User talk:Davewa: Difference between revisions
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I'm a fan of the activity myself :) I note via olpcn you're finding development frustrating -- I'd like to know more about what in particular troubles you, particularly with internationalization. I take it you haven't used gettext before for the i18n part... that's the toolchain you want to use to generate pot files that can be localized by others (see [[pootle]] for more). --[[User:Sj|Sj]] [[User talk:Sj|<font style="color:#f70; font-size:70%">talk</font>]] 17:53, 24 April 2008 (EDT) |
I'm a fan of the activity myself :) I note via olpcn you're finding development frustrating -- I'd like to know more about what in particular troubles you, particularly with internationalization. I take it you haven't used gettext before for the i18n part... that's the toolchain you want to use to generate pot files that can be localized by others (see [[pootle]] for more). --[[User:Sj|Sj]] [[User talk:Sj|<font style="color:#f70; font-size:70%">talk</font>]] 17:53, 24 April 2008 (EDT) |
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== tweezers & tutorials == |
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Hi, Sj! |
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Thanks for the tweezers suggestion - I've added those to the list. (Feel free to edit it, and any other wiki page, directly as well!) |
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I'm new to just about everything with respect to the XO -- I used UNIX (BSD 4.2) back in the 1980s, but I've never had a Linux box before. Python is a programming language I'd never even heard of until I got into 3D modeling as a hobby (it's used as the scripting language in Poser and Blender) but I'd never written in it or even looked at Python code until last December. I've never had to do any actual i18n and I'm only vaguely aware of what's what in that area. Therefore, I have a really steep learning curve. |
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The developer tutorials are getting done more slowly than I'd like - I've been asked to focus on grassroots stuff for my internship (rather than development/tutorials). I'm going to try to start clearing weekend and evening time to work on them; your message was a big motivator that reminded me that they'd be helpful and I should do them. Keep in mind I'm new to all this stuff as well, so I don't necessarily know "best practices" - I'm just writing down the things I find that work for me, hopefully in a format useful to other people. |
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Professionally, I program applications for Windows in C++ using the Microsoft Foundation Classes GUI library and in Java using the swing GUI. I'm chief architect and primary developer for a million-line project and I've got nearly 40 years experience as a programmer and hardware designer. I was deeply involved in the Heathkit Users Group community in the 1975 - 1985 period, contributing newsletter articles and programs. |
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I want to help develop activities for the XO, but I came in in the middle of the third act. The wiki is really hard to use as a learning tool -- it's not organized and a lot of the information seems to be either outdated or proposals for things that are either abandoned or yet to be developed. I find more useful tidbits by clicking on the "random page" link than I do by running down a chain of pages in what appears to be a logical order. |
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== A fresh start == |
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The "beyond hello world" page was really helpful, as was the handbook from OLPC Australia and the article from IBM. But I've yet to find out what an Activity class *is*, for example. Yes, I found the PyDoc pages, so I know what the class's methods ARE. But I don't know what that MEANS. I got my code going by careening off of bugs, not by designing working code. |
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Your frustration with the on-going lack of API documentation is well documented! We have a chance to do things a bit differently at Sugar Labs--I hope you'll persevere and perhaps serve as the leader of the community's "API Documentation Review" process. (StarChart has been a big hit in Peru, BTW.) --[[User:Walter|Walter]] 17:31, 18 May 2008 (EDT) |
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It's been a real struggle, partly because I had to learn Python as I went, partly because I had to learn GTK as I went but mostly because I had to learn the Activity paradigm by trial and error. Example: I was completely surprised when I finally managed to group my options controls into toolbars to discover that rather than having a set of four rows of controls at the top of my screen I had one row of controls and four tabs. Because NOWHERE did anything say that that was the consequence of a call to ActivityToolbox.add_toolbar(). "What it is" is not the same kind of documentation as "what it does" which is not the same as "when and how to use" -- if you're going to do an open project and expect outsiders to be productive contributors, you need to have all three kinds of documents. (And also "where to find"!) |
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== Semantic Mediawiki and the edits to StarChart page == |
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With respect to i18n -- would it really be that hard to provide an example of developing an internationalized version of "hello world" with the whole i18n infrastructure in it (which means calls to gettext in the code, I guess, but also the changes in the activity subdirectory structure and the translation files)? And an explaination of which files the programmer provides and which ones are part of the l10n process? I think I know what strings in StarChart needs to be translated but I don't have anything to go by for setting up the structure needed for translation. |
