From be_well@linuxmail.org Sun Jan 5 14:54:36 2003 From: be_well@linuxmail.org (Will Well) Date: Sun, 05 Jan 2003 22:54:36 +0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] power fails her courage accrues Message-ID: <20030105145436.14669.qmail@linuxmail.org> Dear Lena, here's a... Recipe for a Happy New Year Take 12 fine, full-grown months; see that these are thoroughly cleansed from all old memories of bitterness, hate, and jealousy. Cut these months into 30 or 31 equal parts. (This batch will keep for one year. Do not attempt to make more than one batch at a time- many people spoil the entire lot in this way.) Prepare one day at a time as follows: Into each day, put 12 parts of faith, 11 of patience, 10 of courage, nine of work (some people omit this ingredient and spoil the flavor of the rest), eight of hope, seven of fidelity, six of open-mindedness, five of kindness, four of rest ( leaving this out is like leaving the oil out of the salad-don't do it ), three of prayer, two of meditation, and one of well-selected resolution. If you have no conscientious scruples, add a teaspoonful of good spirits, a dash of fun, a pinch of folly, a sprinkling of play, and a heaping cupful of good humor. Pour love liberally into the whole, and mix with strength. Cook thoroughly in a warming heat. Garnish with a few smiles and a sprig of joy; then serve with quietness, unselfishness, and cheerfulness-and a Happy New Year is a certainty. Ok, Lena be happy and stay well. Best regards to you and yours from all of us here. I remain, Yours sincerely, Larry -- aka Will Well, Be Well, Ack Ping Mobile-telephone: +46-0-704272521 www.angelfire.com/nb/well o o 0 \/ | \_o / \ _| |_ "Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts." (Sign hanging in Einstein's office at Princeton). -- ______________________________________________ http://www.linuxmail.org/ Now with POP3/IMAP access for only US$19.95/yr Powered by Outblaze From urnerk@qwest.net Tue Jan 7 18:55:32 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 07 Jan 2003 10:55:32 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Sets In-Reply-To: References: <20021227170004.4205.36096.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030107104434.01ab8e88@pop.ptld.qwest.net> I'm been playing with the new Set class, added in 2.3a -- wondering if others have been as well. I'm gearing up to write something for the Math Forum, showing how Python is a great tool for teaching math concepts -- using the new Set object in particular (I've already posted oodles regarding other apps, as per http://www.inetarena.com/~pdx4d/ocn/numeracy0.html ) In general, it's more fun to have live/interactive notations (aka interpreted programming languages) and the ability to program algorithms means this isn't just black box arithmetic (the way it is with calculators, at least when they're being abused). More broadly, I'm brainstorming heuristics that'd anchor a different way of approaching math (it would be more a hybrid of current compartments -- more computer than currently standard). Major categories like Time, Space, Objects and Events would be the top-level key words. For more thinking along these lines, see: http://www.dstoys.com/Members/kirby/Works/documents/bigpicture.html/view http://www.mathforum.org/epigone/math-learn/krermplumgul http://www.inetarena.com/~pdx4d/ocn/trends2000.html Kirby From villate@gnu.org Wed Jan 8 09:13:34 2003 From: villate@gnu.org (Jaime E. Villate) Date: Wed, 8 Jan 2003 09:13:34 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Sets In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030107104434.01ab8e88@pop.ptld.qwest.net>; from urnerk@qwest.net on Tue, Jan 07, 2003 at 10:55:32AM -0800 References: <20021227170004.4205.36096.Mailman@mail.python.org> <5.2.0.9.0.20030107104434.01ab8e88@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <20030108091334.C397@fe.up.pt> On Tue, Jan 07, 2003 at 10:55:32AM -0800, Kirby Urner wrote: ... > More broadly, I'm brainstorming heuristics that'd anchor a different > way of approaching math (it would be more a hybrid of current > compartments -- more computer than currently standard). > > Major categories like Time, Space, Objects and Events would be the > top-level key words. For more thinking along these lines, see: > > http://www.dstoys.com/Members/kirby/Works/documents/bigpicture.html/view In my browser (Galeon) I cannot read this page because the black column in the right obscures the last word on each line. even if I reduce the letter size, the problem remains (not to mention that I do not see any flash animations because I've failed to compile the free clone of the flash plugin). > http://www.mathforum.org/epigone/math-learn/krermplumgul > http://www.inetarena.com/~pdx4d/ocn/trends2000.html Very interesting ideas. I think that's a nice teaching scheme. (I teach physics and math at the college level) Regards, Jaime P.S. I'm sorry I do not have anything to say about the Sets class because I have not used it yet. From Arthur" ANN: PyGeo version .8a released ---------------------------------------------------------- see http://home.netcom.com/~ajs Something quite young can grow up a quite some in a year. I believe PyGeo has. And what is PyGeo? : ==================== PyGeo is a dynamic geometry laboratory and toolkit requiring Python2.2 and VPython (and Numeric as distributed with VPython). PyGeo may be used to explore the most basic concepts of Euclidean geometry at an introductory level, including by elementary schools students and their teachers. But is particularly suitable for exploring more advanced geometric topics - such as projective geometry and the geometry of complex numbers. The intent is to bring a rich visual experience to the study of both synthetic and analytic geometry The inspiration: ================ PyGeo is inspired by other dynamic geometry applications - Cabri, Geometers Sketchpad, cinderella and, in particular, David Joyce's wonderful open source java code which is used to create his inspiring site of Euclids Elements with the classic constructions in web-enabled dynamic form. What distinguishes PyGeo ======================== The 3rd dimension ------------------ PyGeo was built from inception to take advantage of the current generation of 3d graphic capabilities (applied geometry, in itself, of course). While this has a certain appeal just on motivational grounds, the importance of this aspect of PyGeo is, it is contended, of a significantly higher order. The study even of the 2 dimensional geometries beyond the simplest Euclidean concepts *requires* 3 dimensions for thorough investigation, or where the enhancement of intuition is a goal. The visualization of the projective geometry of the plane requires the facility for the visualization of the projection from plane to plane. Well accomplished in 3d space. In the exploration of the geometry of the complex plane, the visualization of the projection to the unit sphere adds an important dimension. The 3rd dimension. The Python Programming Language --------------------------------------- The choice of Python as the implementation language for PyGeo goes well beyond the fact of my own comfort with it as a development language. The choice is in fact quite integral to PyGeo's educational purpose and design. Python code is often referred to as "executable pseudo-code". This helps bring some unique characteristics to PyGeo as tool for the study of geometric concepts. Because of the level of programming abstraction provided by Python and the accessibility to its code as readable text, the analytics driving the rendering of the synthetic, visual geometry is highly exposed. One can explore the analytics at work. The abstract becomes much less abstract, and the two classical approaches to the study of geometry can and should become, much more coherently, one. PyGeo, as open source Python, should be readily extensibleby anyone inclined toward the effort. Extend the functionality, create new primitives and interfaces for study of specialized geometric areas. In this sense PyGeo is not an application, as such. It hopes to be a laboratory and a framework, the beginning of a structure for imaginative exploration. And play. And, hopefully, some worthwhile fun. Site for download ================= http://home.netcom.com/~ajs License: ======== GPL Documentation: ============== The release includes source code (of course) and numerous demos, but the user documentation is still in progress - thank you reStructuredText. Feedback ======== mailto:ajs@ix.netcom.com From urnerk@qwest.net Thu Jan 9 07:49:42 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Wed, 08 Jan 2003 23:49:42 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Sets In-Reply-To: <20030108091334.C397@fe.up.pt> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030107104434.01ab8e88@pop.ptld.qwest.net> <20021227170004.4205.36096.Mailman@mail.python.org> <5.2.0.9.0.20030107104434.01ab8e88@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030108233537.01c232c8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 09:13 AM 1/8/2003 +0000, Jaime E. Villate wrote: >http://www.dstoys.com/Members/kirby/Works/documents/bigpicture.html/view > >In my browser (Galeon) I cannot read this page because the black column >in the right obscures the last word on each line. even if I reduce the >letter size, the problem remains (not to mention that I do not see and >flash animations because I've failed to compile the free clone of the >flash plugin). Thanks for the feedback Jaime. I had a too-wide GIF in that article and Mozilla/Galeon was having problems -- which I hadn't noticed until you brought it to my attention. I took out that picture and it should display OK now. Regarding Flash, this site doesn't as yet do a whole lot with it (the animation in the upper right is just minor eye candy). However, you perhaps needn't go to the trouble of compiling a clone. There's a Flash plug-in for Netscape that runs on Linux. It installs in the .mozilla folder of your home directory, and will give Galeon (as well as Mozilla) the same powers. See: http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/alternates/ Kirby From Arthur" <000701c2b7f2$81a8fee0$6892c750@BPC328> Message-ID: <005201c2b7f4$04cbbf00$aa6ff6d1@Arts> Lars - I posted to edu-sig@python.org and python-list@python.org Though I am sure your feelings on my posting of the announcement are full= y justified, I have no way of filtering my messages to those forums out for you. I think it is doable from your end. I'm not very technical about those kinds of things, so wouldn't know how = to help you. But others have promised that they have done just that as to my e-mails = to these groups. Good luck with it. And thanks for the feedback. Art ----- Original Message ----- From: "Lars Nyg=E5rd" To: "Arthur" Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2003 10:19 AM Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] ANN: PyGeo version .8a released > Please don't send me any more mails! > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Arthur" > To: > Cc: > Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2003 2:15 AM > Subject: [Edu-sig] ANN: PyGeo version .8a released From mimi@programgeeks.net Fri Jan 10 03:45:14 2003 From: mimi@programgeeks.net (mimi@programgeeks.net) Date: Fri, 10 Jan 2003 21:45:14 1800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Join our Programming community? Message-ID: <1042256714.264@programgeeks.net> Hi, I found your email today on a website.. I am emailing a selected few to see if they will join a new online Programmer community. It is found at http://www.programgeeks.net/forums . It really means alot to us if you could join. =) See you there? Tony Mimi mimi@programgeeks.net P.S. This is NOT SPAM, it is a personal invitation, your email has been HANDPICKED, you are only being emailed at the same time. From guido@python.org Sat Jan 11 04:12:02 2003 From: guido@python.org (Guido van Rossum) Date: Fri, 10 Jan 2003 23:12:02 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Join our Programming community? In-Reply-To: Your message of "Fri, 10 Jan 1800 21:45:14." <1042256714.264@programgeeks.net> References: <1042256714.264@programgeeks.net> Message-ID: <200301110412.h0B4C2K22230@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> > P.S. This is NOT SPAM, it is a personal invitation, your email has been > HANDPICKED, you are only being emailed at the same time. This is so ironic. Has anybody here *ever* received a non-spam that asserted it wasn't spam? :-) --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) From Arthur" I would very much appreciate it if someone could help me respond to Gary. Thanks, Art ----- Original Message ----- From: "Gary Pajer" To: "Arthur" Sent: Saturday, January 11, 2003 12:41 PM Subject: Re: pyGeo problems: linux progress > Art, > > PyGeo seems to run well under linux (Mandrake 9.0) if you can get it going. > > I'm now facing a python issue that's always confused me. Maybe you can > help. If not, I'll post to the python newsgroup. > > The problem on my system seems to be that /usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo doesn't > appear in sys.path. It does on my Win98 installation, but not on my linux. > How is sys.path initialized? How did those entries get there? How is it > that Win98 knows about it but linux doesn't? I installed both the same way: > from the zip. > > If I modify your demo scripts to add the directory by hand, everything works > splendidly: > > import sys > sys.path.append('/usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo') > > and away we go. > > I think everything will be fine if I can figure out how to get that > directory on sys.path by default. Do you know how to do that? > > -Gary > From guido@python.org Sat Jan 11 18:14:45 2003 From: guido@python.org (Guido van Rossum) Date: Sat, 11 Jan 2003 13:14:45 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Fw: pyGeo problems: linux progress In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 11 Jan 2003 12:49:27 EST." <000701c2b999$ca223710$564c9a40@Arts> References: <000701c2b999$ca223710$564c9a40@Arts> Message-ID: <200301111814.h0BIEj724988@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> > I would very much appreciate it if someone could help me respond to Gary. > > Thanks, > > Art There are several solutions: - You can set the environment variable PYTHONPATH to point to /usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo: assuming a bash shell: $ PYTHONPATH=/usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo $ export PYTHONPATH $ python yourscript.py - You can copy the *contents* of PyGeo into /usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages (a directory that *is* on the path by default). - You can create a file "/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/PyGeo.pth" whose contents is one line containing the single string /usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo (left-aligned, no spaces before or after on the same line). --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Gary Pajer" > To: "Arthur" > Sent: Saturday, January 11, 2003 12:41 PM > Subject: Re: pyGeo problems: linux progress > > > > Art, > > > > PyGeo seems to run well under linux (Mandrake 9.0) if you can get it > going. > > > > I'm now facing a python issue that's always confused me. Maybe you can > > help. If not, I'll post to the python newsgroup. > > > > The problem on my system seems to be that /usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo > doesn't > > appear in sys.path. It does on my Win98 installation, but not on my > linux. > > How is sys.path initialized? How did those entries get there? How is it > > that Win98 knows about it but linux doesn't? I installed both the same > way: > > from the zip. > > > > If I modify your demo scripts to add the directory by hand, everything > works > > splendidly: > > > > import sys > > sys.path.append('/usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo') > > > > and away we go. > > > > I think everything will be fine if I can figure out how to get that > > directory on sys.path by default. Do you know how to do that? > > > > -Gary > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Edu-sig mailing list > Edu-sig@python.org > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig From Arthur" Guido writes: >There are several solutions: etc. Thanks much. Guess I should probably redo my distribution and installation instructions to place PyGeo in "site-packages" by default. I'm thinking disutils is overkill for PyGeo so I'm just doing a .zip file distro. But I can and will, after I experiment and confirm I undersand all the implications, change to a "site-packages" placement for PyGeo. Art From guido@python.org Sat Jan 11 19:41:38 2003 From: guido@python.org (Guido van Rossum) Date: Sat, 11 Jan 2003 14:41:38 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Fw: pyGeo problems: linux progress In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 11 Jan 2003 14:36:51 EST." <001301c2b9a8$caf519a0$4355f6d1@Arts> References: <001301c2b9a8$caf519a0$4355f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <200301111941.h0BJfcY25333@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> > Guess I should probably redo my distribution and installation instructions > to place PyGeo in "site-packages" by default. I'm thinking disutils is > overkill for PyGeo so I'm just doing a .zip file distro. No, distutils is *not* overkill. Please consider using distutils; it will make others' lives so much easier! If you get stuck, I'll try to help. > But I can and will, after I experiment and confirm I undersand all the > implications, change to a "site-packages" placement for PyGeo. Is PyGeo itself currently a top-level package, or is it a collection of top-level modules? If the latter, I strongly recommend that you make it a top-level package (and yes, changing all your imports is a royal pain; but it's worth it, and again your future users will thank you). --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) From Arthur" >No, distutils is *not* overkill. Please consider using distutils; it >will make others' lives so much easier! If you get stuck, I'll try to >help. Oh well, another learning curve. Sure its not bad. Having recently been well rewarded by overcoming my resistance to the small reStructuredText learning curve, I'll dig in. >Is PyGeo itself currently a top-level package, or is it a collection >of top-level modules? If the latter, I strongly recommend that you >make it a top-level package (and yes, changing all your imports is a >royal pain; but it's worth it, and again your future users will thank >you). I am sure what you saying here will mean more to me after I dig in a bit. And greatly appreciate your offer to tutor a bit. Art From Jason Cunliffe" Message-ID: <001301c2b9b3$28fc40a0$6501a8c0@vaio> > >Is PyGeo itself currently a top-level package, or is it a collection > >of top-level modules? If the latter, I strongly recommend that you > >make it a top-level package (and yes, changing all your imports is a > >royal pain; but it's worth it, and again your future users will thank > >you). Hi Athur, Congratulations and thanks for latest version of PyGeo. Sorry, I've been busy elsewhere and no time to dig into Python anything. YES please switch to distutils For the longterm health of PyGeo It's one of the most important changes to Python to make it friendly for both newbies and pros. And that's no mean feat.. Everyone will thankyou. ./Jason ______________________________________________ Jason Cunliffe [NOMADICS: Director art+design] Tel/fax: +1 718 422-1078 jasonic@nomadics.org N 43:00.000' W 074:31.875' ALT:1144 ft 84 Henry Street #3C Brooklyn NY 11201 USA From alphac@flashmail.com Sun Jan 12 03:17:54 2003 From: alphac@flashmail.com (Jacob Lee) Date: 11 Jan 2003 22:17:54 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Independent study topic? Message-ID: <1042341474.474.164.camel@foofighter> --=-XflY5jDAU+aGkBmkWSUI Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Hi. I'm a junior in high school who has essentially run out of computing courses. I took Computer Science AP freshman year (got a 5 on the AB exam) and have the opportunity to perform an independent study in some topic this semester. The question is what area of study to pursue. Ideally, any topic will have a textbook available, be easily self-taught, and be something that will benefit from being able to devote 50 minutes/day to it. This means that another programming language would not be a suitable topic, since I can learn that over the Internet (and yes, I've already learned Python :-p). I have identified the following textbooks as possibilities and was wondering if anyone has comments or suggestions: Introduction to Genetic Algorithms Concrete Mathematics: A Foundation for Computer Science Applied Cryptography Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs (the LISP book) I'm leaning towards Concrete Math, but I'm concerned that it might be too hard (I'm currently in Calculus BC, which means I'll essentially be taking Calc II concurrently with the independent study). Does anyone have experience with this textbook? Also, if anyone has any other suggestions that aren't on this list or opinions on these textbooks, that would be wonderful. Thanks in advance. --=20 Jacob Lee (ArthurDenture) Digital signature attached. If it's not signed, it didn't come from me. Would you send all your mail on postcards? Un-encrypted e-mail is just that= . --=-XflY5jDAU+aGkBmkWSUI Content-Type: application/pgp-signature; name=signature.asc Content-Description: This is a digitally signed message part -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.1 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQA+IN5hnn69RiXLM4wRAnk5AJ9lHMbIYyD475rY9aYSoC6otpbEwQCcD1lx Li/3ot5XoFUPw0BfG3YxTNo= =hwdz -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --=-XflY5jDAU+aGkBmkWSUI-- From dennis.hamilton@acm.org Sun Jan 12 05:35:14 2003 From: dennis.hamilton@acm.org (Dennis E. Hamilton) Date: Sat, 11 Jan 2003 21:35:14 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Independent study topic? In-Reply-To: <1042341474.474.164.camel@foofighter> Message-ID: If you are leaning toward Concrete Mathematics, I would recommend that you begin with Knuth's "The Art of Computer Programming," vol.1 - Fundamental Algorithms. It is not so purely mathematical and applies the mathematics. I also recommend it for the numerous worked exercises of rated difficulty. This will provide many more opportunities for structuring and managing your self-study, and also telling how well you are doing. The application to the analysis of algorithms is the next great part. If you don't like the idea of learning the MIX machine (which you don't *have* to learn to get value from the books), you might get on Knuth's Web sites and take a look at the modern machine MMIX, http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/mmix.html Also, you might find an opportunity to be one of the people that reviews and converts exercises for this new machine. Finally, if you want more mathematically-oriented algorithms, you can take a look at the work being done on Volume 4, http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/taocp.html#vol4 which includes many modern areas of computational and algorithmic development. -- orcmid ------------------ Dennis E. Hamilton http://NuovoDoc.com/ mailto:dennis.hamilton@acm.org tel. +1-206-932-6970 cell +1-206-779-9430 The Miser Project: http://miser-theory.info/ AIIM DMware: http://DMware.info/ -----Original Message----- From: edu-sig-admin@python.org [mailto:edu-sig-admin@python.org]On Behalf Of Jacob Lee Sent: Saturday, January 11, 2003 19:18 To: edu-sig@python.org Subject: [Edu-sig] Independent study topic? [ ... ] Introduction to Genetic Algorithms Concrete Mathematics: A Foundation for Computer Science Applied Cryptography Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs (the LISP book) I'm leaning towards Concrete Math, but I'm concerned that it might be too hard (I'm currently in Calculus BC, which means I'll essentially be taking Calc II concurrently with the independent study). Does anyone have experience with this textbook? Also, if anyone has any other suggestions that aren't on this list or opinions on these textbooks, that would be wonderful. Thanks in advance. -- Jacob Lee (ArthurDenture) Digital signature attached. If it's not signed, it didn't come from me. Would you send all your mail on postcards? Un-encrypted e-mail is just that. From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Sun Jan 12 12:01:30 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 12 Jan 2003 12:01:30 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Status of the CP4E Project Message-ID: <1042372890.1124.681.camel@localhost.localdomain> Hello I have recently discovered this mailing list and was hoping that someone might be able to give me a quick and dirty synopsis of where this project is at (I understand that funding is an issue and has largely put brakes on the project) and where subscribers to this list see the project going from here. Thank you Andrew -- ________________________%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%____________________________ Proudly sent using Ximian Evolution 1.2.1 on a Linux Red Hat 8.0 box. From ny@adslhome.dk Sun Jan 12 15:28:25 2003 From: ny@adslhome.dk (=?iso-8859-1?Q?Lars_Nyg=E5rd?=) Date: Sun, 12 Jan 2003 16:28:25 +0100 Subject: [Edu-sig] Mistake Message-ID: <000c01c2ba4f$3fd806a0$e208c450@BPC328> This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_0009_01C2BA57.A1549030 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Will someone please remove my name from the mailing list! ------=_NextPart_000_0009_01C2BA57.A1549030 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
