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| | == Sugar Digest == | | == Sugar Digest == |
| | | | |
| − | 1. I've spent much of the week working on Turtle Art. At the urging of Cynthia Solomon, I decided to make some visual changes to some of the blocks, in an effort to make it a bit easier to follow program flow. To that end, I changed the way the flow block works. For example, the Repeat block had an overhang to the right below which you could stack blocks that would be repeated. Once the repeating was complete, flow continued on to blocks attached to the bottom of the repeat block. I've often seen people confused by this: they have been uncertain where to attach the blocks to repeat and have had to use vertical-spacer blocks to make their programs less cluttered. In the new look, the Repeat block has a clamp (or jaws) that surround the blocks to repeat and it auto-expands, eliminating the need to use vertical-spacer blocks. In this case, a picture is worth a thousand words. In addition to Repeat, there are new blocks for Forever, If-then, If-then-else, While, Until, and, from the Extras palette, the Collapse block. The latter is useful for collapsing a large stack of blocks into a single brick. | + | 1. It has been a few weeks since I posted to the Sugar Digest. I've been buried in a few projects and only just beginning to come up for air. One distraction was that I got a request via Reuben to write a chess activity for Armenia. It was too tempting to resist, so I pulled a few all-nighters that resulted in a Sugar front-end to the gnuchess program. The program, Gnuchess, can be downloaded from [http://activities.sugarlabs.org/en-US/sugar/addon/4593] and is documented on the [[Actvities/Gnuchess]] page in the wiki. Fairly rudimentary, but for a few fun features: you can play against the robot, another person on the same computer, or over the network. You can use a generic set of pieces, load in some Sugar-colored ones, or those of your own design. When you play against someone over the net, they will see your artwork and you'll see their artwork. |
| | | | |
| − | [[File:New-TA-Repeat-block.png|300px]] | + | I also have been making a number of subtle but important changes to Turtle Blocks. Cynthia Solomon (of Logo fame) has been giving me feedback and as a result, I think the box and action naming is much more streamlined and consistent. Check out [http://activities.sugarlabs.org/en-US/sugar/addon/4027 v 154] and keep an eye out for v 156, coming soon. |
| | | | |
| − | 2. Stephen Jacobs sent a pointer to the projects his students at RIT have done this year:
| + | Also, we hosted a learning workshop at the OLPC office in Cambridge last week at which I got some feedback on the Portfolio and Bulletin Board activities. I am in the midst of streamlining Portfolio and also enabling comments to be made over the web. (You can get a sneak preview of [[File:Portfolio-27.xo|v 27]].) I have a number of outstanding questions about classroom protocol; a team from the workshop has been meeting to discuss my questions and to make additional suggestions. Once I get the Portfolio released, I'll dive back into the Bulletin Board activity. |
| | | | |
| − | * [[Quilt]] is a chat system designed for mesh networks. It was written in Python and uses Zeromq as a way to pass data between nodes. Each node connects to other nodes and allows a user to chat. The end goal is to have a resilient chat network that auto discovers nodes on a mesh network.
| + | 2. At the workshop, the group organized working groups to address a number of important issues: classroom protocols, assessment, and a collaborative web presence for teachers and students. Stay tuned. |
| | | | |
| − | * [[PyCaveExplorer]] is designed to teach children basic electronics by having them explore randomly generated, grid-based caves. The goal is to create a lit path from the starting tile to the goal tile by placing lights, batteries, and connecting pieces of wire. The base educational goal is to teach how simple circuits work, along with the differences between series and parallel circuits, and the relationship between a power source and the number of things connected to it.
| + | 3. I got some feedback from Nicaragua about the [[Activities/Nutrition|Nutrition activity]]. More region-specific foods and a new game: match the food to its food group. A new release will be available soon; a preview is available [[File:Nutrition-6.xo|here]]. |
| | | | |
| − | * In [[Point-and-Click-Arthur]], the player is Arthur's Royal Detective. The goal is retrieve all the knights who are in the middle of their most famous quests for a banquet at Camelot. The game is a "point and click" game in the same vein as Monkey Island and King's Quest. The user reads dialog, hunts for an item on screen, and figures out who to use the item on. This causes a reaction and new areas open, etc.
