Live stream from Sugar Camp #2 here in Paris.

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La semana pasada Mariana Ludmila Cortés anunció que OLPC Mexico, OLE, Activity Central y Sugar Labs se juntaron para organizar un taller de programación en Sugar en Ciudad de Mexico:

Walter está a la espera del evento Te invitamos a aprender a programar para la plataforma educativa libre que le está cambiando la cara a la educación, de la mano de su creador: Walter Bender. Este taller está orientado a quienes quieran conocer mejor la plataforma de aprendizaje Sugar, tanto desde el punto de vista de su enfoque educativo como del punto de vista técnico. Fecha: 29 y 30 de Septiembre
Lugar: Universidad Iberoamericana, Ciudad de México

Hay más información sobre el taller en el blog de OLPC Mexico y esta entrada en la wiki de Sugar Labs. Para registrarse hay que mandar un e-mail a info@olpcmexico.org.

Otros eventos

En general me encanta ver que en este año hay tantos eventos organizados por la comunidad de OLPC y Sugar:

• en Mayo teniamos el Conozco Uruguay Tour y eduJAM! summit (articulo en ingles)
• este fin de semana la comunidad Europea se encontró en Paris para Sugar Camp #2 (espero publicar un resumen sobre el evento en las próximas semanas)
• el 25 y 26 de Septiembre vera el SugarDay de SugarLabs Argentina en la ciudad de Junín, provincia de Buenos Aires y
• para el fin de Octubre OLPC San Francisco esta organizando el segundo cumbre comunitario OLPC SF Community Summit (articulo en ingles)

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En estos días ya no quedan muchos países en América Latina que no tienen un proyecto de OLPC. Hasta esta semana uno de ellos fue Costa Rica que dentro del contexto del OLPC solo fue el sitio de un vídeo pero ningún proyecto hasta ahora. Pero esto cambió ayer cuando se anunció que el país se esta preparando para un proyecto que empezará con 1500 computadoras en febrero del año que viene:

Capacitación docente El Ministerio de Educación Pública (MEP) y la Fundación Quirós Tanzi firmaron este miércoles un convenio mediante el cual dotarán de computadoras a 25 mil niños en los próximos tres años. Gracias a este convenio, realizado a través del programa "Conectándonos", niños de escuelas que actualmente no cuentan con plataformas informáticas tendrán acceso a un programa planeado por la Fundación Quirós Tanzi y el MEP, que incluye una computadora personal para cada niño y para cada profesor, así como toda la estructura necesaria para la interconexión de los equipos. El convenio incluye mantenimiento y capacitación continua.

Es excelente escuchar que se están considerando aspectos como mantenimiento y capacitación continua ya desde el inicio. Esto muestra que hay una nueva generación de proyectos de OLPC que esta aprendiendo de las experiencias de otros países de la "primera generación" como por ejemplo el Perú y Uruguay.

Usando XO y Classmate

En cuanto a las maquinas Daniel Castro, Director Ejecutivo de la Fundación Quirós Tanzi, nos comentó un detalle interesante: Mientras que los niños van a recibir XO con Sugar 0.92 (basado en OLPC 11.2.0) los maestros están usando Intel Classmate PC que vienen con Sugar 0.92 (basado en Fedora 14) y Windows 7 Starter. Esta decisión esta basada en un requerimiento de MEP para aseguar que los maestros también pueden usar estas maquinas en otros proyectos educativos.

Los mejores lugar para seguir el progreso de este proyecto son la pagina de Facebook de la Fundación Quirós Tanzi y su blog donde por ejemplo hay impresiones de un evento de capacitación docente centroaméricana en Julio.

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If there is one OLPC event which I really wish I hadn't missed in 2010 then it's the OLPC San Francisco Community Summit 2010. No, and not just because San Francisco's Mayor actually declared October 23, 2010 "One Laptop per Child Day".

But luckily I have another chance this year as the OLPC-SF community announced that the 2011 Summit will be held in late October:

OLPC SF Community Summit 2011 is a community event that brings together educators, technologists, anthropologists, enthusiasts, champions and volunteers. We share stories, exchange ideas, solve problems, foster community and build collaboration around the One Laptop per Child project and its mission worldwide. Time & Date: Friday, October 21 at 5:00pm - October 23 at 5:00pm
Location: SFSU Downtown Campus, 835 Market St, San Francisco, CA

More details and the program will be posted on the Summit's Web site over the coming weeks and I'd also suggest keeping an eye on OLPC-SF's Facebook page as well as their Twitter and identi.ca feeds. Oh, and if you want a sneak preview of what the summit's t-shirt might look like then you should check out this link on OLPC-SF's mailing list.