Will someone please remove my name from = the mailing=20 list!
------=_NextPart_000_0009_01C2BA57.A1549030-- From pajer@iname.com Sun Jan 12 17:09:30 2003 From: pajer@iname.com (Gary Pajer) Date: Sun, 12 Jan 2003 12:09:30 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Fw: pyGeo problems: linux progress : an oddity References: <000701c2b999$ca223710$564c9a40@Arts> <200301111814.h0BIEj724988@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> Message-ID: <000701c2ba5d$5f191780$6e142044@levtwn01.pa.comcast.net> Thanks Guido and Art. PyGeo is working now, BUT: I have some odd behavior for you. The *.pth mechanism won't work as expected in this case. The punch line is in 7.) below. Recall that I've got Linux Mandrake 9.0, and the version of python that comes with it (2.2.1) I don't know if it's worth any effort to track this down, since things are working for me. But I'll let you decide. 1.) Setting PYTHONPATH works fine, once I did it correctly. 2.) I have Numeric in .../site-packages and a file Numeric.pth that points to it. The directory .../site-packages/Numeric appears in sys.path. 3.) I have PyGeo in .../site-packages and a file PyGeo.pth that points to it. The directory .../site-packages/PyGeo *does not* appears in sys.path. 4.) I have an empty directory 'test' in .../site-packages and a file test.pth that points to it. The directory .../site-packages/test *does* appears in sys.path. 5.) I have renamed .../site-packages/PyGeo, PyGeo.pth, and it's content pointer all to lower case 'pygeo'. The directory *does not* appear in sys.path. 6.) I have recopied, rewrote, reinstalled all of the PyGeo files several times, makeing sure that spellings were correct, that PyGeo.pth (or pygeo.pth) had no extra spaces. (In all cases, including the cases for Numeric and test, the .pth file contains one word, the directory name, followed by a newline.) In no case did the PyGeo directory appear in sys.path 7.) I copied PyGeo into a new directory called xxx, and create xxx.pth pointing to the directory, and .../site-packages/xxx **does** appear in sys.path. !!! And PyGeo runs flawlessly. 8.) Under Win98, PyGeo and PyGeo.pth both live in c:/python22. c:/python22/PyGeo *does* appear in sys.path. I suppose that despite all my care, it's still possible that I misspelled something. But I really tried hard. And if I simply unzip the PyGeo dist. into site-packages it does not work. If I simply unzip the PyGeo dist under Win98, it *does* work. Regards, Gary (P.S. to Art: obviously, none of this bears on our original PyGeo problem under Win98. That problem is still there.) > > I would very much appreciate it if someone could help me respond to Gary. > > > > Thanks, > > > > Art > > There are several solutions: > > - You can set the environment variable PYTHONPATH to point to > /usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo: assuming a bash shell: > > $ PYTHONPATH=/usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo > $ export PYTHONPATH > $ python yourscript.py > > - You can copy the *contents* of PyGeo into > /usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages (a directory that *is* on the > path by default). > > - You can create a file "/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/PyGeo.pth" > whose contents is one line containing the single string > > /usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo > > (left-aligned, no spaces before or after on the same line). > > --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) > > > ----- Original Message ----- > > From: "Gary Pajer" > > To: "Arthur" > > Sent: Saturday, January 11, 2003 12:41 PM > > Subject: Re: pyGeo problems: linux progress > > > > > > > Art, > > > > > > PyGeo seems to run well under linux (Mandrake 9.0) if you can get it > > going. > > > > > > I'm now facing a python issue that's always confused me. Maybe you can > > > help. If not, I'll post to the python newsgroup. > > > > > > The problem on my system seems to be that /usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo > > doesn't > > > appear in sys.path. It does on my Win98 installation, but not on my > > linux. > > > How is sys.path initialized? How did those entries get there? How is it > > > that Win98 knows about it but linux doesn't? I installed both the same > > way: > > > from the zip. > > > > > > If I modify your demo scripts to add the directory by hand, everything > > works > > > splendidly: > > > > > > import sys > > > sys.path.append('/usr/lib/python2.2/PyGeo') > > > > > > and away we go. > > > > > > I think everything will be fine if I can figure out how to get that > > > directory on sys.path by default. Do you know how to do that? > > > > > > -Gary > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Edu-sig mailing list > > Edu-sig@python.org > > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig > From Arthur" <200301111814.h0BIEj724988@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> <000701c2ba5d$5f191780$6e142044@levtwn01.pa.comcast.net> Message-ID: <001201c2ba60$e7f19070$4260f6d1@Arts> > > (P.S. to Art: obviously, none of this bears on our original PyGeo problem > under Win98. That problem is still there.) I tried to fire up an old machine we had around the house running Win98 to do an install and see what I ran into. Unfortunately I managed to blow the thing up before I even got to the point of installing PyGeo. I'm doing a little threading thingy with the GUI, mechanically following something I saw being done . But I may have done it badly. My best guess is that is the source of the Win98 issue. But whatever it is, it does not seem to effect Win2000 or WinXP, which is strange. Anyway I'll try to have another go at getting my Win98 machine up. I am in fact curious as to what the issue might be. Art From Arthur" FWIW, The Ny Times has an article today about the lack of interest in computer science by female students. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/12/edlife/12STABINE.html?todaysheadlines Nothing new said, and what is said is said kind of badly. So badly, that if it were written by a man, rather than a women, there would proably be hell to pay. But I thought I'd mention it, only because its maybe interesting to others that the Times decided to fill space with the article. Art From guido@python.org Sun Jan 12 18:35:36 2003 From: guido@python.org (Guido van Rossum) Date: Sun, 12 Jan 2003 13:35:36 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Fw: pyGeo problems: linux progress : an oddity In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sun, 12 Jan 2003 12:09:30 EST." <000701c2ba5d$5f191780$6e142044@levtwn01.pa.comcast.net> References: <000701c2b999$ca223710$564c9a40@Arts> <200301111814.h0BIEj724988@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> <000701c2ba5d$5f191780$6e142044@levtwn01.pa.comcast.net> Message-ID: <200301121835.h0CIZaZ07296@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> > 2.) I have Numeric in .../site-packages and a file Numeric.pth that points > to it. The directory .../site-packages/Numeric appears in sys.path. > > 3.) I have PyGeo in .../site-packages and a file PyGeo.pth that points to > it. The directory .../site-packages/PyGeo *does not* appears in sys.path. > > 4.) I have an empty directory 'test' in .../site-packages and a file > test.pth that points to it. The directory .../site-packages/test *does* > appears in sys.path. > > 5.) I have renamed .../site-packages/PyGeo, PyGeo.pth, and it's content > pointer all to lower case 'pygeo'. The directory *does not* appear in > sys.path. > > 6.) I have recopied, rewrote, reinstalled all of the PyGeo files several > times, makeing sure that spellings were correct, that PyGeo.pth (or > pygeo.pth) had no extra spaces. (In all cases, including the cases for > Numeric and test, the .pth file contains one word, the directory name, > followed by a newline.) In no case did the PyGeo directory appear in > sys.path > > 7.) I copied PyGeo into a new directory called xxx, and create xxx.pth > pointing to the directory, and .../site-packages/xxx **does** appear in > sys.path. !!! And PyGeo runs flawlessly. I have no time to try this myself. If others report the same thing, open a bug report on SF. Until then, I expect it's a quirk of your setup. Those generally can't be tracked down except by sitting next to you, and I have no time for that. > 8.) Under Win98, PyGeo and PyGeo.pth both live in c:/python22. > c:/python22/PyGeo *does* appear in sys.path. > > I suppose that despite all my care, it's still possible that I misspelled > something. But I really tried hard. > And if I simply unzip the PyGeo dist. into site-packages it does not work. > If I simply unzip the PyGeo dist under Win98, it *does* work. After unzipping PyGeo, what is left behind? A directory named PyGeo or just a bunch of .py files? I think Art does all his development on Windows; it may be that he is case-inconsistent in the spelling some module name and that that causes the problem. But I have no time to download PyGeo and poke at it. :-( --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) From Arthur" >After unzipping PyGeo, what is left behind? A directory named PyGeo >or just a bunch of .py files? There is a PyGeo directory with a number of files I consider "top-level", and sub-directories for docs,examples, utils, and a directory for some modules for classes that are "abstract", i.e. not called directly by a PyGeo construction script. But what is in top-level and what below is in a number of cases arbitrary, and I am rethinking it in connection with getting my arms around a distutils distribution. >I think Art does all his development on Windows; Is so. Got comfortable with a particular text editor and seem to be inertia - ed there for the time being. > it may be that he is case-inconsistent in the spelling some module name and that that >causes the problem. Or some kind of "encoding" (Windows/DOS vs ANSI) or some such ? issue on the PyGeo.pth file? The "fault" of this self-same Windows text editor to which I am devoted? I assume you have tried leaving all else as is in the distro, and deleting the PyGeo.pth file that came with it and recreating it in Linux. >But I have no time to download PyGeo and poke at it. :-( Can't understand where this man's priorities are. :) Art From Arthur" <200301111814.h0BIEj724988@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> <000701c2ba5d$5f191780$6e142044@levtwn01.pa.comcast.net> Message-ID: <006501c2ba8a$2cb185c0$4260f6d1@Arts> Well .... I am seeing a new line/ return code at the end of "PyGeo" in PyGeo.pth when I do a "view visible spaces" on my text editor. Not so of the Numeric.pth file. 99% - that's the issue. Funny it impacts Linux but not Windows - but lots of this crossplatform stuff is mysterious to me and it doesn't shock me I got into a little trouble with it. Meanwhile, I'm going to replace the PyGeo.pth file in the distribution. Thanks Gary and Guido for helping me track this down. Art From Arthur" (this belongs on tutor, but since the investigation that led me her2 started from edu-sig discussion I am copying there) To setup, I have a directory called "Geometry", with 2 modules "Real" and "Complex". >From the command line: Python 2.2.1 (#34, Apr 9 2002, 19:34:33) [MSC 32 bit (Intel)] on win32 Type "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information. IDLE 0.8 -- press F1 for help >>> import Geometry >>> Complex=Geometry.Complex >>> Complex >>> from Complex import * Traceback (most recent call last): File "", line 1, in ? from Complex import * ImportError: No module named Complex >>> from PyGeo.Complex import * >>> My Python instincts are a little surprised by this. In my mind Complex and Geometry.Complex have become identical by the Complex=Geometry.Complex line but obviously the import mechanism is not working from "names" in the same way "names" are usually used in scripts. In the end what I am trying to accomplish is simplification of importing for the users of my modules instead of from Geometry.Complex import * or from Geometry.Real import * I would ideally like the following to be sufficient (not a real big deal, one way or other, admittedly): from Complex import * or from Real import * Ideas appreciated. Art From urnerk@qwest.net Mon Jan 13 02:01:54 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 12 Jan 2003 18:01:54 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] import mechanism questions In-Reply-To: <00b001c2baa0$f55ea730$4260f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030112173535.01118af0@pop.ptld.qwest.net> > >Ideas appreciated. > >Art Are you fully exploiting the 'package' feature by using the top level __init__.py in /PyGeo to bring in everything a user might need? It seems to me that ideally you'd want PyGeo under site-packages, with an >>> import PyGeo giving the user access to all top-level tools needed to exploit the package. The option to go: >>> from PyGeo import * would be there too (up to the user to opt for that form). You'd use __init__.py at the top level to pull in whatever you need from any of the subdirectories. As to your specific question, as I understand the docs, import foo treats foo as a key string into a lookup table of accessible module objects (of type 'module'), which table you may expose as sys.modules. Failing here, Python initiates a platform-specific search routine paying attention to the path (sys.path). By defining Complex = Geometry.Complex, you are not adding anything to this lookup table (nor to the path). However, you may do so explicitly: >>> sys.modules['Complex'] = Geometry.Complex >>> import Complex will work. Kirby From Arthur" Message-ID: <00cc01c2bab0$e9c5cce0$4260f6d1@Arts> > Are you fully exploiting the 'package' feature by using > the top level __init__.py in /PyGeo to bring in everything > a user might need? Inbetween drivng my son to the airport to go back to college, exactly what I'm up to. And making good progress. Before: a typical PyGeo construction might have required: from VPyFrame import VPyGeo from Complex import * from GeoConstants import * from utils.utils import randomXYZ to get started. Got that down to: from PyGeo.PyElements import * from PyGeo import randomXYZ using the mechanisms of __init__.py imports My post was just me getting greedy, and trying to get PyGeo.PyElements down to PyElements > >>> sys.modules['Complex'] = Geometry.Complex I think this is good! putting: import sys import PyGeo.Complex import PyGeo.Real sys.modules['Complex'] = PyGeo.Complex sys.modules['Real']=PyGeo.Real in the __init__.py of the toplevel directory I can have all scripts start with: from PyGeo import * (this will bring in all utilities functions, including, e.g. randomXYZ) and then one of from Complex import * or from Real import * depending on the mode one wants to work in. And that should be it. Which I think is just fine, actually. And so far I don't see a catch. You're scary sometimes Urner. Thanks. Art From pajer@iname.com Mon Jan 13 03:21:14 2003 From: pajer@iname.com (Gary Pajer) Date: Sun, 12 Jan 2003 22:21:14 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Fw: pyGeo problems: linux progress : an oddity References: <000701c2b999$ca223710$564c9a40@Arts> <200301111814.h0BIEj724988@pcp02138704pcs.reston01.va.comcast.net> <000701c2ba5d$5f191780$6e142044@levtwn01.pa.comcast.net> <006501c2ba8a$2cb185c0$4260f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <000501c2bab2$d47e7ec0$6e142044@levtwn01.pa.comcast.net> > Well .... > > I am seeing a new line/ return code at the end of "PyGeo" in PyGeo.pth when > I do a "view visible spaces" on my text editor. > > Not so of the Numeric.pth file. > > 99% - that's the issue. I've rewritten and recreated PyGeo.pth a half dozen times. I've written it with and without a newline at the end. I've "selected all" and deleted all the text and rewrote it. But it's worth trying again, and ... you're right. Shows to go you that you can never be sure you've checked things as thoroughly as you think. Thanks all, gary From Arthur" A recent thread on python-list re-raises copy and deepcopy becoming built-in. It is controversial, to be sure. But there doen't seem to be any sentiment that the idea is *fundamentally* unsound. Nor does the thread even touch on the reasons that I, for example, think it to be important. If my argument has any weight, and the idea is not unsound even without consideration of it, well.... http://groups.google.com/groups?dq=&num=25&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&group=comp.lan g.python&start=25 > >If it still bothers you, how about a PEP proposing that object have > >copy and deepcopy methods that DTRT? That way, all new-style classes > >would have a copy and deepcopy methods, so you could invoke them > >without having to import a module. > > Actually, I think Python could get what he wants if copy.copy and > copy.deepcopy were added to the builtins as 'copy' and 'deepcopy'. > It seems he mostly didn't like the need for an extra import, based > on the OP's statement From Arthur" Not me wrote - > Actually, I think Python could get what he wants if copy.copy and > copy.deepcopy were added to the builtins as 'copy' and 'deepcopy' Now that I am a reStructuredText guru ;), I can at least *format* a nice PEP. But I, like everyone else, have a lot on my plate. Guido - Total waste of time? Maybe a preliminary ruling on that narrow question? thanks, Art From guido@python.org Mon Jan 13 15:52:21 2003 From: guido@python.org (Guido van Rossum) Date: Mon, 13 Jan 2003 10:52:21 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Elegant copy-by-value In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 13 Jan 2003 10:09:53 EST." <001001c2bb15$d450d610$f6d0d23f@Arts> References: <001001c2bb15$d450d610$f6d0d23f@Arts> Message-ID: <200301131552.h0DFqMd23733@odiug.zope.com> Edu-sig is not the forum to discuss language additions. --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) From Arthur" >Edu-sig is not the forum to discuss language additions. >--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) I am having trouble digesting that as a fully appropriate response to my question. And I think there has in fact been a history of such discussions here. And not at all instigated by me, in most cases. That is when such changes were thought to have a direct impact on Python as a learning language, or Python in a learning process. Which is my *only* interest in the built_in copy issue. And in fact I think it inappropriate that this forum *not* be the central forum for language addition questions that happen to focus on that issue. Many people in a wider forum might with all rights take the position that they have no interest in the language addition issue as it effects people new to programming, for example. Presumably, members of this forum include this among those concerns. Assumedly my only alternative is to contact you off-line for some clarification. Which itself doesn't seem fully appropriate. But I will do so. Alternatively, you might want to clarify for me what *is* the forum. It seems to me that in the past, many of those discussions have occurred in private dialogue with you. Are you suggesting gthat? Art From villate@gnu.org Tue Jan 14 08:58:47 2003 From: villate@gnu.org (Jaime E. Villate) Date: Tue, 14 Jan 2003 08:58:47 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Elegant copy-by-value In-Reply-To: <000b01c2bb1d$d4d21a60$fb5cf6d1@Arts>; from ajs@ix.netcom.com on Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 11:07:10AM -0500 References: <000b01c2bb1d$d4d21a60$fb5cf6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <20030114085846.B389@fe.up.pt> On Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 11:07:10AM -0500, Arthur wrote: > >Edu-sig is not the forum to discuss language additions. > >--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) > > I am having trouble digesting that as a fully appropriate response to my > question. > > And I think there has in fact been a history of such discussions here. And > not at all instigated by me, in most cases. > > That is when such changes were thought to have a direct impact on Python as > a learning language, or Python in a learning process. > > Which is my *only* interest in the built_in copy issue. But please keep in mind that some of us in this list joined the list to talk about "Python in Education - Computer Programming for Everybody" and cannot give you any feedback in your discussions about language additions. On the other hand, there must be some other list where python-language-additions guys use to hang around. > Alternatively, you might want to clarify for me what *is* the forum. hasn't he clarify it in http://www.python.org/sigs/edu-sig/ ? That's what I read when I decided to join this forum. Cheers, Jaime From Arthur" <20030114085846.B389@fe.up.pt> Message-ID: <00bf01c2bbc7$dd15bab0$e860f6d1@Arts> > > hasn't he clarify it in http://www.python.org/sigs/edu-sig/ ? > That's what I read when I decided to join this forum. I see no reason to put any strictures on the list subject matter - beyond filtering spam. Certainly the list does not suffer from an over abundance of traffic. And by question to Guido was quite specific. He might have answered me using no more bandwidth than he used with reasoning as to why he was not answering me. Why is formality necessary. Was your post permissable? Is this? Why do we need to wonder and inhibit ourselves? Art From michael.williams@st-annes.oxford.ac.uk Tue Jan 14 12:36:16 2003 From: michael.williams@st-annes.oxford.ac.uk (Michael Williams) Date: Tue, 14 Jan 2003 12:36:16 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] On and off-topic [was Re: Elegant copy-by-value] In-Reply-To: <00bf01c2bbc7$dd15bab0$e860f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: On Tuesday, January 14, 2003, at 12:24 pm, Arthur wrote: >> hasn't he clarify it in http://www.python.org/sigs/edu-sig/ ? >> That's what I read when I decided to join this forum. > > I see no reason to put any strictures on the list subject matter - > beyond > filtering spam. Certainly the list does not suffer from an over > abundance > of traffic. If really you see *no* reason to put *any* strictures on what's on and off-topic on a mailing list then perhaps you've got rather more spare time than many of the other people on this list. This list not being high-volume is one of its virtues, not a failure, and is certainly not a reason to keep posting until you deem the level to be suitable to you. > And by question to Guido was quite specific. > > He might have answered me using no more bandwidth than he used with > reasoning as to why he was not answering me. It's not bandwidth that's the issue. It's people time being wasted on stuff they're not interested in. > Why is formality necessary. One of the reasons we compartmentalize "python" into smaller topics is so that busy people only have to read about what they're interested in. I should imagine that many of this lists subscribers consider *technical* discussion of Python's development and structure to be irrelevant to them -- Michael From Arthur" Message-ID: <00cb01c2bbcd$5454d250$e860f6d1@Arts> Michael - Can we at least then take this as an opportunity to discuss, as a community, what if fact is and is not apporpriate here? It seems to me, my bringing up technical issues I face as a novice developer as to PyGeo, as I have, would be *more* inappropriate than discussing a language addition that I, for one (and probably only one) , thinks has importance to Python's suitablility as a learning language. But I have from time to time let myself do just that. Because