SIGs/Education/Meetings/2008-05-09

sdziallas	hi everybody!
sdziallas	so, who is here for the edu sig meeting?
rdieter	here (mostly).
sdziallas	okay :)
sdziallas	well, i have updated the list of applications in the wiki a little bit
sdziallas	and i was thinking about selecting a few apps or a focus for the spin
rdieter	so what's on your mind?
sdziallas	for example, if we focus on mathematics we might - at least - include drgeo and wxmaxima
sdziallas	on the other hand i have created a very basic spin with just some normal apps and an desktop environment
sdziallas	and we have about 150 mb of space for edu apps (less or more depending on kde, gnome or xfce)
rdieter	well, how about start with a math-focussed spin then, since thats: 1. focussed and 2. we have a pretty good selection of math apps to choose from.
* nirik butts in and wonders if there has been thought of a 'sugar' spin... I guess thats something for an olpc interested group to work on tho
rdieter	nirik: would be neat.
nirik	and that could be a good thing for a younger age group education demographic.
sdziallas	nirik: agreed. i know, that there is a olpc live cd, but i didn't knew, that you could easily install sugar on f9
nirik	I'm not sure if it's easily installable yet, but I think it's being worked on.
sdziallas	(some time ago, you still needed to compile it, right?)
rdieter	there's a lot to do with 150mb: kdeedu (kig, we could split this out to make space), geomview, Macaulay2, octave (some good gui's are currently under review)
sdziallas	rdierter: that's true
nirik	well, you can 'yum install sugar' in f9 fine. I don't know if you need to do anything to get it to come up tho.
sdziallas	rdieter: well, i really like kdeedu, since it contains a lot of intersting edu apps, but it includes apps for different topics (math & languages & and so on)
rdieter	R, scipy...
sdziallas	nirik:
rdieter	sdziallas: right, wrt kdeedu, we already split -kstars for Astronomy SIG/spin. can do the same here as needed.
sdziallas	sugar.i386 0.79.4-1.fc9 fedora
sdziallas	nirik: but i have no idea, how it needs to be installed - might be worth a try, hu?
* nirik installs on the test box.
sdziallas	rdieter: okay, so we would select a few kdeedu (and other related) apps and then start with a math-focussed spin?
sdziallas	nirik: great
rdieter	sdziallas: I think so (as well as continue on working to get more good edu apps in fedora).
sdziallas	+1. we definitely need more edu apps - maybe, if we get good feedback to a first spin, there might be further people encouraged to help
rdieter	right
sdziallas	but i'm not quite sure, which apps to should include - kdeedu has kalgebra, kbruch, kig, kmplot and kpercentage - i think it's important not to include software for the same use 3 times
rdieter	having a "produce" to point at, will get more attention, feedback, etc.
rdieter	true, make the list of apps, wieghted priorities, and include stuff until you run out of space.
sdziallas	okay :)... and some pr might not be bad, too
sdziallas	nirik: if a sugar desktop environment is working, i think we should definitely consider it - for example as a spin for younger children (with fitting edu apps... gcompris, childsplay, and so on)
nirik	it installs fine, but I am not getting it to come up in a vnc... looking.
sdziallas	hmmmm.....
* sdziallas has look at a possible spin config
rdieter	so app/pkg candidates to top the list of what to include?
rdieter	shameless plug: maxima/wxmaxima (I'll try to let others suggest others, since I maintain a few others and am totally biased).
dgilmore	gday all
sdziallas	hi
sdziallas	rdieter: +1
rdieter	dgilmore: yo mr. olpc
dgilmore	you can get sugar running with "yum install sugar suagr-journal telepathy-gabble telepathy-salut"
dgilmore	then you can run sugar-emulator or log into suagr from gdm/kdm
dgilmore	though it still needs some work
dgilmore	sugar needs porting to the new NetworkManager
rdieter	An olpc/sugar spin would be... sweet. *ba dum crash*
dgilmore	and we need to get more activites packaged
sdziallas	might sound somewhat euphoric, but +100
dgilmore	but yes a sugar spin would be awesome
dgilmore	right now im migrating OLPC to F-9
rdieter	dgilmore: you think NM + activities would be do'able in F10 time-frame
rdieter	?
dgilmore	rdieter: yep defiently
rdieter	alrighty
dgilmore	we have journal done so far
dgilmore	but thats it
sdziallas	that's pretty cool
* sdziallas is going to try it on on his own machine
dgilmore	please let me know if you have issues
dgilmore	its worked fine in my testing
sdziallas	okay! :) downloads right now...
nirik	not working for me in vnc... will try a real login soon here. ;)
dgilmore	ive had some issues with suagar-emulator
dgilmore	the Xepher X server doesnt support th 129dpi that my laptop runs at
dgilmore	anyway please ask me if you need any help
sdziallas	rdieter: a calculator like qalculate or galculator and drgeo or kig might be interesting, too?!
dgilmore	rdieter: im hoping that NM will be done ssoninsh since id like to use it for OLPC though. none of the mesh stuff is in NM-0.7
rdieter	sdziallas: yep, surel
rdieter	dgilmore: well olpc's will presumably run the real thing, not an f10-olpc spin. :)
rdieter	or am I wrong?
dgilmore	rdieter: who knows.