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Do you live outside the USA but want an XO laptop? Then check out this XO laptop sale on eBay. eBay seller yuqian_li is willing to ship you the XO even if you live in South America, Europe, Asia, or Australia - worldwide, really.

This auction includes the OLPC laptop itself, the LiFePO4 battery, the AC adapter. The laptop is tested, in good condition. The software has been upgraded to the latest version.

But the XO will not wait forever - bid now on the OLPC as the sale ends tomorrow.

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eBay seller eliz2206 has a brand new XO laptop for sale on eBay. I have no clue how she came to have one several years after the original Give 1 Get 1, but you can get your mint-condition OLPC computer this weekend.

Yes, hurry, as this eBay computer auction ends this weekend - hurricane or not.

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Se presenta aquí el montaje de un sensor que al colocarse en una persona, permite monitorear su pulso en la pantalla de la XO, mostrándose un gráfica de "pulso en función del tiempo" donde a cada máximo ("pico") le corresponde un latido cardíaco. El sensor se conecta a la entrada mic y USB de una XO-1 y el programa está hecho en "TurtleBlocks" v.109.

Está previsto programar el cálculo para la posterior impresión en pantalla de la frecuencia cardíaca, si bien podría extraerse este dato modificando este programa para que imprima en pantalla los valores medidos.

Introducción

La Pulsioximetría es un método no invasivo que permite determinar el nivel de saturación de oxigeno de la hemoglobina de un paciente.

Para realizar esta técnica, se coloca un sensor en una parte delgada del cuerpo,....lo cual permite determinar la absorbancia causada únicamente por la pulsación de la sangre arterial. (Hay más información en http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulsioximetr%C3%ADa y http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ox%C3%ADmetro_de_pulso.)

Nota: la aplicación que mostramos aquí se basa en la pulsioximetría pero no es un ejemplo de este método.

Implementación

Kick-off for OLPC in NKR

Un LED blanco de alto brillo, conectado en serie a un RESISTOR adecuado se enciende alimentado por 5VDC del puerto USB. Este LED ilumina un LDR (en este caso el GL12537) conectado a la entrada mic de una XO1. Si se disponen en los extremos de una pinza para ropa y se coloca entre ellos una zona como el lóbulo de la oreja o la piel que une el dedo pulgar con el índice de la mano, cada pulsación sanguínea producirá un cambio en la intensidad de luz que incide sobre el LDR, con la variación correspondiente en su resistencia. El programa "TurtleBlocks" v.109 muestra en pantalla la resistencia del LDR en función del tiempo, monitoreando el pulso del "paciente".

Con los valores de voltaje Vled e Iled, puede calcularse el valor de resistencia R y potencia (mínima) P del resistor, como:

Al conectar el LED debe respetarse su polaridad, pues de lo contrario, no enciende.(PRECAUCIÓN: tenga mucho cuidado en NO conectar los cables rojo(+) y negro(-) del USB directamente entre sí, ya que podría quemar la XO1, produciendo un daño irreparable!. Si no está seguro, alimente el led con 3 pilas AA o AAA. En este caso usar 4.5V en vez de 5V en los cálculos).

Puede utilizarse el LDR indicado o cualquiera cuya resistencia al ser iluminado se encuentre entre 700 y 14000 ohm (rango de medida de XO1).

Guzmán Trinidad es profesor de física en el Liceo de Solymar, Uruguay. Esta documentando sus proyectos del uso de los XO en la física y biología en este sitio web.

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Apparently Rasha Hussein journeyed with OLPC and PaleXO over the past year in Ramallah, a Palestinian city in the central West Bank. From all of her travels, she was able to put together a single blog post, with marginal new information. Here is a taste:

I am going to talk about this awesome group that inspired me. Joining it was the first step into engaging in the community activities.

It was the beginning of the year when I saw a post on facebook about a workshop for teacher to teach them how to use this green little laptop that's part of OLPC program (one laptop per child), I learned that any volunteer is welcome to join this group, so next day I went to talk to the girl -Noura Salhi- who posted it, and I told her I am totally in. I wasn't that good as a student, and I skipped lots of classes, and this girl told me that they need committed people and there's a lot to do, and that maybe I should give it a thought before going into it, cause they don't need people just for the number.

