[Server-devel] Edublog notes (Tomeu Vizoso)

[Greg Smith (gregmsmi)]

Hi All,

Great work. Tarun is awesome!

That said, I didn't intend him to do any C++ or compiled programming
before we began. Not that he can't or shouldn't, just that it wasn't in
the job description :-)

I'm not sure I understand everything you are talking about below but I
want to re-iterate one design goal.

I hope this whole app can be done server side with no changes to code on
the XO. I don't even want to "sugarize" beyond making sure the web pages
display well in the default Browser.

That saves us from updating the Xos and doing a huge regression test on
the client side.

Let me know if you think that is not possible and we need XO code
changes. 

The "XS only" requirement and the need to create a dynamic (AKA
configurable by teacher/admin) set of options were the main reasons we
chose Browse for the client instead of Write. We give up powerful
formatting tools by using unmodified Browse + HTML but that's a price
we're willing to pay for shorter development time and flexibility in
updating.

BTW Tarun, is your XO on its way to India? Get me the shipping address
off list and I'll ping SJ again if needed.

Thanks,

Greg S

**************
Date: Thu, 5 Jun 2008 12:38:40 +0200
From: "Tomeu Vizoso" <tomeu at tomeuvizoso.net>
Subject: Re: [Server-devel] Edublog notes
To: "Tarun Pondicherry" <tarunpondicherry at gmail.com>
Cc: server-devel at lists.laptop.org, sugar <sugar at lists.laptop.org>
Message-ID:
	<242851610806050338y54999075h4a5508ea11e2ac32 at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

On Thu, Jun 5, 2008 at 12:00 PM, Tarun Pondicherry
<tarunpondicherry at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> - Embed Mozilla's editor inside an activity similarly to how we are 
> embedding the browse in Browse.
> http://www.xulplanet.com/references/xpcomref/comps/c_editorhtmleditor1
> .html
>
>
> This looks very promising.  The only question I have is how easily I 
> would be able to make that interface mimic Write and add options to 
> it.  (I assume it would involve changes to Browse or other sugar 
> code).  HTML controls don't display using the sugar interface controls

> either, so I'm unsure if this uses them.

Well, Browse is a python activity that uses pyxpcom to access the
xulrunner functionality from python. Browse uses the browser
functionality in xulrunner because it is a browser ;), but your activity
could use the html editor functionality that is in xulrunner.

You would code the UI in pygtk very similarly to Browse, and just call
xulrunner through pyxpcom.

> Not sure which one is the best for you, perhaps going with #2 may be 
> easier? Would be good to leave space for growing later as needed, 
> though. #1 and #3 would give you support for tables.
>
>
> I'm not sure why #2 (JS editor) would not give me support for tables.
> Doesn't Gecko's Midas provide functions to create and modify tables?  
> (I've done it with editors that run in firefox.)  Has that feature 
> been disabled for some reason?

Well, Midas is a html editor implemented in C++ inside xulrunner, right?
It can be accessed though js or pyxpcom, so it would work both as #2 and
#3. Didn't knew it had support for tables, so I stand corrected.

Regards,

Tomeu