PyGeo is a good faith effort to contribute to Python in education, and it seems to me that at least some in the community with an interest in that specific issue would have no objection to being helpful. Guido was recently tremendously helpful. In the past, when such a discussion looked like it was becoming more than a post or two I in fact have specifcally volunteered to move the discussion out and to tutor@python and was advised by at least one community member (a prolific Python author), in one instance, that it was, at least as far as he is concerned, unnecessary. So I am somewhat confused. A discussion of the div operator helped you, you said, identify an issue you felt you should give more emphasis to in your initial presentation of Python material. Jason oftern keeps us up on things going on *outside* the world of Python. Terribly inappropriate, by some measure, though I for one have alwys appreciated his cites, and have, form time to time, become informed of things I don't know how I didn't know were going on. A new list member recently asked a question about the status of CP4E and its future, and got no response. Proably becuase no one knows *how* to answer that question. But let me say it straight out - ' And I am more than ready (an fully expect) at this point to be booed off the stage. My true problem is that I consider PyGeo a serious enough effort in the CP4E category, and I am not aware of many others of the kind, to have *earned* a little latitiude on a list organized around that concept. Art From Arthur" Message-ID: <00f401c2bbd7$023585a0$e860f6d1@Arts> >My true problem is that I consider PyGeo a serious enough effort in the CP4E category, and I am not aware of many others of the kind, to have *earned* a >little latitiude on a list organized around that concept. And, let me add specifically, a fair hearing of my well-considered ideas. Art From Arthur" Message-ID: <010301c2bbdb$c6fdf800$e860f6d1@Arts> And I'll continue to be irrelevent by letting the edu-sig list know that a search on the word Python at http://mathforum.org/ which, by any standards, is a *major* (and vast) resource to the educational community at all levels, comes up with 3 hits. one's a Monty. one's a reference to a professors site, with "Python" buried in "IGF, LibPS 2, Python, Perl, TeXtool 2.12a" and one's PyGeo: "A dynamic geometry toolset written in Python" which in fact is a *selected* site in the subject area of geometry. Selected by whom, I don't know, but certainly not by me. Do I have some epectation of being treated as something more than a nuisance in a Python forum dedicated to education. Yes, I do. Art From Arthur" >and one's PyGeo: >"A dynamic geometry toolset written in Python" >which in fact is a *selected* site in the subject area of geometry. >Selected by whom, I don't know, but certainly not by me. Worth noting: Kirby, who I met here, helped me with the web site. Worth noting: That attention at math forum was before PyGeo was very good. The damn thing keeps getting better. From Arthur" > The damn thing keeps getting better. Not by itelf, of course. but that's obvious, isn't it. From Jason Cunliffe" <010301c2bbdb$c6fdf800$e860f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <001a01c2bbe3$6b42b7a0$6501a8c0@vaio> f o c u s From Arthur" I'm done, for now. Art From villate@gnu.org Tue Jan 14 15:19:03 2003 From: villate@gnu.org (Jaime E . Villate) Date: Tue, 14 Jan 2003 15:19:03 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] On and off-topic [was Re: Elegant copy-by-value] In-Reply-To: <010301c2bbdb$c6fdf800$e860f6d1@Arts>; from ajs@ix.netcom.com on Tue, Jan 14, 2003 at 09:46:51AM -0500 References: <010301c2bbdb$c6fdf800$e860f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <20030114151903.I389@fe.up.pt> On Tue, Jan 14, 2003 at 09:46:51AM -0500, Arthur wrote: > PyGeo: > "A dynamic geometry toolset written in Python" > which in fact is a *selected* site in the subject area of geometry. > Selected by whom, I don't know, but certainly not by me. > Do I have some epectation of being treated as something more than a nuisance > in a Python forum dedicated to education. > Yes, I do. >From my experience with Internet mailing lists I can tell you that even if you are Mother Theresa, if you write too many off-topics subscribers will consider you a nuisance and ignore you. But if you write interesting posts on the list's topic, people will read them carefully even if you were John Doe. Cheers, Jaime From urnerk@qwest.net Tue Jan 14 20:42:02 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 14 Jan 2003 12:42:02 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] On and off-topic [was Re: Elegant copy-by-value] In-Reply-To: <010301c2bbdb$c6fdf800$e860f6d1@Arts> References: Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030114124022.01112758@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 09:46 AM 1/14/2003 -0500, you wrote: >And I'll continue to be irrelevent by letting the edu-sig list know that a >search on the word Python at > >http://mathforum.org/ > >which, by any standards, is a *major* (and vast) resource to the educational >community at all levels, comes up with 3 hits. If you drill down to the Discussion Groups level and do the search there, you'll find hundreds more links (and not all to posts be me :-D). Kirby From urnerk@qwest.net Tue Jan 14 21:06:18 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 14 Jan 2003 13:06:18 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Elegant copy-by-value In-Reply-To: <00bf01c2bbc7$dd15bab0$e860f6d1@Arts> References: <000b01c2bb1d$d4d21a60$fb5cf6d1@Arts> <20030114085846.B389@fe.up.pt> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030114124538.01ce2dc8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 07:24 AM 1/14/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: > > > > hasn't he clarify it in http://www.python.org/sigs/edu-sig/ ? > > That's what I read when I decided to join this forum. > >I see no reason to put any strictures on the list subject matter - beyond >filtering spam. Certainly the list does not suffer from an over abundance >of traffic. > >And by question to Guido was quite specific. > >He might have answered me using no more bandwidth than he used with >reasoning as to why he was not answering me. > >Why is formality necessary. I think Guido was implicitly inviting you to join the higher ranks, by continuing this thread among those who actually do mold the language -- over on python-dev for example. From the Python website: Finally, python-dev is the heart of Python's development. Practically everyone with CVS write privileges is on python-dev, and first drafts of PEPs are often posted here for initial review and rewriting before their more public appearance on python-announce. Anyone can subscribe to python-dev, though your subscription will have to been approved, resulting in a delay of a day or two before you start receiving e-mail. The list address does accepts e-mail from non-members, and the archives are public. There really is a structure to the Python community. I think it's up to the would-be contributor to pay some attention to it. Trying to make Guido engage you here seems a kind of willful inattention to The pros and cons re moving copy and/or deepcopy into the built-in core were already summarized on this list, rather recently. We also had a short thread on rational numbers (a proposed new number type) -- in part because I was reporting back from fresh experience with J, and one thing we *do* talk about on edu-sig is comparisons with other languages (the recent REBOL and longer-ago ISETL threads come to mind).[1] I think edu-sig should only intersect language design and development threads occasionally. Ideally, I'd like to read pithy synopses regarding the debates of the day -- but be spared the blow by blow stuff. If you do pursue your design concepts amidst the developer community, I hope you will update us on your progress, or lack of it, from time to time. Kirby [1] One thing I'm working on now is trying to figure how to pass J commands as strings back to jserver, using the Python sockets library. In principle, it's doable, and it'd be cool to avail myself of some of J's powers, from within Python. I suppose Mathematica could be used the same way. If anyone here has experience with this, I'm eager to learn more. From Arthur" Jaime write - >From my experience with Internet mailing lists I >can tell you that even if you >are Mother Theresa, if you write too many off->topics subscribers will consider >you a nuisance and ignore you. Which moves us nicely around the circle. I can tell you that the question of the effect of the case sensivity on Python as it effects new users was a vast topic here. The fact that I missed a damn carriage return on my PyGeo.pth file (or missed understanding I needed to concern myself about it) is not something I would expect to have you on the edge of your seat. True. But I had no idea that's where things were going. I do think the issue of the potential impact on the overall learning experience by a small change like moving "copy" from an import to a built_in is *extremely* interesting, from a number of perspectives. Not that I'm correct. But it is an interesting proposition, I think. You apparently don't. But I find it *so* interesting, that I'm surprised by that. As to Kirby's comments, I do know and follow the procedure. A PEP. And SOP, if there has been any prior discussion with Gudio on the issue, is to get a prelim from Guido as to whether one is wasting one's time. Since this is the forum in which Guido heard my reasoning, this seemed a perfectly sensible forum to ask that very standard question. In Guido's defense, perhaps he thought that there was something more than a simply, sincere, straight-forward inquiry at work - knowing me. In my defense, there was not. And had there not been some recent friendly exchanges between us, I would have done more to try to signal that there was not. As to your suggstion that there was an implicit suggestion by Guido for me to move the discussion to a forum like python-dev and and me with it, I will make my first official attempt at channeling Guido: God forbid. Art From webmaster@pferdemarkt.ws Wed Jan 15 12:23:44 2003 From: webmaster@pferdemarkt.ws (webmaster@pferdemarkt.ws) Date: Wed, 15 Jan 2003 04:23:44 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Pferdemarkt.ws informiert! Newsletter 01/2003 Message-ID: <200301151223.EAA01426@eagle.he.net> http://www.pferdemarkt.ws Wir sind in 2003 erfolgreich in des neue \"Pferdejahr 2003 gestartet. Für den schnellen Erfolg unseres Marktes möchten wir uns bei Ihnen bedanken. Heute am 15. Januar 2003 sind wir genau 14 Tage Online! Täglich wächst unsere Datenbank um ca. 30 neue Angebote. Stellen auch Sie als Privatperson Ihre zu verkaufenden Pferde direkt und vollkommen Kostenlos ins Internet. Zur besseren Sichtbarmachung Ihrer Angebote können SIe bis zu ein Bild zu Ihrer Pferdeanzeige kostenlos einstellen! Klicken Sie hier um sich direkt einzuloggen http://www.Pferdemarkt.ws Kostenlos Anbieten, Kostenlos Suchen! Direkt von Privat zu Privat! Haben Sie noch Fragen mailto: webmaster@pferdemarkt.ws From Arthur" I'm going to take the shot that some might consider this on topic to edu-sig. Anyone not interested in the real life story of new (and happy) distutils user, and my PyGeo distribution configuration progress, have no need to read further. Jason writes - >YES please switch to distutils >For the longterm health of PyGeo >It's one of the most important changes to Python to make it friendly for both >newbies and pros. And that's no mean feat.. >Everyone will thankyou. Guido writes - >No, distutils is *not* overkill. Please consider using distutils; it >will make others' lives so much easier! If you get stuck, I'll try to >help. Where this has led - Considerable rethinking not only of the form of distribution of PyGeo, but its organization, etc. Where I am at. For ceating any PyGeo script: from pygeo import * does it all. A *considerable* improvement from where things were a week ago. Thanks Kirby for the help. As to disutils: got it down, and have a distro of standalone PyGeo that puts everything nicely where it belongs by: "python setup.py install" The nice thing about distutils is that the setup.py script that is used to "package" the distro is the exact script that is used by the enduser to install. But there's more. >From this setup script I can create a self-installing Windows executable. Who knew? Distutils implicitly recognizing that the Windows and Linux communities represent, in many ways, have different users and therefore different needs. And it accomodates both well, easing the developers life. Good stuff. Thanks again, Guido, for getting me started down this road. But this is still Art speaking, so of course there is a problem. And with some "political" content. The VPython distribution on which PyGeo depends chooses to be off in its own world. In my view, to an extreme. Among the bizarre things it does is overwrite the *Python's* root documentation file, "index.html". Which means, among other strange effects, that even after you might uninstall VPython, you will forever get VPython's root help file, rather than Python's. *Which no longer exists*. Obviosuly absurd, IMO. And ill-mannered. IMO. And believe me I've raised this with Mr. Sherwood - to no avail. But even solving that, there are other issues. Not only does VPython install in non-standard places, it includes Numeric, but installs Numeric differently than Numeric installs itself on a standalone basis. So my plan is to go the step further. Probaly just ask my users to install the "official" Numeric. There is a Windows self installing executable. And I just tested the from source shebang under Windows, the setup.py install, that calls my VC++ and compiles and then installs in site-packages, and it worked quickly and flawlessly, and I ended up with something I would consider "standard" placement of files under the Python root. And then include my own VPython installation with PyGeo. Don't know a lot about these licensing things, but if VPython can offer a Numeric distribution that "mangles" its distribution, I can only assume that I am within my rights to do something similar as to VPython. The best choice, as far as I am confirmed, is to have VPython comply to with some reasonable standards. Apparently not in the cards. ALL FWIW, I guess. Art From Arthur" Let me start my saying that I know Guido is giving the following issue keen attention, and my understanding is that the issue will go away in 2.3. Will be a tremendous help to PyGeo. But its worth noting, that in the real world, as to PyGeo, the IDLE situation has *considerably* complicated life . Particularly since PyGeo *needs* the forked version, rather than the version distributed with Python2.2. That is if a user chooses to use IDLE. And that would be the most natural and sensible choice for a true newbie. A look into the IDLE fork mailing list about a week ago seemed to indicate that the forked version is now encountering some problems running VPython scripts, and will therefore the same would be true as to PyGeo. I am sure this is being attended to. I guess I will be more proactive and download the current IDLE fork version (or first see if it is part of 2.3a) and do some testing of PyGeo scripts with it. Results to be reported on the IDLE fork list, not here. Art From urnerk@qwest.net Sun Jan 19 18:34:05 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 2003 10:34:05 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] PyGeo distribution progress. In-Reply-To: <002c01c2bfca$6b4a0fb0$8c4a9a40@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030119103008.01d7a008@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 09:52 AM 1/19/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: >And then include my own VPython installation with PyGeo. > >Don't know a lot about these licensing things, but if VPython can offer a >Numeric distribution that "mangles" its distribution, I can only assume that >I am within my rights to do something similar as to VPython. > I hope so. I agree that VPython is annoyingly out of compliance with the standards, when it comes to installation. I don't know if the new IDLE coming in 2.3 is going to solve the runtime issues which led VPython to go its own way with IDLE, but if it does, then I'm looking forward to a streamlined VPython which goes into site-packages where it belongs -- maybe a year from now? >The best choice, as far as I am confirmed, is to have VPython comply to with >some reasonable standards. Apparently not in the cards. Didn't the VPython people get some huge grant to make it even more whiz bang? Seems making it a better citizen, when it comes to installation, might be a part of that package. Or maybe I'm just day dreaming. Kirby From urnerk@qwest.net Sun Jan 19 18:36:33 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 2003 10:36:33 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] PyGeo distribution progress. In-Reply-To: <004401c2bfcd$38270f40$8c4a9a40@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030119103448.01cea488@pop.ptld.qwest.net> > >I guess I will be more proactive and download the current IDLE fork version >(or first see if it is part of 2.3a) and do some testing of PyGeo scripts >with it. It's not part of 2.3a1, but the web site leads us to expect it in some upcoming version of 2.3. That the fork people are looking into VPython compatibility issues in particular is a good sign. Perhaps the convergence we're hoping for really *is* in the cards. Kirby From Jason Cunliffe" Message-ID: <004501c2bfe9$841be120$6501a8c0@vaio> "Arthur" wrote: > As to disutils: > > got it down, and have a distro of standalone PyGeo that puts everything > nicely where it belongs by: > > "python setup.py install" So if I understand correctly, Art, you've switched to distutils and that's the GOOD news. Well done And thanks :-) But the bad news is VPython is now out of sync, and needs its installation to be updated for everyone's sanity. What's the status on that happening? Can anyone fix VPython? Are the installation problems/violations now recognized by its authors? ./Jason From Arthur" >So if I understand correctly, Art, you've switched to distutils and that's the >GOOD news. Well done And thanks :-) Just cockily answered a disutils question of someone of python-list, as a matter of fact. And even might have given him the right answer. >But the bad news is VPython is now out of sync, Always has been, to an extreme degree. > and needs its installation to be updated for everyone's sanity. What's the status on that happening? I pointed out to Sherwood that the overwrite of Python index.html file was totally and easily avoidable. Since he is distributing his own IDLE, all he had to do is have that IDLE point to, let's say, a v_index.html. That way I (and the rest of the universe) get the Help screen we want and expect when we go to help when using the regular IDLE interactively. And his students get the help screen *he* wants them to get when they go to help from the VPython IDLE. It couldn't be simpler and more straight forward. He refused. I could say a lot more. Folks are uncomforatble with me speaking my mind to the extent I fell comfortable doing. I always think doing so is a good thing. Maybe I'm wrong. So I'll pass on saying more on the subject. >Can anyone fix VPython? Are the installation problems/violations now recognized by its authors? I'm proceedding to work on my own VPython distro - using distutils, and handling it "as if" there were might be other uses for Python other than to script Mr. Sherwood's students pictures. Art From Arthur" >I'm proceedding to work on my own VPython distro - using distutils, and >handling it "as if" there were might be other uses for Python other than to >script Mr. Sherwood's students pictures. Actually, the Windows compiled version is a no-brainer. My problem is a distro suitable for other platforms, as VPython does need to be compiled. PyGeo is pure Python, so the issue did not arise doing PyGeo stand-alone. I consider Linux a probably more legitimate platform in an educational environment than Windows. So I would not be interested a distro that was not Linux friendly. And though I truly was an early Linux adapter/explorer (as a user - only blew up one video card trying to get XFree up when you still had to set video card and monitor info by hand) I've been away from it for a good while. Were time not an issue - I'd have a Linux box going, testing everything related to PyGeo on it. Well this issue might push me there. Probably for the best. Art From Arthur" Sorry for my ususal bad habit of multiple posts. But to complete the thought. >But the bad news is VPython is now out of sync, I would be the first to say that VPython is of more general usefulness for educational purposes than is PyGeo, and in that sense is more "important" than PyGeo. One can argue either way about PyGeo. I don't think it can be argued that VPython is *not* an important contribution to the Python and education effort. And one of the true beauties of VPython is its small footprint under a standard Python installation. This will be even more true when the IDLE situation is resolved. And is particularly true if someone - as many, many people do - have other reasons to have Numeric installed. But the current VPython distribution gives exactly the opposite impression. It is not exaggerated, IMO, to call it at least a little viral. But how can this help but be "politcal". David Scherer is alive and well. He wrote VPython. What are his thoughts? Not really fair to ask. So I guess unless someone stops me, I proceed on my own path. Art From mad_hatter@blueyonder.co.uk Sun Jan 19 22:47:09 2003 From: mad_hatter@blueyonder.co.uk (CBC Systems) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 2003 22:47:09 -0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] CBC Systems -=- Cheap, Custom made computers - individually for YOU Message-ID: <0ac8d1147221313PCOW057M@blueyonder.co.uk> Dear, edu-sig@python.org! This is a quick e-mail to let you know about CBC Systems. A Company set up by a local group of highly experienced computer enthusiasts. CBC Systems build Custom made computers for you, which works out cheaper than a computer bought at PC World, for example. Only the parts you will need will be included, for example if you play a lot of games you will need a fast graphics card which you will not otherwise need. If you on the other hand only write up the odd letter, or go on the internet you will not need such a fast graphics card, and this will therefore reduce the cost of the computer. All components come with a 1Yr warranty, so should anything go wrong it will be repaired within days. You will also receive lifetime technical support, so if you ever need any help you can call us, or e-mail us any time of the day. Our computers start as low as £300, which includes a Monitor, Modem, Keyboard, Mouse, and all the neccessary components to get you started. Awaiting your reply, Imanuel Votteler CEO CBC Systems No two individuals are the same, why should their computers be? From Jason Cunliffe" Message-ID: <001501c2c01b$3ed399a0$6501a8c0@vaio> > But the current VPython distribution gives exactly the opposite impression. > It is not exaggerated, IMO, to call it at least a little viral. Maybe, but virtually all software in somewhat viral in nature these days - conceptually, installationally, screenwise, etc.. Certainly just about everything Microsoft touches is viral above and below the lines of documented visibility. Ditto all the competing media player/platforms. Would be nice if Python was always installed on all machines and platforms.. or would it? > But how can this help but be "politcal". David Scherer is alive and well. > He wrote VPython. What are his thoughts? Well I guess if enough people write in to David and suggest/volunteer to 'fix' VPython, we'll all be happy and benefit. The way I remember it from a few years back, there was time when I really appreciated VPython would just install and go. It was easier often than installing Python on windows and then trying to get a bunch of packages lined up. But it was disconnected from the rest and hard to connect - which goes against the idea of open programmability. Whatever it takes... God I really hope this does get re-solved now. So that VP plays well with IDLE, and distutils, and PyGeo, or whatever else edusigists might cook up. ./Jason From Arthur" >Whatever it takes... God I really hope this does get re-solved now. So that VP >plays well with IDLE, and distutils, and PyGeo, or whatever else edusigists >might cook up. Agreed. But