OLPC's UI To Be Kid-Tested In February

dfoulger writes "The AP is reporting that kid testing of Negroponte's '$100 Laptop' starts in February. This article is some of the first mainstream coverage of just how different the user interface of the XO Computer is — it ditches the traditional office metaphors in favor of a 'neighborhood' and an activity-based journaling approach. Video of Sugar, as the UI is called, has been out on the net for a while, and Popular Science recently gave the color / monochrome display a 'Grand Award' in its 2006 technology roundup. What do you think of this new UI?"

Obvious joke in 3... 2... 1...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm waiting until it's mother-approved!

What do you think of this new UI?

[stubear]

I think Microsoft Bob might have been a better choice for the UI.

Review

[oyenstikker]

I downloaded the QEMU image and converted it to VMWare and ran two copies, which I named Tom and Dick. There are some neat ideas. Tom opens the web browser and goes to slashdot.org. Tom shares the web browser. Dick looks at the neighborhood view and sees Tom with a shared web browser. Dick clicks on Tom's web browser. It opens up to . . . google. What happened to slashdot? Tom is still looking at slashdot. Tom closes the browser. Dick is still looking at google. Tom looks at the neighborhood view and sees Dick looking at his web browser still, so he clicks on it and gets slashdot. Dick can't close it. Tom can close it, but Dick is still looking at it. Ok, switch to console, killall -HUP sugar-shell. Now it behaves like it should. It is really pretty neat when it works.

I guess this is pretty typical of how computers work. Throw 'em in the water, they'll learn to swim. Hopefully somebody was taught how to use ps, grep, and kill.