5 years ago I posted about various speculations on this fabled operatig system, here, and part of the idea was the cloud as repository and the convenience of open source and accessibility.

Well, finally! Google posted in their blog [...]]]> Google is going with their own OS, and it is not going to be a GoOS. Sadly.

5 years ago I posted about various speculations on this fabled operatig system, here, and part of the idea was the cloud as repository and the convenience of open source and accessibility.

Well, finally! Google posted in their blog about this:

Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks. Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010.

FastCompany hints towards a system that operates, in part, in the clouds,

I’m betting that some of the key components will be cloud-based, which is implied by the instant-on aspects of the project.

yet what I find the most interesting of this whole thing is that aspect of the user input, recognizing that the free product, as Chris Anderson would say, reaches more people than a proprietary solution, gets more suggestions and solutions, and achieves more, faster and with a higher efficiency.

We still have to see if what we get is actually a manageable product, and there are too many caveats: the dependency on web applications might be as well a deterrent for certain uses and demographics, the need to muscle out microsoft and all the linux distros, the acceptance toa new gadget when people are already entrenching due to economic malaise are all situations to take into account.

Then again, storage and processing power dedicated to fuel an apps machine, and the increase in demand for internet access as basic infrastructure is going to make wonders for our interactions within the net.
What next? Infrastructure, mobility, price.

Photo by Ferdi’s World

OLPC = One License Per Child

Reported by the Inquirer, the OLPC project is throwing away its linux pedigree, opting for the impossibly corporate Microsoft Windows.

What, I wonder, is the rationale behind it. An open-source OLPC would have been magic, even more so in poor countries, or in countries with large barriers [...]]]> This comment summarizes it all:

OLPC = One License Per Child

Reported by the Inquirer, the OLPC project is throwing away its linux pedigree, opting for the impossibly corporate Microsoft Windows.

What, I wonder, is the rationale behind it. An open-source OLPC would have been magic, even more so in poor countries, or in countries with large barriers to technology.

By making it Windows the OLPC is effectively dead; it needs a bigger platform, licenses, updates and distributors, and introduces security risks in all these countries: having an open-source laptop? Cool. Having a closed-source PC? Backdoors come to mind.

Next: get your own Asus eee

Afterwards I need a nice way to work with gigantic databases.

Is this a broad generalization, or is this post by Atanu Dey actually on point?

The famous OLPC irks me because of the [...]]]>

I am confident that the One Laptop Per Child will have the effect which is the educational equivalent of the nutritional disaster that imported formula has had on the poor parts of the world.

Is this a broad generalization, or is this post by Atanu Dey actually on point?

The famous OLPC irks me because of the arbitrary definition of “poor parts of the world”, and it has a big shadow reminiscent of “white man’s burden” all over it.

At the same time, I see how communication and free access to networks can create more open, egalitarian discussion, and that in turn might be good.

But I am reading a lot on the OLPC because I am interested in getting those little shiny laptops here in NC:

• Huge income diaprity between classes? Check.
• Limited access to education? Check.
• Low life expectancy? Check.
• Human rights abuses? Check.
• economy in turmoil? Check

I think that the USA qualifies as well as any other country.

Following a successful install of linux ubuntu 7.04 in my PPC Mac g4, I went ahead and tried to update it to the oh so praised Gutsy Gibbon.

It didn’t work. It failed to recognize my root partition, and all I get is the recovery message and [...]]]> This is an entry in many parts, so watch out.

Following a successful install of linux ubuntu 7.04 in my PPC Mac g4, I went ahead and tried to update it to the oh so praised Gutsy Gibbon.

It didn’t work. It failed to recognize my root partition, and all I get is the recovery message and an emergency shell. Nice, ubuntu.

And today I find that in my haste to install these things, the PPC wasmoved off site: the last line has a link ot thye official explanation

Beginning with Ubuntu 7.04, the PowerPC edition of Ubuntu will be
reclassified as unofficial. The PowerPC software itself and supporting
infrastructure will continue to be available, and supported by a community
team.

In English: you are doomed. Your platform has been discontinued, so you might as well be left out cold without ubuntu.

Well, I am feeling like the proverbial redheaded left hanbed stepchild, and ubuntu goes from being the a;lternative solution to the cool kid, playing now exclusion games. The whole purpose of why linux is an alternative to bloated buggy expensive OS is that you can use it and install it everywhere, even in old, discontinued, out of support computers.

Well, I am off to find expensive computers in which to install the latest gutted gibbon.