I insisted on joining in, as I loved the idea, and I knew I would add a lot to this group, and my journey started.

Yeah, like it was totally wow for her! And like, if you compared that one, brief post with, like, all the work of Christoph Derndorfer over just two months in South America, she was like totally slacking!

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In his latest weekly Sugar-Digest Walter Bender mentions that the first prototypes of OLPC's ARM based XO-1.75 have started arriving at the doors of software developers around the world. One aspect of the XO-1.75 which I had managed to ignore until now is that it features a three axis accelerometer as commonly found in smartphones today:

XO-1.75 + Etch-a-Sketch = XO-3? One of the nice things about the 1.75 is that the OLPC engineering team threw in a few additional sensors. Saadia Husain Baloch got the accelerometer working and I immediately wrote a Turtle Art plug-in (included with v114). Saadia wrote a fun 'etch-a-sketch' program in Turtle Art that works by shaking the machine.

Etch-a-Sketch with an XO? Seriously, how cool is that? But Walter continues:

Not to be outdone, I added an enhancement to the Portfolio activity while I was on a short flight last week. If you hit the left side of the XO, it will advance to the next slide. If you hit the right side of the XO, it will return to the previous slide. The person sitting next to me on the plane told me, "That's the strangest thing I have ever seen anyone do with a computer."

Hehe, so it has only been a week and we are already seeing three great ways of using the accelerometer (and confusing fellow passengers on planes). Now I really can't wait to see the ideas others come up with and so I can only agree with Walter's conclusion:

The bottom line is the more sensors the better: we want to give young learners more opportunities to observe and interactive with the physical world. .

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En Julio habiamos mencionado el concurso que OLPC esta organizando junto con Nickelodeon Latinoamérica. Participantes tienen que crear una historia o un cuento multimedia con los programas en su XO para ganar un viaje a los Estados Unidos.

Ahora solo queda una semana para entrar en el concurso así que les recomiendo ver el video abajo y luego visitar www.olpcstories.org para aprender más sobre como participar.

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It was back in early 2011 when Wayan stumbled across a news article that said that memorandum of understanding concerning the introduction of OLPC in Armenia - or more specifically the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) - had been signed. The so-called NUR initiative is a result of a collaboration between the NKR government, the New York based Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) and an Argentinean-Armenian businessman called Eduardo Eurnekian.

Kick-off for OLPC in NKR

Now last week about half a dozen articles appeared on Armenian Web sites which contained more information about the initiative which will be launched shortly. times.am provided the most comprehensive article from what I've seen. Among other things it says:

The government of NKR has agreed to provide the internet connection at the schools, which is one of the key aspects of the Plan.

In a first stage, in September 2011, 160 teachers from schools in the cities of Stepanakert and Shoushi will start the training which will consist of a 3 week intensive course on SUGAR, the educational Software of the XO. They will also attend a 6 week virtual course to incorporate further updates on the different programs to be used with the students.

The following stage will consist of the deployment of NUR Plan laptops to 3.600 children, promoting equal opportunities and integrating technology in everyday school classes. The schedule will be agreed with the government of NKR.

I was particularly excited to see the mention of teacher training happening before the pupils receive the laptops. In the past too many other OLPC and similar ICT4E projects unfortunately did this the other way around which tends to lead to problems down the road.

At the same time one probably shouldn't be surprised about seeing such a decision given that no other than Uruguay's Plan Ceibal has been providing consulting support for the NUR project since early 2011.

A Plan Ceibal success story

Back in September 2010 I mentioned that Plan Ceibal is working very hard to make Montevideo the OLPC capital of the world. One of the key ingredients of that strategy is their "services to the exterior" consulting arm. As I write this the corresponding Web site is still partially under construction however you can see a news-item called "Project Nur: From idea to execution in six months, with the advice of Plan Ceibal" which links to their success stories section.

It's going to be very interesting to see how well Plan Ceibal will be able to channel its experiences into recommendations for other projects and organizations. Particularly for countries which don't have all the pre-existing infrastructure, resources, and human capital which you can find in the Switzerland of South America. However I do have to say that these first public signs are certainly very encouraging and I hope it will enable many projects to avoid what Alan Kay has called "reinventing the flat tire".

