Magellan project: How to deploy 550.000 Linux notebooks in classrooms
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Probability distributionRevision controlFreewareEmailWindowProbability distributionWritingReading (process)Revision controlDifferent (Kate Ryan album)FreewareEmailData managementRight angleInternet forumWeb pageComputer animationLecture/Conference
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Software developerFormal languageComputer hardwareWireless LANIntelFunction (mathematics)UsabilityHuman–computer interactionMultimediaLocal GroupInheritance (object-oriented programming)Web pageInterface (computing)Game theoryLevel (video gaming)Internationalization and localizationSoftware developerProjective planeInterface (computing)Web pageGame theoryLevel (video gaming)Focus (optics)Group actionNeuroinformatikOnline helpInstallation artGoodness of fitComputer hardwareBootingUsabilityProbability distributionMobile appFormal languageInheritance (object-oriented programming)TrailWechselseitige InformationInteractive televisionTraffic reportingSystem on a chipDevice driverCoordinate systemRight angleFrequencyComputer animationLecture/Conference
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Data recoveryRevision controlStandard deviationComputer hardwareInclusion mapPhysical systemRevision controlPhysical systemData recoveryAsynchronous Transfer ModeCursor (computers)Denial-of-service attackDevice driverMedical imagingMultiplication signComputer hardwareComputer animation
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GUI widgetMultiplicationGame theoryInternationalization and localizationTask (computing)Physical systemWeb browserInternetworkingZugriffskontrolleControl flowFormal languageConsistencyIntegrated development environmentServer (computing)Client (computing)SoftwareComputerComputerMobile appComputer configurationConfiguration spaceGroup actionSoftware testingType theoryLocal ringConsistencyConfiguration spaceGame theoryCartesian coordinate systemRight angleWeb browserDefault (computer science)Multiplication signGame controllerSound effectTask (computing)Physical systemData managementAuthenticationStudent's t-distributionBootingFormal languagePointer (computer programming)Point (geometry)INTEGRALComputer fileClosed setOpen setInheritance (object-oriented programming)Focus (optics)Different (Kate Ryan album)Group actionStandard deviationView (database)Operating systemGoodness of fitComputer configurationSoftwareSoftware developerNeuroinformatikServer (computing)Client (computing)1 (number)Context awarenessFamilyGUI widgetMultiplicationReal numberOffice suiteWindowInstance (computer science)BootingMaxima and minimaComputer animationLecture/Conference
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Transcript: English(auto-generated)
00:09
The Magellan project. Some of you may have heard it, some of you may have not. What is it? It's basically a government funded project with the aim to improve children's computers literacy,
00:22
ages 6 to 12, elementary school children. It has dual boot, Microsoft, Windows and Linux. It is an Intel classmate PC based, this one. It had the first deployment of 300,000 computers based on older hardware. The one that is here, Magellan MG1. And it's now until the end of this year will be another 250,000 deploys.
00:47
Caché Magica is the main Linux Portuguese distribution. We have free installation DVDs, CDs, KDE, GNOME, other Windows managers. We have official phone and email support for the paid version, which is basically the difference for the free version.
01:03
We have USB versions with read and write support, we have free user forums, we have shared base with Mandrive, although we are changing it to Ubuntu. So, how do you make a project as big as this one, how do you make it work? We ask help for the right people.
01:22
First, design and development. We have the help of Nuno Pinheiro, which is the KDE oxygen coordinator, which is Portuguese. Good. And also Tomáš Canobrávo, which is a QTKD developer, which helped us make something in the interface, I'm going to show you later. We have the help from Language Institute, the Portuguese Language Institute.
01:41
Since it is for kids, it's for schools, we have to make sure everything was correctly spelled, everything was okay, since otherwise the Ministry of Education would not be very pleased. We have hardware support by Realtek and Intel. Special Realtek helped us with the OSTAP support for this wireless driver, which they didn't have.
02:04
And it's not working very well in general, but it's working okay for this project. So this computer has OSTAP support. The teacher, and I will talk about it later, can make this OSTAP, and every children in all classrooms can have access to the teachers' computers.
02:22
We have quality assurance by Anglos Olios, a Portuguese company which has many deploys of Linux installations. And most important, we have the help from usability teams, especially this one that I refer to here, which made focus group interaction, usability reports, and basically we had to make sure that kids and teachers
02:44
actually wanted to use and were ready to use this Linux distribution. One thing that's very important in this kind of deployment is to choose a killer app. And we chose SuperTux. Okay, it's not very educational, but kids love it.
