[gcompris-devel] Re: Wishes for 2003

Tue Jan 7 10:12:11 UTC 2003

Sory to answer lately. My comments inline:

Le sam 04/01/2003 à 16:17, Herman Bruyninckx a écrit :
> My best wishes too!
> 
> > I would like to start a discussion about what would we like to be in
> > gcompris next.
> [...]
> >  - What to you prefer/dislike.
> >  - Where can we improve
> >  - Do we need more activities, in which area ...
> 
> To improve:
> - modularity of code: separate logic of a game from the graphical widget
>   set. (In order to improve portability and cleanliness of code.)
That's already the case but some activity do not have associated data
because sometimes it doesn't make sense. For example the time reading
(clock) is designed to do time reading and only that. I don't see what
it could to more.
What's realy missing is an editing feature for those that do have data
associated.

>   And from the sound server.
That's a tough topic.
I can't go faster than gnome and KDE. That's on their task to make
thinks better in sound compatibility.
At least, as a workaround, can't you run a soundwrapper in KDE to get
the gnome sounds as well ?

> - documentation for developers: how to build a new board?
This is perhaps not know but a document exists by clicking on the help
button within gcompris or at the url:
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/gcomprisfr.html

Also look at these documents in french:
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/docs/architecture1.jpg
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/docs/architecture2.jpg
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/docs/architecture3.jpg
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/docs/architecture4.jpg

Now perhaps we need more but I am not sure since I don't get much
feedback from this document even if it is not accurate.
Developpers tends to rely on the code first.

> - documentation for users:
>   - on line: help with a board.
We have a great infrastructure in gcompris to do this with the xml
boards definitions.
More, the xml is well reused to create the html screenshoots pages in
every supported language.
Now and this is new, still from the xml, I create a great open office
documentation ready to be printed and distributed to teachers.
Today only in french:
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/gcompris-maitre-fr.sxg
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/gcompris-manuel.sxw

So what we miss is one person willing to help us write the documentation
when it is missing.

Also at ofset, we want to use 'education' terms in order to close the
gap beetween software and the teachers.
This requires to have 'real teacher' helping us on that.

Note that I am not a teacher myself.

>   - off line: how to personalize some boards? (I.e., adding new words,
>               or sums, or images ...)
Correct, my idea is to use gcompris-edit for that but it is not still
there.
Technically, each board that supports editing will have a new entry in
the board plugin definition so the editing code will reside in the board
while the User Interface will not be the gcompris UI but gcompris-edit.

> - develop/adapt a "motion description" API, in order to build more
>   dynamic boards.
No sure what you mean here.
gcompris is based on the gnome canvas that makes this kind of thinks
easy but not 'smooth'.
Doing this choice I choosed to help the entry barrier in gcompris.
This document describes the canvas API:
http://www.ofset.org/gcompris/docs/architecture4.jpg

There is also a good one on the gnome dev site (BTW, I should link it).

Then there is plenty of example now in gcompris.

> - stability: all versions till now do crash from time to time. And they
>   take my Gnome environment with them...
Oops.
I also saw gcompris crashed but it has never bring gnome in my case.

I agree to focus on stability but I need help from others.
Send me bug reports, stack traces and so on to help me track the bugs.

> 
> More activity:
> - more contents (jig saws, math quizes, ...)
Of course, I spend most of my time doing this and I can't do more so:
any coders out there please help us ;)

For info, since the creation of gcompris, we have now more than 40
different activities. This is a 2.5 year old project.
Gcompris creates new activity at a rate of let's say ONE/MONTH.
I am prety happy with this ;)

What's most missing also, is boards in the musical area (ear training).

On my side, I am working on a new board that mimics an old game called
TIM the incredible machine. (it in the cvs under the name machpauzzle
and in the puzzle menu)

> - cooperation with other projects, in order to share code and
>   experiences. (Tuxpaint comes to my mind as an obvious candidate,
>   because both projects target the same user group.)
Tuxpaint is a great project. I got many good review of it. Now I don't
see in what we could cooperate.
BTW, some attend to cooperate with the KDE EDU team failed. They are KDE
oriented and are not interrested to improve a gnome application.
I am not willing to spend time moving back and forth between gnome and
kde, so I stick to Gnome until we have something that brings us a real
advantage (to me gnome and kde are equals).

Bruno.

> 
> 
> Herman Bruyninckx
> --
>   K.U.Leuven, Mechanical Engineering, Robotics Research Group
> <http://people.mech.kuleuven.ac.be/~bruyninc> Tel: +32 16 322480
> 
> 
> 
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