[Sugar-devel] Fw: [REQUEST] ChimePlay-1

[Chris Leonard]

Dear Art,

Well, music may be the "universal language", but English UI strings
sadly are not.  In order to expand the potential user base for your
efforts, I would encourage you to work on the internationalization of
the UI strings with gettext in future versions.

http://en.flossmanuals.net/make-your-own-sugar-activities/going-international-with-pootle/

and I will be happy to work with you on getting them set up in Pootle
for localization.

cjl
Sugar Labs Translation Team Coordinator

On Tue, Mar 13, 2012 at 3:56 PM, Walter Bender <walter.bender at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 13, 2012 at 1:13 PM, Art Hunkins <abhunkin at uncg.edu> wrote:
>> I'd appreciate a reviewer taking the time to review my new activity,
>> ChimePlay. It has been in the queue for several weeks now (originally the
>> queue contained 13 activities; it still does, FWIW).
>>
>> In case it matters, I've included here my response to Walter's request in
>> regard to ChimePlay. (My response wasn't originally addressed to this list
>> or to Walter personally.) Perhaps someone was waiting for me to address it?
>>
>> In any case, thanks for your support.
>
> Hmm. I thought someone pushed it through. Will take care of it now. I
> would like to sort a few things out with you regarding how to make all
> of your activities a little more friendly to some of our younger
> users. But that can happen sometime when we both have a bit more time.
>
> -walter
>>
>> Art Hunkins
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Art Hunkins" <abhunkin at uncg.edu>
>> To: <activities at sugarlabs.org>
>> Cc: <aslo at lists.sugarlabs.org>
>> Sent: Saturday, March 03, 2012 4:36 PM
>> Subject: Re: [REQUEST] ChimePlay-1
>>
>>
>>> Hello, Walter,
>>>
>>> Thanks so much for your on-going help and encouragement for and with my
>>> Sugar activities. Without it, and similar counsel from other seasoned Sugar
>>> activity developers, I'd still be stuck in the "Sugar starting gate."
>>>
>>> Your observations here can apply just as well to my previous 7 activities.
>>> Indeed, perhaps it is ironic that in ChimePlay there is the *least* amount
>>> of displayed verbiage of any of my activities; I've done my best to keep it
>>> down. (For my last three activities, which urge children to create their own
>>> audio samples, most of my commentary is included in a ReadMe.txt file. Only
>>> "immediately relevent" material is presented on-screen.)
>>>
>>> Some context: I am a professional art music composer, whose main
>>> "electronic" language is Csound. All my Sugar activities are spinoffs of
>>> live-performance Csound works composed for adults (please see my website,
>>> www.arthunkins.com, where these relationships are clear enough). At the
>>> urging of Richard Boulanger, I was led into OLPC, Sugar and the XO, to offer
>>> some of my work to at least the older children of the world. As an
>>> exclusively Windows person, Linux has been a strange new world - also
>>> inhabited by Sugar, Python, PyGTK, git, Inkscape - all equally new and
>>> strange.
>>>
>>> ChimePlay almost didn't get written; I thought that SamplePlay was my last
>>> activity. However, inspired by a couple of chime sets at the St. Francis
>>> Springs Prayer Center (Stoneville, NC, USA) and my life-long fascination
>>> with chimes and bells, ChimePlay manifested and here we are. In the future,
>>> I intend no more activities; I'll simply maintain and continue to test the 8
>>> activities I have so that hopefully they remain useful. Hopefully you can
>>> humor me this one last time. I also hope my work points the way for other
>>> Csound artists to become involved with Sugar with an equally limited
>>> investment of time and technology. (Though I admit the requirements of my
>>> doing *anything* in Linux/Sugar was infinitely beyond any investment I'd
>>> anticipated. It's been an incredibly difficult and arduous learning curve.
>>> For example, I just spent three intense and frustrating days relearning
>>> Inkscape in order to create a passable icon for ChimePlay.)
>>>
>>> Early in my activity work, I found some Python/GTK code structures that I
>>> could reasonably understand and continue to use in all my activites. I've
>>> intentionally limited the depth of tech work I've exposed myself to, and
>>> only bugged other developers, like yourself, with issues I considered
>>> crucial. I've dealt with others (such as on-screen text, the limit to
>>> English, the treatment of MIDI device insertion/detection) in
>>> "non-Sugar-like" ways, which were understandable by "low/non-tech" me. I did
>>> this to protect myself and my sanity - as well as to complete anything.
>>>
>>> I'm well aware that most children will not have access to MIDI devices.
>>> For live Csound work in the adult world, however, MIDI devices are
>>> universally required. (In my recent activity ReadMe's, I've indeed
>>> recommended certain inexpensive devices to children and their teachers,
>>> especially the Korg nanoKontrol.) It seems to me that for any performance
>>> activity with Csound (such as for the XO or Sugar), classrooms might well
>>> opt to invest in a few MIDI devices, such as keyboard controllers. My
>>> activities allow for a very wide range of devices.
>>>
>>> In previous activities, I've made alternate versions which used only the
>>> ASCII keyboard. However, I've found these versions awkward and
>>> counterintuitive, as well as requiring considerable additional written
>>> explanation. I never use them for my own demonstrations. (They also are a
>>> pain to program.) Instead, in ChimePlay, I've paired one live-performance
>>> MIDI version with an auto-play incarnation, which requires no controller at
>>> all. Just (optionally) adjust the presets, press START and instant chimes
>>> (your choice of two chime sets).
>>>
>>> Once again, thanks for your most valuable help and advice - and the spirit
>>> and tone in which it has been given - over several years.
>>>
>>> Art Hunkins
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sugar Labs Activities"
>>> <activities at sugarlabs.org>
>>> To: <abhunkin at uncg.edu>
>>> Cc: <aslo at lists.sugarlabs.org>
>>> Sent: Friday, March 02, 2012 11:03 PM
>>> Subject: [REQUEST] ChimePlay-1
>>>
>>>
>>>> A Sugar Labs Activities Editor requested further information from you
>>>> regarding version 1 of your activity ChimePlay.
>>>>
>>>> Walter Bender wrote:
>>>>
>>>> "I wonder if the bulk of the explanatory text could be under an about
>>>> button? Also, could you look for the midi device on launch and display an
>>>> error message if it is not detected? Alas, I doubt too many Sugar users have
>>>> a midi device :("
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Please reply to this e-mail or join #sugar on chat.freenode.net.
>>>>
>>>> Sugar Labs Activities
>>>> http://activities.sugarlabs.org
>>>>
>>>
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> Walter Bender
> Sugar Labs
> http://www.sugarlabs.org
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