Problems Getting Solar Power Installed Before Next Deployment

I would first like to thank all the OLPC Community Support Volunteers who shared their expertise and help determining the best system for our needs, with a very special thank you to Richard Smith, Alex Kleider, and Chris Leonard. I'd also like to thank David Leeming for his assistance.

We've run into problems getting a solar-powered electrical system installed at Kokobe Primary School, the site of our next deployment in January 2013.  The problem arose just last month with the installer, Bethel BCDC, and he has put us in a bind both time-wise and financially.

Right now, we are faced with some unpleasant conditions:

• The installer may not be willing or able to install the system before deployment.
• The cost of the recommended system far exceeds our current funding.

We have a few, less than ideal options:

1. We could postpone deployment.
• This would delay deployment until we have the money to pay for the system (probably a year from now).
• This could be devastating to our organization.  We have a number of volunteers who have already bought plane tickets to Lesotho for January (average price $2100).They would suffer significant financial loss if we have to postpone.
2. We could risk taking out a loan to cover the cost. 
• This assumes the installer can and will install they system before January, which is seeming less and less likely.
• We would have to alter our Articles of Incorporation to allow for taking out a loan.
• We would have to hope donors will contribute to pay off the loan.
3. We could temporarily borrow a small gas generator and 10 portable individual-laptop solar chargers from Nohana Primary School.
• Charging with this set-up would be difficult and time-consuming, but we could charge some of the laptops during deployment and training. 
• Because getting gas to the site is extremely difficult, this option would leave the school in a very difficult situation until a permanent solution is found.
4. We could buy 20-30 portable solar chargers that the supplier, ilovemyXO, currently has in stock. 
• These are a newer version that has not been fully tested with XO-1 laptops, and there is some uncertainty whether they will work with the laptops we are deploying.
• Even if we go this route, we would have too few chargers for the full 50 laptops that will be deployed at Kokobe in January. 
• If we also borrow the 10 panels from Nohana, that would allow us to charge up to 40 laptops at a time. We could supplement this temporarily with Nohana's gas generator.
• For the long run, there is no stored power to fall back on, when it is too cloudy or raining, like there is with the system using permanent solar panels and batteries.

We are leaning toward the last option.  It is the most affordable and the most likely to be ready in time for the upcoming deployment.  It has some serious drawbacks though:

•  It is a bit of a gamble because the panels may not work well with the laptops we have.
• It will take much more effort on a daily basis on the part of the teachers and students.
• The portable panels will pose more of a temptation to steal.
• We will still have to find 20 more panels after deployment and find a way to get them to Kokobe. 
• Our funders donated their money to install the permanent system.  Hopefully, given the circumstances, they will be willing to alter our agreements to fund the potable chargers instead.

I'll keep you posted.

- Janissa

Problems Repairing Non-booting XO-1 Laptops

I spent a couple days this month repairing the last of the XO-1 laptops that will go to Kokobe Primary School in January 2013.

Of the 50 XO laptops I had purchased on eBay.com for Kokobe, eight were not working.  Most of those were ones that became bricked during storage or shipping from the seller.  The remainder were advertised and sold as "non-working."  I bought the non-working XOs for fairly low prices, with the hopes that they were just bricked,** a problem that is usually reparable.  I figured any that were beyond my capacity to repair could be used for parts. 

**bricked = problem booting due to a failure of the internal cell battery which triggers a software glitch that prevents the laptop from booting properly

I'm not a computer technician by any stretch of the imagination, but I like to tinker and love a good challenge.  I had fixed a couple bricked XO laptops last year without any problems, so I was feeling pretty confident.   As it turned out, working on the bricked XO laptops this year turned out to be much more frustrating than I had expected.  I'm still not sure why.

The fix involves using a serial adapter, known  in layman's terms as a doohickey - a thing with wires attached to a little electronic board and plug gizmo about the size of a flash drive.  This gets hooked up between the non-working XO laptop and a working computer.  Thanks to very detailed directions on the OLPC wiki, I was able to dismantle the non-working laptop and hook the doohickey up to the motherboard without any trouble.



Serial adapter for fixing bricked XO laptops

[links to the directions I used: 
Disassemble XO laptop to reach motherboard,
Hooking up and using the serial adapter]

Running the software that lets the two computers communicate through the serial adapter doohickey is where I ran into problems this time around.  The OLPC directions were a bit vague here. (Sometimes OLPC directions are great, but other times they assume the reader has a degree of computer technical skills that I don't possess, and then the directions start reading like Greek to me.)