there is essentially, within broad guidelines, what is recognized as a right way to distribute a Python 3rd party package. And what that standard is has evolved and become clearer and more broadly accepted over the past few years. I am purely a volunteer developer, working on my own. The VPython maintainers, have, or could have with a little effort, true resources. If there was the will to bring VPython into reasonable compliance - with distutils, for example - it could happen easily enough. I am somewhat paralyzed, because, for me it is a substantial effort - and it seems clear that VPython "official" will have to get there, and will eventually get there. When?. In the normal course, one would assume, if there not otherwise indications of unreasonableness. The simple fix of the overwrite of index.html - literarily involving 4 keystrokes - rejected based on reasoning that was convoluted in the extreme. Oh well. We'll see what we see. ART From Arthur" Terry - >You may not like how that developer's package works. I personally agree >with your opinion on the design issue (at least as far as I understand you >-- I haven't seen the rebuttal, only your statement that you didn't >understand it, which is hardly a strong case). But as I posted, you already >have perfectly adequate remedies for it: >* Use somebody else's package if there is one. >* Make your own replacement (by patching or forking if possible). OK, OK - I hereby put the license issue aside. But I am also makling Free Software. Not only am I making Free Software, I am making it during my Free Time. Yes, I can replace, fork, patch, redistribute. port, recode whatever. All of which is time consuming. And, in this case, should be totally unnecessary. I am asking the distributor to do no more than bring his distribution into reasonable compliance with normal practice, because I am otherwise uncomfortable - trying myself to adhere to good practice - asking my users to download that distribution. Is the Free Software world possible, without some voluntary adherence to standards? Art From Arthur" My last post here was meant for python-list, and misdirected here. Apologies. Art From brad@wpi.edu Mon Jan 20 15:54:55 2003 From: brad@wpi.edu (Brad) Date: Mon, 20 Jan 2003 10:54:55 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Computer Programing for Everybody Message-ID: <20030120155455.GA32423@ithryn.net> Hi All! I was reading on-line about 'Computer Programming for Everybody'. The home page says that the project has stalled. I read through the proposal and one of the goals is similar to a project that i am involved with (particularly the part about creating a curriculum for non-CS majors). Does anyone know about work at CMU or the work being done at the University of Chicago? For those how don't know here's the link to the home page http://www.python.org/cp4e/ Thanks, -b From Jason Cunliffe" Message-ID: <001301c2c0a7$78241fe0$6501a8c0@vaio> check out http://creativecommons.org/ ./Jason From be_well@linuxmail.org Mon Jan 20 18:40:17 2003 From: be_well@linuxmail.org (Will Well) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 2003 02:40:17 +0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Time flys like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana. Message-ID: <20030120184017.3972.qmail@linuxmail.org> Bob, I trust all's well with you too. Candy wrote she spoke with you. I did not want to bother you, yet of course grateful for your input. Thank you, the praxis is clearer, i.e. we have the police report stating we are free from fault, thus right to claim compensation from the other parts insurance company -- good. Regards, stay well cousin, Yours sincerely, Larry (aka Will Well) -- ______________________________________________ http://www.linuxmail.org/ Now with POP3/IMAP access for only US$19.95/yr Powered by Outblaze From Arthur" Brad asks - >Does anyone know about work at CMU Yep. But I don't think you want to hear about it from me, particularly. Long story, Brad Art From Arthur" >BTW, the package is apparently VPython, based on the conversation on >edu-sig. It seems to me that making an advisory along with the patch >would be a much more appropriate behavior. Yes, as I said on edu-sig, I understand that is my only reasonable option. But its a bigger job than the 4 key strokes, in my hands. Because in my hands I will attempt to make it fully comply with sound practice for the distribution of a Python 3rd party module. The overwrite problem issue I focus on is the one that makes the contribution unlivable. There are a many other issues that make it simply a bad non-compliant distribution. A community of people working reasonably cooperatively in an effort toward exploring the potential of Python in education was one of the things I thought and hoped CP4E would be about. But as I say repeated on edu-sig, I have come to understand myself to be in fact a fish quite out of water in this world of free software and whatever it is the "community" in the Python community represents. Expressing the wish, out loud, that someone else who is taking advantage of the community's productivity might act a bit more reasonably and less selfishly as a community member is seen by (at least some) of the community as an assault on that community. Its too complex for my simple mind. My continuing alienation from the community, frankly, is one of the things that makes me resent having to take on the project of bringing the VPython project into compliance with what are, I think, very reasonable community expectations as to how a 3rd party module should install and behave. Super ironic, too me, that the reaction should be "shut up,and kill a few more weekends for the good of the cause". Of course, the other solution is to overwrite his help file with my help file. That would indeed be 4 keystrokes. And than I could be the guy sitting on ten thousand lines of code, driving my pet toy. Unfortunately, thats not who I am. And please. What advisory do you have in mind. Art From Arthur" That post was on purpose. Art From urnerk@qwest.net Tue Jan 21 15:31:41 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 2003 07:31:41 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: license In-Reply-To: <00b401c2c152$d1c876d0$63a09840@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030121064614.01bbcb88@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 08:41 AM 1/21/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: >But as I say repeated on edu-sig, I have come to understand myself to be in >fact a fish quite out of water in this world of free software and whatever >it is the "community" in the Python community represents. I think you over-stress this self image. Some people disagree with some of your points, as is natural in a free wheeling give and take world. Others don't find the axes you grind particularly interesting. Others agree with some of your points. >Expressing the wish, out loud, that someone else who is taking advantage of >the community's productivity might act a bit more reasonably and less >selfishly as a community member is seen by (at least some) of the community >as an assault on that community. I think this has now been expressed very clearly, and archived appropriately. You've had some agreement from both myself and Jason. Now I don't see what more there is to be said on this topic. Continuing to stress how this makes you "a fish quite out of water" doesn't seem relevant or important (or even true -- you're really not that special (but I'm sure it adds spice to hype the soap opera angles of life -- kinda the daytime TV approach (now if we can just get you 'n Guido on Jerry Springer together (or even just you by yourself))). >My continuing alienation from the community, frankly, is one of the things Which community again? The whole of the Python user community? >that makes me resent having to take on the project of bringing the VPython >project into compliance with what are, I think, very reasonable community >expectations as to how a 3rd party module should install and behave. You don't "have to". You can tackle it if you like. Given you don't really seem to want to, I'd say feel more than free to forget the whole business. If people want to run PyGeo, they'll just have to put up with VPython's crap. They'll also have to install Python itself, which many in the geometry community won't have, won't even have heard of. It's all a big hassle. Wouldn't it be nice if you never needed to hassle. >Of course, the other solution is to overwrite his help file with my help >file. That would indeed be 4 keystrokes. And than I could be the guy >sitting on ten thousand lines of code, driving my pet toy. VPython currently comes with its own IDLE. If only *that* IDLE were to point to VPython documentation under help, with a forwarding link to the main Python docs, that'd be more acceptable. That it overwrites the help index for my generic IDLE is less cool, as if the only thing I want to use Python for is VPython. It does give a forwarding link though -- one more mouse click between me and Python docs. You'll notice that the VPython IDLE actually adds a menu item under Help as well: Advice. Click it and you get a cute "Don't Panic" message. OK, so how hard would it be to add VPython Help as a menu item under help? This, to me, would make the most sense. I wouldn't mind if this is what it did even to the default (non-VPython IDLE). But doing it in the VPython IDLE, and having this item point to a *different* root page for help on VPython, would seem the more responsible approach. You've said as much. I think you've gotten agreement from people who track this stuff at all. Indeed, it would make sense to me for IDLE itself to have a default location where Help menu items could be added by 3rd party installers. Other IDEs could take advantage of this too (i.e. it'd really Python that's helping here, not just IDLE). If I'm Joe Developer who wants to stick help for my little package >Unfortunately, thats not who I am. > >And please. > >What advisory do you have in mind. > >Art I just went through uninstalling Python 2.1 and all the stuff related to that (I just need 2.2.2 for now, plus maybe I'll add 2.3 -- which is already on the laptop). It was nice to find uninstallers in my Add/Remove Software section in the Windows control panel. PyGeo was not listed (nor VPython), nor is my 2.2.2 version of PyGeo. Only in the last few weeks have you started to pay attention to stuff like that (thanks in part to promptings from Guido). And now that you are, VPython is on your shit list, and you're on the war path. Sheesh. I see PIL (Python Image Lab) isn't properly under site-packages either. Maybe if I reinstalled the latest version, it would be (like win32 is). Maybe not. I don't really care that much. If I install PyGeo using dsutils, will I get one of these nice uninstallers? If not, I think that'd be a better use of your time than trying to mess with VPython (which will keep changing so your improvements on the side will be irrelevant with the next release), which I personally don't think you should mess with -- unless you just want to contribute an install patch which rationalizes what VPython does with the Help menu. As it is, I thank you for bringing that to my attention, and I plan to dig into the source code and make it be how I want (can't be that hard). I have VPython running, and Numeric in site-packages where it belongs. I have PyGeo working too, but am looking forward to manually deleting it so I can reinstall it using your newest, more sophisticated version. I'm going to assume that the new IDLE will obviate the need for VPython's separate one eventually, and that in time, VPython will change how it installs. Since PyGeo depends on VPython, as well as Python (which also changes), PyGeo will probably keep changing too. Such is life in the world of complicated code. Kirby From ajs@ix.netcom.com Tue Jan 21 13:36:07 2003 From: ajs@ix.netcom.com (ajs@ix.netcom.com) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 2003 08:36:07 -0500 (EST) Subject: [Edu-sig] re: license Message-ID: <7182510.1043167060603.JavaMail.nobody@dewey.psp.pas.earthlink.net> >I think you over-stress this self image. Some people disagree >with some of your points, as is natural in a free wheeling give >and take world. Others don't find the axes you grind >particularly interesting. Others agree with some of your points. Stop being reasonable and asking me to be so also. I hate that. But of all the messages of the "re:license" thread that illustrates my sense of things - my feelings (yes, I said "feelings") was the one by Dr. David Mertz - a profilic Python popularizer. (aka Lulu of the Lotus Eaters): """ "Arthur" wrote previously: |>BTW, you still haven't mentioned the package. Tell me THE PACKAGE!!! ;) |I am *never* discrete. |But at my age, an opportunity for a new experience is rare. s/discrete/obnoxious/ s/rare/elsewhere/ """ I honestly don't know what it means. I'm suspecting it doesn't mean something nice, but that's not the point. The point is that it is a message, from my perspective, from the intiated to the initiated. My alienation from the community is a 2 way street though. To a large extent I see it as a community of initiates - which is fine - with a core belief that it is something else; which is not fine. If it wants to be something else, it needs to find a way to try harder. CP4E! Art From Jason Cunliffe" I've been out of the VPython and idlefork loops, but inspired by the recent install problems Art experiencd with latest PyGeo I wrote directly to Bruce Sherwood [VPython author]. With his permission I quoting from his replies correspondence to me: """ It was not clear how to deal with this issue, but help is on the way. Soon the standard IDLE distributed with Python will be replaced by the idlefork project, based on David Scherer's original major revision of IDLE as distributed with VPython. The new IDLE has a good mechanism for dealing with multiple help files, which was not available in the past. At that point I'll be able to change the VPython installer to avoid the current problem. Currently the VPython installers do not use distutils, because using a distutils-based installer is difficult for the novices who are common among the VPython users. For example, on Windows you need to bring up a commands window and cd to an appropriate directory and invoke Python.... I know from actual experience with college students that this is way beyond what works in that environment. It is however likely that distutils would be the right tool for Linux and Unix installations. """ And then some further comments today... """ A question: What problems have there actually been with this? I have heard complaints that VPython isn't doing the right thing, but these complaints seem rather theoretical, in that I don't know in what way anyone has actually been significantly inconvenienced concerning the help situation. It seems to be Guido's intent that idlefork replace the standard idle with the final release of Python 2.3. If the new idlefork works for VPython, we would start using it right away. Unfortunately there are no guarantees, because at the moment VPython does NOT work with the new idlefork. You can't quit a VPython program as you could with the original idlefork. """ If any of you can help this along please do.. Seems like we are all very close to having happy re-solution now. thanks ./Jason ______________________________________________ Jason Cunliffe [NOMADICS: Director art+design] Tel/fax: +1 718 422-1078 jasonic@nomadics.org N 43:00.000' W 074:31.875' ALT:1144 ft 84 Henry Street #3C Brooklyn NY 11201 USA From Arthur" Message-ID: <000601c2c1b9$eb92eb60$dcdad23f@Arts> >Only in the last few weeks have you started to pay attention to stuff like > that (thanks in part to promptings from Guido). And now that you > are, VPython is on your shit list, and you're on the war path. Not fair. My issue with the VPython overwrite of the index.html is also archived and is probably 6 months old. My discussion on the issue was never general. Just to make sure it was not a tecfhnical issue that Sherwood thought he faced, I recommended a very specific fix. The one discussed here. VIdle gets the VPython help. The Python index.html stays as it is. 4 keystrokes. All reasoanble concerns handled. Rejected. What has changed is that I feel less helpless and resigned to the situation. Guido urging me to undertake disutils was the key to that. I thanked him. And have no problem thanking him again. Thanks. Art From Arthur" Jason unfortunately I need to comment: >I've been out of the VPython and idlefork loops, but inspired by the recent >install problems Art experiencd with latest PyGeo I wrote directly to Bruce >Sherwood [VPython author]. BRUCE SHERWOOD IS NOT THE VPYTHON AUTHOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is comment one. VPython is copywrite, David Scherer. BUT I CAN CERTAINLY UNDERSTAND HOW THAT CONFUSION COULD ARISE. >With his permission I quoting from his replies correspondence to me: >It was not clear how to deal with this issue, but help is on the way. Soon >the standard IDLE distributed with Python will be replaced by the idlefork >project, based on David Scherer's original major revision of IDLE as >distributed with VPython. The new IDLE has a good mechanism for dealing with >multiple help files, which was not available in the past. At that point I'll >be able to change the VPython installer to avoid the current problem. Problem? Is there a problem? There was a 4 keystroke solution to the problem, since day one. It was handed to him on a platter. He opted for the more elegant solution of CONTINUING TO OVERWRITE PYTHON OWN HELP INDEX FOR NO DAMN REASON. He did not see the problem then. He does still not see the problem. See below. >Currently the VPython installers do not use distutils, because using a >distutils-based installer is difficult for the novices who are common among >the VPython users. For example, on Windows you need to bring up a commands >window and cd to an appropriate directory and invoke Python.... I know from >actual experience with college students that this is way beyond what works >in that environment. It is however likely that distutils would be the right >tool for Linux and Unix installations. I personally have no patience with hearing about Bruce's remarks about his "actual experience with college students". And their ineptitude. Even after the division thing was settled, HE WAS STILL GOING TO USE A PATCHED PYTHON BECAUSE HIS STUDENTS COULD NOT BE EXPECTED TO HANDLE THE IMPORT STATEMENT TO GET THE NEW BEHAVIOR HE LOBBIED FOR. I AM CONVINCED IF HE SPENT 20 MINUTES OF CLASS TIME EXPLANING THE UNDERLYING ISSUE OF THE OLD DIV STATEMENT - NUMERIC TYPING BASIC BASICS - THE ISSUE WOULD HAVE BEEN TINY. HE FAILED TO PROVIDE HIS STUDENTS WITH ESSENTIAL INFORMATION AND THEN REPORTED THAT THEY WERE CONFUSED. CONFUSION IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU AREN"T GIVEN PERTINENT AND ESSENTIAL INFORMATION - YOU GET CONFUSED. MAKE THEM LESS INEPT, AND STOP TELLING US HOW INPET THEY ARE. Besides the fact that he is dead wrong about the disutils operations on Windows. >And then some further comments today... """ A question: What problems have there actually been with this? I have heard complaints that VPython isn't doing the right thing, but these complaints seem rather theoretical, in that I don't know in what way anyone has actually been significantly inconvenienced concerning the help situation. """ VINTAGE BRUCE, is all I can say. Art It seems to be Guido's intent that idlefork replace the standard idle with the final release of Python 2.3. If the new idlefork works for VPython, we would start using it right away. Unfortunately there are no guarantees, because at the moment VPython does NOT work with the new idlefork. You can't quit a VPython program as you could with the original idlefork. """ If any of you can help this along please do.. Seems like we are all very close to having happy re-solution now. thanks ./Jason ______________________________________________ Jason Cunliffe [NOMADICS: Director art+design] Tel/fax: +1 718 422-1078 jasonic@nomadics.org N 43:00.000' W 074:31.875' ALT:1144 ft 84 Henry Street #3C Brooklyn NY 11201 USA From urnerk@qwest.net Wed Jan 22 04:34:30 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 2003 20:34:30 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: license In-Reply-To: <000601c2c1b9$eb92eb60$dcdad23f@Arts> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030121064614.01bbcb88@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030121201657.01bb5860@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 08:59 PM 1/21/2003 -0500, you wrote: > >Only in the last few weeks have you started to pay attention to stuff >like > > that (thanks in part to promptings from Guido). And now that you > > are, VPython is on your shit list, and you're on the war path. > >Not fair. > >My issue with the VPython overwrite of the index.html is also archived and >is probably 6 months old. My discussion on the issue was never general. It has only become more general recently -- in the few days since you did more to improve your own app's distribution methods. I'm confused about something you wrote earlier: "Not only does VPython install in non-standard places, it includes Numeric, but installs Numeric differently than Numeric installs itself on a standalone basis." So where does Numeric install? I just reinstalled VPython-2002-12-12.exe (Windows) and see that it puts Numeric under site-packages, where I'd *like* it to be. Maybe Numeric as a standalone is what needs fixing. >Just to make sure it was not a tecfhnical issue that Sherwood thought he >faced, I recommended a very specific fix. The one discussed here. VIdle >gets the VPython help. The Python index.html stays as it is. 4 keystrokes. >All reasoanble concerns handled. Rejected. My fix was to save Python's official index.html as oldindex, install VPython, then rename VPython's to VPython.html, changing oldindex back to index (Python's normal top level). Then I edited the HTML in both pages to have them point to each other. No code changes to either IDLE at all. Both IDLE's go to Python top level docs by default, but that page has a link to VPython's top level help embedded inside. I agree that VPython's overwrite of index.html is a kludge, especially because it supplies a substitute top level page from an older Python: Release 2.2b1, October 19, 2001. So I go to a top level page saying I'm using this older version, when I'm actually not. If the goal is to prevent confusion, then this is *not* a good solution. >What has changed is that I feel less helpless and resigned to the situation. You might want to put directions for the fix above, or something you've come up with, in the readme.txt of PyGeo. Go ahead and express yourself in the readme (it's your program after all). Something like: "VPython has this really goofy way of overwriting Python's top-level help page with its own, then supplying an obsolete substitute for Python's. If this pisses you off (it sure pissed me off), then here's a fix: ". Note that to get index.html back from the dead in the first place, I had to reinstall from the Python2.2.2 distro. But at least in Windows, there's an option to reinstall *just the docs* -- so that's really not so bad. I recommend people keep the installer handy for whatever version of Python they're using anyway -- for situations just like this. >Guido urging me to undertake disutils was the key to that. I thanked him. >And have no problem thanking him again. > >Thanks. > >Art Kirby From urnerk@qwest.net Wed Jan 22 04:45:55 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 2003 20:45:55 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: VPython followup In-Reply-To: <000701c2c1c6$6edb33e0$6543f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030121203528.01c50b80@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 10:29 PM 1/21/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: >He did not see the problem then. He does still not see the problem. See >below. Fine, it's goofy, but it's not a show stopper. People less confused than Sherwood's apparently not-so-bright students will be able to undo the doodoo (e.g. see my previous post). >I AM CONVINCED IF HE SPENT 20 MINUTES OF CLASS TIME EXPLANING THE UNDERLYING >ISSUE OF THE OLD DIV STATEMENT - NUMERIC TYPING BASIC BASICS - THE ISSUE >WOULD HAVE BEEN TINY. HE FAILED TO PROVIDE HIS STUDENTS WITH ESSENTIAL On the other hand, people collectively spent hours trying to persuade you that changing the div model in Python was a good idea completely irrespective of Sherwood's students' conceptual