Linux Handhelds in African Schools

blastard writes "Seems some students will be getting to use their Linux handhelds in school without getting into trouble. BBCNews has a story on fifth-graders in Kenya who will be using "E-slates" from EduVision. The EduVision site is available in German, English and Swahili."

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Multilingual

[tagish]

The EduVision site is available in German, English and Swahili.

No it isn't. Only the English link works. Quality fact checking as ever :)

Not so sure about that....

[The Mutant]

I'm EMEA (Europe, The Middle East and Africa) Manager for a multinational financial services institution. Either myself or someone from my team spend a lot of time on client site at banks in Africa, so we've got some insight.

We take a lot for granted in the developed world. Even at the better run banks in Africa things we could do in less than a day take two or more.

Part of the problem is infrastructure : for example, the power in Lagos goes out constantly. Even the banks with UPS' get caught out sometimes.

Part of it is education : the skills just aren't as widely available as compared to the developed countries. Lot's of times it's the blind helping the blind. Yep, they muddle through but it takes far longer.

The OP had more insight into this problem : after the Company Man leaves there definitely will be loads of these devices that are unusable. Efforts of the curious children asdie, we see it all the time in the banks - why would it be different in the remote villages?

Oh and I'm not knocking these folks; they're just doing the best they can and I actually enjoy going down there to help them, but things are a lot different in Africa.

In case you're curious I've got few pix from my last visit/a :