Am Sonntag, 25.05.03 um 07:41 Uhr schrieb Christopher Sawtell (by way of Christopher Sawtell csawtell@paradise.net.nz):

On Tue, 20 May 2003 03:20, Naala Brewer wrote:

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Hi everyone,

What is the best current squeak image to use to create new projects and/or interactive exploratory scaffolding?

I use this one on Linux. chris@liberty chris $ squeak -version 3.4-1 #1 XShm Thu Mar 13 22:24:42 NZDT 2003 gcc 3.2.1 Squeak3.4 of 1 March 2003 [latest update: #5170] Linux liberty.localnet 2.4.20-xfs_pre6 #1 Sat Mar 8 20:42:23 NZDT 2003 i686 Pentium II (Deschutes) GenuineIntel GNU/Linux

It appears to work pretty well.

But this does not tell you anything about the image version, This is the virtual machine version (VM).

Squeak needs a VM to interface with the hardware.

To show the image version, use Cmd-Shift-W to bring up the World menu, choose "help..." and "about this system".

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Does the Squeakland plugin image now have the full capabilities that a Squeak image from "Squeak.Org" has?

Unfortunately not. I am aware that the beautiful TrueType variable font stuff is missing. There are probably other features which have been removed in the interests of image file size and simplicity for the tyro user, but I don't know what they are.

Actually, (almost?) no features have been removed. The Squeakland image is intended to provide a stable environment for non-expert users. Thus, not all the latest features of the main Squeak image have been incorporated.

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Or is it still best to create baseline lessons and explorations in a "Squeak.Org" Squeak image and then allow teachers/students/parents to create off-shoot projects using the internet and the plugin image?

No, the "Squeak.Org" Squeak image has more features than the plugin, so if you wish to share projects universally you have limit your projects to the plugin version. A most unfortunate limitation imho.

If there is something you specifically would like to see in the Squeakland image, just point it out in this list. Using the update mechanism it can rather easily be added which benefits all Squeakland users. Projects that you create after this inclusion can be shared without problems.

Regarding the TrueType font support: Yes, I vote for having that included. Unfortunately, not everyone has the same platform fonts installed. One way to solve this would be to include some free fonts with the image. Another way would be to embed all non-default fonts with your project, which might have legal problems when you distribute that project.

But adding some nice fonts to the image might suffice - what do you think? Incidentally, on the main Squeak list there was a discussion to include the Vera fonts (http://www.bitstream.com/categories/products/fonts/vera/) which were released for use in Open Source projects. I'm not sure how much larger the download would get when these were included.

-- Bert