On Sun, Aug 31, 2003 at 10:19:15PM -0000, leftie2100 wrote:
> Considering the supposed emphasis on using Squeak as a teaching tool,
> I guess I find these reasons to be a really poor excuse. What good is
> a great tool to the public as a whole if the only people who can use
> it are the developers?
> 
> The lead developers need to make development of good documentation
> just as central to releases as the code itself. Until they demand that
> documentation be completed and updated before software is released, it
> won't be. The lead developers need to take charge of the documentation
> process instead of allowing themselves to let others take this "chore"
> off their hands. The attitude I'm seeing here that the documentation
> is a necessary evil that must be "grinded out' sounds like it very
> well could be a significant part of the problem. Writing can be fun to
> do if you go about it in a light-hearted fashion and that type of
> writing also engages the reader.
> 
> Personally, I know a bit about writing, but I know nothing about
> programming.  I'm a programming newbie that would really like to learn
> Squeak, but I'm pretty much kept from doing that because of your
> current documentation situation. I read this list because I keep
> hoping I'll read some new focused learning resources have been
> created. So when I read that many feel "coding is fun, documentation
> is not" on the threads, it doesn't do much for my confidence that I'll
> ever get the chance to use Squeak.
> 
> If you guys really want to be the Squeak evangalists you seem to all
> claim you want to be, you're going to have to have a complete attitude
> change about things like complete centralized documentation and the
> creation of Squeak programming texts for those new to programming.

some sorces of information you might consider to check (in this order)

--------------------
[1]

Adele Goldberg: Smalltalk-80, The Language (Purple Book)

not very funny, but convers the basics:
+ the language.
+ the fundamental classes one should be aware of (Numbers, Collections, ...)
  these things are there treated quite in detail. Those things are taken
  seriously there.

Without this knowledge I would not be able to appreciate the Squeak
(or any Smalltalk) appropriately.

Try everything directly in Squeak. Look at the class comments.

- You might perhaps consider to skip the following:
  - graphics (Squeak does the things differently)
  - Smalltalk implementation (byte code, object memory, virtual machine).
--------------------
[2]

Mark Guzdial wrote two books directly about Squeak. The draft of one
can be find here:

http://www.iam.unibe.ch/~ducasse/WebPages/FreeBooks/GuzdialBookDrafts/

The first and the second chapters are very good.
--------------------
[3]

Now, look at the wiki:

http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/

Try to find out what is there. It contains various stuff targeting
on the particular problems. Here

faq

	http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/471

documentation:

	http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/2983

documentation/morphic

	http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/30

documentation/howto

	http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/666

The button `Search' works also.

Find the information, try out the demos. If there is is something what
does not work - annonce it or repair or improve it directly if you
are sure that you are right.

If you find out something usefull and it is not already there - add it.

Next try to look at various packages registered on squeakmap. If the
author meant its creation seriously, there is usually some information
about it.

- it either has separate web-page which may help you to start up.
- and/or there is "documentation" in the code (for example PlotMorph
  contains `example*' class methods which shows how to use the stuff.
--------------------
VisualWorks contains also some usefull stuff. There some "lessons"
you might want to review. There are various pdf file but mostly
VW specific.

Help / Lessons Browser
--------------------
Other stuff:

(various links - I didn't diged through everything)

http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/377

(table layout tutorial)
http://map1.squeakfoundation.org/sm/package/9adc070c-3155-4d6b-ae1b-50f7f85b38bb

(looks very well)
http://www.iam.unibe.ch/~ducasse/WebPages/FreeBooks.html

(very interesting)
http://www.squeakland.org/school/HTML/essays/essays.html

(hm and perhaps also this one)
http://www.squeakland.org/sqmedia/books/squeakerbooks.html

(HC)
http://users.ipa.net/~dwighth/smalltalk/bluebook/bluebook_imp_toc.html
--------------------
What do you want Squeak to use for? What information are you missing?
--
Matej Kosik <http://altair.dsc.elf.stuba.sk/~kosik>
ICQ: 300133844