Negroponte Says Windows 'Runs Well' On XO Laptop 339
Stony Stevenson alerts us to comments from OLPC founder Nicholas Negroponte indicating his approval of Windows' performance on the XO laptop. Negroponte said in an email, "Sugar needs a wider basis, to run on more Linux platforms and to run under Windows." The full email is available at OLPC News. He was also quoted by the Associated Press as saying that Sugar "didn't have a software architect who did it in a crisp way," and cited the lack of Flash as an example. Negroponte continued, "There are several examples like that, that we have to address without worrying about the fundamentalism in some of the open-source community. One can be an open-source advocate without being an open-source fundamentalist."
Lack of Flash?!?!?! (Score:5, Interesting)
The reason they went with Gnash in the first place was because the Adobe Flash player needs more CPU power than the entire damn machine had available.
How is hell is MS's bloatware supposed to fix that?
Re:What version (Score:2, Interesting)
Apple (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Lack of Flash?!?!?! (Score:3, Interesting)
You can be an open source fanatic, but you cannot be an open source fundamentalist.
Stop. Think about the meaning of the words you are using. Select correct words. Continue.
don't I know it (Score:5, Interesting)
I am both amazed and dismayed by the extent to which such issues effect people.
Not only that, but almost everyone I know who has been what I would call a rabid opponent of proprietary code haven't themselves released any open source code. They just download the free stuff and get angry about the non free code without a single opinion that wasn't borrowed from someone else.
It seems to me that the fashion is that open source == hates proprietary. This is a nieve viewpoint in my opinion.
Power Power Power and infrastructure (Score:5, Interesting)
Thus I always chuckle when I see comparisons to this or that better performing laptop. Of course it's possible to get cheap and faster by going to high power. And you can add more features again by adding power. They were going for cheap and low power.
I think what may have happened here is that windows is now learning to play nice with flash memory and windows CE is presumably learning to play nice with batteries.
The other thing is that the world is moving towards cloud computing. Now while their may not be a cloud available to bushmen in Nairobi. it's not unthinkable that schools might be able to serve apps locally. And MS is building that infrastructure.
So maybe Microsoft is up to the task.
The problem MS will face I suspect is that they lack an agile resizable code base like Linux and Apple have. Windows CE and Windows XP only are simmilar in their look. So this may be a complete blank sheet. Sure XP will run but will it meet the original driver of low power? I suspect not out of the box otherwise it would be Window CE instead.
But MS does have the dowry and an incentive. And the OLPC does need the cash. So it might be a successful arranged marriage. Or maybe it will be one of those Weddings where the groom tosses the bride on the funeral pyre.
Re:Screw Sugar (Score:2, Interesting)
Anyway, a lot of what you say as negatives, I like. I don't know this for sure, but I attribute the slowness to two things about Sugar--it's in Python, and it's handling communication. The communication is a major feature. The fact that it's in Python means it's hackable.
So, for instance, you & I (and almost everyone else) gets annoyed with the frame popping up when the cursor gets near the corner. It's an easy fix in the code to stop that from happening. I can go in with a non-programmer 11-year-old, and show them how to change that! That's so cool.
I've also decided that Journal rocks (well, OK, rocks except for some bugginess). I'd switch to that over my directory tree on my Mac if it was possible.
No big deal (Score:5, Interesting)
I read the letter on the OLPC site and the article about Windows running well on the XO, but I couldn't get to the article that mentioned flash. Flash in my opinion is the scourge of the internet these days, and don't go off on a youtube rant, internet video and streaming codecs were available before flash.
From what I've read nothing has really changed, Windows on OLPC was in the works and it doesn't mean that linux will be dumped. So much for the sensationalist headlines. You have media outlets and scumbag corporate leaders who will juice this for all its worth but really it means nothing.
I will say that it appears from Negroponte's message that there may be some friction between the Sugar developers and Negroponte probably concerning the porting of Sugar to Windows. He is welcome to his view but really it has absolutely nothing to do with Open Source Fundamentalism.
If the open source developers of Sugar are balking at porting their work to Windows it should be no surprise, unless you've been living in a vacuum for the past 10 years. The Microsoft Corporation has not only been found guilty of using illegal business tactics to destroy competition in the market to maintain their ludicrous profit margins but they have also been on a non-stop PR harassment campaign specifically targeted against the same developers who wrote Sugar.
