Usability and look-and-feel (was Re: [squeak-dev] The future of Squeak & Pharo (was Re: [Pharo-project] [ANN] Pharo MIT license clean))

Rita Freudenberg rita at isg.cs.uni-magdeburg.de
Wed Jul 1 10:36:11 UTC 2009


Ryan Simmons wrote:
> I some ways I agree with Ramon, that Squeak should become more aimed
> at developers.
>
> I do however feel that education is very important I was especially
> impressed by Dr. Geo II.
> I feel that EToys, Dr. Geo etc  should become applications that can be
> loaded in very much like Seaside can be loaded into a variety of
> smalltalks.
>
> I will probably not be too popular for saying the following, but I
> fail to see how EToys helps to teach children the use of smalltalk,
> (and hence why I am confused that so many feel that it should be part
> of Squeak) if it is there to help teach programming concepts to
> children then I would also have to say that Scratch seems to be a much
> better tool for doing this.
>   

When I'm building Etoys scripts with teachers and I show them the option 
in a scriptor "show code textually" they are surprised and interested.  
Because for kids/students, who are eager to learn more that's a way to 
show them what is "under the hood".  You can even go all the way to the 
class browser and look for your etoys objects and scripts. That's not 
really easy at the moment, but I think that is something worth to work 
on! We have BotsInc, too, as a learning tool of how to use the squeak 
environment. What we need are ideas about how to better integrate these 
parts. And of course we need documentation, so that all the wonderful 
features of Squeak are accessible.

Rita
> 2009/7/1 Stéphane Rollandin <lecteur at zogotounga.net>:
>   
>>> +10
>>>
>>> Seriously, stop talking about kids, who cares, I'll be retired by the
>>> time they're useful.  Programming languages are tools that are
>>> primarily used by and useful for adults, they should be aimed at
>>> adults.
>>>       
>> Man, do you realize what you wrote here is incredibly out of place ? This is
>> Squeak-dev here, Squeak has been involved with education and children since
>> its beginnings, we have EToys, Scratch, OLPC. My own children use it. If you
>> want a cultural revolution, ok, but first gather your troops, and let us
>> count them.
>>
>> There's definitely a need to have everybody explicit their view of what it
>> Squeak, me repeat again... surprises could be ahead.
>>
>>
>> Stef
>>
>>
>>
>>     
>
>
>   


-- 
Rita Freudenberg
FIN-ISG
Otto-von-Guericke-Universität Magdeburg
http://isgwww.cs.uni-magdeburg.de/isg/rita.html




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