HanSamBen-a derivative of Edupup with Gcompris 8.4- Alpha V2

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sidders
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#41 Post by sidders »

I havn't taken anything out yet. I will look at the network module in the kernel at a later date.

Childsplay has been left hanging on another thread,somone else might come up with an answer.

I'll put v2 together over the next couple of nights and get it up. Taking the kids to the Lakes under canvas this weekend.

I'll post the GST-good and the libs if anyone wants to stick it in V1.

The printing hasnt been tested, i just scanned the forum for the best options, to try and make it so as many printers are PnP (if you like).

Is Abiword worth keeping in?. I'll put it in anyway and see what people think or whether it gets used at all.

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ecomoney
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#42 Post by ecomoney »

Hi Sidders,

Abiword, yes (kids Ive noticed like something they can just write on, especially if you are including tuxtype)...the older ones would need a word processor they could learn on IMHO... but you could take a gNumeric which I think would save a bit of space.

I think the network modules are just files at the location I specified in my earlier post. It should just be a matter of deleting them, plus the /usr/sbin/net-setup.sh file (the network wizard). In fact you could remove the "network" and "internet" menus entirely from the start menu...plus all of the programs they point to (this should alleviate parental concerns also). Hint, you could try running qemu/virtualbox to create a "virtual machine" for programming HSB, otherwise your going to need to reboot constantly to get on the net to do your research. Qemu/Virtualbox would also allow you to alter the amount of RAM to test various machine specs. I know this is how Antonio (slapshot) does it with edupup.

Regards the childsplay problem, you could try it with the updated JWM that patriot has just released. It gives nice rounded corners too!

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=39162

Patriot would probably help you with that side of things if you PM'ed him, xservers are his thing.

Ive just been to the preschool and got the files about the UK curriculum, they are uploading as we speak to http://www.ecomoney.eu/hsb/curriculum, and should be finished in about 20 minutes from the time of this post.

Many thanks again for your work sidders...you deserve a well earned holiday, the Lake District is a beautiful place and Im sure will refresh you.
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sidders
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#43 Post by sidders »

Got a new game installed called stickers, used Petbgone to strip out network menus, pppoe, wvdial etc and removed any browser.

Just about to make the ISO and i thought CUPS!!!. On the hunt for a bare minimum browser to serve CUPS.

With whats been added and whats been taken away, it now stands at 205mb. Until i get a browser that is.

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ecomoney
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#44 Post by ecomoney »

On ecopup (which Ive been tweaking for the last two years) I use the Dillo browser, that operates cups very well. You have to set in the config file not to cache, that way it updates when you add new printers etc. I think its very small.

Very much looking forward to the new version Sidders :-)
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sidders
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#45 Post by sidders »

CUPS

Going to play about with Dillo and Netsurf. Away this weekend, back to the project on Sunday night. I will have a V2 next week.

Dilo from pup3 repo 261k
Netsurf from pup4 repo 344k

I think Netsurf is in Cups_shell. Whether it does the Bareview without Seamonkey i dont yet know. If it doesnt i'll go the Dillo route (dependency pending). The smaller the better, and Rob knows Dillo.

Pete i havnt solved the Red arrow cursor in Gcompris. I've used 8.4.6 for this one, but the result was the same. Had to start with the mouse game. I think it will be smaller anyway as i stripped out the test folder in Python (no adverse effects).

I'm seeing the programmer friend this weekend, i will ply him with dhim drink and get him or someone he knows to tickle a few games, but that
wont delay V2, more of a long term quality thing.

I went to the nursery today, still didnt get much detailed feedback, they just said the kids loved it. Which bits, what areas need improving?.

Going to resort to waterboarding!!! :x

Peter444
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HanSamBen V2

#46 Post by Peter444 »

Thanks for the feedback on the big red arrow, not a show stopper with the workaround available

3 year old GD likes Hexahop, and has worked out how to go backwards if she makes an error, hasnt mastered the trampoline section yet

Also likes using the eraser in Tuxpaint to scrub out her animals as she puts it to remove the stamps she has used

Thanks Peter444

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ecomoney
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#47 Post by ecomoney »

Sidders wrote:I will have a V2 next week.
A word of advice, programmers NEVER give a date things are going to be ready by! (Especially open source programmers :-) ). Deadlines are left to Micro$oft, they force mistakes :)

I dont really know a lot about dillo...it came as a .pup for 2.15ce so I just used it. I would say, as long as it displays "localhost:441" use it! It needs chache turning off too, so it loads changes immedietly they are made. Dillo in ecopup doesnt do this you have to manually refesh with F5 :oops:

With regards to your testers and them providing feedback....getting this from them is actually quite tricky. As youve provided with them with the kit and the programs for free they are probably of the mindset that "we dont want to critisise anything weve been given for free"....which is unproductive in terms of improving it.

