder to that work (even if you used openoffice.org to write it), and you decide how (or even if) you want to license it or distribute your work.
It is very simple, even schoolkids get this.
Edited 2007-12-07 11:35
Yet more ill informed nonsense bordering on trolling.
Quite aside from the other inaccuracies in this post that have already been addressed we have:
How are foreign kids going to benefit from being able to look at obfuscated, ill-documented C code with comments, variable names method names, class names, and library names written in English? And not even full English sentences, mind you, but a horribly contracted version (HorCntrVers) that’s barely readable even to a native English speaker?
The OLPC’s Sugar environment unlike the Linux kernel is not written in C but rather in Python. Python is an excellent language for learning programing. As for the use of English, you have to learn some English to program, as virtually all programming languages including those developed by non first language English speakers are written in English anyway. Learning English is educational too.
Hello? The kids aren’t getting the laptop to learn about operating systems and how computers work, they are getting them to help educate them about reading and writing and arithmetic. It doesn’t matter if the software was opened or closed for those tasks. The kids aren’t learning programming for the age group this is targeted at. I don’t see how if they learn linux they can learn Windows but not vice versa. Your arguments make no sense.
Could be that the GUI is not the best. I only saw videos of it. But at least they are trying to develop one which fits the needs best. How these needs are defined is debatable.
First, you don’t need to switch OS to replicate the Windows look&feel.
Next, doing so makes no sense for this laptop. Wether or not the whole world uses Windows XP now, it won’t use it in five years. And we all can really hope that some serious progress will happen in these years, because nowadays UI’s arent what I would consider as very nice fitting to the needs of the user.
Having “learnt” Windows will be just useless then. If MS doesn’t do radical changes in the next years, it will just loose. So in either case, today XP is just obsolete for an educational PC.
Part of the equation is OLPC’s insistance on open source (software wise) and open specifications (hardware wise). The projects goal is – if I interpret and understand the mission statement correctly – not necessarily to train tomorrows computer users but to provide a machine, that helps to bring education, literacy, numeracy – short knowledge – to more children in challenging environments. Sure, the fact that it is a computer (and a very well thought out one) opens a range of possibilities (mesh networking, using it as a communication tool in rural areas with poor communication infrastructure, a light source, that is rechargeable by hand, etc.) but it’s foremost aim is to enable more children to participate in the education process.
Education process >>> computer lab course.
The before mentioned openness of the OLPC guarantees, that once the need for a different User Interface emerges, it can be developed and deployed, even locally . The Asus Eee (quick, how many e’s are there in this name – I always forget it) PC is arguably a less open platform (cf. initially undocumented modifications to the acpi / Wifi drivers for example) and people have nevertheless started almost immediately to scratch their itches, to install different distributions, etc.
My take is, that once the need for a more conventional user Interface emerges (e.g. either when the children that use the XO’s grow older and start to learn more about programming, Office work, etc. or when countries start to buy XO’s especially with the need for such more advanced courses in mind), there will almost certainly be a large number of projects that can and will bring IceWM, the Equinox Desktop, WMers like Flux/Black/Openbox, XFCE, stripped down versions of KDE or GNOME, Enlightenment, …. and probably a host of other, original and to-be-developed Desktop – Environments / Window managers to the XO.
EDIT: wording and fixed typo
Edited 2007-12-06 18:08
The goal is *not* to get kids into computers, it is to provide a general education tools to kids, you know, to help them learn about math, language skills, history, collaborative work, and so on.
Not only that, but UIs are easy to understand. You don’t get “spoiled” because you’ve used one UI, i.e. it doesn’t make other UIs harder to learn. Video games (who each have their own distinct UIs) have taught us that much.
I personally think it’s great that this device does not railroad users into the Microsoft mold. Also, Sugar isn’t that bad, and it’s certainly not “crappy” – in fact, once you get used to it, it’s kinda cool. In any case, you can install other Linux DEs on the OLPC if you’re so inclined.
I like office a lot, but one word you cannot use with it is small… it uses a lot of memory, and a lot of disc space. Trying to get Office to run on something with the XO’s space seems to me to be a fool’s errand.
