[Sugar-devel] design bugs and unimplemented features (was Re: easier installation of soas)

[Tomeu Vizoso]

On Mon, Mar 2, 2009 at 02:20, Eben Eliason <eben at laptop.org> wrote:
> On Sun, Mar 1, 2009 at 8:12 PM, Gary C Martin <gary at garycmartin.com> wrote:
>>
>> On 2 Mar 2009, at 00:21, Caroline Meeks wrote:
>>
>>> Point of clarification.
>>>
>>> The next sticks we are getting will not be randomly given out to
>>> people.
>>>
>>> We are going to use them for:
>>>
>>> 1. Working with classes of kids at computer labs for an hour or two.
>>> In an ideal world we could let them keep their stick so they could
>>> work on thier project after the class is over.  We hope to get
>>> testing and publicity from these events.
>>> 2. Giving out at FOSS VT. A conference for educators interested in
>>> Free and Open Source Software. I'd like to see if we can get people
>>> back channeling the conference through Sugar Chat and shared write.
>>
>> Just a word of warning on Write, last time I tested (8.2,
>> 8.2.1,Write-60) it's still a 'master/slave' set-up when working
>> collaboratively. If you leave (say you go home, or switch off
>> wireless), do some more work on the write journal entry, and later
>> rejoin a master (i.e the document you had originally shared) – all
>> your changes are wiped as they get re-synced with whatever is on the
>> current master. Who ever gets to be master of a previously shared
>> write session first, gets to keep their work, every one else looses.
>>
>> Very bad usage case would be:
>>
>> - teacher get 5 kids to start a shared assay project in class together
>> about hobbies
>> - then tasks them to each add a new section about their own hobby as
>> homework
>> - next day... first kid that boots up and resumes their entry will be
>> master
>> - other 4 kids arrive, resume... and all get their homework auto-wiped
>> by kid number 1
>>
>> Fail.
>>
>> This is one of the reasons I don't like the design mantra of, "once
>> shared you have no private control of that activity any more" (i.e.
>> you can never un-share an activity). And combined with the Journal
>> auto-keeping, you work is wiped and then auto-saved as wiped, if you
>> had the foresight to make an extra 'kept' copy before you came to
>> school, don't risk ever resuming it with your network active, or it
>> may be wiped as well.
>
> This sounds like a pretty substantial Sugar bug. It's the reason that
> I've been adamant that we need to introduce the notion of versions,
> and that an (activity_id, version_id) tuple serve as the unique
> identifier of a running activity instance.  In this manner, the saved
> copies of the "slaves" would take on different version_id, and Sugar
> would recognize them as distinct from the running "master" when
> resumed, and open them separately (to make copy/paste merge possible).
>
> It sounds like this bug should be added to the list for the next
> release.  (We can keep a version identifier of sorts without true
> versioning...)

Please start entering feature requests in trac and btw, change the
subject of the thread when needed.

We are getting very good ideas for 0.86 features but we have little
manpower to actually implement them. So if we don't make a big effort
in tracking these ideas, prioritizing them and setting a strategy, we
risk forgetting about good stuff and end up implementing
not-as-important stuff.

Thanks,

Tomeu

> - Eben
>
>> Only solution I've found to this with write is to manually copy and
>> paste all the content to a new and un-shared instance of write, where
>> you can now work safely.
>>
>> --Gary
>>
>>> If we are going to do conferences on a regular we'll need to get
>>> them cobranded and have someone else pay.  Then it would be way cool
>>> to have them in the conference goodie bag with everyone at the
>>> conference talking and sharing through sugar.  We could have Browse
>>> set to the conference home page.  It could be very fun at education
>>> conferences.  But we need to get someone else to pay. :)  As
>>> companies will often pay for a branded USB stick without anything on
>>> it to go in the conference goodie bag this seems like a realistic
>>> hope.
>>>
>>> On Sun, Mar 1, 2009 at 3:41 PM, David Farning
>>> <dfarning at sugarlabs.org> wrote:
>>> This become an issue of cost effectiveness.  I understand Branded USBs
>>> are on the order of $8 a stick.
>>>
>>> The Fedora Ambassadors tried giving away USB keys.  Thye found that
>>> they were not cost effective.  The high cost per unit combined with
>>> the low 'stick rate' made them unfeasible.  I understand everybody who
>>> walked by, grabbed a stick.  After all, who turns down a free USB
>>> stick.  With CDs people who grab one at least have some level of
>>> interest about the product.
>>>
>>> This leads me to believe that good old LiveCDs will continue to be our
>>> primary introduction method.  USB keys will be a higher cost method
>>> for higher potential users.
>>>
>>> For example: We give a way CDs in our booth at a conference.   We give
>>> away USB sticks as part of Sugar related talks.
>>>
>>> david
>>>
>>>
>>> 2009/3/1 Eben Eliason <eben at laptop.org>:
>>> > As I understand it, this cannot be so simple because it needs to
>>> be a
>>> > bootable image, and not just a set of files.  I'd also suspect
>>> there's
>>> > partitioning being done (not sure) so that user data can still be
>>> > stored on it as well.
>>> >
>>> > An alternative proposal (if Sugar Labs is willing to assume the
>>> > overhead involved) is to offer "Sugarsticks" at cost to those who
>>> want
>>> > them.  We could even brand them with the sugar logo, perhaps, in its
>>> > variety of colors.  Reducing the barrier to entry like this would
>>> make
>>> > it really easy for people to try, and "commercializing" like this
>>> > gives the project a certain credibility; a realness.
>>> >
>>> > In a way, we could give kids an attachment to their "Sugarstick"
>>> > similar to that of kids to their XOs.
>>> >
>>> > - Eben
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Sun, Mar 1, 2009 at 12:27 PM, Tomeu Vizoso
>>> <tomeu at sugarlabs.org> wrote:
>>> >> Hi,
>>> >>
>>> >> I'm wondering if it may be possible to lower further the barrier
>>> for
>>> >> the less technical users that want to download sugar on a stick.
>>> >>
>>> >> Maybe we could offer a .zip for download that can be expanded on a
>>> >> bootable usb stick and just work?
>>> >>
>>> >> Regards,
>>> >>
>>> >> Tomeu
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>>> >>
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>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Caroline Meeks
>>> Solution Grove
>>> Caroline at SolutionGrove.com
>>>
>>> 617-500-3488 - Office
>>> 505-213-3268 - Fax
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>>
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