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At the top of the page there is now an "edit with form" tab... using this form creates the "Activity Summary" that appears at the bottom of the page. I know its not pretty now, but the wiki admins are planning on using the info to make the pages uniform, prettier, and easier to search. I filled out the form for every activity on the wiki. Now its up to the admins to make it beautiful! ;-) --[[User:AuntiMame|AuntiMame]] 11:56 ET, 8 August 2008 |
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I'm sorry if I seem to come across as negative and needy. I really want to be able to help this project and about all I am qualified to do is write code. I am an amateur astronomer and have a good grounding in the physical sciences, so activities involving basic astronomy, physics, chemistry or electronics are things I can probably go off and write. I want these activities to be "good citizens" in the Sugar community -- Python as the implementation language and built to look like and work like they were supposed to run under Sugar, not simply Sugar-ized at the last minute. But I need some examples and a lesson plan to get up to speed. |
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Thanks for |
== Thanks for the headsup == |
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Mal-edits reverted. FYI, we're working on a [[Wiki gang]] and a counter-vandalism bot to address issues like this as they come up. Please check out the [[Wiki gang]] page if you're interested in getting involved. [[User:Sethwoodworth|Seth]] 19:58, 26 August 2008 (UTC) |
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== solitaire == |
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sweet! thanks for the info. btw, I've been doing a lot of work on the wiki (categorizing files that have been uploaded) and there appears to be some good programmer stuff here that is just buried.. I'm trying to collect links in the hopes that something might help you with StarChart. [[User:AuntiMame|AuntiMame]] 19:56, 3 September 2008 (UTC) |
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== notes from one wiki newbie to another == |
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here are some of the neat things I've learned about using wikis (and I still think of myself as a newbie too!) |
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To answer your questions: |
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# you can make any dang pages you want ;-D |
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# I thinks the naming structure you proposed is perfectly fine. It make a heck of a lot more sense than what some folks do! And, yes, all you need to do is type in wiki.laptop.org/go/StarChart/<name of new page> and you're ready to rumble. In fact, I've recently learned that you don't even need to put in the underscore. The wiki will do that for you! |
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# Anyone can upload anything. (I'm in the process of categorizing everything that's ever been uploaded to the wiki and believe-you-me, there is a lot of extraneous stuff!) There is a link in the left-side nav (down in the Toolbox section) for "Upload File". It'll take you here: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Special:Upload |
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Wiki Tricks I have recently learned: |
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* If you place <nowiki>~~~~</nowiki> (that's 4 tilde's) at the end of a post it will automagically add your username and the date/time. |
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* its really helpful if, when uploading files, you use a name that indicates the version of the activity. Also please put a description in the comment field. Pretty please with sugar on top? |
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* underscore in a page title is not needed (see #2 above) |
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* when typing something that the wiki wants to process (like a URL, or a category, or whatever) but that you just are typing for instruction-- if you place it in the <nowiki><nowiki></nowiki> <nowiki></nowiki></nowiki> (which, funnily enough you have to do to get the command to appear here!) tag it will be see but not processed. |
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[[User:AuntiMame|AuntiMame]] 18:40, 18 September 2008 (UTC) |
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== soul of a new machine == |
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nice reading group suggestion. :) I'll do my best to make it happen. [[User:Mchua|Mchua]] 21:49, 8 October 2008 (UTC) |
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Good book and an easy read! GS |
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== Thanks for the release notes edit == |
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Thanks a lot for catching that typo on the 8.2 release notes page! Really appreciate it. |
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[[User:Gregorio|Gregorio]] 19:34, 10 October 2008 (UTC) |
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== Adding Activities/Peru to StarChart worked for me == |
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Hey, I saw your comment on [[User_talk:Skierpage]]. I'm not sure what the problem is/was. Click [[StarChart]], click the [edit with form] tab, click the Activity group "Activities/Peru" checkbox, click [Show changes], click [Save Page]. It worked for me! Some day, I hope to streamline the forest of activity "badges", activity form with multiple activity versions, activity fragments, ... -- [[User:Skierpage|skierpage]] 00:04, 11 December 2008 (UTC) |
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== Mouse click event == |
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Have you tried dropping by #sugar on freenode and asking about the mouse-click event problem you are having? Just a suggestion. [[User:Cjl|cjl]] 18:34, 6 January 2009 (UTC) |
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: I really can't help you with that sort of question myself, which is why I suggest firing up an IRC client and navigating to #sugar on freenode. Lots of people that can help are hanging out there and talking sugar development all the time. BTW, I moved your comment to my talk page (instead of my user page). [[User:Cjl|cjl]] 19:38, 6 January 2009 (UTC) |