If they want to get an OS running on the OLPC’s restricted space, why don’t they use the embedded versions of Windows and Office designed for cell phones and such, as opposed to the full desktop OS? That way, you’d already have an OS designed to run in the low memory/power overheads of the XO, and with an office suite equally sized to match.
It’s not like the XO is upgradeable or repairable; it’s more of an embedded device anyways.
My first reaction as well. If resources are a problem then try to use XPe or CE instead of full grown XP. But if they’re not going for such an obvious solution then the reason is clear. They want XP in there in order to open up OLPC to mainstream Windows desktop software, whereas Windows CE and XPe are niche platforms. In short, they see cheap, small, low power laptops as an emerging market and want to conquer it early.
I was wondering about that too. Using something like windows embedded (winCE?) that still has the windows underpinnings should be fine with this. I wouldn’t think it would take too much for application developers to port over to that.
I can understand why Microsoft are pushing XP, but surely it would be smarter to push MS Works than Office.
I know Works lacks a lot, but essentially is has most of the basic tools required for doing the job without a lot of the bloat. Surely the aim should be providing a complete, yet portable slimline package rather than the all or nothing attitude MS are pushing on this particular device?
You don’t actually need to install Windows on OLPC
Well since OLPC laptop is linux based you can always install rdesktop on the laptop and run windows apps on ThinServer XP
http://www.rdesktop.org
http://www.aikotech.com/thinserver.htm
Reopen Windows 2000, strip it down, and add OpenOffice or an older version of Works, if the newest still can’t handle this little memory that is. Those are better suited for the specs of the machine.
OLPC is long dead project. Infusion of any good or bad operating system is not going to help. It is ivory tower project written by ivory tower professor Nigroponte. He pulled this scam previously in medialab project and other similar. His track trecord shows to obtain a government grant but produce nothing useful.
BTW tell me any decent linux distro with DECENT graphical interface(KDE GNOME etc) which runs smoothly under 256M RAM. Ubuntu refuse install at all….and how much HD/SD space will be required for sugar interface to install openoffice?
Edited 2007-12-06 17:50
Disclaimer: I’m neither associated with the OLPC nor with it’s subsidiary in my country, OLPC Austria. But the place and topic of my work (university, particle physics) have been associated with the proverbial “ivory tower” a few times too often to let the following pass uncommented:
The OLPC XO is a real, existing (as in non-vapourware) and – judging from my limited experience with it ( half an hour with a prototype machine ) – very useable machine. Calling it “dead” and not useful is something that I certainly can’t subscribe to.
The hardware alone is very innovative and seems to be *very* rigid. I had the pleasure to use a Panasonics Toughbook in the past and while the XO is certainly not as durable as the W2, for the money it costs it seems to be very reasonable. Combining the technologies that are used by the XO together in one *low price* machine and tell the world, that such a thing is not useful is in my book similar to people who highly over-estimate for example NASA’s budget (it is less than 1% of the overal budget of the US, btw.) and complain about lofty, ivory-tower space exploration projects, that offers no real use (while ignoring a whole load of secondary by-products, that have proven to be incredible useful).
If you ask using fuzzy attributes (“decent” -> What do you mean with that?), you will get fuzyy answers.
One of my old boxes (256MByte Ram, Duron 600), runs Slackware with XFCE fine. Vector Linux, DSL and several flavours of popular distributions (Mepis antiks (?), Fluxbuntu, for example) provide alternative Versions of their products that aim at Hardware in the <= 256MByte Ram section.
If eye-candy is your thing, then I can recommend one of the e17 – beta based distributions. I had little problems with them on my ancient box.
(Then again, I ran Win95 on a 486er with 8Mbyte RAM so I’m tolerant).
EDIT:
As for space, I’m not sure if it would be a good idea to use OpenOffice in it’s current shape on a machine with such specs. Something like Abiword / kword, gnumeric etc. is probably better suited for educational purposes and should -thanks to ODF support getting slowly better – allow for documents exchange with other computers, that run OO.
