OLPC Friends

Many Australians and New Zealanders want to get access to an OLPC XO device, and up until recently this has been really hard! Now there are new initiatives which make gaining access to XOs and to the software they run much easier! Please check out our resources page for links about user guides, developer information, deployment information, teacher information and more.

Before outlining how you can get an XO, it is important to understand that these computers are not like normal laptops, they really are specialist collaboration devices meant for children aged 5-12 to be used in the classroom as part of their normal education process. They won’t necessarily make great gifts in isolation, because most of the value comes in collaborating and sharing with others, particularly in an educational setting. If you think an XO would be a great gift, please consider talking to the child’s school, and helping arrange a trial or deployment. If you want an XO for development or demo purposes, there are also some free options available to you.

Borrowing an XO

Loaning an XO is a great way to access the device for development, for a demo, to see whether it meets your school’s needs, or to run an event involving the XO. Today there is a small pool of laptops available with OLPC Friends’ community members, and we are in the process of setting up OLPC Library, which will automate the process of people borrowing (and loaning) XO laptops, as well as volunteers for projects, and useful resources.

You can also go along to community events to see and play with an XO (as well as catch up with other local community members). Check out the usergroup links here.

Buying an XO in Australia/NZ

If you really want to buy an XO in Australia/NZ, then you have a couple of options:

• Change the World - You can purchase laptops in minimal orders of 100 or 1000, useful for people looking at doing deployments. Laptops are USD$259 each, which includes postage and spare parts. You can easily coordinate your own orders by getting together with friends or other schools/deployments.
• Purchase Pool - OLPC Friends has a wiki page for people to add their name to a purchase pool (limited to Australian/NZ), and everytime numbers hit 100, an OLPC Friends volunteer will coordinate a purchase for the community. It will cost the normal “Change the World” USD$259 per laptop, plus an additional AUD$15 for local distribution.
• Australian G1G1 - There is an Australian G1G1 program being run by a local company called OLPC Australia. Australian G1G1 Laptops cost USD$468.95 and it pays for one laptop for you, and one for someone else. More information on their website. Update: shortly after posting this story the OLPC Australia page to their G1G1 program became password protected and they have not let us know whether the program is running or not.

Running the XO software on your normal computer

If you want to check out the software that runs on the XO, you can run it on your normal computer. You can either install Sugar (the user interface for the XO) directly on a variety of platforms including a bootable CD (information available here), or you can run the XO specific software under a virtual environment or using a LiveCD (information here).