[IAEP] Sugar Digest 2011-08-22

[Bert Freudenberg]

On 22.08.2011, at 17:50, Walter Bender wrote:

> == Sugar Digest ==
> 
> 1. The OLPC XO 1.75 machines (beta units) are starting to be
> distributed to developers. This machine is ARM based, which means that
> it will have superior battery life once all of the fine-tuning is
> complete. It also means that it uses some different components, e.g.,
> audio circuitry, so there is some driver work to be done. But so far,
> so good.
> 
> 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.
> 
> 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."
> 
> 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.

The accelerometer is fun to use indeed. I just made an Etoys project that lets you steer a ball by tilting the XO-1.75. Find a description and video at:

http://croquetweak.blogspot.com/2011/08/squeak-etoys-on-arm-based-xo-175.html

- Bert -