Edited 2007-12-06 19:14
Elive
Vector Linux
DeliLinux
Xubuntu
Pepper Linux (embedded Linux distribution) can be run on XO machine. There is even an XO version although dated (version 3.1).
http://www.pepper.com/solutions/hardware_solutions.html
Speaking about office application, Write activity is based from Abiword.
Round Peg, meet Square Hole. Square Hole, meet Round Peg. 😉
Edited 2007-12-06 18:04
Why in the heck isn’t Microsoft modifying Windows Mobil to work with XO? There are already Mobile versions of Word, Excel, and other Microsoft products in addition to hundreds of freeware titles.
Even if they can get XP operating system trimmed down enough to install on the XO, what XP/Windows software can be used on it? Probably nothing…
Read this:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/default.mspx
Love or hate Microsoft, but creating the slimmer version of XP capable of running on some machine with limited resources is a good thing. I’m not talking specifically about OLPC, but in general. I just wander whether Microsoft will succeed.
Too bad Microsoft seems to feel the need to improve their products only when they’re in a tight spot, in a market where they struggle. It says a lot about their complacency in the desktop market. When they’re not challenged they crawl to a stop and just milk what they’ve got. I bet that if the likes of Linux and OpenOffice and Mozilla or Opera didn’t come along there would be no Explorer 7 or Vista or Server 2003 or actually improved Office versions. In spite of any bullshit you may hear, it’s still good old honest competition that drives innovation, not patents and monopolies.
How is this a “tight spot”? It’s not as if MS is going to make any money on this boondoggle — or get any kudos from any of you guys — and it knows it.
Here’s my take: MS wants its software to be able to run on this machine because it knows that users are eventually going to want to pirate Windows (sorry, not Linux) to run on XO. And it’s a good foot in the door for the future. But, in the short term, it’s lose-lose.
Hardly.
With the sudden arrival on the scene of the XO, the Everex gPC and the ASUS EeePC, all of them low-spec inexpensive machines running Linux, and all of them at least initially being apparently very popular purchases, Microsoft can see a market beginning to develop that they are not a part of.
The ASUS EeePC appraently expects to sell nearly 4 million units alone next year, and that is just one model.
Suddenly, a market for software for these devices will open up. It will be a software market that MS has no control or influence over.
That is what they are deathly afraid of.
You will note that they are busting a gut to make sure that there is an XP option for each of these machines.
The funny thing is, people will find they have to additionally spend a significant percentage of the cost to get XP running on these machines … and they end up with a bare OS that can’t do anything. Then they will have to spend an additional amount, possibly more than the whole original purchase, just to get the machine as functional as it was before they broke it by installing Windows on it.
It won’t take long for the word to get out then. “Just leave the Linux stuff on the machine. It works way better, and costs nothing”.
This is the lesson that Microsoft do not want people to learn.
Edited 2007-12-06 23:35
I forgot to mention … if people put XP on the machine, and the start looking for safe secure functional free application software (in order to keep the costs from ballooning) … they will suddenly find that the firefox + thunderbird + abiword/gnumeric or openoffice solution they arrive at … is all available for Linux in the first place.
Then the penny will drop.
“We don’t need the Windows, and if we keep the Linux and run the same application software anyway, we don’t need anti-virus and we won’t have to put up with WGA & DRM & activation keys and other similar nonsense either”.
Ars Technica:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071205-microsoft-feeling-hea…
… has apparently arrived at more-or-less the same conclusion as I did as to why Microsoft is doing all this. I think like Ars Technica that it is fairly clear that Microsoft see a threat emerging.
http://arstechnica.com/journals/linux.ars/2007/07/19/intel-launches…
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070710-hands-on-with-a-proto…
Edited 2007-12-06 23:58
I have read the article twice, and the phrase “putting lipstick on a pig” keeps coming to mind. Linux scales well for this type of limited hardware and Windows just doesn’t.
One good thing may come of this. It might extend the life of XP.