| + | 4. Aleksey Lim and the Somosazucar team continue to make progress on their "Harmonic" distribution, the goal of which is to provide a collaborative Sugar environment in the real-world context of limited network connectivity. See [[Harmonic_Distribution/1.0/Todo|the to-do list]] for a list of milestones already achieved and still to come. The team has been doing some preliminary testing in Puno. |
| | | | |
| − | 3. I had blogged about a meeting with Teemu Leinonen from Alto University last week and had mentioned that I was working on a new activity inspired by [http://teamup.aalto.fi/ TeamUp]. The beta version of [[Activities/Bulletinboard|Bulletin Board]] is ready for testing. It is quite simple: think of it as Portfolio shared among multiple users. Starred entries in your Journal are shared, along with an audio recording. | + | 5. Simon Schampijer and Manuel Quiñones represented Sugar Labs at GUADEC 2012, the GNOME user and developer conference. Simon gave a talk outlining our progress on the GTK-3 port (See items 6 and 7 below). I also participated, remotely, in the advisory board meeting, where I gave a more general update of the project. One theme in my presentation was internationalization. Chris Leonard, our i18n team leader, supplied me with a list of accomplishments and concerns about the state of i18n in GNOME (specifically in glibc). There was an immediate reaction from the board. I am hopefully that we'll see some of Chris's suggested adopted by the GNOME community. |
| | | | |
| − | 4. Danishka Navin reports from Sri Lanka that next month, another remote school will be running Sugar on [http://www.hanthana.org/ Hanthana Linux].
| + | 6. Daniel Francis, a product of Plan Ceibal, has been helping with our GTK3 port. This week he ported [http://git.sugarlabs.org/~danielf/turtleart/danielfs-gtk3 Turtle Art to GTK3]. We are well on our way to getting our core activities ported thanks in large part to the efforts of our Sugaristas. |
| | | | |
| − | 5. Meanwhile, Sameer Verma has been having some [http://bhagmalpur.wordpress.com/ adventures] on the sub-continent.
| + | 7. Simon posted some instructions for porting Gstreamer Activities to PYGobject and Gstreamer 1.0 to the [http://lists.sugarlabs.org/archive/sugar-devel/2012-July/038700.html Sugar developer list]. |
| − | | |
| − | 6. Hilaire Fernandes of [http://activities.sugarlabs.org/en-US/sugar/addon/4561 DrGeo] fame shared [http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xrupz0_1310-programmed-sketch-rulers_tech a cool video] of some of the things you can do. Worth checking out.
| |
| − | | |
| − | 7. Daniel Narvaez announced that he has released a new sugar-build that should make it pretty easy to build Sugar on most GNU/Linux systems (tested on the latest Fedora and Ubuntu systems).
| |
| − | | |
| − | git clone git://git.sugarlabs.org/sugar-build/sugar-build.git
| |
| − | cd sugar-build
| |
| − | make build
| |
| − | make run
| |
| − | | |
| − | Don't forget to read the README file.
| |
| − | | |
| − | 8. Last week Bert Freudenberg announced a [http://etoys.squeak.org/download/ release candidate] for Etoys 5.0.1. Please help with testing.
| |
| − |
| |
| − | 9. Reuben Caron announced the [http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Release_notes/11.3.1 final release of OLPC OS 11.3.1] for XO-1, XO-1.5 and as a formal release for XO-1.75. Details are available at [12].
| |
| − | | |
| − | 10. Meanwhile, Daniel Drake announced another [http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Release_notes/12.1.0 candidate release of 12.1.0]. Please help test this build as well.
| |
| | | | |
| | === Sugar Labs === | | === Sugar Labs === |
| | | | |
| − | Visit our [http://planet.sugarlabs.org planet] for more updates about Sugar and Sugar deployments. | + | Visit our [http://planet.sugarlabs.org planet] for more updates about Sugar and Sugar deployments. |
| | | | |
| | == Community News archive == | | == Community News archive == |
What's new
This page is updated each week (usually on Monday morning) with notes from the Sugar Labs community. (The digest is also sent to the community-news at sugarlabs.org list, blogged at walterbender.org, and archived here.) If you would like to contribute, please send email to walter at sugarlabs.org by the weekend. (Also visit planet.sugarlabs.org.)
