mynameiselderprice

How do you feel about other ways of serving potatoes - Mashed? Boiled? Double baked?

Hi guys,

I am currently a Technology teacher at a secondary school in rural Mozambique. My school is lucky enough to have 25 workstation computer lab where I'm able to teach 10th graders basics such as typing, Word, and Excel.

I have a few questions I could ask, but how is your OS going to actually make a difference in a young Africans life?

The biggest barrier for computers is cost, plain and simple. My computer lab was donated by an NGO, and my school let it collect dust (literally) for 2 years because they had nobody that was able to teach the kids Windows and other basics. Most everyone in Mozambique that can afford (or even has access) to a computer is an educated, middle class individual. With that, 99% of the other computers a user would encounter would be Windows (Win7/8). It seems like adding a new OS would cause confusion and not be sustainable in the long run without rapid adaptation, which would have to come from donated machines.

I still have more questions, but where have you been deploying to test? You say it's "as easy to use as a smart phone", yet most kids and adults associate smart phones with touch screens. I had students that had literally never had access to a computer before. I had to teach how to place a mouse in their hand, that when you move the mouse the cursor also moves, which buttons to physically click, etc.

As for the cheap hardware, costs of computers/components are greatly inflated due to import taxes. What would normally cost $400 in the states would be $800 here. Also, who is buying a compute without an OS (aka Windows) Even in Maputo, Mozambique's capital, there are hardly places to even get a computer repaired, let alone buy cheap parts.