Edited 2007-12-06 19:27
Quite frankly, you’re full of sh**e. Windows is just a kernel, just as Linux is just a kernel. Microsoft can and does have minimal configurations.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/default.mspx
OLPC $200(last time and increasing price) XXX Fill in specs
Toshiba satellite retail $400-450 with rebates, mostly available at CC Bbuy online at this holiday season. Specs: 1GB RAM, 80GB HD, 15 inch wide screen, wifi, usb ports, SD card port, VIsta Installed with MS works, LAN, SVideo port..and there are Thousands of windows free programs available http://www.opensourcewindows.org/ or http://osswin.sourceforge.net/ which installs in seconds and works without problem.(how many linux experts are able to run wifi smoothly on their laptop, with/without ndiswrapper?
Why not TWO thirdworld students share one laptop of $400 with million times better configuration rather than ‘yet to be delivered’ 200$ OLPC
i know power problem is not excuse and definitely not excuse for throwing third rated machine at third world children..
Edited 2007-12-06 19:33
[quote]Why not TWO thirdworld students share one laptop of $400 with million times better configuration rather than ‘yet to be delivered’ 200$ OLPC[/quote]
Because the $400 laptop isn’t conceived to be used in harsh environnement like the third world. You only get two and half hour with a single charge (cheap battery), the laptop is fragile (prone to break), wouldn’t resist well to dust/sand/water and not to mention that charging the battery require a working power oulet. The power grid in many sub-developped country is far from reliable, power being cut now and then. Even better, the XO has a networking scheme conceived for low net availlability. Its OS has been thinkered with this in mind, especialy for software updates.
The better of the XO, is the fact that is use open source software and has been designed to be extended by kids who would program for it. The linux distribution on it is open and can be customized. This my friend, is FREEDOM. And it’s exactly what this laptop has been conceived for. Giving these kids a tool to learn and set themselves free of poverty. The laptop wont do it alone, but it’s still a great tool. Software is idea and ideas are cheap but powerful.
The idea of having Windows on it digust me. This is simply greedy. How much for it mr Ballmer? Ho you give it away? Ho sure, but it’s still your IP! I don’t think that Windows on this platform would have a lot of attraction. Even free. For many countries, especialy in the arabic world and in asia, MS is another USA capitalism icon. Still I suspect that MS could give money to some governements individuals to get their product trough like they did with the Nigeria (like the Nigeria had money to waste on Windows)!
Non-sequitor. What prevents this functionality from being incorporated into a slightly more expensive config?
Perhaps to you, that laughable concept represents FREEDOM. But real freedom will be derived from whether or not the machine is actually USEFUL. Given that most of the world uses Windows, this user is going to be at an immediate disadvantage because he or she can’t run any of that software.
Nigeria currently has only 29% of eligible children in its educational system. Cheap notebooks aren’t going to make much of a dent in illiteracy. These problems need to be addressed on a larger scale by governments. Funding a larger percentage of their children in the schools would do far more than these laptops ever will.
And here we get to the heart of your conflict: ideological axe-grinding. Seriously, who gives a crap about the OS. Isn’t the point to ensure that these kids get to use a computer? Or is it about indoctrinating them into the Cult of Linux?
You’re kidding, right? You do realize that Windows has overwhelming market share in developing countries because of piracy, eh? If Windows is so unattractive, what’s driving these people to pirate it, when they could use a free alternative? Answer: They don’t care about ideology. It’s just a tool. Get over it.
Nigeria is saying that they want Windows. I see nothing wrong with letting them decide. It’s their future: Let them own it.
You’ve lost me already in your first sentence. Can you provide any evidence, that the OLPC’s price is currently rising (or for the sake of the argument will rise in the future) above 200$ ?? Experience, Moore’s law and the principle of demand and supply suggest, that with rising numbers of produced XO’s the price should decrease, not increase.
….
It surely is a good idea to standardise on educational hardware, that has lots of moving mechanical parts (esp. if moving means “rotating with >= 5400rpms” in this case), especially when the target audience hast often to carry them many kilometres trough extreme weather conditions each day before and after school. NOT.
….
Having no first hand experience with that particular computer: can you please comment on the display quality, esp. the readability in bright sunlight? Recent mid- to highclass laptops still have problems with that and in my expeirence, cheap off-the-shelf laptops are particularly prone to this behaviour.
…
Which are surprisingly features also the XO has. Strange, aint it?