03:04
And we wanted that kids love it so that they will choose to boot to Linux. SuperTux, it's a standard SuperTux, except we made some developments on top of it. We made sure we had the download and upload of levels through the interface of the game itself.
03:21
The upload of iScores through the game interface also to a web page so that everybody who wants to upload their iScores can check it out on the web page so everybody can keep track. Ah, I'm better than you and all of that, I have more coins, that kind of thing. We had to make sure we got full Portuguese support, language-wise. And we added a support web page for the iScores and all of that
03:43
to the download and upload of levels also through the web page and all of that. This was the first version of the Magellan, the MG1, those 300,000 computers that I talked about. It was about two years ago. It was still KDE 3, so we had the SuperKaremba theme displaying the main applications.
04:04
We had the Kasia Magica 12, which is our Linux version at the time. Standard KDE 3, full hardware support, a larger interface bar so kids could see things better. There wasn't. There still is a recovery system from our disk,
04:20
so if someone just messes up with the system, it's easy to make it all as it was when they received it. And you have an easy to install new software from web, a click and install system, which we didn't have, and we made it for that version. This is the latest version. It's the one we just installed in this one that I have. It's basically as KDE 4, so it acts as a plasmoid.
04:42
Plasmoids, this is an example. It uses Kasia Magica 14, which was the latest version of Kasia Magica at the time. Now we have it on the 15. KDE 4, full hardware support, including a light sensor, which the first version of the Magellan didn't have, and the OCP support for the wireless driver. This version of the Magellan is installable on the first hardware version of the Magellan.
05:04
We made sure it's totally compatible, so everyone that has the first version can install this version on it and have all the bells and whistles of this one. And it has a graphical recovery system from AG. The other one was text mode, the same cursor system. This one has a better one. Why do people want to boot into Kasia Magica and not Windows?
05:24
First, the look and feel. This is a plasmoid by Thomas Canaprava, which is a multi-folder view. This is basically reading a folder. It has desktop files in it, and it just shows them. You have a clock widget, which is actually running.
05:40
This is a still shot, but you cannot see it. If you want, you can see it here. It's actually working on the desktop, integrated. The second pointer is working. We have a theme made by Nuno Pinheiro, and we have the KDE desktop effects standard enabled by default. Then we have things that we needed to make sure were like this
06:01
so it was easier for people to use. One application per task is essential. Great system MIME type handling, browser MIME type handling, easy parental controls for access control, application control, and time usage control, timekeeper, and some developments we made ourselves. Great and simple game for children. For instance, full localize to Portuguese, Portuguese for Je compris.
06:25
Desktop lockdown. Make sure that people don't mess around with desktop too much because they usually don't know how to put it back together, like, for instance, removing the plasmoid of the main applications. And, of course, good localization and language consistency across menus. It's important that people read the same thing for different applications.
06:46
They know open here, open like that, not open application, close is another thing. People don't really understand if things are not written in the same way. Basically for the teacher's computer because this computer is for teachers, for students, but also for teachers,
07:03
and they have to use it in the classroom. So we have the easy way to configure the teacher's computer as an access point because not all classrooms have wireless and some of them don't really work. So the teacher computer is very easily configured as an access point so the student's computers can use it.
07:22
Then we have preconfigured shared folder on the teacher's computer so also kids just click, open a folder, and it's the teacher's folder. They place documents there, whatever they want. Simple iTalk client and server configuration. iTalk is a way for the teacher to see the desktops of the students.
07:42
We made sure we had a very simple way to pass the authentication keys that iTalk server needs to connect to the students, and we also made sure that the iTalk client is always running in every computer. And we have classroom management software made by a Portuguese company which is basically a PHP software that is running on the teacher's computer,
08:01
and which the students access very easily. So we had to make sure that we had all the software that teachers would use it, would want to use it on the classroom, and that it was actually usable. And we also had to make sure that the kids wanted to boot, either to play or to use in the classroom also with this computer.
08:24
We have to make one of the things that I say in the following remarks is that First, use a clean desktop, no cluttering. Don't place too many things on the desktop. Just place the essential things, and that's it. People don't want to see many things because they don't know it. They won't use it if they don't know it.
