Difference between revisions of "Getting Started"

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HowTo [ID# 103502]

About Sugar

Sugar is a constructionist learning desktop environment that is an alternative to the ones typically used in Microsoft Windows, Apple's OS X or other GNU/Linux operating systems. It is conceived as a platform upon which children learn with Sugar Activities. The platform provides mechanisms for collaboration, reflection, and exploration. Sugar Activities cover a broad range of applications: browsing, drawing, composing, writing, programming, etc. See this gallery of screenshots.

Sugar Desktop
MusicBlocks - A sugar Activity
Collaboration on Sugar

Introduction to the Sugar Interface describes multiple full-screen views: a Home view, from which Activities are launched; a Neighborhood view, where learners can connect to each other through a Jabber network; a Journal view, which can be used as a lab notebook; and the Activity view, where Sugar Activities are run.

Sugar Activities have no Save menu: everything is saved automatically. While the interface uses very little text, additional information is revealed when the user hovers over icons.

Sugar is Free Software. It is developed in Python and runs on a GNU/Linux Kernel, originally from the Fedora Project, and now from a variety of GNU/Linux distributions.

For an overview of the components composing a Sugar system see the Sugar System Stack.

Developers: Those interested in developing Sugar software should visit our developer documentation website.

Getting Sugar

This section aims to be an introductory walkthrough of some of the methods of installing Sugar covered on the pages Sugar on a Stick/Installation and Supported systems.

Hardware requirements

1 GHz or faster processor
64-bit Processor
1 GB System Memory (RAM)
The Sugar .iso file from Sugar on a Stick/Downloads
1 GB USB Drive (2 GB Recommended) or a Compact Disk (any)
A compatible USB or CD port (any)
USB Boot allowed on the BIOS (older PCs)

If your system requirements fall below those mentioned here, or you would like to check for alternatives, see Detailed Hardware Requirements

Sugar Live CD

The Sugar LiveCD contains a complete, functioning Sugar distribution and operating system on CD.

The Sugar LiveCD does not alter files already installed on your computer. It returns to its previous state when the LiveCD is ejected and the computer is rebooted. The Sugar LiveCD allows you to temporarily run Sugar; this allows you to explore Sugar and test how Sugar runs on your hardware. Your settings will not be saved between boots, but you can experiment with inserting a USB stick into the computer running the LiveCD, and reading from, and saving work to, the USB stick.

Produce your LiveCD by downloading the Sugar on a Stick .iso image from Sugar on a Stick/Downloads and burning it onto a blank CD.

Many computers have built in software which will convert and copy, "burn", an .iso image to a blank CD. In Windows 8 from the File Manager, right click the .iso file and select 'Burn disc image' from the context menu, or use a free utility, like ImgBurn.

To run Sugar, insert your LiveCD into your computer and reboot into Sugar.

Sugar on a Stick

Sugar on a Stick (aka SOAS) is the USB implementation of Sugar for its portability and efficiency. There are many methods to create a SOAS. The downloaded sugar .iso from Sugar on a Stick/Downloads is then flashed (a bootable copying process) to a USB. For people who like GUI, there are Fedora Media Writer (Linux/Windows), UNetBootin (Linux, Mac, Windows), Rufus (Windows), etc. For command line interfaces, see livecd-iso-to-disk on Sugar on a Stick/Installation

Sugar on a Virtual Machine

The advantage of a Virtual Machine (VM) is that, with the full VM documentation provided online, you follow that documentation to install the VM on your PC or Mac. VirtualBox^® is a suitable choice of VM for a first attempt, see their website: https://www.virtualbox.org/

As ever, download the Sugar on a Stick .iso from Sugar on a Stick/Downloads

Open the VM, bind the .iso image to the VM and boot it.

All VMs have excellent documentation on how to boot an .iso and again it is covered on this page Sugar on a Stick/Installation#SoaS on VirtualBox and the method to make a Sugar on a Stick from your VM, is covered here Sugar on a Stick/Installation#with Microsoft Windows in Method 3, Launch a virtual machine with the Sugar on a Stick .iso file, then run the script, livecd-iso-to-disk

Please Explore Sugar

and take it out into your community

There are two further pages in the Getting Started set.

Once you are able to launch Sugar, see Getting Started/Explore.

If you can take Sugar out into your school or community, see Getting Started/Presentation for ideas on how to demonstrate it to others.

I need more information

See https://help.sugarlabs.org, the Activity Help provided online.

