etoys-dev December 2011

etoys-dev@lists.squeakfoundation.org

13 participants
10 discussions

bug with variable types
by Markus Schlager 26 Dec '11

26 Dec '11

Hi all, Attached a screenshot of a typical problem several of my pupils ran into recently: - create a variable (partner) - create a script using this variable (script1) - change the value type of the variable (e.g player instead of number) - run the script I think at least a warning should appear in case a user tries to change the type of a variable used already within any script. Wishlist: show also a list of all scripts the variable is being used in. Markus

1 0

learning algorithms and programming
by Ralph Boland 26 Dec '11

26 Dec '11

I want to develop a system for teaching various algorithms that students learn starting from primary school all the way to high school and perhaps even into university. For this I need a core system and for each algorithm an application layer on top of the core needs to be written. The idea is the the student first solves the problem by hand, then implements low level components of the algorithm into procedures and then is able to solve the problem more quickly by invoking these procedures by hand. Then these procedures can be combined into higher level procedures that the student can use to solve the problem even more quickly. Eventually the the entire algorithm is implemented into a top level procedure that the student can invoke. Thus the student learns all the steps of the algorithm (since (s)he initially does them by hand but also combines them into procedures that can be called but the student also learns programming at a basic level. It is noteworthy that once the student has partially implemented the algorithm (s)he is able to solve large instances of the problem by using the procedures already implemented. For example, a student learning long division could compute 91935 / 45 more easily after implementing subtraction and multiplication of a number by a single digit. The student could then do the division even faster by implementing a procedure that combines subtraction and multiplication of a number by a single digit. And so on. Algorithms I am interested in implementing include multiplication, long division, simplifying fractions. and simple linear algebra. I am also interested in Chemistry/Physics and university level algorithms. For example Gaussian elimination and the simplex method could be taught this way. OK so where does EToys fit in? Well, I don't want to implement this utility from scratch. But EToys, Scratch, and BYOB/Snap all implement aspects of what I need already. Scratch looks like a better fit than EToys and BYOB/Snap looks even better (has procedures and recursion (recursion is useful for simplifying fractions for example)). Unfortunately for me, Scratch is being ported to Flash and Snap is being rewritten in Javascript but I very much want to continue working in Smalltalk. A version of Scratch has been ported to Pharo but the porters suggest that the best thing to do is rewrite Scratch from scratch since it is so poorly written. So my question is: Would it be better to use the core of EToys to build my system. For that matter, if I wanted to re-implement Scratch should I not use the core of EToys to base it on? This probably means that EToys would need to be re-factored to some extent so that a core could be separated from the "EToys Application". In fact, I might need a Scratch/Snap core that goes on top of EToys core. For that matter should not EToys and Scratch already have been written with a common core? For those of you familiar with the Enchanting project (which allows programming of the Legos Mindstorms robot using a version of Scratch) I would also want to be able to base Enchanting on the core of EToys. By the way Enchanting is an example of where a web based version of Scratch is not going to work so it looks like Enchanting developers will have to maintain their version of Scratch. So what should my plan be? Regards, Ralph Boland

3 2

Codea on iPad
by Lawson English 24 Dec '11

24 Dec '11

OK, why don't we have this for squeak/etoys? http://twolivesleft.com/Codea/ L

3 2

Re: [etoys-dev] Please add my iPad UDID to the testing profile
by Bert Freudenberg 14 Dec '11

14 Dec '11

On 13.12.2011, at 22:08, Richard Applebaum wrote: > No luck with anything so far... > > Downloaded app won't install. Interesting. Did you try tapping those two install links on your iPad? http://etoys.squeak.org/experimental/ipad/ So far we've only had installation issues with the iTunes method, not when installed directly on the iPad over Wifi. I have not tried it on iOS 5 yet - anybody else? > Compiled source won't run. Yes, I have trouble compiling a working version myself. A lot has changed in XCode. - Bert -

2 2

Regarding project-specific translations
by Séverin Lemaignan 14 Dec '11

14 Dec '11

Hello, (First, sorry if this question has been already answered: I didn't find the answer in this mailing-list) I'm working on the SqueakBot project, which is getting closer and closer to the Physical Etoys project. We have a fair amount of strings that are specific to this project, and we try to currently support 3 languages (English, Spanish and French). Most (but not all) of these strings are in tiles. My current approach, consisting in exporting all the EToys .pot and completing the missing SqueakBot/Physical Etoys strings in the relevant .po files. As you can imagine, it's painful to maintain it synchronized with the official translations, and it forces us to redistribute the whole .po. So, I'm wondering if there's a better way to manage it, like a project specific .po file? I must say I've not yet dug into the translation system, but if an 'official' way to deal with it exist... Cheers, Severin

3 4

Please add my iPad UDID to the testing profile
by Richard Applebaum 13 Dec '11

13 Dec '11

I have 2 iPads I use for development: -- please add these UDIDs IPad 2 9648247fc959ff4db3e161483ac771573078bf50 iPad 1 b9e1dec0c2eabc50e516dce441b35ee0312ab21d

2 2

Please add my iPad UDID to the testing profile
by sheilafunk＠comcast.net 12 Dec '11

12 Dec '11

d944af2c82440fe56d4dd822d33264c7fab5614d Sent from Comcast mobile

2 1

Re: [etoys-dev] Stencils in Etoys
by Steve Thomas 02 Dec '11

02 Dec '11

Subbu, Thanks this is a lot of fun and useful. So I tried to use it for fractions (although I really like your art work project at Ofset <http://community.ofset.org/index.php/Grab_area_button>better, but I am thinking about fractions lately) I used the "do menu item | stencil a sketch" scripting tile in a "Mouse Down" script. The rectangle then moves forward by its width. So with a series of successive clicks you can make a fraction. It get's my vote for inclusion in the next release. Thanks, Stephen On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 10:02 PM, K. K. Subramaniam <kksubbu.ml(a)gmail.com>wrote: > Hi Steve, > > I have attached a patch to Morphic that adds three functions to 'extras...' > menu for any Morph. These enable anyone to quick convert an assembly of > morphs > into a sketch (e.g. a car assembled using rectangles and ellipses), use any > morph as a stencil to cut out a sketch from underlying screen area and to > create silhouette (shadow) sketch respectively. > > To use the patch, just drop it into Etoys and select "file it in". I would > appreciate it if you could use it and let me know if it is useful. If so, I > will send it to Etoys Inbox. > > Subbu >

3 12

ZOO Spooky Paint license
by karl ramberg 02 Dec '11

02 Dec '11

Hi Anybody know the license to this project ? http://languagegame.org:8888/zoo/241 I would like to work on a better paint system for Squeak / Etoys and this is a nice starting point. Karl

6 11

HELP - At Google Hackfest and need some quick code for a contest
by Steve Thomas 02 Dec '11

02 Dec '11

How can I call execute a shell script (ie: python script) from within Etoys. I am using the image export tools, and have a python script to upload the images from the book to Picasa and create a Google Doc, for comments and review. Quick piece of code would be great. Stephen

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etoys-dev December 2011