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



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

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Daniel Howard
President and CEO
Georgia Open Source Education Foundation