[Its.an.education.project] Where do you want to go today?

[Bernie Innocenti]

[cc list]

Walter Bender wrote:
> I don't think we can pick up the entire load of supporting the OLPC
> platform. OLPC has to do that. But I think we can maintain a great
> working relationship with the core Tech Team.

Agreed, but maybe we should ship a full OS image nevertheless,
at least for emulators such as QEMU.

Otherwise, how do we distribute Sugar for public evaluation?
RPMs and debs for the various distros?   It's a possibility, but
it seems a little weak as a demo...

We could endorse groups or individuals who want to provide Sugar
"distributions", such as Wolfgang Rohrmoser, Kurt Gramlich with the
LiveCD, and Aaron Kaplan with the Classmate port.  OpenWRT also seems
to be doing progress on OLPC support.  Red Hat may also be interested
to resume work on it.


> Regarding support, I am concerned that we'll need to support Sugar
> regardless of whether or not we "sell" to end users and we need a
> connection to end users in order to get the feedback necessary to keep
> grounded. Maybe a for-profit entity is the best way to think about the
> support problem.

Yes, it's a well tested business model.


The rest of the quote to provide more context for everybody else:

> On Fri, May 2, 2008 at 9:38 AM, Bernie Innocenti <bernie at codewiz.org> wrote:
>> Walter Bender wrote:
>>
>>
>>> I think it is clear what we ant to do: find a home for Sugar where it
>>> can grow in both a principled way and in a way that broadens its
>>> reach. But we shouldn't abandon the project on the XO, even if there
>>> is instability and uncertainty at OLPC.
>>>
>>> I think the next steps are consensus on the scope of what Sugar is and
>>> the structure of its new home. In regard to the latter, I think we
>>> should try to keep it simple and aligned with other projects.
>>>
>>  I think I am the only platform developer in the group.  Unless Chris,
>>  Michal, Scott and Dilinger join in -- which is likely, but not
>>  imminent -- we'd be seriously understaffed to do the whole OS on
>>  our own.
>>
>>  On the other hand, if we want to get into the business of integrating
>>  Sugar with several different hardware platforms, we'd have to do some
>>  hiring.  Given my background, of course I'd _love_ to work in this area.
>>
>>  Frankly speaking, I also view this as an interesting for-profit
>>  business opportunity.  I see a large market here and nobody being
>>  better positioned in it than us.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> In parallel, I am also trying to put together a plan for a broader
>>> focus on learning, where Sugar would be the technology core. I think
>>> this will help with scoping the various efforts.
>>>
>>  Yes.  I have no contacts and experience here, but it's clearly needed.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> I am still on the fence about the support issue,
>>>
>>  What support issue?  I think we won't be "selling" to end users
>>  directly, or did I misunderstood our middle-term intentions?

-- 
   \___/
  _| o |  Bernie Innocenti - http://www.codewiz.org/
  \|_X_|  "It's an education project, not a laptop project!"