squeakland February 2004

squeakland@lists.squeakfoundation.org

29 participants
36 discussions

drive-a-car newbie questions
by Randy Heiland 01 Mar '04

01 Mar '04

Hello, I'm going to swallow my pride and ask the list... I just finished the drive-a-car (Proj 2) in "Powerful Ideas..." and at the end, after I've built the script to have the car turn in circles, I see the "Challenge" sidebar with the various geometric shapes. But I have no idea how to make a simple square. I don't believe I've learned anything up to this point that tells me how to "stop after traveling distance X" (so I can change my heading). The geometric shapes would seem to involve conditionals. Please enlighten this "professional" programmer :) Related, is there a searchable archive for the Squeakland list? (I found the raw archive) Also, just some newbie feedback, the term "forward by N" seems a bit confusing. It really is "speed", isn't it? And if so, wouldn't every 1st-grader on understand the concept of speed? thanks, Randy

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Charles Stark Draper Prize
by Mankovsky, Sheine 29 Feb '04

29 Feb '04

I sent this note somewhere into cyberspace in error: I was extremely pleased to read about the acknowledgement given to Alan and his colleagues for their work. It has been both a privilege and a personal joy to participate in extending its benefits to children in the Toronto District School Board (www.tdsb.on.ca). While I was sad to hear from Kim recently that Professor Yahiko Kambayashi had passed away, it seems fitting to include him in this picture. He left a noteworthy legacy for us and for all our children for generations into the future through the work he did to make learning opportunities like Squeak available to children in Japan. Congratulations again, Alan, for real achievements and for achievements still imagined. Sheine Mankovsky Trustee, Ward 5 Toronto District School Board "The very essence of the creative is its novelty, hence we have no standard by which to judge it." -Carl R. Rogers

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Favorite quote from radio interview
by Aaron Lanterman 29 Feb '04

29 Feb '04

> > archived later at this url: > > http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2004/Feb/hour1_022704.html > > I just was able to listen to it. > > RealMedia: > http://www.npr.org/dmg/dmg.php?prgCode=TOTN&showDate=27-Feb-2004&segNum=2&m… My favorite quote from that (I'm not quoting it exactly, it's as close as I remember though): "The managers at Xerox would say 'if this is so great,' why isn't IBM working on it?" (not sure who said that - it wasn't Alan, but one of the other interviewees) - Aaron ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. Aaron Lanterman, Asst. Prof. Voice: 404-385-2548 School of Electrical and Comp. Eng. Fax: 404-894-8363 Georgia Institute of Technology E-mail: lanterma(a)ece.gatech.edu Mail Code 0250 Web: users.ece.gatech.edu/~lanterma Atlanta, GA 30332 Office: GCATT 334B

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RE: [Squeakland] Favorite quote from radio interview
by Mankovsky, Sheine 29 Feb '04

29 Feb '04

I was very interested in the commentary on the use/non-use of computers in education. The Maine project is an excellent example of what can be done when the public sector supports kids. Hope that part of the discussion encourages some conversations. I haven't been following the development of the US national technology plan. Anything interesting happening there? Cheers. Sheine > -----Original Message----- > From: squeakland-bounces(a)squeakland.org > [SMTP:squeakland-bounces@squeakland.org] On Behalf Of Aaron Lanterman > Sent: Saturday, February 28, 2004 2:47 PM > To: squeakland(a)squeakland.org > Subject: [Squeakland] Favorite quote from radio interview > > > > > archived later at this url: > > > http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2004/Feb/hour1_022704.html > > > > I just was able to listen to it. > > > > RealMedia: > > > http://www.npr.org/dmg/dmg.php?prgCode=TOTN&showDate=27-Feb-2004&segNum=2& > mediaPref=RM > > My favorite quote from that (I'm not quoting it exactly, it's as close as > I remember though): > > "The managers at Xerox would say 'if this is so great,' why isn't IBM > working on it?" > > (not sure who said that - it wasn't Alan, but one of the other > interviewees) > > - Aaron > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > --- > > Dr. Aaron Lanterman, Asst. Prof. Voice: 404-385-2548 > School of Electrical and Comp. Eng. Fax: 404-894-8363 > Georgia Institute of Technology E-mail: lanterma(a)ece.gatech.edu > Mail Code 0250 Web: > users.ece.gatech.edu/~lanterma > Atlanta, GA 30332 Office: GCATT 334B > > _______________________________________________ > Squeakland mailing list > Squeakland(a)squeakland.org > http://squeakland.org/mailman/listinfo/squeakland

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Re: [Squeakland] Alan Kay on NPR/"Science Friday"
by Thomas Oeding 28 Feb '04

