[sugar] Viewing PDFs from Browse

[Eben Eliason]

The user couldn't annotate a file they don't "have".  Obviously we
have to download the bits to a temporary location to view them, but in
the normal paradigm of the web, nothing is permanently kept unless you
explicitly download it.  Perhaps an attempt to navigate away from the
page could ask if you wanted to keep it around or not, but I'd just as
soon expose the keep button and have kids learn to keep only what they
actually want.  Everything on the web is transient unless you grab
something while you can.

It doesn't really make sense to me to add annotation tools and such to
the pdf viewer in Browse for this reason.  It should remain limited to
handy viewing controls, saving the annotation tools for Read once the
document is local, I feel. (As an analogy, you wouldn't expect to be
able draw on top of or otherwise edit an image within Browse, right?
You'd be able to zoom, pan, *maybe* rotate; but you'd download it and
edit it in an activity designed for that purpose.)

- Eben


On Sat, Oct 11, 2008 at 6:21 AM, Tomeu Vizoso <tomeu at tomeuvizoso.net> wrote:
> On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 5:01 PM, Eben Eliason <eben.eliason at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 10:53 AM, Tomeu Vizoso <tomeu at tomeuvizoso.net> wrote:
>>> On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 4:46 PM, Eben Eliason <eben.eliason at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 4:24 AM, Tomeu Vizoso <tomeu at tomeuvizoso.net> wrote:
>>>>> On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 1:40 AM, Eben Eliason <eben.eliason at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>> Hey, this looks pretty cool, actually.  One powerful addition which I
>>>>>> think is necessary in order to adopt this is the addition of a Keep
>>>>>> button in that toolbar, by which one *could* download the pdf for
>>>>>> offline reading later if wanted.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> In a similar vein, would it be possible to create a supplemental
>>>>>> toolbar like this for other media types which browse specifically
>>>>>> supports?  I could see having a similar UI for images, and a perhaps
>>>>>> for audio and video, too.  The ability to view various formats
>>>>>> directly, yet also have a one-click means to download the file, sounds
>>>>>> promising.
>>>>>
>>>>> Hmm, shouldn't the act of viewing a PDF create an entry in the journal
>>>>> that allows you to resume this act? If so, shouldn't the viewer plugin
>>>>> create an entry in the journal by itself and that entry would contain
>>>>> the PDF?
>>>>
>>>> Well, in this new model, I'd think not, actually.  I can view an image
>>>> directly within Browse without creating a new Journal entry.
>>>> Basically, anything Browse handles natively remains a part of my
>>>> Browse session.  Anything which it cannot, or which I explicitly wish
>>>> to keep for myself, becomes a new downloaded object.
>>>
>>> So Browse would create some kind of entry that would allow resuming
>>> the reading of that book?
>>
>> Of course.  Basically, the following would happen:
>>
>> 1. Child clicks on a link to a pdf (or "natively supported media type")
>> 2. Browse displays the pdf directly, with the contextual toolbar
>> 3. Browse does not yet interact with the DS; this is just part of what it does
>>
>> (Stopping here would result in no Journal entry, apart from the Browse one)
>
> Not sure about it, if the user spent some good time reading (and
> perhaps annotating) the PDF, shouldn't the journal record this in the
> same way it tries to record all worthy interaction with the machine?
>
> Regards,
>
> Tomeu
>