Sugar Digest
1. It has been a few weeks since I posted to the Sugar Digest. I've been buried in a few projects and only just beginning to come up for air. One distraction was that I got a request via Reuben to write a chess activity for Armenia. It was too tempting to resist, so I pulled a few all-nighters that resulted in a Sugar front-end to the gnuchess program. The program, Gnuchess, can be downloaded from [1] and is documented on the Actvities/Gnuchess page in the wiki. Fairly rudimentary, but for a few fun features: you can play against the robot, another person on the same computer, or over the network. You can use a generic set of pieces, load in some Sugar-colored ones, or those of your own design. When you play against someone over the net, they will see your artwork and you'll see their artwork.
I also have been making a number of subtle but important changes to Turtle Blocks. Cynthia Solomon (of Logo fame) has been giving me feedback and as a result, I think the box and action naming is much more streamlined and consistent. Check out v 154 and keep an eye out for v 156, coming soon.
Also, we hosted a learning workshop at the OLPC office in Cambridge last week at which I got some feedback on the Portfolio and Bulletin Board activities. I am in the midst of streamlining Portfolio and also enabling comments to be made over the web. (You can get a sneak preview of File:Portfolio-27.xo.) I have a number of outstanding questions about classroom protocol; a team from the workshop has been meeting to discuss my questions and to make additional suggestions. Once I get the Portfolio released, I'll dive back into the Bulletin Board activity.
2. At the workshop, the group organized working groups to address a number of important issues: classroom protocols, assessment, and a collaborative web presence for teachers and students. Stay tuned.
3. I got some feedback from Nicaragua about the Nutrition activity. More region-specific foods and a new game: match the food to its food group. A new release will be available soon; a preview is available File:Nutrition-6.xo.
4. Aleksey Lim and the Somosazucar team continue to make progress on their "Harmonic" distribution, the goal of which is to provide a collaborative Sugar environment in the real-world context of limited network connectivity. See the to-do list for a list of milestones already achieved and still to come. The team has been doing some preliminary testing in Puno.
5. Simon Schampijer and Manuel Quiñones represented Sugar Labs at GUADEC 2012, the GNOME user and developer conference. Simon gave a talk outlining our progress on the GTK-3 port (See items 6 and 7 below). I also participated, remotely, in the advisory board meeting, where I gave a more general update of the project. One theme in my presentation was internationalization. Chris Leonard, our i18n team leader, supplied me with a list of accomplishments and concerns about the state of i18n in GNOME (specifically in glibc). There was an immediate reaction from the board. I am hopefully that we'll see some of Chris's suggested adopted by the GNOME community.
6. Daniel Francis, a product of Plan Ceibal, has been helping with our GTK3 port. This week he ported Turtle Art to GTK3. We are well on our way to getting our core activities ported thanks in large part to the efforts of our Sugaristas.
7. Simon posted some instructions for porting Gstreamer Activities to PYGobject and Gstreamer 1.0 to the Sugar developer list.
Sugar Labs
Visit our planet for more updates about Sugar and Sugar deployments.
An archive of this digest is available.
Planet
The Sugar Labs Planet is found here.
Sugar in the news
| 08 Jul 2012 |
Estado de S. Paulo – Para educar
|
| 24 Apr 2012 |
Pacific Standard – OLPC Redux
|
| 12 Apr 2012 |
Huffington Post – Hult Global Case Challenge: One Laptop Per Child
|
| 30 Mar 2012 |
newswise – “Sugar on a Stick” Helps Kids Learn How to Learn
|
| 11 Jan 2012 |
Boston Herald – One Laptop Per Child screening $100 tablet
|
| 10 Jan 2012 |
ars technica – Crank, bicycle, and waterwheel: hands-on with the OLPC XO 3.0 tablet
|
| 08 Jan 2012 |
The Verge – OLPC XO 3.0 tablet preview: impressions, video, and pictures
|
| 07 Jan 2012 |
The Verge – OLPC XO 3.0 tablet: an 8-inch tablet for $100, with Android and Sugar options for the children
|
| 23 Dec 2011 |
Miller-McCune – One Laptop Per Child Redux
|
| 18 Oct 2011 |
BDU – Robotics in Uruguay (video)
|
| 11 Aug 2011 |
Berlin.de – Gewinner des Berliner Landeswettbewerbs zu Open Source stehen fest
|
| 25 Jul 2011 |
CCC Classic – Garmin-sugarlabs development cycling team at Crit starting line
|
| 25 Jul 2011 |
CCC Classic – Garmin-sugarlabs development cycling team after Crit
|
| 13 Apr 2011 |
framablog – L'expérience Sugar Labs préfigure-t-elle une révolution éducative du XXIe siècle?