problems, and that didn't seem to make much of a dent (or maybe it did finally, I dunno). From my point of view, you too have been manifestly confused about these issues (which isn't to assert that I am somehow immune from confusion myself -- we should cut ourselves some slack, as subgenius level mortals). >INFORMATION AND THEN REPORTED THAT THEY WERE CONFUSED. CONFUSION IS WHAT >HAPPENS WHEN YOU AREN"T GIVEN PERTINENT AND ESSENTIAL INFORMATION - YOU GET >CONFUSED. MAKE THEM LESS INEPT, AND STOP TELLING US HOW INPET THEY ARE. > >Besides the fact that he is dead wrong about the disutils operations on >Windows. > >And then some further comments today... > >""" >A question: What problems have there actually been with this? I have heard >complaints that VPython isn't doing the right thing, but these complaints >seem rather theoretical, in that I don't know in what way anyone has >actually been significantly inconvenienced concerning the help situation. >""" > >VINTAGE BRUCE, is all I can say. > >Art Hey, he's allowed to not see what's the big fuss, given his narrow perspective of trying to do some physics with students with little background in programming. What's cool is that VPython has grown beyond the bounds of CMU, thanks in some part to PyGeo's dependency thereon. Fingers crossed the new IDLE will eventually iron out the kinks with VPython, and we can all forget about these footnotes to footnotes. From my narrow perspective, it's all working the way I want on my box, so I'm ready to stop paying attention. :-D Kirby From Jason Cunliffe" Message-ID: <000701c2c1d5$b6640c00$6501a8c0@vaio> > BRUCE SHERWOOD IS NOT THE VPYTHON AUTHOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! > > VPython is copywrite, David Scherer. VTHESAURI oops... Scherer Sherwood Scherxxx Like I said I've been out of the loop Art, please.. SHOUTING like this really serves little constructive purpose. Except to vent your frustrations, which are familiar with. HARD TIMES I want to see VPython, PyGeo and any other cool Python apps be easy to install, but not get in each other's way. It has been extremely frustrating, on Windows for example installing PIL, Alice, VPython, PyGeo BerkeleyDB, Zope etc.. [Zope was easy but that's because it installed its own Python.] Most Python programmers have long ago figured this stuff out, so harder discussion how/why/what can be so hard for inexperienced beginners. MISSION POSSIBLE CP4E has an enduring responsibility to address that cognitive gap. TALES OF MICE AND MEN Personally, I've never really sorted it out. My hard disk archive is still littered with history Python installations. I keep them around to remind me. Incredibly discouraging at times. Windows registry is partly to blame and that makes me fucking nuts as its one of those things I never got to grips with. Check the archives and you'll see. Rather deal with Linux/Apache permissions any day :-) Distutils have gone a long way to remedying this. oh happy day.. ROCKET SCIENCE But I really think we should take seriously anyone who says they have trouble installing something. They may be dumb/scared/confused/impatient/ill-informed, or the teacher may be lacking/preoccupied, or maybe they are simply telling it like it is: "Houston we have a problem..." If someone says they got a problem then they do. Today, Bruce Sherwood indicated Yes and it will get sorted out soon. All I am asking for is people to step and volunteer help them, since I do not feel competent. NEXT GENERATION I don't care about the history of what's broken. I am VERY interested in the future of what works. There many more ahead, than behind who may benefit. cheers ./Jason From Arthur" <5.2.0.9.0.20030121201657.01bb5860@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <000d01c2c1d8$45916b50$bfdbd23f@Arts> > "Not only does VPython install in non-standard places, it includes > Numeric, but installs Numeric differently than Numeric installs > itself on a standalone basis." You're going to be sorry you got me started on this one. Also in the archive is my suggestion to Bruce as to his web page: '''' VPython includes: a.. the Python programming language b.. an enhanced version of the Idle interactive development environment c.. "Visual", a Python module that offers real-time 3D output, and is easily usable by novice programmers '''' Now of course, VPython does not "include" the Python programming langauge. In any sense. Its not part of the distribution. But let's leave that aside. VPython does *very much* include Numeric. It is in fact the bulk of the bulk of the VPython download. Bruce - shouldn't you mention that VPython includes Nunmeric - because: A) it does B) its cool C) its integral to working with VPython. C) its other people's work and effort Got as far as I did on the on the help index issue. Kirby - don't make me spell it out more than I have to. What VPython is and who is responsible for what gets obscured in a haze of bad practice. These are things that should be clear as a bell, all ambiguity removed. In BOLD LETTERS. I also pointed out to Bruce that if someone already had Numeric installed when they downloaded VPython, and did an unisntall on VPython, their prior Numeric - which they had no intention of removing - is gone. Oh yeah. He said he could understand how that might be a problem and he apologized if that happended to me. I told him it did not happen to me. That I work with VPython extensively, like it quite a bit, and have no reason to uninstall it. But that the distribution structure was flawed in that respect. No further response. I see no reasonable reason to have a bad distribution of Numeric bundled with a bad distribution of VPython. Numeric's install is flawless, on all platforms. Including - paying attention Jason - the Windows self-installing executable built with distutils. The reasonable and rational methodology is a link to the Numeric download site. With the added bonus that at least there one finds out at little bit about what one is downloading and who is responsible for it. That's a good thing to know - *even* for physics students. No? To answer your question. The Numeric install creates one master directory for Numeric under site packages, and a directory structure under that for its separate packages. The VPython install of Numeric creates a separate site-package directory for each component of Numeric - FFT, etc. The Numeric install is better. Art From Arthur" <5.2.0.9.0.20030121201657.01bb5860@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <001301c2c1d9$d91018d0$9066f4d1@Arts> > My fix was to save Python's official index.html as oldindex, install > VPython, then rename VPython's to VPython.html, changing oldindex My fix is going to be asking folks to download Numeric at the Numeric download site, and having a reasonable distribution of the lean and mean VPython, at my site. Art From Arthur" I wrote - >What has changed is that I feel less helpless and resigned to the situation. >Guido urging me to undertake disutils was the key to that. I thanked him. >And have no problem thanking him again. Sort of feel I stumbled here into a definition - to me - of the significance of CP4E. And it's more than appropriate that Guido's name comes up in the middle of it. Art From Jason Cunliffe" Message-ID: <001501c2c22b$aef884e0$6501a8c0@vaio> > Sort of feel I stumbled here into a definition - to me - of the > significance of CP4E. What's the definition? From urnerk@qwest.net Wed Jan 22 15:55:03 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 2003 07:55:03 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: license In-Reply-To: <000d01c2c1d8$45916b50$bfdbd23f@Arts> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030121064614.01bbcb88@pop.ptld.qwest.net> <5.2.0.9.0.20030121201657.01bb5860@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030122074656.01bf2750@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 12:36 AM 1/22/2003 -0500, you wrote: >Kirby - > >don't make me spell it out more than I have to. Just wanted some info re what's wrong with the Numeric install. >I also pointed out to Bruce that if someone already had Numeric installed >when they downloaded VPython, and did an unisntall on VPython, their prior >Numeric - which they had no intention of removing - is gone. This is a good point. I didn't even see the VPython uninstaller before. I ran it, and yes, Numeric is gone. >To answer your question. At last. Your solution sounds good. I'll plan to get my next install of Numeric and VPython from you. I think you've established that Sherwood is not the world's most competent packager when it comes to getting this app widely distributed. That you choose to get so hostile and confrontational about it shows the limits of your competence in the "works well with others" department. We all have our disabilities. Kirby From Jason Cunliffe" <5.2.0.9.0.20030121201657.01bb5860@pop.ptld.qwest.net> <001301c2c1d9$d91018d0$9066f4d1@Arts> Message-ID: <002901c2c235$fa424ee0$6501a8c0@vaio> > My fix is going to be asking folks to download Numeric at the Numeric > download site, and having a reasonable distribution of the lean and mean > VPython, at my site. Excellent. Thank you. ./Jason From Arthur" <001501c2c22b$aef884e0$6501a8c0@vaio> Message-ID: <001101c2c235$ac0c7cf0$5fd8d23f@Arts> Jason > What's the definition? """What has changed is that I feel less helpless and resigned to the situation. """ The point I am trying to make is that before undertaking the (very tolerable) learning curve of distutils, a situation that I found quite intolerable, seemed pretty insurmountable. That breeds hostility - true enough. With disutils under my belt, I am much better able to take the situation into my own hands, as I see fit. Less dependency. More self-sufficiency. Less hostility. Those kinds of good things. From learning some coding, is all. Slightly related: Linux gave me a sense of what's under the hood of an operating system, and gave me some sense of self-sufficiency and a sense of having options. The Linux folks are probably not going be glad to here this - and I don't blame them - but I can actually live with Windows better knowing that I have a viable alternative, than I could if I didn't. Linux actually made me *less* hostile toward Windows. Just a pondering point. Art From Arthur" <5.2.0.9.0.20030121201657.01bb5860@pop.ptld.qwest.net> <5.2.0.9.0.20030122074656.01bf2750@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <000c01c2c237$63dd6a00$1c203841@Arts> >That you choose to get so hostile and confrontational about it shows the > limits of your competence in the "works well with others" department. . We all have > our disabilities. Why can I take that kind of assessment of yours so calmly, is an intersting question. Partly, because I know there is substance to it. I do wish I had the facility to handle these situations *much* better. But mostly because I have a sense of that I am in the end working with a reasonable person, trying to work reasonably with me, in spite of my disabilities. In recognition that we all have them. I appreciate that. Because we all in are way have a vision thing going on here. And hopefully we can continue to cooperate in working toward it, to the extent we are capable. Art From Jason Cunliffe" was:{Re: [Edu-sig] re: license} References: <000701c2c224$4d124790$ca54f6d1@Arts> <001501c2c22b$aef884e0$6501a8c0@vaio> <001101c2c235$ac0c7cf0$5fd8d23f@Arts> Message-ID: <004101c2c239$f94b9600$6501a8c0@vaio> > > What's the definition? > > """What has changed is that I feel less helpless and resigned to the > situation. > """ CP4E self-sufficency insight options confidence From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Thu Jan 23 19:38:12 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 23 Jan 2003 19:38:12 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <1043350691.2526.274.camel@localhost.localdomain> Greetings Aside from the usual internicine bickerings common to most mailing lists, could someone on this list please take the trouble to answer a question that I have asked previously and that I saw someone else raise recently: what is the probable future of the CP4E project, and have any alternatives to it been considered/discussed? How does Art's PyGeo project fit into the Edu-SIG framework? Is there anything that interested parties could do to assist in carrying the project forward in some way (aside from donating big bucks to the project - sorry). Thanks for your time Andrew From pobrien@orbtech.com Thu Jan 23 20:16:43 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 14:16:43 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <1043350691.2526.274.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043350691.2526.274.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Thursday 23 January 2003 01:38 pm, ahimsa wrote: > Greetings > Aside from the usual internicine bickerings common to most mailing > lists, could someone on this list please take the trouble to answer a > question that I have asked previously and that I saw someone else raise > recently: what is the probable future of the CP4E project, and have any > alternatives to it been considered/discussed? How does Art's PyGeo > project fit into the Edu-SIG framework? Is there anything that > interested parties could do to assist in carrying the project forward in > some way (aside from donating big bucks to the project - sorry). My understanding is that the official CP4E effort has been abandoned, for now, due to insufficient funding. This list remains, and several individuals keep the dream alive. PyGeo is one man's admirable attempt to bring 3-d geometric manipulations to the masses (I hope that's an accurate description). Others here have their pet projects. I like to think that my PyCrust project helps make Python that much more approachable to novices. I think interested parties should pursue their interests and lobby for support in the best tradition of Open Source. Or lend a hand to existing projects. There's plenty that can be done. What are your interests? -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From villate@gnu.org Thu Jan 23 20:40:16 2003 From: villate@gnu.org (Jaime E . Villate) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 20:40:16 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com>; from pobrien@orbtech.com on Thu, Jan 23, 2003 at 02:16:43PM -0600 References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043350691.2526.274.camel@localhost.localdomain> <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <20030123204016.R397@fe.up.pt> On Thu, Jan 23, 2003 at 02:16:43PM -0600, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > > My understanding is that the official CP4E effort has been abandoned, for > now, due to insufficient funding. This list remains, and several > individuals keep the dream alive. PyGeo is one man's admirable attempt to > bring 3-d geometric manipulations to the masses (I hope that's an accurate > description). Others here have their pet projects. I like to think that my > PyCrust project helps make Python that much more approachable to novices. Thanks for your explanation. Where can I find PyCrust? It would be very insteresting to put a link to it, together with links to PyGeo, Kirby's pages --and others that I must not be aware since I new to this list-- in a single page. Is there room for that in the edu SIG pages at python.org? I'd be willing to help with its maintenance and find a place to host it if necessary. Regards, Jaime From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Thu Jan 23 20:49:51 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 23 Jan 2003 20:49:51 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043350691.2526.274.camel@localhost.localdomain> <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <1043354990.2526.300.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Thu, 2003-01-23 at 20:16, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > My understanding is that the official CP4E effort has been abandoned, for > now, due to insufficient funding. This list remains, and several > individuals keep the dream alive. PyGeo is one man's admirable attempt to > bring 3-d geometric manipulations to the masses (I hope that's an accurate > description). Others here have their pet projects. I like to think that my > PyCrust project helps make Python that much more approachable to novices. > > I think interested parties should pursue their interests and lobby for > support in the best tradition of Open Source. Or lend a hand to existing > projects. There's plenty that can be done. What are your interests? Hello Patrick Thanks for getting back to me about my query. It was my impression from sifting through the documentation that the CP4E project was dormant due to funding issues, which is a real shame. I would certainly advocate for it to be extended here in the UK, and using OSS and Python would be a pretty low-cost way of doing so. Unfortunately, I have neither the skill nor experience with which to carry that forward here coming from a social science background and with Python being my first language and being a novice at that to boot!! It is probably a little too early in my learning arc for me to get involved in projects, although I am quite happy to discuss different roles that I could do in existing projects if some project team is looking for some assistance (e.g. documentation or advocacy or a tester for the novice-ease of use factor?). It has been of interest to me that in various readings that I have started over the last few months, there have been several references from different sources about how computer programming is an extension of the cognitive psychology of problem solving. I would extend this and suggest that comp programming is similar to, or a branch of, epistemology: it concerns the construction and negotiation of problem frames and solutions to those problems, and really underscores the processes by which we organise the world, its data, and - to top it off - how we organise our thinking processes (analysis, hypothesis, antithesis, synthesis - the usual Aristotlean process). From this perspective, I think that teaching school kids how to program is not only great vis-a-vis the development of computer/digital savvy (as was suggested in the EDU_SIG docs), but also a significant step forward into advancing structured cognitive training for kids (and adults too) to assist them in the analysis of problems, the proposition and testing of solutions and a meta-analytic perspective in terms of the construction, relevance, and flow of data/cognitive constructs: computer science meets George Kelly in education. Anyway, I ramble ... To close this off, I guess that I'll sit back and lurk for a while and keep hacking away at learning both Python and Linux, take courses where I can (anyone teaching Python in SE London?) and read, read, read. BTW, Patrick - I surfed over to the sourceforge site to check out PyCrust (lol!!) and apprantly they are no longer carrying the files and didn't have a forward link that I could see. Can you give me an alternate link to check it out please. All the best Andrew -- ahimsa From urnerk@qwest.net Thu Jan 23 21:40:44 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 13:40:44 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <1043354990.2526.300.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043350691.2526.274.camel@localhost.localdomain> <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030123125743.018b2bd8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 08:49 PM 1/23/2003 +0000, ahimsa wrote: >On Thu, 2003-01-23 at 20:16, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > > > My understanding is that the official CP4E effort has been abandoned, for > > now, due to insufficient funding. This list remains, and several > > individuals keep the dream alive. PyGeo is one man's admirable attempt to > > bring 3-d geometric manipulations to the masses (I hope that's an accurate > > description). Others here have their pet projects. I like to think that my > > PyCrust project helps make Python that much more approachable to novices. > > > > I think interested parties should pursue their interests and lobby for > > support in the best tradition of Open Source. Or lend a hand to existing > > projects. There's plenty that can be done. What are your interests? > >Hello Patrick >Thanks for getting back to me about my query. >It was my impression from sifting through the documentation that the >CP4E project was dormant due to funding issues, which is a real shame. I >would certainly advocate for it to be extended here in the UK, and using >OSS and Python would be a pretty low-cost way of doing so. People have taken the broad mission of CP4E (computer programming for everyone) and run with it in various directions. One of the most obvious directions is into the schools. And there you get a fork in the road, with most heading towards the computer science curriculum, but others of us exploring the role of programming (and other modes of computer use) in other parts of the curriculum as well e.g. in math class (there's a tradition here too of course, which precedes Python -- Seymour Papert's Logo initiative for example). Also, under the broad heading of "school", there's this question of levels or target audience -- are we talking college, high school, earlier? or maybe adult education? All of the above no doubt. But each individual will have their bias/strength. What I learned about from Jeff Elkner's posts and web pages over the years (he introduced Python to high schoolers at his school -- also Linux based), is the importance of a text, at least something on-line that's printable, if not a bound text book. He uses 'How to Think Like a Computer Scientist', which he adapted from the original to work with Python. This work is on-line. I had recent discussions with a teacher casting about for a language to use in a computer intro course (high school level). He was drawn to Scheme, largely on the strength of this resource: http://www.htdp.org/ (How to Design Programs), which is indeed the kind of thing a teacher looks for when designing a course. He had every right to be excited about it. I told this teacher that I thought highly of Scheme (which I do -- it's always on my list as a candidate intro language) and its educational materials, but that it's also my view that an intro course (especially an intro course) should look at (at least) two languages, in part because it's in comparing and contrasting them that some of the commonalities leap to the fore -- helping to bring home some of the more abstract concepts (flow of control, named functions, parameters, data structures ...). Beginners will better appreciate the world they're entering if they get exposure to some of the variety that's out there (nothing like a couple hours with J to blow one's mind re the stuff people find useful). I recommended Python as a good candidate for a second language, in part because, unlike Scheme, it really makes the class/object model accessible right at the outset (with the everything-is-an-object paradigm -- with users rolling new types of their own). Although maybe not precisely CP4E's official intent, I look at "computer programming for everyone" as meaning more than everyone learning Python. Python is a good way to get *access* to programming, but then you find yourself learning all kinds of little languages, from Lego Mindstorms to some JavaScript to your calculator, to programming your VCR. And this is actually in harmony with Python's goals as a language -- it's a "glue language" (i.e. "works well with others") and also an "API language" (often used to bind an application's functionality to some syntax scriptable "from the outside"). I emphasize the above because I think it's possible for CP4Eers (people who've taken on this mission) to be pro Python without being tiresomely negatory towards all other languages, thereby falling into one of those deep "language war" wells which dot the internet landscape like so many vortices from hell (loud sucking sounds). It's not about Python OR Scheme or Python OR C# or Python OR Java. It's about Python AND _____ (fill in the blank, with as many languages as you wish). That being said, it makes sense to play up Python's strengths. No need to be shy. Lots of CS teachers are indeed moving to Python. >It has been of interest to me that in various readings that I have >started over the last few months, there have been several references >from different sources about how computer programming is an extension of >the cognitive psychology of problem solving. I would extend this and >suggest that comp programming is similar to, or a branch of, >epistemology: it concerns the construction and negotiation of problem >frames and solutions to those problems, and really underscores the >processes by which we organise the world, its data, and - to top it off >- how we organise our thinking processes (analysis, hypothesis, >antithesis, synthesis - the usual Aristotlean process). From this There's a question here as to whether programming mirrors our thought process or whether, after we program for awhile, our thought process starts to take on some features of programming. Certainly it's a great source of metaphors. The books usually say "objects" (in the programmed sense) are metaphors for objects in the real world i.e. the problem space is modeled by the solution space in terms of objects. But it works the other way too: getting used to thinking of composition and inheritance affects the way you see the real world (suddenly, that cell phone "really is" a subclass of the more generic telephone class, and so on). Good thing my dog here overrides some of those wolf methods, with more domesticated versions. >perspective, I think that teaching school kids how to program is not >only great vis-a-vis the development of computer/digital savvy (as was >suggested in the EDU_SIG docs), but also a significant step forward into >advancing structured cognitive training for kids (and adults too) to >assist them in the analysis of problems, the proposition and testing of >solutions and a meta-analytic perspective in terms of the construction, >relevance, and flow of data/cognitive constructs: computer science meets >George Kelly in education. Shouldn't programming be taught hand-in-hand with mathematics, which is already so vested in "algorithms"? >Anyway, I ramble ... >To close this off, I guess that I'll sit back and lurk for a while and >keep hacking away at learning both Python and Linux, take courses where >I can (anyone teaching Python in SE London?) and read, read, read. >BTW, Patrick - I surfed over to the sourceforge site to check out >PyCrust (lol!!) and apprantly they are no longer carrying the files and >didn't have a forward link that I could see. Can you give me an >alternate link to check it out please. >All the best >Andrew PyCrust is cool. I've used it with pleasure. I should find the latest version and play with it some more. Kirby From pobrien@orbtech.com Thu Jan 23 22:19:59 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 16:19:59 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <20030123204016.R397@fe.up.pt> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> <20030123204016.R397@fe.up.pt> Message-ID: <200301231619.59075.