The Priory Lane Preschool where I work have been software testers for several years now, and I made it clear to them that I not only wanted, but NEEDED feedback in order to improve whatever software we had on test there....and that was part of the deal. Part of the problem I think is that "User experts" like the people in preschools (who have extensive kids "social" skills) often have a mindset that they are "not very good at computers" and therefore there is nothing that they are able to contribute...not at all - they are the ones that provide the direction and expertise necessary to create good software. This is something Ive learnt through years as a professional programmer, and also via theory from my higher education in Programming/Computing/Business Information Systems. Most computer systems fail BECAUSE the end user, and the environment in which they work, are not taken into account (child benefit, NHS records etc).

I think that it would do the project a great deal of good if you were to sit them down and explain this to them very carefully. Explain how it is an open source project (explain this too!), so that their expertise and suggestions go toward improving the education of children all over the world. I think once they "get it" you will find them more than willing to go over it with a "fine toothed comb", and get a lot more personal satisfaction from being involved.

Dont resort to waterboarding....generally speaking it doesnt produce good intelligence, and is bad for PR :lol: ;-)

I was Speaking to Antonio (Slapshot) today, who co-ordinated/programmed Edupup on Facebook Chat (irc...whats that?). He was aware of the project and has given it his blessing. Although he is wuite busy at the moment (he was just going out to teach a course on the linux filesystem!), he said he would drop by to give some input on some of the technical issues/generally make available his experience. Looks like you wont need to buy those drinks after all Sidders ;-)
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ecomoney
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#48 Post by ecomoney »

Ive just discovered another mini-browser, which may be suitable for cups. It weighs in at 10k!!!

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 653#305653
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OpenEric
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Amazing!

#49 Post by OpenEric »

I just have to jump in with my two cents, here...

I L-O-V-E this software.

I've toyed with Linux in the past, and in recent months have even built an Ubuntu box, but I have never seen an OS like Puppy (one that runs so well on older equipment and lets you roll-your-own LiveCD), and I am even more impressed by this particular version.

I inherited a Celeron 350 (256 MB RAM) from a co-worker that I was going to set up as a dedicated music-streaming box (for lack of a better idea), but when I heard about Puppy, I decided to try and turn it into a computer for my kids. I tried using 4.20 (Deep Thought), Growler, MacPup... I burned about 10 discs in the last week or so, each a different version of Puppy, but none of them felt right for a 5 and an 8 year old. Then I tried EduPup, but I liked the version 4 base better than version 3, so I discarded it, too.

This version worked exactly right.

I will say that, where I live in the US, the school system has a contract with apple, so they are used to using macs at school, which (I think) is part of why they like this system... Their familiarity extends beyond M$ Windoze, which is great. For what it's worth, my five-year-old was especially impressed with GCompris...

So, kudos to you guys for all the hard work and testing you've done on this project. Thanks, and keep up the good work.

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#50 Post by ecomoney »

[quote=OpenEric]I just have to jump in with my two cents, here... [/quote]

Feel free Eric, thank you for coming on here and keeping us all motivated!

I come from the school of "Listen to your users" development. If were going to make HSB even better then feel free to point out any changes we could make, or report any problems.

Welcome to the forum Eric, and welcome to the team :wink:
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#51 Post by puppyluvr »

:D sidders,
I`m really loving your work on this, as is my 2 1/2 yr old son, as well as my 10 yr old daughter..
The version of TuxPaint on this is far superior to any I`ve been able to find...Well done...
Gcompris works flawlessly, as does everything I`ve tried so far....

(Notice to users, be careful not to let this merge any save files, boot pfix=ram the first time, or you`ll get a mess..)

Also, did you adopt Ecomoney as your spokesman?? Or did he adopt you???
I guess if he`s not griping about anything, then you`re A-OK...huh?? 8) 8)
Difficult test to pass..... :D ( Just playing Rob...)

I`m moving the testing to my P3 600...Will get back...

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ecomoney
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#52 Post by ecomoney »

Hi PuppyLuvr,

I definitely adopted HSB, and speaking what I do.
puppyluvr wrote:Difficult test to pass.....
But very worthwhile ;-)

Keep an eye on your kids, and let us know which games they like the best, and send us some feedback. :-)

@ All

For the next version Sidders is planning on removing the file system drivers...so this will be an entirely liveCD based creation (see above). You make a good paint though, even without the ntfs/fat drivers HSB will (I think) still attempt to create/overwrite/upgrade any pup_save.2fs files on Linux ext2/ext3 partitions, and create one at shutdown. I believe I could edit the init (in initrd.gz) and /etc/rc.d/rc.shutdown scripts that perform this to remove the creation/upgrade parts and make this a purely live cd...I think. :roll: Its a lot easier to take things out of scripts than to put them, and Im willing to give it a go. Hopefully someone better skilled at bash scripting will be reading this though :wink:

Shall I go ahead sidders and post the relevant changes that need to be made?

In some other good news, forum member Crash has agreed to write a routine for easy installation of HSB onto really old equipment! :D

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 0&start=46

I know for schools here, "waste disposal" of old computer equipment is a real headache (they have to pay about £10 per computer to have them taken away). This should I hope make it (VERY!) easy for them, without the need for "expert" staff, to turn a computer into a dedicated HSB machine that kids can use, instead of it costing the school money to send it to landfill.