[link to directions: Running the serial adapter software]

I tried both HyperTerminal and Screen for Linux, software recommended in the directions.  Neither automatically linked to the serial adapter as the directions implied.  After a lot of trial and error, I got Screen to work and got one non-working XO laptop to boot, even though I never got the Page Fault message that the directions say should appear at the start. 

I thought I had it all figured out after that first laptop was fixed.  But every time after that, when I tried to run Screen, I would get an error message, even though I was following the exact same steps as the first time. (I had made detailed step-by-step notes of everything as I went through it the first time so this wouldn't happen, obviously to no avail.) 

After what seemed like hours of trying this and that, nothing worked.  I was extremely frustrated and about to give up, when I decided to try one last suggestion in the directions.  It involved an Automated Python Script that Repair Center volunteers had written.  ("Automated Python Script" means it's programming code written in Python language that can be run to fix a problem without input from you.)    I had shied away from this because I didn't know anything about Python, and I was afraid it would require programming skills I don't have. 

As it turned out, the Python script was much easier to use than Screen.  And it worked every time.  In a matter of minutes, I had all but one of the non-working laptops up and running.  (The remaining laptop needed a new motherboard, so I stripped it for parts.) 

Now all I have to do is test each laptop's hardware, adjust the settings, and load our activities, then the last XOs will be ready to go.

See the next blog post for my more detailed version of directions to repair bricked XO laptops using a second XO laptop and the automated python script.

- Janissa


 

Former Project Manager Mapesh Leaves Nohana Primary School

Tsela "Mapesh" Mapeshoane, formerly the L2L Project Manager, has left Nohana Primary School and is now working at a school near Kokobe Primary School.  He hopes to stay active in the computer project and is looking for ways to assist at Kokobe.  Kokobe is his family home.

- Janissa

Janissa & Sherrie Meet in Colorado

Janissa Balcomb, L2L President, and Sherrie Howey, L2L Director, got together at Sherrie's home in Beulah, Colorado, last week  for 4 days to discuss L2L business.  They met with L2L Volunteer Kathy Plath, and Janissa spent half a day with FIPE's Jack Wilson and his wife Bettie.

Janissa took 15 XO laptops, destined for Kokobe Primary School, with her to Beulah.  This is so Kathy, Sherrie, and Jennifer Selden (Sherrie's daughter) will have an opportunity to learn how to use the XO laptops before they help with training in Lesotho.  To save shipping costs, each of them will then carry 5 of the XO laptops with them to Lesotho when they go in January 2013.

During the visit, Janissa and Sherrie did some serious brainstorming, discussed L2L and FIPE goals, and made plans for the upcoming trip, among other things.  Janissa also gave Sherrie a crash course in how to use the XO laptop.

A special thank-you to Sherrie and Hamp for their wonderful hospitality and to Jack and Bettie for the great conversation and dinner.

- Janissa

Note: All expenses for this trip were paid for out of Janissa's and Sherrie's personal funds. No L2L money was used.

Funding for Solar Power from FOL

I am happy to announce that Friends of Lesotho has generously pledged $3386 to L2L this year! This money has been provided to help establish a solar power system at Kokobe. We will be able to buy four 80 watt PV panels, two 260 Ah batteries, a 20 A regulator 24 volt, and a 1200 watt 24 Volt Victron Inverter. This leaves only $2000 needed for the rest of the system (wiring, distribution board, grounding, and installation). A big thank you to Friends of Lesotho for this generous pledge of support.

PNEC Church

Presbyterian/New England Congregational Church in Saratoga Springs, NY has pledged to support our project. Cindy is in the process of developing a mission project for their Sunday School that will raise funds for our organization during Fall 2012 and Spring 2013. These donations will go towards paying for the solar power system at Kokobe. They hope that the mission project will be successful enough that they can continue supporting our project year after year. Thank you to the people at PNEC Church who are working to make this happen!

Kokobe Primary Expansion!

One of the most exciting developments of the past year is the expansion of our project. We are expanding our project to include a second school. Matlabe put a lot of work and consideration into the choice of school and settled on Kokobe Primary School. Kokobe is grades 1-7 and half the size of Nohana with 200 students enrolled and three teachers. He talked to teachers and the community and made arrangements for a ceremonial start for the project. Janissa went with several teachers from Nohana and took two laptops and solar panels to Kokobe. The teachers and students were very excited and the Nohana teachers talked about how the laptops could be used and how it worked to have students take them home. Matlabe will be visiting with them and starting the process of rules and regulations with them – he has taken a lot of initiative and is handling the whole process!

Grant for 46 XO Laptops for Kokobe

Good news!  We've just receive a grant for $9200 to purchase 46 XO laptops for Kokobe Primary School.

Janissa