-----Original Message----- From: edu-sig-bounces@python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces@python.org] On Behalf Of Dethe Elza

I've taken a cursory look at KPL. It appear very similar to Basic, but exposing the .Net libraries. I guess now that VisualBasic has become another syntax for C#, they needed a new Basic for scripting. It has top-level functions for playing sounds, getting screen information, handling sprites, math, pen (shapes and color). Kind of like combining a subset of DrawBot and PyGame, but backed by .Net instead of the Standard Library.

I would also mention effbots recently released wrapper to the AGG library: http://effbot.org/zone/pythondoc-aggdraw.htm pen, brushes, colors, lines and a host of other 2d primitives --) extremely high-end rendering accessed in a lightweight environment - say IDLE - without the burden of type declarations (which have to hurdle to kids). It simply better for the job - if that still counts for anything. Art

--Dethe

"We realize you had a choice betwen several bankrupt airlines to fly today, and we thank you for choosing our bankrupt airline." --Delta Airlines pilot

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From: edu-sig-bounces@python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces@python.org] On Behalf Of David Handy

And it doesn't appear to be open source, either. (No source code available, and I couldn't find any explicit license, other than a statement that it was "freeware".

Nor - of course - is it cross platform. I agree that is a relevant concern - but articulating why is somewhat difficult. I have little such concerns related to software for business use - for example. Nor am I unconcerned about the Open Source community's tendency to be uncritical of efforts to distribute "educational software" - based on little more than the merit of being cross platform and Open Source. The best I can do is trying to make the analogy of the reaction to a release of a scientific or academic paper that withheld citations and bibliography - as confidential. But of course -having them there does not make it a sound scientific or academic paper. I - like many others- welcome much of the disruption of the disruptive technologies. On the other hand - disruption is disruption. And part of what can and does get disrupted are sound common sense notions. A company like Microsoft would be ashamed - based on more traditional notions - of publicly promoting a position that the realization of the potential of our children is part of their mission. The reality is they spend enormous dollars promoting just such a position - with little general reaction. If there was truth to such an assertion they should (and would) be satisfied to let uninterested others find it, and promote it. Quite possibly this concern/phobia/paranoia of mine is a tempest in a teapot. A stage of be disruption will pass, and thinking around such issues of children's education and the profit motive's of $multibillion business enterprises will return to where common sense concerns regain their footing. But I still see the jury as out. So a few paragraphs sent into cyberspace still seems worth the effort. Art

Hi Arthur -- I really do try to understand your concerns about businesses touting their efforts in the education arena, and how much that concerns you. For me it's more about recruiting i.e. for Microsoft to keep a new generation of talent working in Redmond, it needs to have appeal as an employer, plus needs kids growing up to know something of the Microsoft way and lore. Windows, X-Box and such. If all home schoolers use are Linux and OS X, and same for a generous pie slice of school computer labs, that's maybe not so good, in terms of attracting future talented, fun & friendly coworkers. But Microsoft is not so narrow as to only care about Windows or Office or SQL Server. The .NET technology, which we've been discussing in this thread, is a promising platform for Python, and .NET has a footprint in Linux, in the form of Mono. The technology is, once again, cross platform, and that has a lot of appeal (I can even run Mono on Windows -- have it on my Toshiba A60 WinXP laptop in fact, left over from OSCON 2005). Having lots of options is generally good for client businesses such as mine. We don't like getting locked in to pricing structures, not Microsoft's, not anyone's. Open source often looks a lot less predatory to small businesses, even if harder to grok. The programmer you hire is surviving on the basis of skills, not secret access to back door source code. The code is in the open. Kung fu is on merit, not unfair advantage. Python, for its part, tends to go cross-platform because of its VM architecture. Like Java, it's designed to leave interpretation of the low level byte codes to something native, written in something fast. C, Java and C#/CIL have been the VM source languages so far -- at least those are the ones I know a little about (I'm not so sure what's in that Nokia cell phone). I'd be concerned if just one or two big companies felt they could hijack and control our curriculum, but having thousands upon millions of competing firms hawking their education-relevance doesn't so far bother me. Free speech and all that. If you want to position as a friendly-to-kids, yet commercially minded education company, go right ahead. There's nothing sleazy about that in pure principle (you're just recruiting coworkers), and sure, there're lots of opportunities to mess up. Conclusion: there's no promise you'll succeed, but you do have the right to try, is my attitude. Kirby