Re: [kidsgames] Re: GUIs und kinder

[Doug Loss <dloss@csrlink.net>]

thudson@cygnus.com wrote:
> 
> Has anyone given any thought to programming languages or
> environments. Seems like it would be nice to provide
> some time of framework/language/visual design environment
> so that non-programmers could develop content. I'm not
> that familiar with the Mac, but I've heard that Hyperstack
> was like this.

Over on seul-edu we've been discussing this for some time.  Currently
the product most used on the Mac (I'm told) for this sort of thing,
which we're calling an authoring tool, is HyperStudio.  It's a
commercial program, from MacroMedia (I think).  There isn't currently
anything terribly similar to it for Linux.  We found two possible ways
to address this need.  First, there's MetaCard
<http://www.metacard.com>, a commercial program that can read HyperCard
stacks and can generate its own content.  MetaCard has reasonable
licensing costs for educational use.  The MetaCard people have told us
that the educational community isn't their primary market focus and that
they'll consider making a "lite" version of their product available for
free download for educational use.  They also think that making a
HyperStudio-like interface to MetaCard should be fairly simple, although
they don't plan to invest any effort in doing so.

Then, there's Squeak <http://www.squeak.org>, an implementation of
SmallTalk.  It is being designed by Alan Kay's development group at
Disney Imagineering.  One of their design goals is to have a user
interface that can be expanded, so that it can be made appropriate for
everyone from small children to experienced programmers.  One of the
members of seul-edu is going to go down to Disney in November to meet
with the Squeak team to find out how seul-edu can help in the
development of Squeak as an authoring tool for Linux.

That's about all I know of at this time.

-- 
Doug Loss                 The difference between the right word and
Data Network Coordinator  the almost right word is the difference
Bloomsburg University     between lightning and a lightning bug.
dloss@bloomu.edu                Mark Twain
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