[squeakland] Where should I edit the Playfield INFO?

Tue Dec 8 11:04:17 EST 2009

Rita,

I am at work during the day and have the pager this week (24x7 support and
all) so I can't guarantee I can be available at any specific time.

Also I have no Microphone here at work, so all I can do is text chat during
day EST.

I will do my best to be on chat.squeaklnad.org at 3pm EST. And may send some
more emails to the list.

Couple of other thoughts on terms:

   - We could classify terms as:
      - *User Term* *(UT)*- common language term which describes the
      functionality of an object/thing. This Term should use word(s)
that can be
      easily mapped to common experiences (and mental models of an 8
year old. If
      anyone has a reference to such terms and mental models that
would be great
      ;)
      - *Etoys Terms de Art (ET)*- Etoys/Squeak/OO Programming terms that
      are useful when experts talk. These terms should NOT be used in public
   - *Some examples:*
      - *Example 1:*
         - *UT: Viewer Category *- this describes items such as those found
         at http://en.flossmanuals.net/bin/view/Etoys/TilesMorph?topic=Tilesin
particular the item with the fuzzy picture ;) (FYI, great idea on auto
         capturing the images in png, also like the naming convention,
thanks it will
         save me a lot of effort)
         - *ET:* *Tile* - describes (I am guessing here) the underlying
         object used to create this object.
      - We should also have a list of terms that helps people to
translate *Terms
   of Art *<==> *UT's*

Lastly no need for apologies (but I do apreciate the concern :)
Stephen

On Tue, Dec 8, 2009 at 10:18 AM, Rita Freudenberg <
rita at isg.cs.uni-magdeburg.de> wrote:

> Hi Steve,
>
> do you have time to join our audio chat today at 3 pm EST? Or when would
> you have time for a quick chat, audio or irc? Some of your questions have
> been discussed yesterday, others are on the agenda today.
>
> I apologize for not explaining our writing rules and outline better. And
> with your questions you identified important issues!
>
>
> On Dec 8, 2009, at 3:47 AM, Steve Thomas wrote:
>
> I started editing the Playfield here:
> http://en.flossmanuals.net/bin/view/Etoys/TilesPlayfield
> Then found another spot (which answered my questions on mouse x and y)
> here: http://en.flossmanuals.net/bin/view/Etoys/Tiles
>
>
> Which version should we keep?
>
>
> I already copied your text into the objects chapter. There we will describe
> all the objects you can find in the supplies bin.
>
>
> Also Why is Playfield called a "Tile" wouldn't a better term be Object.
>
>
> This is a misunderstanding, I should have said it more clearly at the
> beginning of the chapter. In Tiles we will describe the tiles of an object.
> So we do not call playfield a tile, but will describe the tiles, which are
> special for playfields, in the tiles chapter (where we will describe every
> tile within Etoys).
> We do have a list with every tile extracted from within Etoys, so we know
> we will not forget one. But I just broke it down into several chapters to
> enable simultaneous editing. It will be re-organised later. We will probably
> end up with a chapter called "tiles" (or something like that), in which a
> user can find a description for every tile, and we still have to decide on
> the order. For now, the idea is to organize it according to the appearance
> in Etoys, e.g. sub-chapters for viewer-categories and then one or more
> sub-chapters for special tiles for special objects (thats where the
> playfield tiles would appear.)
>
> Thank you for sending your mails to the list!
>
>
> Below is an excerpt on my chat with Bert and Scott regarding Etoys Terms:
>
> <mrsteve> Can someone help me distinguish/define the following terms in an
> Etoys context . . .
> <mrsteve> Object, Tile and Morph
> <bertf> An object is what you create in Etoys by painting or from the
> supplies flap. or more generally, anything you can get a halo on and script
> - so everything you see in Etoys.  A tile is what you put in a script,
> usually commands., but  referneces and expressions are tiles too. Morph is
> not really used on the user level, it's an implementation detail.
> <scottwal> "Morph" is any graphical object; it's an internal term which
> unfortunately has leaked out into some of the documentation.   Some morphs
> are "simple" (e.g. a SketchMorph really is simply a bitmap) but most are
> nested structures consisting of submorphs which themselves consist of
> further submorphs, etc.    Thus, for example, a "RecordingControlsMorph"
> consists of a total of 75 parts, each of them a Morph in its own right.
> <scottwal> As bert wrote (btw what are you doing writing documentation at
> 3 am, bert?!) "morph" isn't really used (or at least *shouldn't* be used) in
> user documentation.
> <mrsteve> Got it!
> <mrsteve> Just to reguritate and test my understanding . . .
> <mrsteve> Morph is an internal squeak/smalltalk term of art that should be
> put back in the closet and kept there (action Item, make sure its NOT in the
> documentation)
> <bertf> scottwal: not really, just reading a bit more before going to
> sleep
> <scottwal> bertf:  :-)
> <mrsteve> So distinguish Player for me from Object
> <scottwal> heh heh
> <mrsteve> Also in the "collections" category for Playfield/Holder there
> are references to: "first element" and "player at cursor"
> <mrsteve> Why not "first player" and "player at cursor"
> <scottwal> good point ;-)
> <mrsteve> okay so part of facilitating understanding is to define terms
> <scottwal> One could argue that Player is also an internal term, from the
> standpoint of our users, but it does occur here and here in the UI such as
> "player at cursor"...
> <mrsteve> Is there some Standard reference of terms?
> <scottwal> :-(
> <bertf> as Scott said, Player is another internal term. An Object is
> really a Player + a Morph. The morph being the visible thing and the player
> defining the Etoys behavior
> <bertf> mrsteve: that's one reason we need a reference manual, to define
> our terms
> <mrsteve> :)
>
>
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>
>
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