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== Kudos == |
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Just saw you XO Hospital work, great job, very useful and handy, thanks! [[User:Yamaplos|<sub>Yamaplos]] 07:24, 8 January 2009 (UTC) |
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== Wiki patrolling merit badge == |
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Thanks Dave, that IP has now been blocked. The nerve of them vandalizing the vandalism page :-) [[User:Cjl|cjl]] 23:45, 22 January 2009 (UTC) |
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== Ants in the [[Sugar]] bowl == |
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Don't underestimate your wizarding skills :-) It's not the '''mojo''' , it is the '''method'''. What you want to do for multiple intervening bad edits is to walk back through the History tab to the last good version and then hit the Edit tab. You get a warning that you are editing an old version of the page and that you will lose all edits made since then, which in this case is '''exactly''' the desired effect. [[User:Cjl|cjl]] 02:14, 8 May 2009 (UTC) |
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== Thanks for the hand == |
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Thanks for helping clean up the wiki today! --[[User:Sj|Sj]] [[User talk:Sj|<font style="color:#f70; font-size:70%">talk</font>]] 18:25, 27 September 2010 (UTC) |
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== Moving to ASLO == |
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Sorry to hear that your activities got lost in the shuffle to move Activities/All to activities.sugarlabs.org (ASLO). The reason for the move was to eliminate the confusion being caused by an unmaintained page. But it was never our intention to cause activities to disappear. |
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I hear that you have two concerns about using ASLO: IE compatibility and the fact that you don't think your activities are ready for release. In regard to the former, since ASLO is a fork of the Firefox plugin site, there are bound to be some problems. If you could file a ticket to report these problems on bugs.sugarlabs.org, we will try to address them (It is not our intention to be unfriendly to IE). In regard to the latter, ALSO supports the concept of experimental or unreleased projects. They will be searchable, but warn the potential user that the activity is not yet released. It requires an extra step by the user to download -- an ACK of the experimental nature of the activity. Would this be adequate to meet your needs? Regards. --[[User:Walter|Walter]] 16:56, 23 May 2011 (UTC) |
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Latest revision as of 16:56, 23 May 2011
I hope you enjoy browsing and want to stay. As a first step, you may wish to read our introduction.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask me at my talk page — I'm happy to help. Or, you can ask your question at the main talk page.
Here are some more resources to help you as you explore and contribute to our education project:
Finding your way around:
Need help?
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How you can help:
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Additional tips...
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Starcharting!
I'm a fan of the activity myself :) I note via olpcn you're finding development frustrating -- I'd like to know more about what in particular troubles you, particularly with internationalization. I take it you haven't used gettext before for the i18n part... that's the toolchain you want to use to generate pot files that can be localized by others (see pootle for more). --Sj talk 17:53, 24 April 2008 (EDT)
tweezers & tutorials
Thanks for the tweezers suggestion - I've added those to the list. (Feel free to edit it, and any other wiki page, directly as well!)
The developer tutorials are getting done more slowly than I'd like - I've been asked to focus on grassroots stuff for my internship (rather than development/tutorials). I'm going to try to start clearing weekend and evening time to work on them; your message was a big motivator that reminded me that they'd be helpful and I should do them. Keep in mind I'm new to all this stuff as well, so I don't necessarily know "best practices" - I'm just writing down the things I find that work for me, hopefully in a format useful to other people.
Mchua 11:04, 9 May 2008 (EDT)
A fresh start
Your frustration with the on-going lack of API documentation is well documented! We have a chance to do things a bit differently at Sugar Labs--I hope you'll persevere and perhaps serve as the leader of the community's "API Documentation Review" process. (StarChart has been a big hit in Peru, BTW.) --Walter 17:31, 18 May 2008 (EDT)
Semantic Mediawiki and the edits to StarChart page
At the top of the page there is now an "edit with form" tab... using this form creates the "Activity Summary" that appears at the bottom of the page. I know its not pretty now, but the wiki admins are planning on using the info to make the pages uniform, prettier, and easier to search. I filled out the form for every activity on the wiki. Now its up to the admins to make it beautiful! ;-) --AuntiMame 11:56 ET, 8 August 2008
Thanks for the headsup
Mal-edits reverted. FYI, we're working on a Wiki gang and a counter-vandalism bot to address issues like this as they come up. Please check out the Wiki gang page if you're interested in getting involved. Seth 19:58, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
solitaire
sweet! thanks for the info. btw, I've been doing a lot of work on the wiki (categorizing files that have been uploaded) and there appears to be some good programmer stuff here that is just buried.. I'm trying to collect links in the hopes that something might help you with StarChart. AuntiMame 19:56, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
notes from one wiki newbie to another
here are some of the neat things I've learned about using wikis (and I still think of myself as a newbie too!)