Nice. Will the installed Vista version update itself via snail mail in regions where no broadband communication is available? Does the WiFi hardware offer the possibility to form mesh networks, so that (crowded) classes don’t have to resort to connecting all the machines together using cables? Is the necessary hardware to connect the machines together (switches, cables) included in the price?
I’ll give you, that the Toshiba machine has an S-Video output. But does it have an openly specified webcam built in? And more importantly: While it surely is nice to have a S-Video connector, is it striclty necessary for a machine with the aim of the XO ?
And your point is precisely what? For the record, I’m typing this from my HP nc6120 laptop and the Intel 2200BG based WiFi card works without a hitch. Besides, the OLPC has an open specified WiFi card, that works to my knowledge without needing binary drivers.
(emphasis mine)
That is indeed a very big number, that you have pulled out of your – never mind.
Let’s make a deal: I will try to get my hands on on OLPC XO (G1G1 is a little bit tricky outside the US) and hand it to my oldest nephew (7 years old, laptop-body-count so far: 2 ) for one week. Then, we repeat the experiment with the Toshiba. The one that survives this week is definitly betters suited for education, Ok?
EDIT: s/bug/big -> Freudian ? I don’t think so
Edited 2007-12-06 20:36
OPLC’s taking orders at the $100 price, then changing the specification to use more expensive equipment with a corresponding price increase?
Probably it’s my failure, but the $100 figure was to my knowledge not a valid baseline figure for orders, but the estimated (and targeted) end price. There are a couple of reasons why this price was not met (ranging from currency devaluation to the small number that is currently built, the CPU upgrade that you probably meant and, yes, even a probably overly optimistic prediction of the price development), admitted. But can you please provide specific examples where customers have ordered bindingly (as in: the machine is now ready to produce, send your orders) for $100 ?
EDIT: Forget to mention the CPU upgrade.
Edited 2007-12-06 20:55
I’m actually tempted to purchase the ‘buy one, donate one’ – apparently there is also a move to get OpenSolaris working on it too.
For me, yeap, I have a laptop (MacBook) but I would also like a ruggedised laptop (which this is) which is super low powered, extremely cheap and easy to power up – or could be a great thing for my niece to use for school/write up home work.
I noticed in the linked article that Microsoft are rewriting the bios so the machine can boot from an SD card.
Will this allow people to circumvent the Bitfrost security? At them moment, the laptop is initially disabled, and can only be activated by particular school’s activation server. It then asks for a name, takes a photo, and the laptop user’s identity is established. The machine then acquires a cryptographic lease to run for a certain amount of days before it has to contact the anti theft servers again.
It also gives other advantages, all programs are run in chrooted jails, all programs have to ask the user before opening one of their documents etc.
Will Microsoft implement Bitfrost into Windows and provide the same level of security? I don’t think even they have the resources to rewrite Windows and Office enough to make this possible. Will the laptop be fast enough to run the anti-virus software?
The idea of a large mesh network of laptops running Windows makes me a little nervous.
What’s the problem? Can’t MS meet their own minimal requirements ? The same requirements they’ve been pushing to sell their wares. Guess they don’t like having to eat their own words (or dog food.)
from: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/822129
subject: List of system requirements for Microsoft Office 2003
Processor: at least Pentium 233 megahertz (MHz). Microsoft recommends a computer with a Pentium III or faster processor.
Memory: minimum of 128 MB of RAM. An additional 8 MB of RAM are required for each Office 2003 program that runs at the same time.
Space: Office 2003 requires 400 MB of available hard-disk space
Screen: at least 800×600 resolution and 256 colors is required.
As for Windows XP, I know there’s a slim version of it that’s licensed only to businesses and institutions that doesn’t have support for things like Gaming, Cygwin, Media Player, etc. If you’re required to use Windows XP, this would be the way to go. (You’re still better off with Linux though.
What do get when you try to shoehorn a 900 lb gorrilla into a mini-cooper like device? This is public forum so you’ll have to use your imagination – it ain’t pretty.
The requirements you quoted above are for a different, older office suite; even so, both processor and memory are barely above the minimum.
