Dextrose   ·   Get Involved   ·   Contacts   ·   Resources   ·   FAQ   ·   Roadmap   ·   To Do   ·   Meetings

Dextrose - Deployments' XO Operating System

Dextrose is a Sugar distribution for the XO-1 and XO-1.5. It is being developed jointly by Activity Central, Paraguay Educa and Sugar Labs, in collaboration with Plan Ceibal and members of the OLPC/Sugar community.

The focus of this build is stability and usability in a classroom environment. While there wasn't much time for new development, we've merged a few features contributed by other deployments and freelance contributors:

  • Journal sorting options (aa)
  • CPU/Memory display (m_anish)
  • Journal Backup/restore to removable devices (tch, esteban)
  • Journal Backup/restore to schoolserver (tch)
  • Tabbed browsing (m_anish)
  • OLPC Microformat support in activity updater (gangil) (pending)

Download development builds

Release date Milestone XO-1 XO-1.5
May 26 Alpha1 os240py.img os240py.crc
Jun 12 Alpha2 os258py.img os258py.crc os257py.zd
Jun 16 os260py.img os260py.crc os261py.zd
Jun 28 Beta1 os284py.img os284py.crc os286py.zd
Jul 04 os295py.img os295py.crc os297py.zd
Jul 08 Beta2 os300py.img os300py.crc os299py.zd


Installation

XO-1

  • First, ensure that your laptop is unlocked.
  • Download osNNNpy.img and osNNNpy.crc to the root directory of a USB stick
  • Drop to the "ok" prompt by pressing ESC repetedly during boot
  • Type the command: copy-nand u:\osNNNpy.img followed by ENTER
  • During the next reboot, keep the charger connected to allow OFW to self-update

Also check these detailed instructions.

XO-1.5

  • Download osNNNpy.zd to the root directory of a USB stick
  • Drop to the "ok" prompt by pressing ESC repetedly during boot
  • Type the command: fs-update u:\osNNNpy.zd followed by ENTER

Also check these detailed instructions.


Testing

Besides community testing and field testing, we're planning to reuse and extend the OLPC test plan adopted in release 8.2.0 (aka os801): http://wiki.laptop.org/go/TestPlan_8.2.0

Feedback from the entire community is appreciated. Bugs belonging to upstream components should be filed in the usual trackers:

Please, cc "bernie" on all bugs and kindly keep the table below updated (saves me some time).


Release schedule

ETA Milestone Description Availability
May 8 Build Sugar 0.88 packages for F-11 In-house
May 26 Alpha1 Preview release for OLPC Realness Summit In-house + community testers
Jun 10 Jun 12 Alpha2 Feature-complete alpha release In-house + community testers
Jun 25 Jun 29 Beta1 No known regressions vs. Sugar 0.84 One classroom in Caacupé
Jul 8 Beta2 Passes 100% of test plan 150 teachers in Caacupé
Jul 22 Beta3 Passes 100% of test plan Two classrooms in Caacupé
Aug 1 RC Release candidate One school in Caacupé
Aug 5 Release Deployable stable release General Availability