To answer your questions:
- you can make any dang pages you want ;-D
- I thinks the naming structure you proposed is perfectly fine. It make a heck of a lot more sense than what some folks do! And, yes, all you need to do is type in wiki.laptop.org/go/StarChart/<name of new page> and you're ready to rumble. In fact, I've recently learned that you don't even need to put in the underscore. The wiki will do that for you!
- Anyone can upload anything. (I'm in the process of categorizing everything that's ever been uploaded to the wiki and believe-you-me, there is a lot of extraneous stuff!) There is a link in the left-side nav (down in the Toolbox section) for "Upload File". It'll take you here: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Special:Upload
Wiki Tricks I have recently learned:
- If you place ~~~~ (that's 4 tilde's) at the end of a post it will automagically add your username and the date/time.
- its really helpful if, when uploading files, you use a name that indicates the version of the activity. Also please put a description in the comment field. Pretty please with sugar on top?
- underscore in a page title is not needed (see #2 above)
- when typing something that the wiki wants to process (like a URL, or a category, or whatever) but that you just are typing for instruction-- if you place it in the <nowiki> </nowiki> (which, funnily enough you have to do to get the command to appear here!) tag it will be see but not processed.
AuntiMame 18:40, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
soul of a new machine
nice reading group suggestion. :) I'll do my best to make it happen. Mchua 21:49, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
Good book and an easy read! GS
Thanks for the release notes edit
Thanks a lot for catching that typo on the 8.2 release notes page! Really appreciate it.
Gregorio 19:34, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
Adding Activities/Peru to StarChart worked for me
Hey, I saw your comment on User_talk:Skierpage. I'm not sure what the problem is/was. Click StarChart, click the [edit with form] tab, click the Activity group "Activities/Peru" checkbox, click [Show changes], click [Save Page]. It worked for me! Some day, I hope to streamline the forest of activity "badges", activity form with multiple activity versions, activity fragments, ... -- skierpage 00:04, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
Mouse click event
Have you tried dropping by #sugar on freenode and asking about the mouse-click event problem you are having? Just a suggestion. cjl 18:34, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
- I really can't help you with that sort of question myself, which is why I suggest firing up an IRC client and navigating to #sugar on freenode. Lots of people that can help are hanging out there and talking sugar development all the time. BTW, I moved your comment to my talk page (instead of my user page). cjl 19:38, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
Kudos
Just saw you XO Hospital work, great job, very useful and handy, thanks! <sub>Yamaplos 07:24, 8 January 2009 (UTC)
Wiki patrolling merit badge
Thanks Dave, that IP has now been blocked. The nerve of them vandalizing the vandalism page :-) cjl 23:45, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Ants in the Sugar bowl
Don't underestimate your wizarding skills :-) It's not the mojo , it is the method. What you want to do for multiple intervening bad edits is to walk back through the History tab to the last good version and then hit the Edit tab. You get a warning that you are editing an old version of the page and that you will lose all edits made since then, which in this case is exactly the desired effect. cjl 02:14, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the hand
Thanks for helping clean up the wiki today! --Sj talk 18:25, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
Moving to ASLO
Sorry to hear that your activities got lost in the shuffle to move Activities/All to activities.sugarlabs.org (ASLO). The reason for the move was to eliminate the confusion being caused by an unmaintained page. But it was never our intention to cause activities to disappear.
I hear that you have two concerns about using ASLO: IE compatibility and the fact that you don't think your activities are ready for release. In regard to the former, since ASLO is a fork of the Firefox plugin site, there are bound to be some problems. If you could file a ticket to report these problems on bugs.sugarlabs.org, we will try to address them (It is not our intention to be unfriendly to IE). In regard to the latter, ALSO supports the concept of experimental or unreleased projects. They will be searchable, but warn the potential user that the activity is not yet released. It requires an extra step by the user to download -- an ACK of the experimental nature of the activity. Would this be adequate to meet your needs? Regards. --Walter 16:56, 23 May 2011 (UTC)