In the end it matters not, if Negroponte wants Sugar on Windows all he has to do is ask that wealthy corporation to invest some of their ill gotten gains in porting the open source code themselves. After all, its not like Microsoft's developers aren't used to leeching off the open source community to support their proprietary products. What would be interesting is seeing the response he gets to using open source code in a high profile project considering Microsoft has labeled it a cancer.
Re:who wins? (Score:2, Interesting)
My guess is this outcome was planned from the start. My guess OLPC got from us (us being the OS/FS crowd) exactly what they wanted. Which was exactly what Asus got. Microsoft's attention.
If true, then idealistic hardware and software designers need to remember this example the next time they are approached by someone like Negroponte. I have no problem with helping kids but it's starting to sound to me like the open source talent was cynically used to attain this end.
Re:who wins? (Score:4, Interesting)
The truth is, who knows what's going on in Negroponte's head? He isn't being all that forthcoming, even with the recent statement. From what he has said, he seems to think that availability of Windows will end up in more XO's being distributed.
So maybe countries are demanding it, and you can imagine that any country thinking of buying into the XO is going to have Microsoft/Intel Classmate reps on their other shoulder, saying "but does it run Windows? This one does".
The funny thing about this to me is that lots of developing countries are skipping generations of technology, like going straight to wireless phones without ever having laid copper Ma-Bell style.
And here they have a chance to skip the horrors of Microsoft and go straight to Linux (which the developed world is coming around to), but instead they think they want XP. These are probably the same countries buying Camel cigarettes now that we've stopped smoking. Oh well.
Negroponte is a Moron (Score:4, Interesting)
He also helped start the OLPC project, which couldn't get anywhere while he was "helping".
Why does anyone listen to him anymore, just because MIT was fool enough to give him money for a Media Lab once upon a time (a long long time ago)?
Re:Power Power Power and infrastructure (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:No kidding (Score:3, Interesting)
You're not supposed to hide SSIDs. If you break the implementation of the AP, don't blame a client for not connecting.
If this was done deliberately, see this [zdnet.com] for why it's "worse than no wireless security at all".
Re:The other shoe drops (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Power Power Power and infrastructure (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Screw Sugar (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Lack of Flash?!?!?! (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd be shocked if Microsoft charges more than $5-$10 for Windows on the XO. More than likely they'll "donate" the license to charity and take a tax write off to establish market share.
Re:The other shoe drops (Score:3, Interesting)
Like OLPC, the original Bayless Freeplay Plus Radio [ccrane.com] was designed for local production.
The problem is that the precision manufacturer in Asia can also produce a rugged, reliable, clockwork dynamo.
He can package more sophisticated electronics and he can beat your price anywhere in the world. Midland XT511 Dynamo 22-Channel FRS/GMRS Emergency Crank Radio [amazon.com]
The $67 three pound Midland may not be best-of-breed - but it is an easily portable dynamo powered transceiver and battery charger with AM/FM radio, NOAA weather radio and alerts.
Re:Then why not use ARM? (Score:3, Interesting)
x86 isn't just for Windows. The Geode processor is extremely low power, and I doubt there's an ARM CPU out there that can outperform it while being lower power. Sure, XScale CPUs have ridiculously high MHz numbers, but they still perform like crap.
And x86 isn't just "Windows capable". It's also the most well supported platform for Linux. Have you ever tried to use Linux on any other architecture? It's a huge mess of GCC versions that don't quite generate legal code, and software that won't compile because of all the x86 GCCisms. If you stick strictly to the binary packages provided by some distro, you'll probably get by without anything being too buggy, but as soon as you need to compile anything yourself, expect a mess of weird problems, and terrible performance. It "works" but it's far from user-friendly.
Re:Screw Sugar (Score:3, Interesting)
Good: UI tools provided to configure behaviors ("Control Panel")
Bad: must use a text editor to modify a config file
Ugly: must edit the source code of the application itself
It's a DIY thing. Being able to futz with the code makes what you've done more personal and gives you a whole lot more understanding of what's going on. It also shows you that you can mess with things beyond the 10 options a pop-up box might give you.