[etoys-dev] Re: What about shipping DrGeo in Etoys?

[Hilaire Fernandes]

David,

You brightly exposed the advantage to ship DrGeo directly into Etoys.
Not only it makes DrGeo really usable for the end users
(saving/loading project) but it also shows how Etoys is an open and
extensible microword framework. I found this last point important to
attract not only users but also developers.

Regarding loading/unloading DrGeo in Etoys I agree with you DrGeo
should be a loadable package in Etoys.

Hilaire

2009/8/21 David Corking <lists at dcorking.com>:
> +1
>
> DrGeo loads itself into the Object Catalog.  So distributing in the
> image is the most convenient thing for users - as they can include it
> in projects, and share them, without having to tell their fellow
> students "load DrGeo before loading my cool project".  (*)
>
> Kedama and Connectors are similarly useful construction kits for
> building projects.
>
> To be honest, I think DrGeo deserves to be in the Supplies flap.
> DrGeo isn't just for studying geometry: as I understand it, it is a
> flexible vector drawing tool, and I imagine there is a whole range of
> creative possibilities that come with that.
>
> It is 300 kilobytes on disk.  Is Etoys size on disk or memory
> consumption a problem for distributors?  Is there room for it on small
> Sugar sticks and on the XO, or will it push something else out ?   I
> can imagine it being difficult to fit on handheld devices like iPod
> Touch, Android phones or Nokia N800.  Even though Etoys doesn't work
> any of those places yet, I think a feature request for the future
> should be a way to make sure bigger tools like Kedama, Connectors and
> DrGeo can be unloaded before distribution.
>
> David
>
> * I found that it is easy to save DrGeo in a project, but it makes
> each new project file over 300 kB on disk.  It is easy to accidentally
> make a project file that depends on DrGeo but does not include it.  It
> is a bad experience to open a project file with DrGeo dependencies, as
> the dialog message is not helpful to the inexperienced user:  "Reading
> an instance of DrGCurveCostumeStyle. Which modern class should it
> translate to?"   If DrGeo is distributed in the Etoys image, all these
> troubles are avoided, though a problem of backward compatibility is
> introduced.
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-- 
http://blog.ofset.org/hilaire