[sugar] Squeak / Etoys RPMs

[Owen Williams]

On Tue, 2006-10-10 at 14:06 -0400, Dan Williams wrote:
> On Tue, 2006-10-10 at 13:55 -0400, Owen Williams wrote:
> > On Tue, 2006-10-10 at 13:09 -0400, Dan Williams wrote:
> > 
> > 
> > > Remember, we're not starting from a desktop of discrete files which you
> > > need to open.  Stuff in the journal will save what activity you last
> > > worked on something with, and that's how it will know how to get back to
> > > it.
> > 
> > What about files that were not created on an OLPC, such as oggs,
> > theoras, pdfs, or other media?  I'm writing an RSS reader for OLPC, and
> > it downloads files contained in RSS enclosures.  If there's no mimetype
> > database on the system, it seems to cut olpc off from the rest of the
> > world's content.
> 
> Maybe I am not understanding this.  What do you need a mime database for
> with RSS?  Where do you plan to store the RSS enclosures in the flash,
> and how do you plan to display enclosures that have been previously
> "saved", whatever that means?
> 
> Dan

Podcasts and video blogs both use RSS as their distribution mechanism.
Audio and video files are enclosed in RSS, and then the "pod-catcher"
program downloads these files and saves them for later playback.  

The current, gnome desktop-specific workflow, is that enclosures are
saved in ~/.penguintv/media, and when they are opened by my software, I
query gnome-vfs to find out what program should be used to open the
file.  Usually this is a media player like Totem, but if the enclosure
is a pdf, for instance, it launches evince, acroread, or whatever the
user has configured.

In the OLPC use-case, I was envisioning that a teacher could distribute
class materials -- textbook chapters, homework assignments, etc -- by
RSS, and then the students could open the files at home.  The idea was
that files would indeed be saved on the flash.  Any materials developed
with OLPC software would have the activity association you mentioned,
but more standard formats will need to be viewed by an appropriate
activity, like a music player, video player, or document viewer.

Owen