InfoSlicer is a small application that enables you to download articles from Wikipedia, drag-and-drop sections of them to create new articles, and then publish your collection of articles for others to install or view on their own laptops.

The ideal of InfoSlicer is to support teachers in schools where access to books is limited. They can use InfoSlicer to quickly obtain content from the internet (maybe at a cybercafe rather than at the school or at home) and to create customized versions of the information that are suitable for their pupils and can be viewed with needing access to the internet.

Since completing the initial prototype, however, it’s become apparent that InfoSlicer could actually be more useful to the pupils themselves than just as a means to receive information created by their teacher. The children themselves could use InfoSlicer to download articles and then learn how to re-organise information for a specific audience or purpose and how to attribute someone else’s content without plagiarising it; the outcome of creating the articles is then less educationally important than the process of doing it.

So if you have Sugar, download the first version of InfoSlicer and give it a go (or just find out more) from: http://sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/InfoSlicer

Update 13th April 2009:

On re-reading this article (which was intended to be just a short intro to publicise InfoSlicer), it sounds as if I wrote the software myself! I didn’t. It was the outcome of the brilliant efforts of the InfoSlicer Extreme Blue team during their internship at IBM Hursley last Summer. Here’s a photo of the team at their Expo stand in Germany:

Jessica Vernier, Matt Bailey, Chris Leonard, Jon Mace

Back in February I attended a couple of sessions about free software in education. One was the kickoff meeting of OLPC Europe (the European support group for One Laptop Per Child). The other, was a fantastic talk by Knut Yrvin, who’s done a lot of work with free software in education in Norway.

His focus in the talk was on cross-platform free software – that is, free software that can be used in schools and runs on Windows, Linux, and (usually) Mac. He gave four examples of free software that he thinks is great in schools:

GCompris (award-winning software for younger end of primary school children) (www.gcompris.net/-en-). Having since met a 5 year old at LugRadio Live USA whose favourite activity on her OLPC laptop is GCompris, I’ll happily recommend it too.

StopMotion (for older end of primary school) (I’ve just been hunting for the URL for Windows but can’t find anything about it – can only find the page for the LInux version developer.skolelinux.no/info/studentgrupper/2005-hig-stopmotion/index.php – will let you know if I find the Windows one cos it looks really cool software)

OpenOffice.org (for secondary school level) (www.openoffice.org) – He made a point of saying that we shouldn’t inflict office skills on young children cos it’s boring. But at secondary level, this is a great alternative to paying for Microsoft Office. I use it all the time at work and at home. It’s free now but used to be a product from Sun Microsystems who sold it as Star Office. Much better now and is compatible with MS Office documents (eg .doc, .xls, .ppt files). Just download it and have a go.

Firefox web browser (all ages) (www.mozilla-europe.org/en). Again, I use this all the time (alternative to Internet Explorer) at home and at work.

If you’re a Windows user and want to know more about free software in education, there’s more free software that will run on Windows here: www.schoolforge.net

As you may have heard, I recently acquired an OLPC laptop. At some point I am going to write up my experiences with the OLPC/Sugar software so far (in the meantime, to uphold a promise I made, here are some useful tips for using and setting up software on the OLPC). For now, here are my thoughts on browsing the Web from the OLPC Browse activity.

The killer bit of the Firefox browser, IMHO, was the ability to open multiple Web pages in separate tabs within the same browser window. Of course, internet Explorer now does multiple tabs (in a rainbow of shades) but back in my Windows (pre-IE7) days, I frequently did parallel browsing of websites by simply opening each webpage in a new window. The advantage of multiple tabs is that you don’t end up with a clutter of browser windows all over your taskbar.

I suspect that multiple tabs in browser windows, and (in Firefox at least) being able to bookmark all the tabs at once, has slightly altered how people browse.

Opening in a new window set me off down the path of parallel browsing but multiple tabs ensured I got there. Especially as websites got more interactive and state-sensitive (meaning that you can’t switch to another website then click ‘Back’ to return to your internet banking session). And I got less patient waiting for pages to load (ironic seeing as connection speeds have increased).

So now I’ve started using my OLPC to browse the web occasional when my other laptop is unavailable. This is an interesting, and slightly frustrating, experience.

The Sugar interface on the OLPC basically does away with the idea of windowing environments. That is, you don’t have a desktop on which to drag around and switch between windows. instead, each application (known as an ‘activity’) runs moreorless full-screen, like this:

This means a return to linear browsing. in some ways it’s a liberating experience in that I read what I want to read of the current website or page before moving on the the next. And when reading blogs and the like, I can always click ‘Back’ later. In many ways, though (and i’m a great believer in computers supporting user-behaviour, and not the other way round), it’s just frustrating.

For example, in writing this blog-post, I couldn’t easily open my blog or Andy’s OLPC tips page to check that I used the correct URL in my links. Nor could I quickly check my usage of a word in dictionary.com. I can, and sometimes do, open other instances of the Browse activity – essentially opening in a new window but with a little more effort – but more than three instances, I’ve found, tends to crash the whole lot.