dgilmore	rdieter: though the next release will be based on F-9
sdziallas	rdieter: i'm moving some things around on the list in the wiki
dgilmore	rdieter: it would be nice if a sugar spin runs on the XO
rdieter	nod
sdziallas	rdieter: the question is, how many kdeedu apps we want to include: for example, if we're going to include all of the kdeedu math apps (and splitting them from the rest of kdeedu), it does not really make sense, to have a gnome based spin, right? (it would pull in way too much deps)
rdieter	sdziallas: we'd have to weight that, and see which would be more economical: kde-based vs gnome-based vs. what we choose to include (much of little of kdeedu) + everything else.
sdziallas	+1. true!
rdieter	again, I'm totally biased, so I'd say go with kde-based, but I'd be willing to accept gnome too, esp if it meant more space for more apps.
rdieter	the apps are certainly the focus here.
rdieter	could even consider a smaller/minimal DE, like xfce, but I have little/no experience with that, so don't know how usable it would be for our target audience (whatever that is... ).  :)
sdziallas	well, I'd say go with kde, since kdeedu includes more and imo for our purpose the more fitting apps (unless we find a lot of gtk-based apps for students - i think there are more gtk-based apps for children...)
rdieter	sounds good to me.
sdziallas	okay :).
sdziallas	hmm... how about including taskjuggler?
sdziallas	or scribus? i know, these are all not math-focussed apps - but they might be used by students generally... or should we put those on another spin?
rdieter	imo, let's keep this one focussed.
sdziallas	okay
* sdziallas was just asking for opinions :)
nirik	gnuplot? higher math stuff?
rdieter	but I don't feel strongly. if others feel the need, and/or have a use-case for including other stuff, fine.
dgilmore	there could be a case for a few education spins
nirik	kpolynome ? orpie ?
dgilmore	one aimed at under 5-6
dgilmore	one 5-6 though 11-12
rdieter	dgilmore: definitely, we talked about that @ last meeting, age-based spins.
dgilmore	and one 11-12 through 17-18
dgilmore	very different markets
dgilmore	:)
sdziallas	yeah... but we must start somewhere, right?
rdieter	sdziallas: right, full circle, brings us back to math-spin. :)
sdziallas	so maybe i should focus some ideas (olpc-spin, age-based versions....) in the wiki
sdziallas	nirik: i didn't have them on the list... didn't notice those... somehow
rdieter	sdziallas: eventually yes, but I still think this group would be better served setting a smaller, more-easily attainable goal, and accomplishing that first, before branching out.
rdieter	shrug, but documenting ideas, categorizing apps, is always needed.
rdieter	so, ignore me.
sdziallas	okay ;) so lets talk about math :) i'll post the log and put some things in the wiki, though
rdieter	don't get me wrong, I love all that stuff, I just don't want to get bogged down discussing a ton of diferent things with the end result of nothing.
sdziallas	+1... maybe we should try to get a first spin out asap.... i mean, f9 is not so far away :) and maybe, we should accomplish this *before* f10
rdieter	I think it's doable within weeks or months.
sdziallas	...which would be quite nice. i think we need an idea concerning the included apps... than, I might work a possible config (which should not take too long) and than, it's just a question of getting it approved and hosted
wwoods	F10Alpha freeze is 9 weeks away.
* spstarr_work looks at wwoods
wwoods	Just a friendly reminder.
spstarr_work	shouldn't that countdown only begin *after* F9 is GA?
wwoods	why? people have been building new packages for f10 for a couple of weeks now
spstarr_work	true
rdieter	wow, 9 weeks isn't very long.
wwoods	planning for new features for F10 starts as soon as we close F9 for features
rdieter	time flies when you're having fun.
wwoods	that was months ago
spstarr_work	wwoods: but rawhide hasn't switched to f10-devel yet :/
wwoods	we move pretty quick here, people
spstarr_work	even if i could just switch myself to it
wwoods	p.s. doooooom
wwoods	heh
wwoods	it'll be unlocked in a couple of days
wwoods	anyway, wasn't trying to derail the conversations
rdieter	wwoods: not at all, thx.
sdziallas	yeah :)
spstarr_work	rdieter: my packages are targeted for F10, since they aren't really useful for post-F9 unless your backporting KDE 4.1 to post-F9 later? ;-)
rdieter	spstarr_work: we will, yeah, most likely.
spstarr_work	ok
rdieter	sdziallas: do you have a good enough list of math apps yet? or do we need some more suggestions and brainstorming?
sdziallas	kdeedu, qalculate, wxmaxima, octave (?), gnuplot, kpolynome, orpie
sdziallas	that's on my list... basically
nirik	orpie is not very pretty, but It's small so I guess it could be handy.
sdziallas	the package is 650 kb... should be fine, hu? :)
rdieter	Macaulay2, R (warning: big)
sdziallas	package is 6,3 mb... i have a look at the deps
sdziallas	not much more.... should stay at about 6,5 mb
nirik	scipy ?
rdieter	nirik: I'd lean toward no, let's stick with apps with ui's.
rdieter	gui preferable even.
nirik	ok, fair enough
sdziallas	would cost us again about 6.5 mb - i have never used this one before.... so?!
sdziallas	leave it off the spin?
sdziallas	maybe, i should just take those apps and work on a kickstart file...
rdieter	cool, I gotta run in a few minutes, thx for the meeting (so far).
sdziallas	okay :)
sdziallas	anything else to discuss so far, or should we talk again in a week or so?
sdziallas	well, I'm going to post some results on the list
sdziallas	thank you everybody
sdziallas	have a nice day
sdziallas	meeting adjourned!

Generated by irclog2html.py 2.6 by Marius Gedminas - find it at mg.pov.lt! [[Category:Education]