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Thursday 23 January 2003 02:40 pm, Jaime E . Villate wrote: > Where can I find PyCrust? It ships with wxPython. Or you can get the latest development version from the CVS repository on SourceForge. wxPython: http://www.wxpython.org/ PyCrust: http://sourceforge.net/projects/pycrust/ -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From pobrien@orbtech.com Thu Jan 23 22:23:01 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 16:23:01 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <1043354990.2526.300.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <200301231416.43282.pobrien@orbtech.com> <1043354990.2526.300.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <200301231623.01185.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Thursday 23 January 2003 02:49 pm, ahimsa wrote: > BTW, Patrick - I surfed over to the sourceforge site to check out > PyCrust (lol!!) and apprantly they are no longer carrying the files and > didn't have a forward link that I could see. Can you give me an > alternate link to check it out please. Here is the description I have on the main SourceForge page: "PyCrust is an interactive Python shell written in Python using wxPython. The latest stable version ships with wxPython (www.wxpython.org). The latest development version can be checked out of CVS. Packaged file releases are no longer available here." Is that not clear? -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From pobrien@orbtech.com Thu Jan 23 23:12:57 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 17:12:57 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <1043361922.10496.305.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <200301231623.01185.pobrien@orbtech.com> <1043361922.10496.305.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <200301231712.57816.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Thursday 23 January 2003 04:45 pm, ahimsa wrote: > On Thu, 2003-01-23 at 22:23, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > > Here is the description I have on the main SourceForge page: > > > > "PyCrust is an interactive Python shell written in Python using > > wxPython. The latest stable version ships with wxPython > > (www.wxpython.org). The latest development version can be checked out > > of CVS. Packaged file releases are no longer available here." > > > > Is that not clear? > > Actually no - not if one is looking for something that says 'PyCrust' as > something that ships *with* (as in a module/additional component to > rather than subsumed *within*) wxPython. Since you asked > Andrew Funny, I had to read your comment and my description several times before I saw where my description was misleading. One challenge is that SF limits the description to 255 characters. Is this one better? "PyCrust is an interactive Python shell written in Python using wxPython. The latest release is now included with wxPython (www.wxpython.org). The development version can still be checked out of CVS. Packaged file releases are no longer available here." -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From pobrien@orbtech.com Thu Jan 23 23:24:10 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 17:24:10 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <200301231712.57816.pobrien@orbtech.com> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043361922.10496.305.camel@localhost.localdomain> <200301231712.57816.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <200301231724.10767.pobrien@orbtech.com> I also updated the PyCrust wiki page (http://www.orbtech.com/wiki/PyCrust) to this: PyCrust, The Flakiest Python Shell PyCrust is an interactive, graphical Python shell, written by PatrickOBrien. PyCrust is similar to the shell that comes with IDLE, however, where IDLE uses the tkinter GUI toolkit, PyCrust uses the wxPython GUI toolkit. In fact, the wxPython folks liked it so much that PyCrust is now part of the standard wxPython distribution. Most users who want to use PyCrust should simply download and install wxPython from http://www.wxpython.org/. The latest development version of PyCrust is still available in the CVS repositor on SourceForge at http://sourceforge.net/projects/pycrust. If you'd like absolute latest version, feel free to check out the files from CVS. One of the neat features of PyCrust is that it can be run standalone, like a regular desktop application, or it can be embedded in other wxPython applications. So a couple of lines of code adds complete, interactive Python access to any wxPython application, allowing you to manipulate your program while it runs. In the interest of giving due credit, note that PyCrust leverages the wonderful source code editing component called Scintilla (http://www.scintilla.org/). The wxPython wrapper of Scintilla goes by the name wxStyledTextControl. -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From pobrien@orbtech.com Thu Jan 23 23:35:26 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 17:35:26 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <200301231712.57816.pobrien@orbtech.com> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043361922.10496.305.camel@localhost.localdomain> <200301231712.57816.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <200301231735.26864.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Thursday 23 January 2003 05:12 pm, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > Is this one better? > > "PyCrust is an interactive Python shell written in Python using wxPython. > The latest release is now included with wxPython (www.wxpython.org). The > development version can still be checked out of CVS. Packaged file > releases are no longer available here." Not one to leave well-enough alone, I changed it to this: "PyCrust is an interactive Python shell written in Python using wxPython. In fact, PyCrust is now included with wxPython (www.wxpython.org), so packaged files are no longer available here. But the latest development version can still be checked out of CVS" By now I'm sure everyone is tired of this thread. I promise this is my last post on the matter. (Topic police can put their pistols back in their holsters. ) -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From pobrien@orbtech.com Thu Jan 23 23:40:08 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 17:40:08 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] On-Topic: LinuxFormat Magazine Message-ID: <200301231740.08132.pobrien@orbtech.com> Just to prove I can stay on-topic, here is a bit of good news: a series of Python tutorials will be appearing in LinuxFormat magazine beginning with issue #38, written by yours truly. -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From Arthur" Patrick was challenging my consecutive post record, so I thought I should get something up quickly. Jaime writes - >Where can I find PyCrust? It would be very insteresting to put a link to it, >together with links to PyGeo, Kirby's pages --and others that I must not be >aware since I new to this list-- in a single page. >Is there room for that in the edu SIG pages at python.org? There are projects listed on the edu-sig page, but the page is quite stale and I'm not sure it is being maintained at all anymore. I've tried a number of times to have the PyGeo link and description corrected - but to no avail. There was an earlier PyOpenGL based PyGeo that predated VPython - plus the web site has changed. Besides liking for my own reasons to have the correct link, I do think dead links are embarassing and give a bad impression. But its not fully clear to me what you are hoping to do. But yes it would be great, I think, if we could have sort of a community site. (After we work on the community part some more). One subplot - As a community, there seems to me to be 2 fundamental threads - those who's specific interest is in a focused approach to teaching programming as a subject matter, and those who feel programming can also be introduced embedded in other curriculum, an enhancement to other curriculum - but with the programming understanding hopefully gained in the process something more than a side effect. One important thing those two schools of interest seem to have in common - Python! Sometimes not much elae. But that should be OK. Both schools of interest seem to conclude that Python has unique features to facilitate the learning process that they are interested in facilitating. And I don't think there should a problem defining this community broadly enough to be inclusive of these approaches. Art From urnerk@qwest.net Fri Jan 24 05:02:53 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 21:02:53 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] On-Topic: LinuxFormat Magazine In-Reply-To: <200301231740.08132.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030123210027.01130410@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 05:40 PM 1/23/2003 -0600, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: >Just to prove I can stay on-topic, here is a bit of good news: a series of >Python tutorials will be appearing in LinuxFormat magazine beginning with >issue #38, written by yours truly. > >-- That *is* good news. I've downloaded the latest wxPython, including PyCrust. I think I'll stay with this for awhile and get more used to it. I've been wedded to IDLE all these years, but I don't really like Tk for GUI work. wxPython looks like a better place to tackle GUI-building -- and I might as well do my regular stuff here too, at least for a few months (I'm in XP at the moment -- looks great -- but plan to get it all working on the Linux side too (I'm dual boot)). Kirby PS: any way to turn off those line numbers in the shell? Nevermind, I need to read the docs. From pobrien@orbtech.com Fri Jan 24 13:20:04 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2003 07:20:04 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] On-Topic: LinuxFormat Magazine In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030123210027.01130410@pop.ptld.qwest.net> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030123210027.01130410@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <200301240720.04358.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Thursday 23 January 2003 11:02 pm, Kirby Urner wrote: > PS: any way to turn off those line numbers in the shell? I haven't created a simple configuration option for that, and you're the first to ask for it. But the shell itself is programmable, so this will narrow the left margin, at least for the current session: >>> shell.SetMarginWidth(1, 0) The shell object is actually an instance of a "facade" that simplifies the options displayed. To see all the options for the "real" shell object, type: >>> shell.other. Then you'll see an autocomplete list of the available attributes and methods. The example I gave you is equivalent to: >>> shell.other.SetMarginWidth(1, 0) > Nevermind, I need to read the docs. What docs? "Insert your favorite reference to the children of shoemakers here." -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Fri Jan 24 20:04:32 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 24 Jan 2003 20:04:32 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Losing the plot In-Reply-To: <200301231735.26864.pobrien@orbtech.com> References: <20030123170003.10373.73475.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043361922.10496.305.camel@localhost.localdomain> <200301231712.57816.pobrien@orbtech.com> <200301231735.26864.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <1043438671.10496.308.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Thu, 2003-01-23 at 23:35, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > Not one to leave well-enough alone, I changed it to this: > > "PyCrust is an interactive Python shell written in Python using wxPython. In > fact, PyCrust is now included with wxPython (www.wxpython.org), so packaged > files are no longer available here. But the latest development version can > still be checked out of CVS" > > By now I'm sure everyone is tired of this thread. I promise this is my last > post on the matter. (Topic police can put their pistols back in their > holsters. ) Thanks Patrick - I have now found the plot again!! ;-) Cheers Andrew -- ahimsa From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Fri Jan 24 22:07:35 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 24 Jan 2003 22:07:35 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Re: On-Topic: LinuxFormat Magazine In-Reply-To: <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> References: <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <1043441111.2526.323.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Thu, 2003-01-23 at 23:40, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > Message: 11 > From: "Patrick K. O'Brien" > Organization: Orbtech > To: edu-sig@python.org > Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2003 17:40:08 -0600 > Subject: [Edu-sig] On-Topic: LinuxFormat Magazine > > Just to prove I can stay on-topic, here is a bit of good news: a series of > Python tutorials will be appearing in LinuxFormat magazine beginning with > issue #38, written by yours truly. Great !!! I look forward to reading it, since I subscribe to LXF. This month it should be issue #37 so I guess #38 comes out end of February. How many issues will it appear in - i.e. how many parts? Andrew -- ahimsa From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Fri Jan 24 22:07:42 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 24 Jan 2003 22:07:42 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Re: Losing the Plot In-Reply-To: <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> References: <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <1043445890.2526.402.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Thu, 2003-01-23 at 13:40, Kirby Urner wrote: > People have taken the broad mission of CP4E (computer programming for > everyone) and run with it in various directions. > > One of the most obvious directions is into the schools. > > And there you get a fork in the road, with most heading towards the computer > science curriculum, but others of us exploring the role of programming > (and other modes of computer use) in other parts of the curriculum as well > e.g. in math class (there's a tradition here too of course, which precedes > Python -- Seymour Papert's Logo initiative for example). > > Also, under the broad heading of "school", there's this question of levels > or target audience -- are we talking college, high school, earlier? or > maybe adult education? All of the above no doubt. But each individual > will have their bias/strength. > > What I learned about from Jeff Elkner's posts and web pages over the years > (he introduced Python to high schoolers at his school -- also Linux based), > is the importance of a text, at least something on-line that's printable, > if not a bound text book. He uses 'How to Think Like a Computer > Scientist', which he adapted from the original to work with Python. > This work is on-line. > I understand Tim Wilson (also on this list) does so too with his work at Henry Sibley (sorry Tim - don't mean to speak for you). > I had recent discussions with a teacher casting about for a language > to use in a computer intro course (high school level). He was drawn > to Scheme, largely on the strength of this resource: http://www.htdp.org/ > (How to Design Programs), which is indeed the kind of thing a teacher > looks for when designing a course. He had every right to be excited > about it. I am presently printing off the HTDP book in installments and have read snippets of it and it does seem pretty good. I believe that the exemplar language is Dr.Scheme isn't it - a variation of Scheme. I was thinking of downloading the language and its associated files and playing around with it. I probably will, once I've finished printing off the text. I must be cautious however and not rush madly from one thing to the next, and I think that is one of the values of a more formalised instruction process. On the Feb 4th I start with an eight week course in C programming, which I'm looking forward to as that will be the first time I have ever attended any formal instruction in computing. > I told this teacher that I thought highly of Scheme (which I do -- it's > always on my list as a candidate intro language) and its educational > materials, but that it's also my view that an intro course (especially > an intro course) should look at (at least) two languages, in part > because it's in comparing and contrasting them that some of the > commonalities leap to the fore -- helping to bring home some of the > more abstract concepts (flow of control, named functions, parameters, > data structures ...). I understand what you mean here: this has become more apparent to me as I read more, and especially more widely (e.g. Sturcture & Interpretation of Computer Programs, and Foundations of Programming) because although SICP is written using Lisp as the example and FoP cuts across languages but focuses on Basic, Pascal, and a bit of C. Certainly flow of control, declarations, data abstractions seem to be themes that surface again and again. Much of it leaves me in the dark, but since I don't need to swot the material that deeply it gives me the opportunity to get more of an overview of generalities which is quite useful. > Beginners will better appreciate the world they're entering if they get > exposure to some of the variety that's out there (nothing like a couple > hours with J to blow one's mind re the stuff people find useful). > > I recommended Python as a good candidate for a second language, in part > because, unlike Scheme, it really makes the class/object model accessible > right at the outset (with the everything-is-an-object paradigm -- with > users rolling new types of their own). > > Although maybe not precisely CP4E's official intent, I look at "computer > programming for everyone" as meaning more than everyone learning Python. > Python is a good way to get *access* to programming, but then you find > yourself learning all kinds of little languages, from Lego Mindstorms > to some JavaScript to your calculator, to programming your VCR. And > this is actually in harmony with Python's goals as a language -- it's > a "glue language" (i.e. "works well with others") and also an "API > language" (often used to bind an application's functionality to some > syntax scriptable "from the outside"). > > I emphasize the above because I think it's possible for CP4Eers (people > who've taken on this mission) to be pro Python without being tiresomely > negatory towards all other languages, thereby falling into one of those > deep "language war" wells which dot the internet landscape like so many > vortices from hell (loud sucking sounds). It's not about Python OR > Scheme or Python OR C# or Python OR Java. It's about Python AND _____ > (fill in the blank, with as many languages as you wish). Good point - I appreciate the inclusivity. > That being said, it makes sense to play up Python's strengths. No need > to be shy. > > Lots of CS teachers are indeed moving to Python. > There's a question here as to whether programming mirrors our thought > process or whether, after we program for awhile, our thought process > starts to take on some features of programming. Certainly it's a > great source of metaphors. Indeed it is. > The books usually say "objects" (in the programmed sense) are metaphors > for objects in the real world i.e. the problem space is modeled by the > solution space in terms of objects. But it works the other way too: > getting used to thinking of composition and inheritance affects the > way you see the real world (suddenly, that cell phone "really is" a > subclass of the more generic telephone class, and so on). I come from a psych and philosophy background, and this taps into a whole bunch of issues from those fields - the notions of 'reality' and the constructions of reality, the idea/image or simulcra and the whole question of representation, ... . The lens of language (non-computing) inform the way that we perceive and interact with our worlds (introducing the ideas of discourse and interpretive frames, for example), so it makes good sense that when one learns computing language as a means of representing 'reality' (putting to one side the important questions about that particular concept!), the 'world' begins to 'resemble' (or perhaps more germanely - becomes 're-assembled'!) according to the codes of reference of that language. In philosophy, one of the issues has been the extent of interleaving between concepts and that which they are said to represent: when we have a concept for microscopic particles (e.g. virii or bacteria) it is easier to 'see' them with a microscope. The beauty of a well-written program does not become apparent unless one knows what one is looking at. Before Object Oriented Programming, the notion of using objects was foreign to programmers; once upon a time, it was unheard of not to use 'goto' in a program; now it is almost bad manners to use 'goto'. > Good thing my dog here overrides some of those wolf methods, with more > domesticated versions. LOL - some inheritance features *should* be surpressed!! > Shouldn't programming be taught hand-in-hand with mathematics, which is > already so vested in "algorithms"? Indeed - math has made a science of the algorithm. Yet I can't help but wonder whether or not it is the emphasis on math and such technicality that tends to leave many feeling excluded from (or reluctant to attempt) programming. Consequently, this emphasis might have a tendency to elide the creativity and the *art* that is also a seemingly key aspect of programming. Perhaps then, both and ... altho' the relative time of introduction might be an important consideration. > PyCrust is cool. I've used it with pleasure. I should find the latest > version and play with it some more. > > Kirby Now that Patrick has given me a virtual road map to get it, I too will make a note to play around with it. Thank you Kirby for answering my request for info with such a generous response. All the best Andrew -- ________________________%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%____________________________ Proudly sent using Ximian Evolution 1.2.1 on a Linux Red Hat 8.0 box. From urnerk@qwest.net Fri Jan 24 22:35:13 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2003 14:35:13 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Re: Losing the Plot In-Reply-To: <1043445890.2526.402.