08:41
One application per task is essential. Don't put too many things, even though some are better than others for other tasks. Look and feel is essential. The first time they boot the computer, if they see a not so pretty desktop, they won't use it, even if it's a lot better than the other one. Simplify everything, even if losing configuration options. We remove some of the configuration that we click with the right mouse button
09:03
because people just didn't know what to do with them, so we remove them simply from the context menus. They don't need it. If they need it, they usually don't. You have to think that this is for kids and teachers, people that are not very computer-friendly. Don't oversimplify.
09:20
Sometimes, for instance, we thought about using OpenOffice for kids. We ended up using standard OpenOffice because teachers in our focus groups thought that they lost many functionalities, and, okay, we'll use standard OpenOffice. Keep in mind that although it's designed for young children, teachers and parents will use it too.
09:41
This is very important because this is for children, but they are not the only ones that are going to use it. Think that. Have at least one or two killer apps that will make kids use it, or even teachers that are not fond of the other operating system. And the most important thing, use focus groups, whatever you want, but test your system before releasing it with real teachers,
10:03
real kids in a real classroom, and make sure they can use it. They use it in an easy way. They understand what is on their desktop without the need for someone to tell them, and all the configuration things they have to do are simple click, next, next, next, to start, next, next, next, to stop, whatever,
10:23
and that's it, because they know what they want. You can only guess, unfortunately. We, on the developing side, a lot of times think that we know what people want, and that's absolutely not true. And that's it. Any questions?
10:46
I'm impressed now with the presentation, but I have a question. Because it is a dual-boot system, people can still boot into Windows. Why do they still boot into Windows? What are the most important applications on Windows
11:02
that you still don't have an alternative for? Well, although we do have a lot of... I'm sorry, I'm going to repeat the question. Exactly. Why are people still booting in Windows and not only using Linux? What are the main applications they still have in Windows that they don't have in Linux?
11:21
Well, the first thing is basically not a question of applications. It's a question of people know Windows and they don't know Linux. So they just boot to what they know. This is the first thing. And we are talking about elementary school teachers that really don't have the time and don't have the patience to learn anything new. They just want to use what they know.
11:41
So they just boot to Windows. It doesn't matter what it has. And that's a problem with every Linux distribution in every project. The other thing is in Windows there are other programs and other applications. There is an Intel stack for the classroom that basically uses the same thing that we do with iTalk
12:02
and JCompre and all of that they have in the magic desktop thing, which is a little prettier, but although it doesn't work very well, and then Microsoft made a lot of press about all of their features, which are just standard features,
12:21
and it's always hard for us to push Linux around. Yes? Did you get any negative feedback from parents, perhaps, who would want their children to learn Windows because it would be more useful in the marketplace, perhaps, or there would be a perception that if you go for a job
12:41
you want them to know the PC that they probably have the desktop? I'm sorry, I repeat the question. Did you have negative feedback for parents because they want what everybody is using, Windows is used in the marketplace and not Linux, so they don't want to use Linux because of that?
13:03
Well, actually no, because since it's for younger kids there isn't that negative perception yet. So when a teacher uses Linux in a classroom it doesn't matter if it's Linux or Windows.
13:21
At least in our focus group when you use it there is no negative conception of that. A linked question would be that if you search for young kids as they move to middle school, do they then come into difficulty of having access to Linux? If it's difficult for young people that started with Linux
13:42
to have a pass to Windows because it's what they have in schools and all of that? No, we didn't have any negative feedback for that. We shouldn't have, I don't think there should be any negative feedback with that because our government fortunately supports open source very well
14:01
and we have other projects with our company and other companies for laptops, usually normal laptops for older kids which also have Linux installed. And in school there are many projects so most computers have dual boot installation. If you keep working at school on one system then going home in the family computer
14:22
it would probably be a Mac or a Windows PC. That might cause problems. I'm repeating the question. A kid who is working in Linux at school and then he goes home and it has only a Mac OS or a Windows system, it's different. We didn't have any negative feedback on that
14:40
so I'm not sure if it's a problem. Maybe it is, but I really don't know. Do you have any idea how many kids actually use the Linux version? How many kids actually use the Linux version? I really don't have any real numbers. What we do is our support line
15:01
which is only on second level support. We receive about 20 calls a day about it which is usually very simple questions. Things that they don't know how to do in Linux and most of the time these are hardware problems that were passed strongly to our line.
15:23
Okay. Sorry. Thank you. Thank you very much.