Quite some years ago, we brought the #OLPC AKA the 100$ laptop to Rwanda [1].
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lobingerareplied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
@jwildeboer @MonniauxD @simon Well, several things apply here:
a) Outdoor-to-indoor is hard
b) Many enterprise-WLANs are technically cellular systems (i.e. coverage and frequency planned)
c) My industry would really like to do indoor deployments also, as this is a very nice market, but landlords are hesitant (and WLAN exists)
d) I'm expecting more campus networks and then there will be not much difference between Telco and Local operator. -
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to lobingera last edited by
@lobingera e) mobile prioviders make indoor repeaters prohibitively expensive and you often need separate ones per provider for reasons (even if the hardware they send is identical, just a different logo sticker @MonniauxD @simon
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lobingerareplied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
@jwildeboer @MonniauxD @simon At which price does "prohibitively" start for you?
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Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to lobingera last edited by [email protected]
@lobingera A few years ago we asked for our office in Munich. It started with a non-refundable fee of around 5000€ for measuring the office to identify the best placement of the repeaters. Then a lease/rebnt offering of around 150€/mo per repeater and another hefty sum for installing them. We said no. (This was at least 6 years ago, though) @MonniauxD @simon
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Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
@lobingera I am convinced it wasn't a serious offer. They simply didn't want to do it. And they succeeded @MonniauxD @simon
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lobingerareplied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
@jwildeboer @MonniauxD @simon I see.
I'm the research and technology guy and i cannot comment on product and/or service prices.
But i have seen recently how much effort you need to spend on proper measurement campains and ...
Central operated radio networks have a high efficiency (user-TP vs. carrier bandwidth) that ad-hoc deployments will not achieve.
But as many technologies, they are complementary. -
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to lobingera last edited by
@lobingera An additional (and specific) factor is that our office building was originally built as the Infineon headquarter. They never moved in, though. But this means the building is well protected to avoid industrial espionage. One of the consequences of that is that mobile network reception is really bad. By design. Our WLAN works perfect while in the office, but once you step out of the office, it's gone @MonniauxD @simon
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@DJGummikuh @jwildeboer I remember back then there was a huge demand from people in Europe saying "Give me one as well! I'm paying 200$ and you can give one child one for free." I always wondered, why this never happened.
I guess, your stories of pressure explain this nicely. Thanks for sharing!
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Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to Harald Geyer last edited by
@haraldgeyer The Give One, Get One program did exist It turned out it wasn't that helpful, though. Imagine you are a school in Rwanda and you need 1500 OLPC. With G1G1 you now need to spend time and money in finding enough donors in time so you can make sure all kids in your school get the OLPC at the right time. And OLPC are social laptops When you have just one, you will never experience all the cool things the mesh network adds @DJGummikuh
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Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
@haraldgeyer The first campaign back in 2007 was a huge success. 85.000 laptops were donated this way. But the second one in 2008 "only" yielded 10.000 laptops. [1] And there were quite some problems with shipping and wrong expectations. [2] @DJGummikuh
[1] https://wiki.laptop.org/go/XO_Giving
[2] https://wiki.laptop.org/go/Ask_OLPC_a_Question_about_Give_1_Get_1 -
@paoloredaelli @jwildeboer some years ago mesh networking in phones was a no-go, because it would drain their battery too quickly. Lately I was very surprised to see a Gl.inet XE300 travel router last for 8 hours on its integrated 5000mAh battery with a #Freifunk firmware with #11s + #batman_adv (and no user traffic). So maybe portable 24/7 mesh networking devices in your pocket or bag is on the table again these days.
I'm wondering what #OLPC's experience with 11s and battery life was. -
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to T_X last edited by
@T_X As the OLPC had the Marvel chip, it could keep the mesh up with very low power usage. Most current implementations are CPU dependent, which causes a LOT more battery drain. @paoloredaelli
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T_Xreplied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
@jwildeboer @paoloredaelli oh, that's neat, I wasn't aware of that! So it didn't use the 11s implementation in mac80211 in the Linux kernel? Oh wait, back then there wasn't even mac80211 yet, I guess.
Did the Marvel chip use some extra firmware for that? Or was it burned into the chip, with no option to update the algorithm?
That now makes me wonder, if the firmware for Qualcomm and Mediatek Wifi chips were OpenSource / reverse engineered if they could be used similarly. -
Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
@T_X More precise: when the OLPC only acted as a mesh point, this could be completely done by the Marvel chip, without CPU. So the machine was more or less in deep sleep and the mesh was still working. @paoloredaelli
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Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to T_X last edited by
@T_X I can only say "it's complicated". You are right, at design time (2005/06) of the OLPC 802.11s wasn't fully standardised. More details are at https://wiki.laptop.org/go/Mesh_Network_Details and https://wiki.laptop.org/go/Path_Discovery_Mechanism/Differences_from_80211s @paoloredaelli
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Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
Meanwhile, I am sourcing the rather unusual DC power plugs for the OLPC. They are 5,5x1,7x9,5mm DC barrel plugs [1]. Once I get hold of a 10 pack of them, I can build adapter cables using USB-C PD as the OLPC is happy to work with anything between 11-18V DC. Wouldn't that be cool? 10 OLPC from 16 years ago, powered with USB-C?
[1] https://wiki.laptop.org/go/Battery_and_power#DC_plug_specs
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Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:replied to Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: last edited by
Which is not as cool as the cow power solution for the OLPC, tested in one of the pilots in Khairat (India) back in the days https://wiki.laptop.org/go/Cow_Power