Just another thought, on recent version of Ecopup, I included a game called "Rocks and Diamonds", they seem to like it a lot, even though I didnt include it under the kids section (even kaleb can play it!). Its a lot like the old "boulderdash" game for 8-bit computers, and I believe it would be good for "lateral thinking" and "spacial awareness".

http://www.artsoft.org/rocksndiamonds/s ... ginal.html

I believe I found it in a .pup format somewhere, I think I could make a .pet from it (its very simple!).

Keep up the good work Sidders, let me know where I can help :-)
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#53 Post by pupshock »

ecomoney wrote: For the next version Sidders is planning on removing the file system drivers...so this will be an entirely liveCD based creation (see above). .... I believe I could edit the init (in initrd.gz) and /etc/rc.d/rc.shutdown scripts that perform this to remove the creation/upgrade parts and make this a purely live cd...I think.
respectfully, may i suggest keeping the file system drivers & ability to
mount drives, because
1. running from CD is slow especially on old computers
2. the CD player is more often wonky than the hard drive
3. the kids need somewhere to save their handywork

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sullysat
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#54 Post by sullysat »

The last discussion about file systems that I recall was about whether to leave fat/ntfs in. At that time, I explained that being able to accomplish a HDD install of the distro was important, depending on the hardware.

I agree completely that 'mom & dad' need to be able to run completely from the CD, but I would, again, submit that limiting install options severely limits the distro, long term.

For me, it would mean that I'm wasting my time trying to find a good preschool to test it in here in San Antonio.

You guys do whatever you think is best, but my position would be that the size benefits are not justified by the versatility loss.

Just my few cents,
Sully

sidders
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#55 Post by sidders »

I'll do a couple of ISO's, one with and one without. The next one is with (Fat and Ntfs drivers)

Just having issues with cups at the mo, as i'ved ripped out the network components, i have to manually configure the loopback interface

Code: Select all

ifconfig lo 127.0.0.1

I tried it in /etc/rc.d/rc.local, but the remaster doesnt include a rc.local its generated by sysinit (or something like that).

Will have to play some more.
Last edited by sidders on Mon 18 May 2009, 22:08, edited 1 time in total.

muggins
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#56 Post by muggins »

@ecomoney,

RnDiamonds .pet available in this thread.

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ecomoney
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#57 Post by ecomoney »

Just to clarify the idea behind removing the Windows ntfs/fat drivers...

Pros

1. HDD install/Save will still be available (using a faster linux FS), either FULL or Frugal (I hope this suffice for your needs Sullysat?)

2. Easy to be 100% sure that Windows systems will not be damaged, or kids can get into parents files...(good for parents peace of mind!)

3. Quicker way of getting a "safe" v 0.2 out, so we can start getting feedback into apps/games/bugs earlier

Cons

1 Kids will not have place to store their work *on windows computers only*


This idea was just based on my observations that, in the home parents are often very reluctant to let their children use their P.C. for fear of them "breaking" the software already on it.

If there are better ways of achieving the result above (perhaps without the "cons" or the problem Sidders id finding) then that would be great :)
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sullysat
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#58 Post by sullysat »

Hey Rob,

Maybe I got confused again when I read the post about running CD only. I'm good as long as installing the system doesn't become a problem.

I kinda see this little beauty from two standpoints.

1. Used in schools and on stand alone systems; this is where I'd want to be able to actually install it (because I have more small hard drives here than decent CDROM drives).

2. A software set for parents to use with their kids at home; this would, and should, run from CD without a hitch.

On another note, I'm expect to be just about done with a couple of major projects here within the next month. I should be able to start working on documentation at that point so it would be good to get with you and sidders and whoever else is actively working issues that will need documentation to start sorting out needs for that. I've got some ideas for where to start, but I need everyone's needs clear as well.

Thanks guys!
Sully

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ecomoney
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#59 Post by ecomoney »

@Sullysat

Thats "hit the nail on the head" as we say

With the drivers removed, we can have the two major needs taken care of...

- Dedicated HSB computers for schools/playschools formatted to linux

- liveCD's for home use, or even given out by the the preschool staff for the parents to use at home :D

The third option (pup_save.2fs's) for windows computers at home is a "nice to have", and an option for a "feature" in later versions...if there is demand for it.

Thats good news that you will be more available for this project. I will expect you will need to talk to developers on one side, and parents/preschool staff on the other.

I am sure Sandra from the preschool here would be happy to go through the documentation side of it, and I could also get some of the "mums testing team" I recruited from facebook to help too.

@ Sidders...just a thought...if the CUPS side of things is slowing things down, I would just leave it out for this release......we can make sure its working later after we get the Applications decided upon.
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sidders
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#60 Post by sidders »

I think i have the Cups licked. I just popped a small script into the startup folder. I'll have to check it again.

Jus searching for a couple of icons from the Dosbox games, so they can be popped onto the desktop, in case you wan all the menus to disappear.

I'll stick R&D on from the link Muggins supplied and then get it up.

Then i will attempt to pull the kernel apart and remove the network modules proper, which will leave a Cups problem again, but i will look for an alternative, i can get rid of the NTFS drivers ok, with PetbGone, but will look at the inbuilt Fat driver. It'll reduce the size as well.

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