[Sugar-devel] activity sandbox

[Bert Freudenberg]

On 2012-08-29, at 17:01, blekros sugar <blekros.sugar at gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks, I'll check out the documentation and get up to speed a little more.  Meantime --
> 
> I just want to make sure I understand:
> 
> 1.   Sugar activities *are* Python scripts

... usually. Any programming language is fine for writing Sugar activities, as long as it can connect to D-Bus and provide an X11 user interface. But writing them in Python is a lot simpler because you can make use of the Sugar Toolkit (a Python library used by. One example of an activity not written in Python is Etoys.

> -- but they use Linux-specific packages, instead of using os.* or sys.* packages, which wrap the OS that lies beneath.   Same for GTK+.  The GUI cannot be made to use ported versions of the GTK+ API.

That's pretty much correct. At least no-one has seriously tried to make Sugar work elsewhere.

> 2.  The Sugar shell is not a service layer between the bare metal Linux OS and Sugar presentation (its "desktop") .  In other words, the shell cannot be updated to plug into to modern device OSes such as I/Pad or Android.

Well porting the shell is maybe not that hard, but that wouldn't mean the activities simply work, too. That's because activities are not coded purely against the Sugar API but may make use of stuff more generally available in Linux. OTOH some simple activities might just work.

> 3.  No one has attempted to port Activities, i.e. the FUN stuff,  to Browser apps (HTML 5 + Javascript) so any kid with a smart phone could play with, say, Physics, or Turtle.

It wouldn't be so much "porting" as reimplementing. Also you would need a framework for collaboration and journaling first (which is what distinguishes Sugar most from other environments). Individual activities aren't all that interesting IMHO, equivalent apps can be found for pretty much any platform. The way activities are assembled into a whole learning environment is Sugar's raison d'etre.

- Bert -

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> Brad
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> 
> On Wed, Aug 29, 2012 at 7:15 AM, Bert Freudenberg <bert at freudenbergs.de> wrote:
> On 2012-08-28, at 15:53, Gonzalo Odiard <gonzalo at laptop.org> wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, Aug 28, 2012 at 10:49 AM, blekros sugar <blekros.sugar at gmail.com> wrote:
> >> I'd like to use Eclipse with PyDev on Windows to try to build activities.
> >>
> >> Has the Sugar shell been ported to Windows (x86) or Android or iOS or as a chrome / firefox plugin so that I can use my existing environments without VMWare or VirtualBox?
> >>
> >
> > No. Sugar run in a linux os.
> 
> Right. Sugar activities do not only require the Sugar Shell to run. They are full-fledged Linux applications that follow a few additional conventions to function well in Sugar. But that means that they need a full Linux + X11 operating system stack to work.
> 
> >> I can't find anything resembling an object model, or class diagram that shows the architectural breakdown of Sugar.   Where to look?
> >
> > Sadly, our documentation is not in a good shape.
> > Today, the best doc is the code itself.
> 
> Well, there still is *some* documentation for activity authors.
> 
> We have a nice book:
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>         http://en.flossmanuals.net/make-your-own-sugar-activities/
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> And for a more low-level understanding there is this documentation page:
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>         http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Development_Team/Low-level_Activity_API
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> More documentation resources are listed at
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>         http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activity_Team/Resources
> 
> - Bert -
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>