Now, the OLPC and its software isn’t designed for me; it’s an education tool for children in developing countries. On the other hand, how soon before the older or more tech-savvy children start to want to browse in parallel – especially when internet access gets more ubiquitous?

I have resisted putting Firefox on my OLPC but tonight I’m sorely tempted…

And it’s so exciting! My OLPC laptop has arrived at last!

In case you’ve been living in a cupboard for the past couple of years (this is mainstream, afterall), the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project’s aim is to design a small, cheap, lightweight but robust laptop as a tool to support education in developing countries. The XO (or OLPC) laptop is the result of that effort.

So what’s it like? Well, I’m typing this blog post on it. The width of the laptop is 22.5cm (I just measured it) so the keyboard is quite small. I can’t touchtype on it but I can work up to a fairly efficient multi-finger typing. It’s a bit like typing on the Psion palm-top but the keys feel nicer because they’re rubbery and press easily.

The screen on the XO is amazing. It was designed especially for the requirements of the OLPC project. Many of the children that will use the XO laptop are schooled, or spend a lot of time, out of doors. Therefore, a typical laptop screen would be no good – bright sunlight would render the screen unreadable. There are two modes to the XO’s screen: a full-colour mode which is

pretty readable in sunlight as it is, and a monochrome mode which actually gets clearer to read the brighter the sunlight. Why aren’t all laptops made like this? Working at home in the summer would be so much more fun!

What else? Well, the ‘ears’ are actually the wireless antenae which will still work, apparently, even if you snap one off (they’re actually slightly flexible and tougher than they look in photos). I can connect to my home WPA-encrypted wireless network (but not, sadly, to my work LEAP netwok). There’s no ethernet port but you can, i think, get an ethernet USB dongle to work.

It has a built-in webcam. It comes with 1 GB solid state storage but I’ve put an 8 GB SDHC card in the slot beneath the screen to have more space than I’m bound ever to need. It has a built-in microphone and speakers, with mini-jack sockets for plugging in an external mic and headphones. Or, alternatively, you can plug in different inputs (eg a temperature sensor) to the mic socket.

And there’s ‘ebook mode’… You know how you can get some highly-priced regular laptops that have a screen that swivels round into ‘tablet mode’? Well, the XO does that too. To be fair, the XO doesn’t have a touch-sensitive screen but then its screen swivels so that you can use it to read ebooks. At the press of a button, you can rotate the display by 90, 180, 270, or 360 degrees. And if reading an ebook isn’t your thing, you can play games using the game buttons on either side of the screen.

I know I’m sounding like a commercial break now but it really is that cool. And rather sweet for a inanimate object. And it has a handle. And it fits in my handbag.

Oh, and did I mention it’s green?

And it has ears.

Less than 24 hours ago, we arrived home from a great weekend in Brussels at FOSDEM (see the photos).
FOSDEM is an annual 2-day conference for free and open source software developers (or users, in many cases) in Brussels, Belgium. The conference programme describes the event as:

 4000+  GEEKS
  200+  LECTURES
     2  DAYS
     0  €

Yep, 0 €. That’s free and gratis! Which is rather impressive for such a big event.

My other half has been to FOSDEM a few times but this was only my second experience of Brussels geekery. Last year, I remember enjoying the weekend (we went with a lovely group of people) but apart from some specific talks (inc Jim Gettys on the OLPC, and a talk about the KDE documentation project), I wasn’t so blown away by the conference itself; my general memory is of being cold and tired.

So I wasn’t sure about going this year but in the end I did – if nothing else, it’d be a weekend in Brussels (which is a really lovely city) and good food and company. Which it was. *And* I enjoyed the conference itself!

As ever, I’m planning to write up some of the talks that I went to. As ever, I probably won’t (though I will try!). In the meantime, here’s what I saw:

• Tux with Shades, Linux in Hollywood
• How a large scale OSS project works
• Status updates on Software Patents
• OLPC Europe Kickstart Meeting
• Drupal theming
• Usability and Drupal
• Amazon WS with Drupal
• Free software in education
• Debian accessibility
• The long road to Debian Edu in main

As Tony says, none of the keynotes were that great; the Tux in Shades one, which I thought would be interesting, was particularly disappointing (though the guy seemed to know his stuff).

So, what was cool and uncool for me?

Cool	Not so cool
Knut Yrvin, who did the OSS in Education talk in the CrossDesktop developer room. Best presenter I saw.	Having two presenters for the Linux in Hollywood keynote. Unnecessary, pointless, and annoying.
Lots of OLPC laptops around!	Mine’s not arrived yet.
The green OLPC hand-crank.	Not being able to find the guy to get a closer look at the green hand-crank.
Good presentation on accessibility issues (Debian and accessibility talk) with explanation of how Braille output works.	Developers who don’t realise thatCommand Line != GUI with your eyes closed.
Yummy dinner and beer in the evenings.	Yucky burger and crappy coffee during the day.
Chatting to lovely Josette at the O’Reilly stand.	Impulse buying at the O’Reilly stand – as usual!
Tony’s phone worked abroad!	Vodafone website not updating my unbilled usage for 72 hours – still don’t know what it’s cost me!
Getting there and back in a group of about 12 people and losing only 1 of them.	Arguing over directions – as usual.