Re: [school-discuss] Ways to put Linux PCs in villages w/o electricity

[Daniel Howard <dhhoward@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Charles Cosse wrote:
> How would OLPC address rural connectivity? Or, do they have any strategy 
> re connectivity in rural areas?

They use a peer-peer, ad hoc wireless networking scheme, which means as 
long as one of them is in range or connected to a larger network, they 
can all share it.  But you still have to figure out how to get that 
network in place.

I looked at the map of Malawi, most towns/villages are less than 10 
miles apart.  A 16 dB gain Yagi antenna on each WiFi link boosts the LOS 
range by 10^1.3 (assuming a 3 dBi gain reference), or from 1640 ft 
(802.11b) to about 6 miles.  That cuts it too short for many of the 
towns, but I bet you could get at least half of them via the point to 
point daisy chain WiFi method a la the Appalachian model.  Heck, since 
you're powering them via solar cells, no reason you can't have repeaters 
in between distant towns.

Daniel

--
Daniel Howard
President and CEO
Georgia Open Source Education Foundation