>2) seemed odd for the dots to appear from 6 o'clock to 6 o'clock (12 to 12 > feels more natural to me) I like the clock metaphor, with the boot up process rising like the sun, building upon itself, and then closing the ring to present a complete system. (I guess some of us start our day at noon, or only get started at midnight. And my analog stopwatch starts at the top.) In any case, Sugar, being an open system, can and will distinguish itself by its ability to support unlimited adaptation, of itself and by extension, its Learners. Every element of the system is a learning opportunity. Especially one that can't be avoided. The start-up sequence in Sugar will become a unique, community and personal introduction spot (like home pages and desktops). For Sugar, the new "Hello World" tutorial could be its boot Activities for Learners: Each development tool (Pippy, Turtle Art, Etoys, others, even Forth) should provide an Activity to build the start-up sequence. Learners could play with the tools to build an endless variety of start-up spots, modify and preview from a library of saved sequences, learn all sorts of things about the system, the different tools, and of course, designate one sequence to display on the next boot. The work space is both sufficiently small and necessarily limited, so that robustness could be provided, while at the same time, the content of the sequences is limited only by the imagination. Learners will be able to take pride in a working sequence based on their modifications! Schools and classes of Learners could use prepared sequences to provide short reminders of lessons or announcements (perhaps loaded before shutdown at the end of the day or class). I imagine that simple cartoons with embedded, single point or short point lessons, messages, and humor would become popular. Brief jingles would develop a currency like ring tones. And so on, ad infinitum! --Fred