The Sugar Labs wiki is a collaboration site for Sugar Labs teams, the Sugar on a Stick project alone comprises over 75 pages or sub-pages. For an overview of the developing SoaS see Sugar on a Stick/Project sitemap.

Find The Sugar Learning Platform Homepage at http://www.sugarlabs.org/.

Release notes

Release notes for Sugar 0.121 are available here.

Sugar platform release version cycle: | 0.82 | 0.84 | 0.86 | 0.88 | 0.90 | 0.92 | 0.94 | 0.96 | 0.98 | 0.100 | 0.102 | 0.104 | 0.106 | 0.108 | 0.110 | 0.112 |

@@ Line 52: / Line 52: @@
 ===Sugar on a Stick===
-====Use Fedora Live USB Creator====
+Sugar on a Stick (aka SOAS) is the USB implementation of Sugar for its portability and efficiency. There are many methods to create a SOAS. The downloaded sugar .iso from [[Sugar on a Stick/Downloads]] is then flashed (a bootable copying process) to a USB. For people who like GUI, there are Fedora Media Writer (Linux/Windows), UNetBootin (Linux, Mac, Windows), Rufus (Windows), etc. For command line interfaces, see ''livecd-iso-to-disk'' on [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation]]
-The page [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation]] describes a number of methods of installing Sugar on a Stick. Here we walk through a simple [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface Graphical User Interface] (GUI) method, suitable for use with a Windows computer. (Fedora Live USB Creator also works on any Fedora system.)
-Have a look at the Fedora program you will use: https://fedorahosted.org/liveusb-creator/
-Follow the instructions on [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation]] under the heading
-:'''2. Use Fedora Live USB Creator'''
-On completion you will shutdown your PC. Restart the PC with the newly written USB stick in a USB port. See [[Sugar on a Stick/Boot]] for extra information.
-This method is covered in this screenshot tutorial: [[Tutorials/Installation/Create a SoaS v7 Live USB in Windows]] and in this [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieIj4aECk88 video] of an earlier version of this process.
-==== livecd-iso-to-disk ====
-This is the first method described on the page [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation#with Microsoft Windows]]
-This is a robust method of making a Sugar on a Stick because you are making your LiveUSB from within Sugar, with a LiveCD you have already tested, and all tools are already on the CD.
-You do not have to be a paid up member of the Windows community. If you are running a Linux distribution, the ''livecd-iso-to-disk'' tool will work from the CD, on any PC which will launch the LiveCD.
-You may need to spend a bit of time to become familiar with the Sugar environment using your LiveCD, see [[Getting Started/Explore]]. You need to become familiar with the Terminal Activity and how to gain administrative permissions, that is become root. The Help Activity has a chapter on the Terminal.
-Futher background reading:
-http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/How_to_create_and_use_Live_USB#Command_line_method:_Using_the_livecd-iso-to-disk_tool_.28Fedora_only.2C_non-graphical.2C_both_non-destructive_and_destructive_methods_available.29
-For expert users, from a running LiveCD, Ctrl+Alt+F2 takes you to a console which could be used to run ''livecd-iso-to-disk''.
-To proceed with ''livecd-iso-to-disk'', full instructions are here, [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation#with Microsoft Windows]], in the method headed:
-::'''1. Burn a CD-ROM disc, boot from it, then run the script, ''livecd-iso-to-disk'''''
-====with UNetbootin====
-It is possible to install Sugar on a Stick with UNetbootin.
-There is no persistent storage with this installation method. Software updates, Activities, and documents are not saved between boots, it is recommended mainly for a quick demo of the Sugar Learning Environment.
-See [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation Process]]
 ===Sugar on a Virtual Machine===
@@ Line 98: / Line 64: @@
 All VMs have excellent documentation on how to boot an .iso and again it is covered on this page [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation#SoaS on VirtualBox]] and the method to make a Sugar on a Stick from your VM, is covered here [[Sugar on a Stick/Installation#with Microsoft Windows]] in Method 3, Launch a virtual machine with the Sugar on a Stick .iso file, then run the script, livecd-iso-to-disk
-===Sugar on Fedora===
-If you have, [http://fedoraproject.org/en/get-fedora or create,] a computer running the Fedora operating system, Sugar can be installed and launched as described [[Fedora#Sugar Learning Environment |here.]]
-===Sugar on Debain/Ubuntu===
-Sugar can also be installed on [https://ubuntu.com Ubuntu] or [https://www.debian.org Debian] as a Desktop Environment as described [https://github.com/sugarlabs/sugar#installing-on-debian-or-ubuntu here.]
 == Please Explore Sugar ==