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The IIT team from Chicago, Green WiFi, and the National OLPC Project Director for Haiti did it!!

We successfully carried out our first solar photovoltaic school deployment in Haiti, last week! The EFACAP school in Lascahobas, Haiti now has 2.4KW of solar pv capability to charge 500 laptops with a DC only designed and wired system. According to our research and to OLPC, our installation has the distinction of being the world's largest single-school solar laptop charging deployment!

But that was just one part of the project.

Working with Fabrice Urrizalqui, a French school teacher from San Francisco, a team also set up a brand-new library at the school, full of books in French and Creole, and created an inventory and catalog, and a system for checking out the books.

With the help of a team of local survey-givers, Dr, Laura Hosman from IIT carried out a baseline survey with 150 respondents, inquiring of both community members and teachers on technology and electricity use in the home, and of use of the laptops in the home and in the classroom. She and her team also talked with the teachers at the school about using the library, and about lesson plans on solar power that our team will continue to develop over the coming semester.

Furthermore, we trained the local maintenance staff in how to keep up the solar system. The next step is to complete the internet connection to the school with the help of Inveneo in September 2011.

Bruce Baikie is the founder of Green WiFi. Laura Hosman is assistant professor at Illinois Institute of Technology and regularly blogs about her projects in Haiti and other countries.

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Back in the day, one of the reasons Nicholas Negroponte bemoaned the idea of computer labs and promoted XO laptops was the need for furniture to support the desktop computers. His point was that laptops were cheaper and better because you didn't lose desk space to desktops and you didn't need desks or chairs even, students could learn outside.

Well fast-forward a few years and let us see what is happening in the Eastern Region of Ghana. There, One Laptop Per Child is excited to get the once-stalled OLPC Ghana program going in 21 districts. And according to Ghana Web:

The ambiguity surrounding the initiative has finally come to rest, following the presentation of 75 mini laptops from One Laptop Per Child, an America Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), through the Child's Rights Organisation, to the Suhum Kraboa Coaltar District Assembly (SKCDA).

In addition to the computers presented were 42 chairs and 35 tables to enable the children have full use of the donation.

The donation by the NGO has empowered the Assembly to construct an ultra modern ICT centre at the Korase District Assembly Experimental School, the main benefactor of the items, to house the donation.

I love that OLPC now finds itself buying furniture for shared-use computer labs - the very same configuration once railed against by Negroponte himself.

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When Danishka went to an OLPC deployment in Sri Lanka, he found a dirty XO laptop keyboard. Now you would think that a dirty keyboard is a good sign - kids are surely using it! But there is a problem lurking just below the keyboard - the trackpad.

Let us hear from Jeff Patzer's experience with dirty trackpads:

The trackpad has a serious issue that causes it to not track. Rather, and this is due to the kids being dirty and not washing their hands causing the pad to get dirty, the pointer will jump from side to side and not function in the least. To help solve this problem I can clean the trackpad and reset the pad (press the four buttons in the corner of the keyboard at the same time), but it will only temporarily solve the issue before it reappears. The only real solution is to use a USB mouse.

Since Danishka's and Jeff's experiences, has there been any advancement with the trackpad? Is it still useless when dirty? Or has the XO-1.5 solved these issues?

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In a recent chat between Mike Lee and Marina Zdobnova, they discussed the possibility of a One Laptop Per Child deployment in a Washington DC metro area school:

polyachka: So what are your future plans with DC OLPC club ?
curiouslee: We would like to do a deployment in the DC area.
polyachka: that would be good
curiouslee: But hope for that has dimmed a bit because of the change in DC govt.
curiouslee: Also, XOs are relatively hard to get and there are still many barriers with Sugar.
polyachka: barriers like what?
curiouslee: The Sugar brand and information materials need an overhaul.
curiouslee: Running Sugar outside of the XO (which itself is hard to get in smaller quantities) is difficult.

Of the many challenges that Mike and Marina list, the one that is the most obvious, with the easiest solution, is obtaining XO laptops. Right now, the only way to start an OLPC pilot is to buy XO laptops off eBay. This is a slow, expensive, and inefficient process that no school district would undertake when ASUS Eee PC laptops are so easy to buy.

So good luck to anyone who wants to start an OLPC pilot, anywhere - you'll be spending your first year just trying to get enough XOs for the students.

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