28 Feb '04

Forward for Ned Konz <ned(a)bike-nomad.com>: On Friday 27 February 2004 1:20 pm, Kim Rose wrote: > Thanks to a colleague in Boston, I learned Alan appeared on NPR's > Radio "Science Friday" today. It looks like the segment *will* be > archived later at this url: > > > http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2004/Feb/hour1_022704.html I just was able to listen to it. RealMedia: http://www.npr.org/dmg/dmg.php?prgCode=TOTN&showDate=27-Feb-2004&segNum=2&m… -- Ned Konz http://bike-nomad.com GPG key ID: BEEA7EFE

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Alan Kay on NPR/"Science Friday"
by Kim Rose 27 Feb '04

27 Feb '04

Thanks to a colleague in Boston, I learned Alan appeared on NPR's Radio "Science Friday" today. It looks like the segment *will* be archived later at this url: http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2004/Feb/hour1_022704.html Kim

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collaborative uses
by Randy Heiland 27 Feb '04

27 Feb '04

Hello, I was just curious if there are any existing collaborative possibilities with Squeak? This is a very open-ended question, I realize, but I'm interested in any/all aspects of it. Well, I'm not into multiuser gaming. I am curious about the possibility of squeakers being able to, say, obtain/display data from online instruments. Or being able to build up a regional/national database of (local) measurements - similar to the "plot of temperatures" figure in Alan Kay's "Computers, Networks and Education" paper? More on the tech side, are protocols such as XML-RPC supported in Squeak? thanks, Randy

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Re: [Squeakland] collaborative uses
by Thomas Oeding 26 Feb '04

26 Feb '04

Forward for Ned Konz <ned(a)bike-nomad.com>: On Tuesday 24 February 2004 6:14 am, Randy Heiland wrote: > I was just curious if there are any existing collaborative possibilities > with Squeak? This is a very open-ended question, I realize, but I'm > interested in any/all aspects of it. Well, I'm not into multiuser > gaming. I am curious about the possibility of squeakers being able to, > say, obtain/display data from online instruments. Or being able to > build up a regional/national database of (local) measurements - similar > to the "plot of temperatures" figure in Alan Kay's "Computers, Networks > and Education" paper? I am interested in this too. To this end, I wrote a Squeak plugin for the Spread group communications system (http://www.spread.org) ; you can get it from: http://map1.squeakfoundation.org/sm/package/f58f6558-ad7d-4a0a-b16b-6039a17… Right now there is only the code for Unix systems (it works for me under Linux); it should be simple to port to other systems. We will probably use this in the Microship project (http://microship.com) to make a distributed network of I/O points (sensors and actuators), as well as voice, video, etc. feeds across a network of boats. Spread is very easy to use from Squeak. The idea is that a program subscribes to one or more 'groups' by name, and then it sees all the messages sent to that group (which can include messages when other programs join or leave the group). The messages can be arbitrary data, up to about 100K or so. So there needs to be a layer on top of Spread to do the actual handling of the messages, but it's really easy to use. > More on the tech side, are protocols such as XML-RPC supported in > Squeak? Yes, there have been several such packages made. http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/1399 http://bleu.west.spy.net/~dustin/projects/smalltalk-xmlrpc.xtp http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/2288 http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/2694 http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/2926 -- Ned Konz http://bike-nomad.com GPG key ID: BEEA7EFE

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Demo'd Squeak for preschoolers
by Jen A 26 Feb '04

26 Feb '04

Someone suggested that I share this experience: I recently had a 5 minute "what I do for a living" presentation at my daughter's preschool. I'm a programmer and heard about Squeak through another mailing list where I had asked for suggestions on what I should do to explain my job. I loved the program and showed it to my daughter as soon as I could. She's only 4 but she liked the animations that the kids had done on the site. I did about a two minute demo of a simple hand-drawn bunny and mouse that bounced, moved in a line, moved in a circle around the screen and they loved it. I was a little worried with how impressed they would be considering the level of animation in today's video games but they didn't seem to care. When I have time, I'd love to learn more about how to program some more complex things. It's even fun for adults! Thanks, Jen __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Get better spam protection with Yahoo! Mail. http://antispam.yahoo.com/tools

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Alan Kay awarded Charles Stark Draper Prize!
by Kim Rose 25 Feb '04

25 Feb '04

Dear Squeaklanders, Greetings from Washington DC! I'm delighted to share this wonderful news. Please see the Squeakland site home page or go directly here for more details: http://www.squeakland.org/images/news/html/draperprz.htm Don't miss reading Alan's article/speech "The Power of the Context" found here: http://www.squeakland.org/school/HTML/draper/index.htm cheers, Kim

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squeakland February 2004