|
| 05 Apr 2011 |
Businesswire – The Government of Peru Expands the One Laptop Per Child Program with Local Manufacturing
|
| 31 Jan 2011 |
Sundance – A Day in the Life – Peru
|
| 01 Dec 2010 |
velonation – Sugar Labs to back Garmin-Cervelo’s development team in unique arrangement
|
| 28 Oct 2010 |
UCR – Nuevas tecnologías deben estar al alcance de todos los niños y niñas
|
| 05 Oct 2010 |
xconomy – One Ecosystem per Child
|
| 08 Sep 2010 |
FLOSS Weekly – Sugar Labs
|
| 09 Aug 2010 |
ABC digital – Indicadores constatan el impacto positivo en el aprendizaje de niños
|
| 23 Jun 2010 |
ABC digital – Xo para todas las escuelas de Caacupé
|
| 21 Jun 2010 |
La Nacion – “Buscamos que los niños no solo usen softwares, sino que puedan crear uno”
|
| 20 Jun 2010 |
UltimaHora.com – La laptop une a padres, alumnos y docentes
|
| 15 Jun 2010 |
The H – OLPC XO-1.5 software updated
|
| 10 Jun 2010 |
engadget – Sugar on a Stick hits 3.0, teaches us about a new kind of fruit
|
| 27 May 2010 |
Pro Linux DE – Sugar on a Stick v3 freigegeben (German)
|
| 27 May 2010 |
NY Times – One Laptop Per Child Project Works With Marvell to Produce a $100 Tablet
|
| 27 May 2010 |
PC World – OLPC Rules out Windows for XO-3
|
| 03 May 2010 |
WXXI: Mixed Media – Interview with Walter Bender (audio)
|
| 03 May 2010 |
Linux Magazine – OLPC Computers for Palestinian Refugee Children
|
| 14 Apr 2010 |
National Science Foundation – XO Laptops Inspire Learning In Birmingham, Alabama (video)
|
| 02 Apr 2010 |
|
| 15 Mar 2010 |
nbc13.com – Birmingham City students opt to spend spring break in class, XO computer camps (video)
|
| 18 Feb 2010 |
LWN – Karma targets easier creation of educational software
|
| 05 Feb 2010 |
iprofesional – La PC barata de Negroponte desembarca en la Argentina para pelear contra Intel
|
| 14 Jan 2010 |
AALF – Open Systems for Broader Change
|
| 03 Jan 2010 |
Educacion 2.0 – PLAN CEIBAL, El Libro
|
| 14 Dec 2009 |
xconomy – Sugar gets sweeter
|
| 10 Dec 2009 |
ars technica – Sugar software environment gets sweeter with version 2
|
| 09 Dec 2009 |
Wired – New Sugar on a Stick Brings Much Needed Improvements
|
| 08 Dec 2009 |
engadget – Sugar on a Stick OS goes to 2.0, gets Blueberry coating and creamy Fedora 12 center (video)
|
| 07 Dec 2009 |
Teleread.org – Sugar on a Stick: What it means for e-books and education
|
| 27 Nov 2009 |
CNET Japan – 「コードを見せて、もっと良くなるよ」と言える子どもが生まれる--Sugar Labsが描く未来
|
| 16 Nov 2009 |
zanichelli – software libero a scuola
|
| 12 Nov 2009 |
opensuse.org – openSUSE 11.2 Released
|
| 07 Nov 2009 |
My Broadband News – Mandriva 2010 packs a punch [and Sugar]
|
| 06 Nov 2009 |
GhanaWeb – Open education and an IT-enabled economic growth in Ghana: Musings of a dutiful citizen
|
| 26 Oct 2009 |
Linux Magazine ES – Software Libre como apoyo al aprendizaje
|
| 09 Oct 2009 |
interdisciplines – OLPC and Sugar: mobility through the community
|
| 08 Oct 2009 |
IBM developerWorks – 10 important Linux developments everyone should know about
|
| 01 Oct 2009 |
OLPC France – Interview Walter Bender au SugarCamp
|
| 25 Sep 2009 |
The Inquirer – One Laptop per Child marches on
|
| 18 Sep 2009 |
Groklaw – The Role of Free Software in Education
|
| 18 Sep 2009 |
Reuters – Sugar Labs and Free Software Foundation Celebrate Software Freedom Day
|
| 17 Sep 2009 |
ICTDev.org – Dream Again with One Laptop per Child
|
| 26 Aug 2009 |
Latinux – Azúcar en una memoria USB
