Edward, Thank you for your feedback on SocialCalc. Appreciate it. <div class="gmail_quote">On Sun, Sep 6, 2009 at 8:17 AM, Edward Cherlin <<a href="mailto:echerlin@gmail.com">echerlin@gmail.com</a>> wrote: <div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">Thanks. I believe that you are right in your comments below, that the Open Document spec, manuals for other software, and your video will enable us to create an excellent manual at FLOSSManuals.net. Would you like to join us when we do the Book Sprint? </blockquote><div> Could you please let us know about the date of the Book Sprint. Would ask our team members to participate in it. </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> I am thinking about what we might add to the Help in SocialCalc, allowing for the tradeoff between space and completeness. Adding links to existing documentation will provide a sufficient backstop, but I think that there are several places where just a few words will make all the difference for beginning SocialCalc users, particularly for harried teachers. I don't want to make them learn too much themselves, or to have to tell children to rely too much on external resources. I'm sure that we can find a suitable balance on these questions. </blockquote><div> Yes. It would be great if we could arrive at a list where we get this feeling. </div><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> <div class="im"> > (I think there is a reported issue that SocialCalc's IF > function only takes the 3 argument form, not the 2 argument form. It also > evaluated all arguments unlike many other IF functions.) > > The toolbar buttons, including the two types of move and swap colors, as > well as the sheet settings, names, and more are explained in a video I > created. The 54 minute Flash video, created with Camtasia, goes over many of > the features of the main SocialCalc engine that the Sugar version of > SocialCalc is built upon. (For example, that version does not have the > Sugar-specific graphing tab.) You can view the video at: > > <a href="http://www.peapodcast.com/sgi/socialtext/sctraining1/" target="_blank">http://www.peapodcast.com/sgi/socialtext/sctraining1/</a> </div>Perfect. I'll report on that soon. </blockquote><div> Thank you. Regards, Manu </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> <div class="im"> </div><div><div class="h5"> > Edward Cherlin wrote: > > I ran through all of the basic functions of SocialCalc, including > every icon on every tab. I have tested some but not all of the 109 > functions provided, with good results so far. Although there are > functions I could wish for, the only real deficiency I have found is > in the documentation. > > I have created a page for elements of Sugar that children are not > likely to discover on their own, > <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/The_undiscoverable" target="_blank">http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/The_undiscoverable</a>. I recommend it to > developers who want to think about whether more of Sugar can be made > discoverable, or whether we need to write lesson plans for the > features that cannot be made obvious to the novice. I will put in a > section for SocialCalc. These are not bugs in the sense of incorrect > behavior or missing explanations, so I omit them here. > > Here is a summary of the other issues I have encountered. > > o The database functions are severely underdocumented. What database? > What are databaserange, fieldname, criteriarange? > > o Where does Paste Formats get its formats from? > > o What does Swap Colors do? > > o The financial and statistical function definitions in the Help might > be clear to one who uses other spreadsheets a lot, but certainly are > not to a beginner. > > o More explanation is needed on angles in degrees and radians. > > o I understand Move From and Move Paste, but not Move Insert. > > o I see how to set names, but not what to use them for or how. > > o I don't see the Sheet setting control on the Format tab that the > Help refers to. > > o I found the OK and Sort... buttons on the Sort tab confusing. It has > since become clear to me. Perhaps OK should be renamed Set Range. > > Not bad for a beta. > > On Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 12:16 PM, Manusheel Gupta<<a href="mailto:manu@laptop.org">manu@laptop.org</a>> wrote: > > > Dear community members, > > We are preparing for the next release of SocialCalc on Sugar. Localization > infrastructure, canonicalization of the save format and collaboration will > be the key features available in the next release. We are also looking > forward to develop interoperability between SocialCalc format and a number > of other spreadsheet formats like .wk3/.wk4/csv/excel/open office > spreadsheet. We have recently received a number of requests on developing > interoperability between SocialCalc and .wk3/.wk4 format, which has been a > challenging problem to work on. Hope to get this feature ready before the > next release. > > Lately, I have been testing SocialCalc on the Sugar Live CD, and have run > into issues. I can't seem to get SocialCalc to start. I fired up the Sugar > LiveCD, and opened up the USB icon in my journal. I can see the file > SocialCalc.xo on my USB stick. When I click on it, I get a start button, > but then nothing happens. Below is a gears image, which starts something > that looks like a developer interface. Not sure, where I have been going > wrong. Any help on this issue is highly appreciated. > > Please visit the SocialCalc on Sugar page at > <a href="http://seeta.in/j/products-and-services/socialcalc-on-sugar.html" target="_blank">http://seeta.in/j/products-and-services/socialcalc-on-sugar.html</a>. The > activity is available for download both from the SEETA website > (<a href="http://seeta.in" target="_blank">http://seeta.in</a>) and from <a href="http://activities.sugarlabs.org" target="_blank">activities.sugarlabs.org</a>. If you have any > questions, or would like to add suggestions/comments/feature requests, > please do so here. > > Thank you for your continued support. > > Regards, > > Manu > > _______________________________________________ > Sugar-devel mailing list > <a href="mailto:Sugar-devel@lists.sugarlabs.org">Sugar-devel@lists.sugarlabs.org</a> > <a href="http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel" target="_blank">http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel</a> </div></div><div><div></div><div class="h5">-- Edward Mokurai (默雷/धर्ममेघशब्दगर्ज/دھرممیگھشبدگر ج) Cherlin Silent Thunder is my name, and Children are my nation. The Cosmos is my dwelling place, the Truth my destination. <a href="http://earthtreasury.org/" target="_blank">http://earthtreasury.org/</a> </div></div></blockquote></div>