Difference between revisions of "Sweets Distribution"

Revision as of 04:47, 4 November 2013

These are overview and usage pages regarding the Sweets Distribution. Read technical pages for getting detailed information.

Summary

This is a set of 3rd party repositories with Sugar Learning Platform packages for major GNU/Linux distributions.

The major reasons to support all these repositories are:

Let people to try new functionality which is not available from the regular sources;
Support GNU/Linux distributions that lack of Sugar Learning Platform from official repositories;
Bring recent Sugar Learning Platform versions to systems initially released with older Sugar.

Repositories

Sweets Distribution is formed as a list of repositories that can be added to the system. Only one repository can be registered in the system at the same time. Repositories are identified by names and might be in stable or development stage. Different repositories might be available on different platforms from the supported platforms list.

Installation

The installation occurs in two phases:

add one of Sweets Distribution repositories to local system;
install packages from added Sweets Distribution repository.

Add repository

Experienced users might follow manual instructions to add Sweets Distribution repositories to the system.

For easy attaching Sweets Distribution repositories, use sweets-distribution command.

If sweets-distribution is not yet installed, download the sweets-distribution.sh install script and run it from the root user, e.g., type the following commands in a terminal:

wget http://download.sugarlabs.org/packages/sweets-distribution.sh
sudo sh sweets-distribution.sh

To get the status information about currently selected and all available repositories:

sweets-distribution status

To add chosen, here 0.94, repository in the system

sudo sweets-distribution select 0.94

Install packages

When the sweets-distribution select command finishes, the local system will be aware of the Sweets Distribution repository and it will be possible to install packages.

In the regular way for your operating system (such as with apt-get install or yum install), from a local system terminal, console, or via SSH, install one of the following packages:

sweets-desktop
The full set of packages from Sweets Desktop.

Sometimes, it may be required to downgrade packages while switching to another repository. The easy way to do so is with the sync command:

sudo sweets-distribution sync

Most of the Sweets Distribution packages will be placed in the /opt/sweets directory; thus, it will be possible to use Sugar from the Sweets Distribution and from official packages at the same time.

Usage

Below are instructions on how to use the Sweets Distribution after installing packages.

Sweets Desktop session

If sweets-desktop package was installed, it will be possible to log in to a Sweets Desktop session. Choose the Sweets Desktop session type in a login manager.

Run Sugar in a window

To run Sugar in a window without logging out from the current desktop environment, select the Education/Sugar application menu item or enter the following command in a terminal:

sweets-sugar-emulator

Sugar Activities

For stable 0.94 and 0.88 repositories, the following points are assumed:

Fructose activities need to be used only from Sweets Distribution packages, at least for ones that have external dependencies, i.e., they should not be upgraded from the Activity Library;
The rest of activities need to be handled manually, e.g., manual installing missed dependencies.

All other repositories should bring Sugar Network integration, a different design solution for handling Sugar Activities. Sugar Network is assumed to improve the process of launching Sugar Activities to make it more reliable and smooth. By default, Sugar Network integration might be switched off, enable it after installation.

Testing

Latest Test results for Sweets Distribution on various platforms, such as Ubuntu, Trisquel, and Fedora 14.
Older Test results for Sweets Distribution on Ubuntu.

Feedback

Submit your bug report or feature request.
Subscribe to the sugar-devel mailing list and email with the subject prefixed with [SWEETS].
Ask your question on IRC channels, #sugar (not logged) or #sugar-newbies (logged).