|
| 03 Aug 2009 |
Wired: Geek Dad – Inventing a New Paradigm: SugarLabs and the Sugar UI
|
| 30 Jul 2009 |
Zanichelli – Sugar on a Stick: imparare insieme
|
| 23 Jul 2009 |
Everything USB – RecycleUSB.com - Donate your Flash Drives for a Good Cause
|
| 22 Jul 2009 |
OLPC France – Sugar : mauvaise presse et mise au point
|
| 13 Jul 2009 |
Spiegel Online – Das zuckersüße Leichtbau-Linux
|
| 07 Jul 2009 |
ComputerWorldUK – Gran Canaria Desktop Summit: a Study in Contrasts
|
| 06 Jul 2009 |
Windows Forest – USBメモリなどから“OLPC”用のOSを利用できる「Sugar on a Stick」が無償公開
|
| 02 Jul 2009 |
Howard County Library – Sugar on a Stick
|
| 27 Jun 2009 |
Deutschlandfunk – Süßes für die Kleinen: Sugar ist Linux speziell für Kinder (in Deutsch)
|
| 26 Jun 2009 |
EduTech – Sugar on a stick, and other delectables (praise for the lowly USB drive)
|
| 26 Jun 2009 |
ars technica – Sugar on a Stick brings sweet taste of Linux to classrooms
|
| 24 Jun 2009 |
BBC – OLPC software to power aging PCs
|
| 24 Jun 2009 |
Technology Review – $100 Laptop Becomes a $5 PC
|
| 15 Jun 2009 |
TechSavvyKids – Episode 10 FOSSVT: Sugar on a Stick (audio)
|
| 10 Jun 2009 |
LWN.net – Sugar moves from the shadow of OLPC
|
| 27 May 2009 |
LWN.net – Activities and the move to context-oriented desktops (subscriber link)
|
| 27 May 2009 |
Business Wire – Dailymotion Launches Support for Open Video Formats and Video HTML Tag
|
| 01 May 2009 |
Guysoft – Nokia N810 Running OLPC Sugar
|
| 29 Apr 2009 |
El Mercurio – Así se vivió la fiesta del software libre
|
| 27 Apr 2009 |
ostatic – Sugar on a Stick: Good for Kids' Minds (and School Budgets)
|
| 25 Apr 2009 |
Free Software Magazine – The Bittersweet Facts about OLPC and Sugar
|
| 24 Apr 2009 |
ars technica – First taste: Sugar on a Stick learning platform
|
| 22 Apr 2009 |
Betanews – Beta of Live USB Sugar OS opens
|
| 27 Mar 2009 |
Mass High Tech – Google promotes summer open-source internships
|
| 18 Mar 2009 |
Metropolis – A Good Argument
|
| 16 Mar 2009 |
Laptop Magazine – Sugar Labs’ New Version of Sugar Learning Platform Is Netbook and PC Ready
|
| 16 Mar 2009 |
Market Watch – Sugar Labs Nonprofit Announces New Version of Sugar Learning Platform for Children, Runs on Netbooks and PCs
|
| 14 Feb 2009 |
OLPC Learning Club – DC – Learning Learning on a Stick
|
| 05 Feb 2009 |
xconomy – Sugar Beyond the XO Laptop: Walter Bender on OLPC, Sucrose 0.84, and “Sugar on a Stick”
|
| 26 Jan 2009 |
Linus Magazine – Sugar Defies OLPC Cutbacks
|
| 19 Jan 2009 |
Feeding the Penguins – The status of Sugar, post-OLPC
|
| 16 Jan 2009 |
OLPC News – Sugar on Acer Aspire One & Thin Client via LTSP
|
| 12 Jan 2009 |
Bill Kerr – thoughts about olpc cutbacks
|
| 07 Jan 2009 |
ars technica – OLPC downsizes half of its staff, cuts Sugar development
|
| 06 Jan 2009 |
OLPC News – An Inside Look at how Microsoft got XP on the XO
|
| 30 Dec 2008 |
OLPC News – Sugar Labs Status at Six Months
|
| 22 Dec 2008 |
The GNOME Project – Sugar Labs, the nonprofit behind the OLPC software, is joining the GNOME Foundation
|
| 16 Dec 2008 |
Feeding the Penguins – Sugar git repository change
|
| 14 Dec 2008 |
NPR – Laptop Deal Links Rural Peru To Opportunity, Risk (Part 2)
|
| 13 Dec 2008 |
NPR – Laptops May Change The Way Rural Peru Learns (Part 1)
|
| 09 Dec 2008 |
SFC – Sugar Labs joins Conservancy
|
| 31 Oct 2008 |
Linux Devices – An OLPC dilemma: Linux or Windows?
