On Sun, Feb 3, 2013 at 9:25 AM, Gerald Ardito <gma...@gmail.com> wrote: > Sean, > > I appreciate your comments about teachers. > As a teacher who has used Sugar and the XOs extensively, and has trained > other teachers to do so as well, I can say that things can sometimes be very > difficult. > > I sometimes feels like there is a middle layer missing in the process, a > layer that would let teachers be able to get some support with their > intentions, but that doesn't necessary involve development.
It is somewhat apples and oranges, but when I was in Amazonas and asked where the teachers hung out, they all say, with out hesitation, Facebook. I didn't ask them to join the #sugar IRC channel to help them over the inevitable bumps in the road, or to navigate the wiki, but rather, we set up a Facebook page where they could get help with those "middle" things. I'm 100% certain that US teachers use Facebook, so we should too, if we want to engage them. -walter > > Gerald > > On Sunday, February 3, 2013 at 8:29 AM, Sean DALY wrote: > > It's clear that anything other than pre-installed raises a barrier > most teachers don't want to deal with. However, getting Sugar > referenced with an OEM is far easier said than done. And Apple is not > particularly motivated to encourage others to boot non-Apple OSes on > their hardware. > > In the meantime, we have to make the difficult as simple as possible. > This includes installers and documentation including videos. > > I don't want to underestimate teachers' motivation to find software > for their students, either. I have found that Sugar's unbeatable price > and nonprofit orientation are consistently appreciated by teachers. > > Sean > > > On Sun, Feb 3, 2013 at 2:06 PM, DancesWithCars <danceswithc...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > do you all think installing a VM is easier than > making a LiveCD, or SOAS and rebooting? > > Most Macs these days are Intel, > it's the hardware compatibility to get something > to boot from BIOS, and other issues, AFAICT... > > Of the kids and adults I've talked to, over the years > (realizing most people here have more experience) > they don't bother unless an XO-1.x or better is put > before them... They fall in love with the hardware, > the cuteness factor, and if it's on a regular machine > (even the RPi I've tried a few on), it's a no go, > generally... > > Not that it's not worth having, jhbuild, sweets, VMs, etc > are all good, but most non technical people won't > try it, AFAICT... > > --- > odd nonstandard keyboard so who knows what I intended to type... > > On Feb 3, 2013 7:21 AM, "Thomas Gilliard" <satel...@bendbroadband.com> > wrote: > > > Sean; > > I just did a cleanup of the wiki pages covering Virtual Box and Importable > appliances > deleted a lot of obsolete information and their links [5] > > I updated: > Downloads [1] [2]; Fedora_18 [3]; and Sugar_on_a_Stick [4] wiki pages > > Tom Gilliard > satellit on #sugar freenode IRC > > [1] > http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Downloads#Virtual_Machines_on_all_platforms > Links to Virtual Box Appliances : > [2] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_Creation_Kit/VirtualBox > Links to Soas-v8: > [3] > http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Fedora_18#Sugar_on_a_Stick_v8_.CA.BB.C5.8Chelo_.CA.BBai > [4] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_on_a_Stick > This page is still not updated, you have to scroll down to find SoaS-v8 > [5] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Special:RecentChanges > > > > On 02/02/2013 04:14 PM, Sean DALY wrote: > > > For the past couple of years, our homepage has linked the Sugar on a > Stick (SoaS) badge to the SoaS page [1] and the "download" menu item > and "Try it with a child today" link to the Downloads page [2]. > > The downloads page rightly in my view orients visitors by platform, > but the two largest market share desktop/laptop OSes (Windows & MacOS, > 96% or so of market) only give instructions for Sugar on a Stick and > the "Do you use a virtual machine?" link misses the excellent VMs > available (in particular the VMs of... SoaS!). > > I think teachers will self-classify by OS and virtually none of them > will self-classify as virtual machine users. > > Teachers will also expect pancake button 1-click installers (this was > confirmed by Sloan Marketlab study), problematic with SoaS due to > necessary USB stick manipulation and still a bit hairy on a Mac. > > I think Windows section and Mac section should both propose choice of > SoaS and using VirtualBox with a SoaS VM, explaining benefits of each > method in layman's terms. > > VMs are far less disruptive for trying Sugar, as a teacher can > download to hard disk, install and run, keeping usual apps going > (mail, browser, word processing) while experiencing Sugar. > > The downside is of course massive files to download, but that could be > mitigated with torrents and/or mirrors. > > Comment please before we get into wiki editing of this crucial page > thanks > > Sean > > > [1] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_on_a_Stick > [2] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/DocumentationTeam/Try_Sugar > > > _______________________________________________ > SoaS mailing list > SoaS@lists.sugarlabs.org > http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/soas > > _______________________________________________ > Marketing mailing list > market...@lists.sugarlabs.org > http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/marketing > > > > _______________________________________________ > Marketing mailing list > market...@lists.sugarlabs.org > http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/marketing > -- Walter Bender Sugar Labs http://www.sugarlabs.org _______________________________________________ SoaS mailing list SoaS@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/soas