Also, the version of Windows you’re referring to is the awkwardly-named “Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs”:
http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/sa/benefits/fundamentals.mspx
in a way this could be interesting…. Microsoft rewrite xp and office for the olpc and the olpc kids (the end users) get to choose between sugar (fedora based) or cut down xp (xp olpc).
now, if the millions of users that the olpc project is aiming for actually get their hands on this cool hardware i wonder how many will choose and i mean CHOOSE to use one os over the other.
I’ve tried sugar via qemu in Fedora 7 and it was interesting
http://osnews.com/permalink.php?news_id=18725&comment_id=276311
but i wonder really how these kids will react to either xp olpc versus sugar
i mean, i really really wonder WHICH will the kids prefer to use.
the kids won’t be paying for the hardware/os, they’ll just ‘get it’. So let’s see where this goes
Main problem I’d have as a user of the OLPC (that would require me to be a kid, but I sure can act one
) is the necessity to reisntall the OS every 6 month (plus, it would take a whole afternoon on this machine), and learning to do it without a CD… like a 1G+ download on a sub-56k wifi connexion, that would break just in the middle ten times straight.
Then the whole pain of daily antivirus download, plus the freaking firewall.
Cherry on the cake : the kids would be advised to defragment once a month, like what’s advised on most Windows sites, and we all know how great it is with flash storage.
All the NGO would scream if children were to be subject to such abuse.
Please.
Save The Children.
Not sure if the post is meant to be sarcastic but it is wise to visit the olpc website before making wrong assumptions. The XO does not have any mobile media. Upgrade can be done with wireless or Flash Drive (at least 512 MB but 1G and above is recommended). The big advantage of the XO is upgrade can be done through mesh network. The whole OS is nearly 300 MB which all activities installed.
I think the OP meant to talk about the situation if XP was installed on the OPLC.
One of the main problems that Microsoft face in this arena … of the two (and only two) filesystems that Windows supports, NTFS is totally unsuited for flash devices and FAT is insecure (does not support permissions or owners of files, for example).
To the idiot who said children who won’t learn Linux is a major dimwit. My nine-year-old daughter knows how to install and run Ubuntu. It generally takes a genius to install WinDuhs. Oh wait! That was done at the factory by the manufacturer.
Microsoft is not education regardless of what it as a corporation may believe.
KDE plus openoffice will easily run in under 256MB. I run these all the time and memory usage is often around 100MB-160MB or so.
In fact the only reason I now run 512MB rather than 256MB is because my brother gave me an extra 256MB that he didn’t need any more. My PC wasn’t using the swap file much (if at all) before, and certainly doesn’t touch it now.
I do all the usual stuff people use a PC for, email, web browsing, a few linux games, office stuff, music/dvds, even programming.
It seems vista has brainwashed people into thinking we now need GB’s of RAM in order to run office apps or something…
>>My PC wasn’t using the swap file much<<
The thing is the OLPC don’t have swap..
So any usage of the swap file would translate as an out of memory error on the OLPC!
Even more correct…you never want to put swap on today’s flash devices. Flash is write limited and swap/page files is one of the quickest ways to wear it out.
Ya know, if theres one positive,
It would be this: If microsoft is able to get a passable version of XP onto an SD card, rather than the GOLD_PLATED_HOLOGRAPHIC_LASER_ETCHED_DISC that comes in A BEAUTIFUL_BUT_OTHERWISE_EMPTY_BOX people might begin to “understand” on a more visceral level how much it is worth.
$3 sounds about right, maybe a little more to pay for the cost of SD media
I think learning on a machine like OLPC will be excellent for kids.
Today I’m a software engineer, sysadmin and general all around computer techie and in my opinion a pretty good one. I can handle any flavor of Linux, Solaris, Windows, OS X and if something new showed up, I could figure that out too.
I learned computers on a Commodore 64. Out of the box, it didn’t do anything except print READY. But you could tell it what to do!
My friends and I even got those debugger/assembler cartridges, mostly for hacking games, but of course we had to learn 8-bit 6502 assembler to do it. That’s still the easiest assembly code I’ve ever handled.
I think the OLPC has the potential to be the Apple II and Commodore 64 of the 21st century.