Why OLPC?

Most of the nearly two-billion children in the developing countries do not receive adequate education. Almost one-third do not complete fifth grade. These children need education to improve their quality of life and also the future of their countries. The One Laptop per Child (OLPC) program, which aims to provide a laptop to every child in developing countries, is a step towards this direction. The OLPC program is based on the understanding that only education will give these children an opportunity to transform their lives and contribute to their countries’ growth. As the OLPC official website puts it “It’s not a laptop project. It’s an education project”.

What exactly is the OLPC project?

The OLPC project is the vision of by Nicholas Negroponte, a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Although the idea behind OLPC was conceived many years ago, the project took off in 2002 when Negroponte gave 20 laptops with Internet connections to children in a small village in Cambodia. This experience made him realize the need for a new computing platform. This led to the development of a specifically designed rugged, low-cost, low-power, connected laptop, with content and specially designed software for collaborative, joyful and self-empowered learning. Negroponte presented the idea of a $100 laptop at the World Economic Forum in 2005, and got corporate giants to adopt his idea. The first beta test in 2006 was followed by further releases and tests to improve the laptop.

The XO laptop

The XO laptop was launched in 2007. According to the OLPC, the laptop is “a children’s machine designed for ‘learning learning’.” The laptop has been field-tested for its effectiveness in remote areas and among economically challenged populations. Keeping the children in mind, the operating system and software of the laptop were developed to ensure a user-friendly interface with minimum hardware. The green and white, small, portable, sturdy, light weight, and power efficient machine has a 7.5-inch, 1200x900-pixel screen. The OLPC XO has a dual mode screen and is visible in sunlight too. The screen can easily switch from a high-resolution mode to black and white mode to save power. Its rubber membrane keyboard is designed to be protected from sand and liquid spills and has a triple-wide touchpad. The laptop also has built in camera, stereo speakers, and a microphone. Once known as the $100 laptop, the XO laptop now costs nearly $200 and is designed to last at least five years, even in tough environments.

The operating system developed for the XO-1 is an optimized version of Fedora Linux and is called Sugar! The user interface of Sugar is not similar to Microsoft Windows, Mac OSX or any version of Linux. Sugar is open source software and unlike other operating systems, it starts with a circle of activities instead of programs. The laptop comes with 256MB of RAM and 1GB of flash memory and has no hard drive or optical drive, but has three USB ports and a slot for a SD card.
 
On the connectivity front, the OLPC has implemented a new wireless Internet connectivity protocol called 802.11s (Mesh Networking). This new protocol allows each laptop to connect with each other directly and instantly. The major difference between a normal networking method and a Mesh Network is that it does not require a centralized router device. Instead, it allows each laptop to act as a router of its own and automatically connect with other XO machines and share Internet connectivity as well. Amazingly, an XO machine can talk with other XOs up to the range of 1km!
 
XO-1.5 and XO-2

The OLPC project has adopted VIA’s Ultra Low Voltage x86-compatible C7-M processor (128KB L2 cache) with clock speeds ranging from 400MHz to 1GHz and a VIA VX855 chipset for its updated XO-1.5 laptop. This refreshed version of the OLPC laptop features an integrated 3D graphics engine, an HD audio and video decoder, USB, SDIO, and other system interfaces. The XO-1.5 will have 1GB RAM and built-in storage of 4GB, which can be upgraded to 8GB. The upgrade will improve system performance whilst the model will still consume similar amounts of power. The XO-1.5 will have the same display, but the brightness and power efficiency are improved.

According to developer Chris Ball, the OLPC XO-1.5 laptop software release will be based on Fedora 11 (full desktop build), which will boot into Sugar. Users will have an option to switch to a standard GNOME install instead. Watch this video where John Watlington, Vice President, Hardware Engineering talks about the XO 1.5 laptop:

While the XO-1.5 is scheduled for immediate release, the OLPC is also working on an XO-2 model, which is separate from 1.5. This is expected to work in book mode, tablet mode as well as laptop mode and will be more energy efficient, with more advanced features.