Sugar with sugar-jhbuild
One of the easiest ways to install Sugar is to use sugar-jhbuild.
Sugar-jhbuild will automatically download the latest of Sugar's dependencies as well as Sugar itself directly from their source repositories, rather than relying on source packages that may have become stale. Below are generic instructions on how to use sugar-jhbuild to get up and running with Sugar.
Compatible Platforms
sugar-jhbuild is quite demanding with regard to the packages and setup for the host Linux distribution. As a result there are only a few Linux Distributions which are known to work with it.
The installing Sugar wiki category collects the various articles which detail platform-specific considerations for installing Sugar.
On 32-bit Linux
As of 2007-12-13 the distributions known to be able to support sugar-jhbuild are:
- Fedora 7
- Ubuntu Feisty Fawn (or Greater).
- Gentoo (with a trivial work-around)
At the moment, a Fedora 7 install with sugar-jhbuild is probably the most "sure" approach to getting a working full-speed (non-emulated) working environment for developing on Sugar with the latest libraries and solid upgrade path. As most of the core developers are working on Fedora boxes with sugar-jhbuild it is the most likely environment to be supported and continue to receive support.
On 64-bit Linux
As of 2007-12-13 it is possible to build Sugar on 64-bit Linux with trivial workarounds/fixes. This has been confirmed on Gentoo amd64 and Debian Lenny (with the caveats below).
Sugar seems to be working on Debian Lenny (2007-11-05), though Python 2.5, even when installed, is not detected. Comment out the line jhbuild.commands.run('sanitycheck', config, []), line 95 of the file main.py, to get it to install.
Checkout sugar-jhbuild
In a suitable directory, execute
git-clone git://dev.laptop.org/sugar-jhbuild
Build sugar base system and its dependencies
Change directory and start the build.
cd sugar-jhbuild git-pull ./sugar-jhbuild update ./sugar-jhbuild build
For the base packages , you may be able to use the binary packages from your GNU distribution instead of building them from scratch. Check the Installing or Linux categories for specific distro info.
You may have some issues with penguintv on ubuntu, just inturupt the pull with a CTRL+C, open a shell, repeat the command manualy, and accept the certificate permanently.
Run Sugar
This command launches the Sugar emulator:
./sugar-jhbuild run
To exit the emulator, press Alt-Q.
Running multiple instances
To run multiple instances of sugar you can start it in the following way:
SUGAR_PROFILE=2 ./sugar-jhbuild run
Run an individual activity
Within the sugar shell (./sugar-jhbuild shell), this command launches an individual activity for testing (from the mailing list):
sugar-activity [bundle name]
Configure the mode and resolution of Sugar
You can make Sugar run in a window as well as specify a resolution. Within the sugar-jhbuild directory, backup, then edit the python program file sugar-emulator:
cp build/bin/sugar-emulator build/bin/sugar-emulator.backup nano build/bin/sugar-emulator
Find this piece of code:
cmd = [ 'Xephyr' ]
cmd.append(':%d' % display)
cmd.append('-ac')
if gtk.gdk.screen_width() < 1200 or gtk.gdk.screen_height() < 900:
cmd.append('-fullscreen')
else:
cmd.append('-screen')
cmd.append('%dx%d' % (1200, 900))
Comment out the if and else instructions, and specify the screen resolution and mode you want (it's important to delete 4 spaces before the "cmd.append" lines):
cmd = [ 'Xephyr' ]
cmd.append(':%d' % display)
cmd.append('-ac')
# if gtk.gdk.screen_width() < 1200 or gtk.gdk.screen_height() < 900:
# cmd.append('-fullscreen')
# else:
cmd.append('-screen')
cmd.append('%dx%d' % (800, 600))
Sugar will now run on a 800x600 window. This file may be replaced next time you update sugar-jhbuild, and you'll have to do this again.
Other commands
JHBuild has several other commands that can be useful for development. You can get an overview with:
./sugar-jhbuild --help-commands
A useful sequence of commands for building Sugar, from the Sugar mailing list:
./sugar-jhbuild update ./sugar-jhbuild build ./sugar-jhbuild run
From Within Sugar
Once you have Sugar running, here are some useful commands:
- Alt+F makes the frame appear and disappear
- Alt+C quits an activity
- Alt+0 brings up the developer's console
- Alt+Q quits Sugar
Customize
To customize the build create a configuration file, named .olpc.jhbuildrc, in your home directory.
Write access to the repositories
If you have write access to the repositories you can add:
repos['gnome.org'] = ':ext:marco@cvs.gnome.org:/cvs/gnome' repos['mozilla.org'] = ':ext:marco%gnome.org@cvs.mozilla.org:/cvsroot' repos['dev.laptop.org'] = 'git+ssh://marco@dev.laptop.org/git/' repos['dev.laptop.org/projects'] = 'git+ssh://marco@dev.laptop.org/git/projects/'
Useful Internal Links
External links
- JHBuild manual
- Red Hat Magazine article: Introducing Sugar
- Tinderbox (see the "Sugar JHBuild" tab). The old sugar-jhbuild tinderbox.