Hi all,

I was a lurker last year and unfortunately real life got it in the way and
my Smalltalk interest waned while starting new work and whatnot.  My 

I bought some Smalltalk books off Amazon last year and it kindly informed me
today about Stéphane Ducasse's new book "Squeak: Learn Programming with
Robots. (http://smallwiki.unibe.ch/botsinc/ )"  I read the reviews and
searched the archives but it is not clear to me what exactly the book
covers.   I spent a lot of time with Lego Mindstorms and Brian Bagnall's
book "Core LEGO MINDSTORMS Programming: Unleash the Power of the Java
Platform" and it taught me a lot.  I also spent some time with the PPRK
(http://www.the-gadgeteer.com/review/palm_pilot_robot_kit_pprk_review).
Both have taught me a lot and help me understand the Java and robots.

I'm still very interested in understanding Smalltalk. What was not clear to
me was if Stephane's book has a real hardware platform to experiment with or
whether is it all virtual.  I also searched the archives and didn't see
anything recent about Mindstorms or any actual hardware platform.

Questions:

1) Is the "Squeak: Learn Programming with Robots" tied (or easily tied) to a
real robotics platform.  Is it tied to hardware or is there interest in
tying it to a experimental platform.

2) Is there anything recent with Squeak and a real hardware platform.  I
have Mindstorms and am interested in the new Vex Platform as well as doing
something from scratch.

3) I read the "Seeking Squeak Mentor" thread - anyone interested in
mentoring me in the robotics arena? (p.s. I'm in Albuquerque) and possibly
tying the lessons to hardware?


Best regards,
Paul


p.s. I just ordered Stephane's book from Amazon!