Current Status

Regressions since 0.84

Status Task Owner
DONE:os215 Frame does not always show up (with frame key or going to the corner)
DONE:os205 Translation of "Dismount" is "Eliminar" bernie
DONE:os215 Port-forward bugfix for race condition in activity title bernie
DONE:os215 Port-forward 0.84 patch for GsmPalette.get_state() name clash tch
DONE:os259 ALT-TAB does not switch between apps tch, bernie
DONE:os243 Browse: widgets in forms are 0x0 pixels bernie
DONE:os244 Icons in activity circle are too small (DPI problem?) jasg
DONE:os252 Font size in Terminal too large (DPI problem?) jasg
DONE:os248 Username selection is being skipped on first boot tch
DONE:os223 Add back Write, eToys bernie
WorksForMe Laptop does not sleep when lid closed tch
DONE:os251 Sound breaks in all activities after using Record once (need Record v77) dsd?
DONE:os251 UI of Record activity is garbled m_anish
DONE:os250 #1883: Sugar does not automatically associate with AP on startup bernie
DONE:os231 Memorize does not start because it fails to import libxml2 bernie
DONE:os205 Use es-lat for console keyboard bernie
DONE:os259 Activities sometimes start and remain in window, File:Untitled.jpg screenshot File:TmpxWzNZv.png ; (Window appears at least briefly on all launches) aa
Pulsing launch icon is delayed or absent; occasional "activity failed to start" message then the activity starts tch
DONE:os259 Measure sometimes locks up on recording, quitting from frame then brings up metacity dialog "activity is not responding"
DONE: Needs RPM update #2064: Sugar sometimes restarts; only seen 3 times, twice clicking on journal and once deleting a journal entry bernie
DONE:V70 Font in Write is small (problem caused by patch for #1121) alsroot, bernie
DONE:os252 When opening an epub with read V86, zoom works on the text but not graphics, may not be specific to this OS but considering the other scaling bugs ... jasg
DONE:V89 Turtle Blocks V88 ctrl c ctrl v do not work walter
DONE:os253 Search bar in home page of Browse is too long and overflows off-screen bernie
DONE:os298 Journal list view icon does not display after selection (os258) File:Listviewos258.jpg ( [PATCH] fix malformed svg module-updater icon revealed in F13 ?) aa
DONE:os259 Default font, menus etc seems large, larger than it used to be jasg
DONE:os298 Etoys does not save any more to the journal (ctime problem) aa

Non-regression bugs (also present in Sugar 0.84)

Status Task Owner
Disconnects from network on power save pgf
DONE:??? Cannot create tabs in browse m_anish
DONE:os255 Twice only, boot has frozen on the first dot of the loading clock, before Sugarlabs Fedora logos appear bernie
#1999: Raul's bug about journal browser overlapping activities
DONE:NotABug #2011: Record activity cannot be quit with CTRL-W m_anish
DONE:NotABug Sugar should restart/refresh after updating activities tch
DONE:os205 Keep -> Keep a copy (fold into stop menu) jasg
DONE:os240 Dates of activities don't make any sense bernie
DONE:os240 Pippy layout is broken m_anish
DONE:os245 Sugarized version of scratch dirakx
#2023: Cannot associate to AP with accented letters in SSID carlos
DONE:os240 Enable f11-xo1-0.88 yum repos for updates bernie
DONE:os254 Mesh icons duplicated in Neighbor View on NM restart tch
DONE:os240 Split "freeworld" packages to a separate repository bernie
Review old bugs filed against F11-XO1-PY 0.84 carlos
DONE:os250 Double clicking activities on journal opens 2 or 3 instances tch
DONE:os268 Can't upload images to Blogger.com (tabs needed) carlos
DONE:notIncludedYet #1512 Erasure of downloaded Activity entries in Journal permanently removes the code bundle tch

New features

Status Task Owner
DONE:os205 Switch power management from ohm to powerd bernie
DONE:os223 Add StopWatch, Finance, JukeBox, ImageViewer, InfoSlicer bernie
DONE:os260 Add Words (not on aslo) and GetBooks bernie, sayamindu
WONTFIX Resurrect Rainbow support
DONE:os260 Integrate journalmanagement extension jasg
DONE:os283 #2006: Merge touchpad patches from walter bernie
DONE:os223 Journal size display aa
DONE:os260 Integrate Esteban's backup to USB/SD tch
DONE:os260 Integrate DCastelo's GSM bugfixes tch
DONE:os253 Disabling Hot corners from the frame option tch

Experimental features

Status Task Owner
DONE: os240 experimental menu speedup patch mstone (bernie)
DONE: os240 kill the MANIFEST file bernie


Using this build with other deployments

A few customizations make this image somewhat deployment-specific:

  • Limited language support: to save space, we've included only English and Spanish translations.
  • Image signed with the Paraguay deployment keys. Laptops from other regions need to be unlocked in order to accept this image.
  • The software update control panel icon checks for new activities on our wiki rather than on laptop.org.
  • The Browse home page contains the Paraguay Educa logo and a few links to our website.

We may find the time to release slightly modified images to meet the needs of other OLPC deployments interested in upgrading to Sugar 0.88.

More importantly, we're happy to help other deployments produce their own OS images independently of us, thus exploiting the Freedom #1 provided by Free Software.

How to join development

See the Getting Involved page and our Build System documentation.

Subpages