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030124142906.01d80c30@pop.ptld.qwest.net> > >of Computer Programs, and Foundations of Programming) because although >SICP is written using Lisp as the example and FoP cuts across languages Actually, SICP also uses Scheme, but MIT Scheme instead of PLT Scheme (i.e. DrScheme) -- I don't know what all the variations are (an advantage of Python is it has fewer variations -- mainly it has extensions, in specific libraries, that are platform specific). >I come from a psych and philosophy background, and this taps into a Me too (philosophy background). >Indeed - math has made a science of the algorithm. Yet I can't help but >wonder whether or not it is the emphasis on math and such technicality >that tends to leave many feeling excluded from (or reluctant to attempt) >programming. Consequently, this emphasis might have a tendency to elide That's a good point too. I take a page from the explosive popularity of fractals. Here was a grass-roots, up welling of interest on the part of not math-specialists. With computers, we can do art. Math and art may be bridged, especially through geometry, and here especially is where computers really shine (PyGeo is a good example) -- much more so than calculators. >the creativity and the *art* that is also a seemingly key aspect of >programming. Perhaps then, both and ... altho' the relative time of >introduction might be an important consideration. Exactly. Kirby From pobrien@orbtech.com Fri Jan 24 22:32:59 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2003 16:32:59 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Re: On-Topic: LinuxFormat Magazine In-Reply-To: <1043441111.2526.323.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043441111.2526.323.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <200301241632.59322.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Friday 24 January 2003 04:07 pm, ahimsa wrote: > Great !!! I look forward to reading it, since I subscribe to LXF. This > month it should be issue #37 so I guess #38 comes out end of February. > How many issues will it appear in - i.e. how many parts? At least seven, likely more. -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From Arthur" Andrew writes - >>Indeed - math has made a science of the algorithm. Yet I can't help but >>wonder whether or not it is the emphasis on math and such technicality >>that tends to leave many feeling excluded from (or reluctant to attempt) >>programming. Consequently, this emphasis might have a tendency to elide Kirby writes- >That's a good point too. I take a page from the explosive popularity >of fractals. Here was a grass-roots, up welling of interest on the part >of not math-specialists. With computers, we can do art. Math and art >may be bridged, especially through geometry, and here especially is >where computers really shine (PyGeo is a good example) -- much more so >than calculators. I had specifically logged on line to respond to this same point of Andrews, in a very similar way. Kirby beat me to it. Certainly the history of math and philosophy are intertwined to very strong degree. I think both Kirby and myself are trying - partly through the use of technology - to revitalize an interest in mathematics, as it relates to philosophy, art, design, etc. These is *not* a new concept. The concept that mathematics is somehow divorced from these pursuits is the new concept. A newer new concept, which is an old concept, is the convergence. I happen to be fascinated by projective geometry. It was developed intially by great artists, in studying perspective, then formalized by great philosophers, some of whom were also considered to be the great mathematicians of their day (or vice, versa - depending on how one wants to look at it). In fact many liberal artists hardly understand that the names they know as the significant philosophers, are the same names one studies in the history of mathematics. This is true into the modern era. I didn't understand it, until I began studying mathematics - which I happen to do in conjunction with studying programming. Lots of fireworks went off, in fact. And giving strong emphasis to visual mathematics is - as of today, I think - elevating it, rather than dumbing it down. Chaos theory, as Kirby points out. Wolfram's work. Many, many other examples. There *is* something to overcome, in terms of resistance. At one point some young folk - I think high schoolers - joined in to a discussion here, protesting the concept of bringing to together math and programming curriculum. They like programming and are good at it, they hate math and are bad at it. I don't blame them - if math is being presented to them as it was presented to me. I like to think they would by no means hate math taught by Kirby or myself, though. If they don't like history, philosophy, art -- they might have a problem, though. Art From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Sat Jan 25 10:19:14 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 25 Jan 2003 10:19:14 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Re: On-Topic: LinuxFormat Magazine In-Reply-To: <200301241632.59322.pobrien@orbtech.com> References: <20030123234003.15638.93410.Mailman@mail.python.org> <1043441111.2526.323.camel@localhost.localdomain> <200301241632.59322.pobrien@orbtech.com> Message-ID: <1043489952.2526.407.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Fri, 2003-01-24 at 22:32, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: > On Friday 24 January 2003 04:07 pm, ahimsa wrote: > > Great !!! I look forward to reading it, since I subscribe to LXF. This > > month it should be issue #37 so I guess #38 comes out end of February. > > How many issues will it appear in - i.e. how many parts? > > At least seven, likely more. That *is* good news. Thus far I have seen tutorials on PHP and Java, and was hoping that someone would do a series on Python. I see from the LXF that was delivered today that the next issue is out on Feb 28th, so I'll definitely look out for the article(s). -- ahimsa From missive@hotmail.com Sat Jan 25 16:27:29 2003 From: missive@hotmail.com (Lee Harr) Date: Sat, 25 Jan 2003 16:27:29 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] python turtle-like graphics (and more) Message-ID: Hi; I wrote a python- and pygame-based turtle graphics system. It is actually part of a larger framework which I am hoping to use as an adjunct to a get-started-programming book I am writing. The code is available under the GPL. The latest version is here: http://savannah.nongnu.org/download/pygsear/pygsear-0.pkg/0.23/pygsear-0.23.tar.gz The project page is: http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/pygsear/ Feedback welcome. _________________________________________________________________ Help STOP SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From christian.mascher@gmx.de Sat Jan 25 16:58:55 2003 From: christian.mascher@gmx.de (Christian Mascher) Date: Sat, 25 Jan 2003 17:58:55 +0100 Subject: [Edu-sig] Idle for Mac? Message-ID: <3E32C24F.1CA40D0E@gmx.de> Hello all, I am used to working with Python on Windows at our school. Unfortunately I will probably have to use "the other computer room" with macintosh computers in the near future. So I would be happy to install python on those machines. At least I get python anywhere ;-) Sadly, looking into the archives, it seams as if I wouldn't be able to use the Idle shell under MacOS. Does anybody in this group know if Idlefork might work? And does this only go with OSX? Thanks Christian From Arthur" >Feedback welcome. Quick look. The graphic output looks great! I'm ready to play. Art From pobrien@orbtech.com Sat Jan 25 18:05:43 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Sat, 25 Jan 2003 12:05:43 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] Idle for Mac? In-Reply-To: <3E32C24F.1CA40D0E@gmx.de> References: <3E32C24F.1CA40D0E@gmx.de> Message-ID: <200301251205.43335.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Saturday 25 January 2003 10:58 am, Christian Mascher wrote: > Hello all, > > I am used to working with Python on Windows at our school. Unfortunately > I will probably have to use "the other computer room" with macintosh > computers in the near future. So I would be happy to install python on > those machines. At least I get python anywhere ;-) > > Sadly, looking into the archives, it seams as if I wouldn't be able to > use the Idle shell under MacOS. Does anybody in this group know if > Idlefork might work? And does this only go with OSX? If all you need is a Python shell, the PyCrust shell that you get with wxPython works well on the Mac. At least with OSX, that is. (Not that I have a Mac myself.) Details are on the wxPython website: wxPython: http://www.wxpython.org/ -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From ahimsa@onetel.net.uk Sat Jan 25 18:19:38 2003 From: ahimsa@onetel.net.uk (ahimsa) Date: 25 Jan 2003 18:19:38 +0000 Subject: [Edu-sig] Re: Edu-sig digest, Vol 1 #638 - 9 msgs In-Reply-To: <20030125170005.7499.62604.Mailman@mail.python.org> References: <20030125170005.7499.62604.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <1043518761.10496.449.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Sat, 2003-01-25 at 17:00, Arthur wrote: > Certainly the history of math and philosophy are intertwined to very strong > degree. I think both Kirby and myself are trying - partly through the use > of technology - to revitalize an interest in mathematics, as it relates to > philosophy, art, design, etc. > > These is *not* a new concept. The concept that mathematics is somehow > divorced from these pursuits is the new concept. A newer new concept, which > is an old concept, is the convergence. You have probably read Douglas Hofstadter's (now old) book "The Eternal Golden Braid: Godel, Escher, Bach". That Hofstadter was able to trace the intersections among three semingly diverse conceptual/expressive/creative fields underscores what both Kirby and yourself have pointed out: the degree of confluence is a recent discovery, but rather a recent re-discovery of something that many grand masters knew way back when. I suspect that the split - and the ignorance of said confluence that was spawned - might have been in those days of yore when science (and all things scientific) were governed by the rogour of the 'scientific method' and that those domains considered more expressive and creative were artificially hacked off with conceptual machettes as belonging to someone else's department. Over the last 30 or so years there also seems to have been a progressive diminishing of the importance of creative expression (arts programmes, even humanities tend to receive less funding in academic domains than do scientific/pure technology-driven departments). If you have not yet had an opportunity to read Gregory Bateson's "Steps to an ecology of mind" or "Mind/Nature: A necessary unity" I would encourage you do so. Both books are quite phenomenal undertakings (not as in thick tomes but in their ambition of scope), and have influenced quite a number of different fields from psychotherapy to cybernetics, but one of the strands is the interconnected pattern - "the pattern that connects" - between the phylogenesis of the crab's claw, the dimensions of flowers petals, and human communication patterns. Anyway, all this to say that the divisions between math, art, and now computer programming are imposed cleavages, and the cleavage can be moved to include or to exclude one or more of these (traditionally regarded as) disparate threads. That Kirby and yourself (and doubtless others too) are working at minimising that artificial boundary is good news, and should facilitate some interesting developments in the field of programming (and math and art). > I happen to be fascinated by projective geometry. It was developed intially > by great artists, in studying perspective, then formalized by great > philosophers, some of whom were also considered to be the great > mathematicians of their day (or vice, versa - depending on how one wants to > look at it). In fact many liberal artists hardly understand that the names > they know as the significant philosophers, are the same names one studies in > the history of mathematics. This is true into the modern era. I didn't > understand it, until I began studying mathematics - which I happen to do in > conjunction with studying programming. Lots of fireworks went off, in fact. > > And giving strong emphasis to visual mathematics is - as of today, I think - > elevating it, rather than dumbing it down. Chaos theory, as Kirby points > out. Wolfram's work. Many, many other examples. > > There *is* something to overcome, in terms of resistance. > > At one point some young folk - I think high schoolers - joined in to a > discussion here, protesting the concept of bringing to together math and > programming curriculum. They like programming and are good at it, they hate > math and are bad at it. > > I don't blame them - if math is being presented to them as it was presented > to me. That is probably the source of my own aversion to math: I hate to blame my teachers and no doubt I was also probably a lazy sod :) - but whatever it was, I now do have to work really hard to overcome that resistance, despite my appreciation for the sheer beauty of geometry and algebra at the 'safer' and more 'abstract' level of a philosophical appreciation. > I like to think they would by no means hate math taught by Kirby or myself, > though. If you want a guinea pig - try me: I could benefit from a decent math education and I'd be upfront in giving you feedback!! > If they don't like history, philosophy, art -- they might have a problem, > though. I am absolutely fine there - history is interesting, but philosophy and art ... yep, I do certainly enjoy those. Seriously though, I do think that the project you (and Kirby) describe is important. The way that one field connects to another, that the boundary that separates one academic discipline from another is really a common wall that joins the two, these are important aspects that seem to be in retreat from much academic discourse: there is such an emphasis on specialisation and sub-specialisation that one can get a PhD in something and have absolutely no idea how one's field relates to any others. To (mis)quote Felix Guattari (of Deleuze & Guattari fame or infamy): we need an ecology of ideas. I'd better stop: I can feel a raving swelling up within me ;-) All the best Andrew From Arthur" >If you want a guinea pig - try me: I could benefit from a decent math >education and I'd be upfront in giving you feedback!! I'm horribly predictable. THE THIRTEEN BOOKS OF EUCLID'S ELEMENTS translated from the Text of Heinberg with Introduction and Commentary by Thomas L. Heath Second Edition (orignally published 1908) In print Dover Publications, Inc. Just get through Books 1 & 2 - with the commentaries, and *doing the constructions*. The fact that you already know the substance of what you will encounter there from other sources, does not alllow you to opt out of this as a prerequisite. In other words, it's quite possible that you have already seen the movie version. Doesn't count. Kirby, I'm quite sure, would disagree with this advice, BTW. I don't really know what he would consider as a prerequisie. Art From urnerk@qwest.net Sat Jan 25 21:59:01 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sat, 25 Jan 2003 13:59:01 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Euclid In-Reply-To: <006e01c2c4a7$9b3c5480$3469f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030125135813.01757058@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 02:26 PM 1/25/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: >Kirby, I'm quite sure, would disagree with this advice, BTW. I think you're abdicating -- he wanted *us* to try teaching math, not a long dead dude. How do you do Euclid's Elements in PyGeo? Can be done, yes? Kirby From Arthur" Message-ID: <008401c2c4c6$5f205b80$3469f6d1@Arts> I found Python,Numeric, & VPython. I didn't write them. Euclid may be long dead. But he's still part of my toolkit. Art ----- Original Message ----- From: "Kirby Urner" To: "Arthur" ; Sent: Saturday, January 25, 2003 4:59 PM Subject: Euclid > At 02:26 PM 1/25/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: > > >Kirby, I'm quite sure, would disagree with this advice, BTW. > > I think you're abdicating -- he wanted *us* to try teaching math, > not a long dead dude. How do you do Euclid's Elements in PyGeo? > Can be done, yes? > > Kirby > > From Arthur" Message-ID: <009401c2c4cd$3e2977c0$3469f6d1@Arts> > How do you do Euclid's Elements in PyGeo? > Can be done, yes? Yes, and no. PyGeo is really built to explore more modern notions of geometry. Notions of length, area, and to a good extent shape are not invariants in projective space, or non-euclidan space - and so are not of the essence when studying those kinds of geometries. So not a lot is done with those notions in PyGeo - at least in how I use it. Those notions are more significant in Euclian space. Plus, no need to reinvent the wheel: http://aleph0.clarku.edu/~djoyce/java/elements/elements.html has the complete Elements up, with essentially all the constructions as dynamic Java applets. Using the applets are great to explore a construction *after* one has done that construction by hand, IMO. We can get into a whole discussion about the use of technology in education. To the extent it has been scientifically studied, the evidence is that the heavy use of computers in the classroom = a slight detriment to student advancement. No evidence of a major +. I'm believing that it is too easy for someone to slip into passive mode, and out of learning mode - in front of a screen. There is only one way to build a construction in PyGeo. By the deliberate act of writing a script. The mental process is much closer to that of building by hand - then for example it would be using a GUI. And that is how I want it to be. The important thing is that it does things you can't do on a piece of paper. Like simulate the working in 3d space. In that way - by doing something that it is hard or near impossible to do without it - it employs technology for educational purposes. The Euclidian constructions are generally simple enough to do on paper with a ruler and compass. I see no reason, really, to do them any other way. Art From jmillr@umich.edu Sun Jan 26 19:59:53 2003 From: jmillr@umich.edu (John Miller) Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2003 14:59:53 -0500 Subject: [Edu-sig] Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <20030126170003.28940.58146.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: I recently came across a book by Lakoff & Nunez called "Where mathematics comes from : how the embodied mind brings mathematics into being". After reading the introduction, I jumped to the four appendices where the equation e^(pi)i = -1 is explained. I never thought I'd be able to understand that equation, but reading their explanation made it tantalizingly approachable. It may well be that much of why people were turned off to math in school can be explained by metaphoric deficiencies in the teaching of it. And they show how to rectify the situation with their (metaphor-based) take on how that particular equation might be better explained. Anyway, it'll probably take a few re-readings before I really get it, but at least now, there's a chance... John Miller Technology Services School of Education University of Michigan On Sunday, January 26, 2003, at 12:00 PM, ahimsa wrote: > That is probably the source of my own aversion to math: I hate to blame > my teachers and no doubt I was also probably a lazy sod :) - but > whatever it was, I now do have to work really hard to overcome that > resistance, despite my appreciation for the sheer beauty of geometry > and > algebra at the 'safer' and more 'abstract' level of a philosophical > appreciation. From urnerk@qwest.net Sun Jan 26 21:28:04 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2003 13:28:04 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: References: <20030126170003.28940.58146.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126124606.01df19f0@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 02:59 PM 1/26/2003 -0500, John Miller wrote: >I recently came across a book by Lakoff & Nunez called "Where mathematics >comes from : how the embodied mind brings mathematics into being". After >reading the introduction, I jumped to the four appendices where the equation > >e^(pi)i = -1 > >is explained. I never thought I'd be able to understand that equation, but >reading their explanation made it tantalizingly approachable. It may well >be that much of why people were turned off to math in school can be >explained by metaphoric deficiencies in the teaching of it. And they show >how to rectify the situation with their (metaphor-based) take on how that >particular equation might be better explained. Anyway, it'll probably take >a few re-readings before I really get it, but at least now, there's a chance... > >John Miller >Technology Services >School of Education >University of Michigan What kind of explanation do they give I wonder? The approach I've usually seen, and which I think sort of mirrors Euler's process, involves expanding e^x as a polynomial and then showing how the polynomial expansions of sine and cosine sort of merge to give the same thing, or at least of we pass ix as our value (complex number), the signs change such that e^ix = cos(x) + i sin(x). Here's an example of this approach: http://www.nrich.maths.org.uk/mathsf/journalf/aams/q57.html But then you need to go back and figure out why these are valid polynomial expansions for e, cos and sin. We could avoid the proofs for a bit and just play around with the first expansion, comparing outputs on both sides of the equals sign. I.e. in Python we have math.exp(x) for raising e to the xth power. The expansion is (1/0! 1/1! 1/2! 1/3! 1/4!...) where these are the coefficients of a polynomial, with x^0, x^1, x^2, x^3... respectively. One thing we can do in Python is produce successive factorials using a generator, because once we have 4!, why go back and start the multiplications all over just to get 5!. Just multiply 4! (which we already have) by 5 fer gosh sakes. Now I'm using the PyCrust shell: >>> from __future__ import generators, division >>> from operator import add >>> from math import exp, pi >>> def fact(): """ Sequence of factorials: 0! 1! 2! 3!... """ n=0; result=1 while 1: if n == 0: yield 1 n += 1 result *= n yield result >>> [f.next() for i in range(10)] # sequence of factorials [1, 1, 2, 6, 24, 120, 720, 5040, 40320, 362880] Now we can build the polynomial expansion: >>> def polye(n,x): """ Polynomial expansion of e^x to n terms, using fact() generator """ f = fact() return reduce(add,[x**i/f.next() for i in range(n)]) and compare exp(x) with polye(n,x), where n is the number of terms we want in our expansion: >>> exp(3) # e^x ; x = 3 20.085536923187668 >>> polye(25,3) 20.0855369231876 >>> polye(50,10) # e^x ; x = 10 22026.465794806711 >>> exp(10) 22026.465794806718 I notice I needed to push the number of terms pretty high (like to 50) to get a lot of agreement as x increases. Lots to play with here. Perhaps we need an exponentially increasing number of those polynomial terms, to stay on target, as x increases linearly. Now comes the big test (vis-a-vis the topic at hand). Let's make x = i*pi where i = sqrt(-1). Right away, we see that math.exp() fails, because it won't take a complex argument. But polye() passes the test with flying colors. >>> x = complex(0, pi) >>> exp(x) Traceback (most recent call last): File "", line 1, in ? TypeError: can't convert complex to float; use e.g. abs(z) >>> polye(50,x) (-1.0000000000000002+3.4586691443277667e-016j) Note that, at 50 terms in our expansion, the imaginary component is vanishingly small, and the real part is about as close to -1 as you can get in floating point arithmetic. Kirby From urnerk@qwest.net Sun Jan 26 22:21:35 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2003 14:21:35 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126124606.01df19f0@pop.ptld.qwest.net> References: <20030126170003.28940.58146.