|
| 10 Oct 2008 |
Feeding the Penguin – Sugar on Ubuntu
|
| 21 Sep 2008 |
Groklaw – Interview with Walter Bender of Sugar Labs
|
| 17 Sep 2008 |
Bill Kerr – Sugar Labs
|
| 16 Sep 2008 |
Open Source – Sugar everywhere
|
| 28 Aug 2008 |
OLPC News – An answer to Walter Bender's question 22
|
| 20 Aug 2008 |
OLPC News – Sugarize it: Intel Classmate 2
|
| 08 Aug 2008 |
Investor's Business Daily – 'Learning' Vs. Laptop Was Issue
|
| 06 Aug 2008 |
OLPC News – Twenty-three Questions on Technology and Education
|
| 18 Jul 2008 |
Bill Kerr – evaluating Sugar in the developed world
|
| 28 Jun 2008 |
OLPC News – A Cutting Edge Sugar User Interface Demo
|
| 18 Jun 2008 |
PC World – OLPC Spin-off Developing UI for Intel's Classmate PC
|
| 17 Jun 2008 |
Datamation – If Business Succeeds with GNU/Linux, Why Not OLPC?
|
| 11 Jun 2008 |
LinuxInsider – The Sweetness of Collaborative Learning
|
| 06 Jun 2008 |
Bill Kerr – untangling Free, Sugar, and Constructionism
|
| 06 Jun 2008 |
Open Education – Walter Bender Discusses Sugar Labs Foundation
|
| 06 Jun 2008 |
BusinessWeek – OLPC: The Educational Philosophy Controversy
|
| 05 Jun 2008 |
Code Culture – The Distraction Machine
|
| 05 Jun 2008 |
BusinessWeek – OLPC: The Open-Source Controversy
|
| 27 May 2008 |
The New York Times – Why Walter Bender Left One Laptop Per Child
|
| 26 May 2008 |
ars technica – OLPC software maker splits from X0 hardware, goes solo
|
| 22 May 2008 |
BetaNews – Linux start-up Sugar Labs in informal talks with four laptop makers
|
| 16 May 2008 |
OSTATIC – OLPC's Open Source Sugar Platform Aims for New Hardware
|
| 16 May 2008 |
PCWorld – Bender Forms Group to Promote OLPC's Sugar UI
|
| 16 May 2008 |
MHT – Bender jumps from OLPC, founds Sugar Labs
|
| 16 May 2008 |
News.com – Sugar Labs will make OLPC interface available for Eee PC, others
|
| 16 May 2008 |
Feeding the Peguins – The future of Sugar
|
| 16 May 2008 |
Sugar list – A few thoughts on SugarLabs
|
| 16 May 2008 |
xconomy – Bender Creates Sugar Labs—New Foundation to Adapt OLPC’s Laptop Interface for Other Machines
|
| 16 May 2008 |
BBC – '$100 laptop' platform moves on
|
| 15 May 2008 |
OLPC wiki – Dual-boot XO Claim: OLPC will not work to port Sugar to Windows.
|
| 16 May 2008 |
Softpedia – Bender Launches Sugar Labs for Better Development of OLPC's Sugar UI
|
Press releases
See our Press Page
