[sugar] Squeak / Etoys RPMs

[Ian Bicking]

Marco Pesenti Gritti wrote:
>> I find it hard to avoid this entirely.  For instance, imagine we have 
>> a flashcard activity (not too much of a stretch).  It seems like an 
>> obvious implementation to put flashcard data on the web somewhere, as 
>> type application/xml+x-flashcard (or whatever), and then import the 
>> data when that data type is encountered through a browser.
>>
> 
> What is a flashcard activity? This is *way* too abstract. Activity is 
> not a synonymous for application (our fault we are totally failing to 
> communicate this). But even using the more generic application term... 
> what is a flashcard application?

A quiz-like system, e.g.: 
http://www.quisition.com/demos/short-term/short-term.html -- someone 
happened to bring it up on IRC, so it was in my head.

> Building a good user interface is not putting nice pictures on the top 
> of a prebuilt system. It's a top-down process where the final goal is 
> clearly defined by the user experience design. Usefulness and merits of 
> the architecture are not abstract technical values but are evaluated on 
> the base of this final goal.

Perhaps this is a function of our different backgrounds.  To me issues 
of content management and basic persistence seem pretty concrete, 
because that's a lot of what I work with.  It's also my belief that the 
content will ultimately be a greater investment than the software, and 
that the content has to outlive any particular software associated with 
it.  I'm not an obsessive archivalist, and I don't think that's 
necessary for this project (especially for content just on the laptop 
that isn't hosted somewhere else).  But I do think we need to consider 
content quite seriously as its own entity, because we're managing it on 
behalf of the child, it's not ours.

And I feel really quite strongly that content belongs to the user, not 
the activity.  That means that when possible the content should have a 
purpose and meaning outside of the activity that created it.  Even for 
the most obscure or niche activity this applies, because someone might 
fork that activity and still understand its obscure internal format. 
This is not based on goals of "it should work in 30 seconds" but rather 
"it should work in two years".

So I feel protective of content, and you feel protective of user 
experience, and that means we'll probably be coming at this from 
different perspectives, and I don't know if either one will entirely 
drive the other.


-- 
Ian Bicking | ianb at colorstudy.com | http://blog.ianbicking.org