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126135052.01de8d70@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 01:28 PM 1/26/2003 -0800, I wrote: >One thing we can do in Python is produce successive factorials using a >generator, because once we have 4!, why go back and start the multiplications >all over just to get 5!. Just multiply 4! (which we already have) by >5 fer gosh sakes. Of course this argument applies equally well to the fact that we're going x^0, x^1, x^2.... x^n, i.e. we should just hold on to the last powering of x and multiply by x once again. No reason to start over. This suggests a more specialized generator, which does the whole term, in e^x's expansion, not just the factorial part. Also, we can cause the generator to stop iterating after t terms, by passing this stop value as a parameter: (assuming the same import statements as before): >>> def eterms(x,t): n=0; result=1 if n == 0: yield 1 # moved this line out of the loop while 1: n += 1 if n > t: return # stop iterating else: result *= x/n yield result >>> def polye2(x,t): return reduce(add,[j for j in eterms(x,t)]) >>> polye2(3.45, 30) # note I reversed parameter order (I like this better) 31.500392308747941 >>> exp(3.45) 31.500392308747937 >>> polye2(1j*pi, 100) # again, *really really close* to -1 (-1+3.3357107625719758e-016j) Kirby From Arthur" >After reading the introduction, I jumped to the four appendices >where the equation >e^(pi)i = -1 15 ways of looking at a blackbird. I see a half-turn around the unit circle on the complex plane, with 1+0j as the starting point. That is, we a pointing to a point (-1,0) on the complex plane, by way of its polar coordinates. e is a numerical value - the numerical value that makes this so. Not fully satisfactory, by any means, but is a step toward a geometric approach. PyGeo's new version has does alot with the exploration of the geometry of complex numbers. Art Art From urnerk@qwest.net Mon Jan 27 01:38:40 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2003 17:38:40 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <003001c2c5a3$38f6ba70$7143f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126173757.01dc4260@pop.ptld.qwest.net> > >PyGeo's new version has does alot with the exploration of the geometry of >complex numbers. > >Art So when do we get the new distro, with the site-packages locus, rationalize Vpython and all that. I eagerly await the new and improved. Kirby From urnerk@qwest.net Mon Jan 27 02:00:36 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2003 18:00:36 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126124606.01df19f0@pop.ptld.qwest.net> References: <20030126170003.28940.58146.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126174722.01cedd30@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 01:28 PM 1/26/2003 -0800, Kirby Urner wrote: >The expansion is (1/0! 1/1! 1/2! 1/3! 1/4!...) where these are the >coefficients of a polynomial, with x^0, x^1, x^2, x^3... respectively. Just for comparison and contrast, in the J language, we get Taylor Expansions of many functions, plus polynomials themselves, implemented as primitive "verbs" (the lingo is resolutely linguistic-grammatical -- nouns, verbs, adverbs, conjunctions, and even gerunds, get defined): (NB. means comment = "nota bene") exp =: ^ NB. ^ in front of a noun is like Python's exp(noun) I just renamed a verb to look more like Python. I'm going to ask for the first 10 coefficients of the polynomial expansion of e^x, in rational format ( 1r2 means 1/2 or one half): taylor =: t. rational =: x: NB. make of 'rational type' (coming in Python) range =: i. NB. like i. 10 returns 0 1 2 3...9 like range(10) exp taylor (range rational 10) NB. <-- user, next line is computer 1 1 1r2 1r6 1r24 1r120 1r720 1r5040 1r40320 1r362880 (i.e. 1/0! 1/1! 1/2! 1/3! 1/4! etc.) coeffs =: exp taylor (range rational 30) NB. same, but more terms coeffs p. 3 NB. use polynomial operator to evaluate p(x), x=3 20.0855 ^3 NB. note, same answer 20.0855 And of course: coeffs p. 0j1p1 NB. 0j1p1 means i pi (like Python, J uses j) _1 And even more exact answer than Python's (thanks to internal rounding I guess). Kirby From Arthur" >So when do we get the new distro, with the site-packages locus, >rationalize Vpython and all that. I eagerly await the new and >improved Pretty much there as to the Windows distribution. Took some doing with VPython - since I want to go all the way and be able to provide a Windows source distro. Took me a while to get to the fact that I had to use the custom compile flags option of the distutils to successfully compile VPython under VC6. So I have at this point Windows source distro and Windows self installing exe for both VPython and PyGeo. Have to decide whether to try to combine them into one distro. Any opinion? Got permission to wipe my wife's old machine and install Linux. So I guess that's the next step. But I'm a weekend warrior at this point. So it will be slower than I would wish. Art From urnerk@qwest.net Mon Jan 27 04:05:57 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2003 20:05:57 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <003a01c2c5a9$3e600420$7143f6d1@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126200412.01cdd848@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 09:10 PM 1/26/2003 -0500, you wrote: >Have to decide whether to try to combine them into one distro. Any opinion? I think separate. Then if your VPython distro is more rational than Bruce's, we can get it from you, even if it's a computer on which we're not installing PyGeo (I have several boxes, and might want a combination of capabilities on each). >Got permission to wipe my wife's old machine and install Linux. So I guess >that's the next step. But I'm a weekend warrior at this point. So it will >be slower than I would wish. > >Art Well, why make the Windows people wait? Chompin at the bit here. Kirby From urnerk@qwest.net Mon Jan 27 08:27:24 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Mon, 27 Jan 2003 00:27:24 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] the plot question (in another sense) In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126124606.01df19f0@pop.ptld.qwest.net> References: <20030126170003.28940.58146.Mailman@mail.python.org> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030126220424.01cf9080@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 01:28 PM 1/26/2003 -0800, Kirby Urner wrote: >We could avoid the proofs for a bit and just play around with the first >expansion, comparing outputs on both sides of the equals sign. I.e. in >Python we have math.exp(x) for raising e to the xth power. Clearly if we're doing a polynomial expansion equal to the cosine of x, its graph'll have to be the same as cosine's. (x,cos(x)) crosses the x-axis at all these roots (e.g. pi/2, 3pi/2, 5pi/2 etc.). So the polynomial needs another root, and therefore one higher degree, for every new x-axis crossing. The polynomial expansion for cosine is [1/0!, 0, -1/2!, 0, 1/4!, 0, -1/6!...] where these are coefficients for x^0 x^1 x^2 etc. --except the terms with odd exponents have zero coefficients and so go away. Using the generator approach again: def costerms(x,t): n,result = 0,1 maxterm = 2*t if n==0: yield 1 while 1: n += 2 if n >= maxterm: return # bug fixed (>=) -- one too many terms before result *= -x*x/(n*(n-1)) yield result def polycos(x,t): return reduce(add,[i for i in costerms(x,t)]) >>> polycos(3,20) -0.98999249660044553 >>> math.cos(3) -0.98999249660044542 So now I'd like see graphs of these ever higher degree polynomials that criss-cross the x-axis, just like cosine does. In J, I'd just go something like: load 'plot';'trig' polycos =: (cos t. i.20) & p. NB. coefficients out 20 terms, including zeros domain =: (i: 80) % 10 NB. from -8 to 8 in increments of 1/10 plot domain; polycos domain NB. do the graph and I'd be looking at my wavy line on a graph in a window. One approach I've used is to use a module I wrote for outputting to Povray, the ray tracing engine. I just output the (x,y) points as little spheres and link them with cylinders. This gives a graph with a pleasing 3d look -- can be colorful too. However, since I've recently added wxPython to Python 2.2 (and am using the PyCrust that comes with it), tonight my experiment will by to use a package I've not tried before: SciPy (VPython also has graphing capabilities BTW). I've just grabbed the Windows binary from here: http://www.scipy.org/site_content/download_list It seems to install a *lot* of stuff, but then I see I still need Numeric, which the VPython uninstaller recently stole off my machine (as Arthur warned me it would). So I'll go to http://www.pfdubois.com/numpy/ and grab another copy... (Numpy is pretty small, only like 446K -- downloading *very* slowly though, looks like I need to try again... ah, *much* faster from Chapel Hill, NC). OK, now scipy imports without errors. Time to check the docs and see how to do a quick plot... http://www.scipy.org/site_content/tutorials/plot_tutorial Hmmmm... Strangely, when I used Vim to edit code, then reload my module in PyCrust, I sometimes get error messages referring to old code that's gone from the module. I wonder if there's a namespace conflict with scipy somehow. This 'list' not callable error makes no sense anyway -- cut and paste the same code to the prompt and it runs. I notice it's important not to *close* the plt.plot window, if you want to use it again same session. Just change domain and range and replot, without closing the plot window in between. Here's my result: http://www.inetarena.com/~pdx4d/ocn/python/cospoly.png Notice this polynomial crosses the x-axis 10 times! But it's a degree 40 equation no? No. I've got 20 non-zero terms, but that starts from x^0, so I only get up to x^38. 38th degree equation, with 38 roots. A quick check in J shows it has these 10 real roots (where it crosses x), plus 14 conjugate pairs of complex roots (J has a built-in for finding these roots). The real roots are: _14.1262 14.1262 _10.9956 10.9956 7.85398 _7.85398 4.71239 _4.71239 1.5708 _1.5708 which corresponds to plus/minus pi/2 3pi/2 5pi/2 7pi/2 and 9pi/2 -- except these values don't match the pi values. Because this 38 degree poly is an *approximation* (gotta have infinite terms to be spot on). The only Python functions I added, to create a domain and range for plt.plot(domain,range), were: def mkdomain(x): # kinda ugly, but it works x *= 10 return map(lambda x: x*0.1, range(-x,0,1)) + map(lambda x: x*0.1, range(x+1)) def mkrange(d): return [cospoly(i,20) for i in d] # the 20 fixes the number of terms So this graph was a result of going: >>> from scipy import plt >>> import plotplay # the generator, cospoly, and the above two functions [1] >>> d = plotplay.mkdomain(16) # from -16 to 16 in 0.1 increments >>> r = plotplay.mkrange (d) # feed this domain to cospoly >>> plt.plot(d,r) and that's it! Kirby [1] recall that we need to import some stuff in plotplay: from __future__ import generators, division from operator import add From Arthur" >Well, why make the Windows people wait? Chompin at the bit here. That's what I like to hear. I'm still stymied a bit by the IDLE situation. Soon enough there will be no reason to distribute an IDLE with VPython, so my VPython distro does and will not include it. But if I take Kirby as an audience of one, as of the moment you may have nothing conventiently available to run VPython scripts without the older forked IDLE. Kirby - I'm happy to send along the VPython and PyGeo distros I prepared. In fact I would like a reaction, and a test. But you'd be on your own as to an editor. Though Scite/Scintilla - which Patrick mentioned in conjunction with PyCrust - would be an excellent choice, IMO. At http://www.scintilla.org Scintilla I would call a library for text editor functionality. SCite is an actual implementation of an editor, using the scintilla library. So you would want the Scite executable distribution. As a cross language guy it should be up your ally. Designed to work with many, many languages - that is as to basic editor functionality like keyword syntaxing etx. Highly customizable. Create and play with the local.properties file, which overrides the global.properties file. Let me know if I should send stuff along. Art Art From Arthur" >As a cross language guy it should be up your ally. Designed to work with many, many languages - that is as to basic editor functionality like keyword syntaxing etx. >Highly customizable. Create and play with the local.properties file, which overrides the global.properties file. In fact, I'll give *you* an assignment. How about adding a J Langauge lexer to scintilla. Shouldn't be too hard - particularly as, from my little expereince with J, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot to lex. Art From urnerk@qwest.net Mon Jan 27 16:46:05 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Mon, 27 Jan 2003 08:46:05 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <000a01c2c615$f6288a20$d9a69840@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030127084123.01c91e70@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 10:08 AM 1/27/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: > >As a cross language guy it should be up your ally. Designed to work with >many, many languages - that is as to basic editor functionality like keyword >syntaxing etx. >Highly customizable. Create and play with the >local.properties file, which overrides the global.properties file. Yes. I use gVim for that now -- has lexers for over a 100 languages and markups. >In fact, I'll give *you* an assignment. How about adding a J Langauge lexer >to scintilla. Shouldn't be too hard - particularly as, from my little >expereince with J, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot to lex. > >Art Yeah not a whole lot to do. If I use the color coding of the J IDE, then there's green for comments, blue for quoted strings, and red for the few control words (end. do. while. etc.). And that's it. Most of the 100+ primitives are things like [: @: +: ^ % etc., and they stand out without any color coding. So far though, I don't see a need for an external editor, given J comes with one of its own that's well integrated. Kirby From urnerk@qwest.net Mon Jan 27 16:50:22 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Mon, 27 Jan 2003 08:50:22 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <000501c2c614$0cc7ee30$4bb1f4d1@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030127084838.01d86ab8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 09:54 AM 1/27/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: >But if I take Kirby as an audience of one, as of the moment you may have >nothing conventiently available to run VPython scripts without the older >forked IDLE. Must I use IDLE? Can't I use PyCrust? Or does the use of wxPython mean I can't use any Tk. >I'm happy to send along the VPython and PyGeo distros I prepared. In fact I >would like a reaction, and a test. But you'd be on your own as to an >editor. Though Scite/Scintilla - which Patrick mentioned in conjunction >with PyCrust - would be an excellent choice, IMO. I'd start with gVim and see if that suited my needs. >Let me know if I should send stuff along. > >Art Sure. Kirby From pobrien@orbtech.com Mon Jan 27 17:15:14 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Mon, 27 Jan 2003 11:15:14 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030127084838.01d86ab8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030127084838.01d86ab8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <200301271115.14063.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Monday 27 January 2003 10:50 am, Kirby Urner wrote: > Must I use IDLE? Can't I use PyCrust? Don't let Guido hear you talking like that. ;-) music-to-my-ears-ly y'rs - Pat -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From Arthur" > Must I use IDLE? Can't I use PyCrust? PyCrust is an interactive shell. PyGeo is not designed to work fully from the interactive shell. In other words it does not draw progressively, command by command from the shell. As it uses VPython for rendering, and VPython does have this facility it is probable that I could have designed it to do so. It would definitely be an great enhancement to PyGeo. I am waiting patiently for you or Patrick to help me figure out how to do it ;). Art From urnerk@qwest.net Tue Jan 28 17:03:25 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 28 Jan 2003 09:03:25 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <000701c2c6de$3475a600$07a29840@Arts> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030128084958.01e3a0f8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 10:01 AM 1/28/2003 -0500, Arthur wrote: > > Must I use IDLE? Can't I use PyCrust? > >PyCrust is an interactive shell. > >PyGeo is not designed to work fully from the interactive shell. In other >words it does not draw progressively, command by command from the shell. > >As it uses VPython for rendering, and VPython does have this facility it is >probable that I could have designed it to do so. It would definitely be an >great enhancement to PyGeo. > >I am waiting patiently for you or Patrick to help me figure out how to do it >;). > >Art You're saying I need a text editor yes? Gotta write/run whole scripts. For that I have gVim. But any script can be run from the shell, provided the code has a triggering key word, like run() or doit(). I'd like to be able to go something like: >>> from pygeo.examples import * >>> islamic6.run() Then you can put that if __name__ = "__main__": run() at the bottom of every script, so that the module will run if passed directly to python on the command line (actually, in XP it'll just run as a standalone word, thanks to file association -- more like unix with its all important pound bash notation). Kirby From pobrien@orbtech.com Tue Jan 28 17:53:34 2003 From: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Date: Tue, 28 Jan 2003 11:53:34 -0600 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030128084958.01e3a0f8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030128084958.01e3a0f8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <200301281153.34009.pobrien@orbtech.com> On Tuesday 28 January 2003 11:03 am, Kirby Urner wrote: > But any script can be run from the shell, provided the code has a > triggering key word, like run() or doit(). I'd like to be able > to go something like: > > >>> from pygeo.examples import * > >>> islamic6.run() > > Then you can put that > > if __name__ = "__main__": run() > > at the bottom of every script, so that the module will run if passed > directly to python on the command line (actually, in XP it'll just > run as a standalone word, thanks to file association -- more like > unix with its all important pound bash notation). While this is good general advice, I'm not sure it will be enough to allow PyGeo to be usable from PyCrust as I'm not sure the Tkinter and wxPython event loops will get along with each other. -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." ----------------------------------------------- From Arthur" >But any script can be run from the shell, provided the code has a >triggering key word, like run() or doit(). I'd like to be able >to go something like: > >>> from pygeo.examples import * > >>> islamic6.run() OK. For that PyCrust and IDLE should be at least equal. But I do wonder. The question is whether IDLE (old, regular IDLE) closes when you close islamic6. The single process issue that generally plagues VPython scripts run in IDLE. And how PyCrust behaves. I'm totally dismantled now - testing installs with distutils, but I'll play with both IDLE and PyCrust when I get re-mantled. But the further enticing possiblity exists - and this is my oblem/fault - that PyGeo could draw instance by instance as it is created from the command line. Not normally something one would consider a possiblity, but VPython does exactly that, and so it might just be a matter of reconfiguring, or refiguring some PyGeo code. Maybe I could find a way to toggle it into command line mode. I've thought about this before, but haven't done much to attact it yet. Could be anything from quite simple, to near impossible, to implement. I've narrowed it down that far ;). Art From urnerk@qwest.net Tue Jan 28 18:20:33 2003 From: urnerk@qwest.net (Kirby Urner) Date: Tue, 28 Jan 2003 10:20:33 -0800 Subject: [Edu-sig] re: Where mathematics comes from In-Reply-To: <200301281153.34009.pobrien@orbtech.com> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030128084958.01e3a0f8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> <5.2.0.9.0.20030128084958.01e3a0f8@pop.ptld.qwest.net> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030128101754.01ed7e48@pop.ptld.qwest.net> At 11:53 AM 1/28/2003 -0600, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote: >While this is good general advice, I'm not sure it will be enough to allow >PyGeo to be usable from PyCrust as I'm not sure the Tkinter and wxPython >event loops will get along with each other. > >-- >Patrick K. O'Brien Yes, this is a key question. Do you know for a fact that this experiment will fail? I was hoping wxPython was enough different that it'd sort of "stay out of the way" of the Tk event loop. Maybe not though. Is ActiveState's Pythonwin also incompatible with PyGeo then? In any case, I'll put up with using VPython in a command box Python, if I can avoid installing VPython's separate IDLE, which I don't want (either I use an IDLE bundled with Python itself, or I don't want to use IDLE). Kirby From Arthur" >Yes, this is a key question. Do you know for a fact that this >experiment will fail? I was hoping wxPython was enough different >that it'd sort of "stay out of the way" of the Tk event loop. >Maybe not though. Is ActiveState's Pythonwin also incompatible >with PyGeo then? The issue is running VPython, not so much PyGeo. A VPython script runs fine when imported into either IDLE or PyCrust. BUT, in both cases - I just tried it - closing the VPython graphics window also closes the rest of the environment - whether it is IDLE or PyCrust. Frankly I'm not too hung about this at the moment. PyGeo is not really designed to be run interactively - though, as I mentioned, I might eventually get there. So its not a PyCrust thing in any case, as of now. And IDLE is one of maybe a hundred text editors that might be suitable for creating and running Python/VPython scripts. Its probably one of the few that would have a problem running VPython scripts, as far as I am aware. And that problem is scheduled to go way, quite soon. I guess I don't see it the issue too much since I never used IDLE for script writing in any case. Hopefully PyGeo will reach an audience where the need to have an environment spoon fed to them to that degree will not be a big issue. Though I do intend to point folks in need to the Scite site, at least until the IDLE issue is resolved. I have, BTW, what I think is a nice VPython distro for Windows done. Picked the brain of the IDLE setup.py, among other, to get there. The self installing executable is is under 400k. The source distro under 300k - tested with VC6. It includes all VPython related files - demos, docs, (and licenses :) ). It places itself politely under a site-packages directory. Happy to send it along to anyone. E-mail at my reply, if interestered. Art From Arthur" Kirby asks- >Is ActiveState's Pythonwin also incompatible with PyGeo then? Was curious myself. The answer, yep. Quite incompatible. With the added attraction that I get the opportunity to notify Bill Gates of the problem when PythonWin closes down suddenly after closing a VPython window. Its all hard for me to understand. PythonWin is a Windows executable based on the scintilla library. And the behavior is as described. Scite is a Windows executable based on the scintilla library - and VPython windows shuts down quite politely. Were it not for that fact that VPython runs so smoothly on a number of other text editors I would conclude there is something fundamentally flawed in its design. Bruce Sherwood actually reported the problem of VPython running under the revised IDLE fork. It is actually quite ugly. Rather than a clean, but unwanted, shutdown that you get with the old IDLE, you get a deadlock and a window that is unresponsive in any way. Essentially an entire systems crash - as extensive of a crash as I've come across occuring under XP. It was acknowledged to be a bug. But I haven't seen anything subsequent in the messages or check-ins to indicate it has been fixed. Wish I understood more about what underlies all this - technically. Art