IRC log of #schooltool for Monday, 2007-05-14

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ACSpikegood morning.14:58
ignashi14:58
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ACSpikehi ignas, how goes it?15:12
ACSpikethis week is the last week of the semester. I'm going to try to make it a personal goal for the summer to learn how to dev on schooltool15:13
ignasnot bad, got gradebook for teachers working15:13
ACSpikesuper15:13
ignasneed some cleanup to check it in15:14
ACSpikeof course we've got a lot of projects going for the summer too, like deploying wireless across the campus15:14
ACSpikeignas you've got a lot of work to do, right?15:14
ignasyes15:15
ACSpikewould there be enough payoff for you to tell me what to do and how to do it? or is it mostly mental work rather than grunt work?15:15
ignashmm, gruntwork is too boring for most volunteers (functional tests, bug tracker) ...15:17
ignasbut if you want to, there are a lot of things that should be done in that respect15:18
ignasUI needs a lot of improvement15:18
ACSpikecertainly boring15:18
ignaswhich means going view by view15:18
ignasand looking if all the urls make sense15:18
ACSpikebut I dont' have an immediate use for schooltool myself15:18
ignaswhich should be hidden15:18
ignasand simmilar ...15:18
ACSpikereally hard to learn things with only "that will help me someday" motivation15:19
ACSpikeso I think I could force myself to sit down and do some boring stuff15:19
ACSpikeespecially if I could tell myself I'm training time for education15:19
ignaswell, training has to have a purpose ...15:20
ignaswhat do you want to do with schooltool in the future15:20
ignasbecause functional tests will only help you to know what is broken, and what should get fixed, not how to do it ...15:20
ACSpike1) I want to learn about zope 2) because of my job there are a reasonable number of people asking me about open source SISes right now I have nothing to tell them15:22
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ignaswith the 1, i can only suggest reading schooltool checkin mailing list, asking questions, and doing something yourself15:23
ignasi can't help you learn if i can't see your code ;) so you must do something15:24
ignasas for the second part, what questions are they asking?15:24
ACSpikeif it exists. what to use.15:25
ignashmm15:25
ignasthere is SchoolTool, but it is not usable yet15:25
ignasand there is another one15:25
* ignas only found out recently15:25
ACSpikeas I was saying the problem with 1 is that I don't have an immediate need. I don't have someone in a school saying "wee need this in schooltool"15:25
ignaswait a sec15:25
ACSpikeI cannot recommend focus-sis15:25
ignasACSpike: you should do something you need15:25
ignasnot SIS15:25
ignasbut something webby15:26
ACSpikeoh15:26
ignasACSpike: http://demo.miller-group.net/index.php15:27
ignaslook at this one15:27
ignasfind out what it does, and what it doesn't15:27
ACSpikefocus-sis was forked from that15:27
ignasthen tell us about it ;)15:27
ACSpikecentre15:27
ignashttp://www.miller-group.net/content/view/38/47/15:27
ignasfocus-sis ?15:27
ignaswhat is it?15:27
ignashttp://www.focus-sis.org/ ?15:28
ignashmm15:28
ACSpikeI think one school I talk with is going to use focus-sis soonish. I'll probably write a hot lunch module for it.15:28
ACSpikebut I don't like the code15:28
ACSpikecentre was originally developed by a high school student and somehow he got into some commercial deal with the miller group15:29
ACSpikethere was bad blood and he forked it15:29
ACSpikeanyway, I probably will get some exposure to that codebase over the next year15:31
ACSpikeso then I will be able to tell you about it15:31
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ACSpikefyi there are a few other smaller and less capable efforts too. I went through them a year or so ago. slim pickins15:32
* ignas is interested in those who are ahead us ;)15:36
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ACSpikewould probably be good to dissect the functionality of those who claim that they are being used in schools15:41
ACSpikeI have access to some people using powerschool too15:42
ACSpikeI think they are probably the real competition15:42
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ignasACSpike: if you could get screenshots, manuals, information about integration capabilities etc about powerschool15:48
ignasi would be very interested15:49
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ACSpikeI'll see what I can do15:52
ACSpikeignas: wrt grunt work, dream up a specific small task for me.15:57
ignashow small ? ;)15:57
ignasin hours/days/weeks ? ;)15:58
ACSpike2-3 evening after kiddie bedtime hacking sessions15:58
ACSpikeso probably hours15:58
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ignasACSpike: https://bugs.launchpad.net/schooltool/+bug/8009216:06
ignasperform the testcase16:06
ignasif everything is fine, comment on the bug16:06
ignasthe testcase is describet by Tom Hoffman16:07
ACSpikeperfect16:09
ignashttps://bugs.launchpad.net/schooltool/+bug/79824 - is a UI issue, you might try finding a way to display multi day events better16:09
ignasand either submit a patch to the template16:09
ignasor an html mockup that shows dates on the event and let me fix the code16:09
ACSpikeI disagree with the premise of the second bug16:09
ignaspremise?16:10
ACSpikeI don't think it should be forbidden if it can't be done through the ui16:10
ignasthis part is fixed16:10
ignasthe problem is - if event spans 2 days (23:00-2:00)16:10
ignasyou can's see dates in the event title16:10
ignasso you don't know how long the event spans16:11
ACSpikeoh, right, I didnt' get that far down :-)16:11
ACSpikeok16:11
ignasso you should play around with long events and see if you can think of a way to improve the UI16:11
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Lumiere'morning wjohnsto16:16
ACSpikeignas: yeah, I'll look. don't know if that is my expertise.16:20
ACSpikeignas: thanks!16:20
Lumiereignas: I haven't had time lately to look over permissions on resources16:21
LumiereI'll get back to it in the next week or two16:21
wjohnstohello Lumiere16:22
ACSpikeignas: heh, the my calendar has the same kind of problem :-) month -> https://portal.mlc-wels.edu/nwpp/Information/calendar.php?m=6&y=2007 day -> https://portal.mlc-wels.edu/nwpp/Information/calendar.php?y=2007&m=06&d=0616:23
th1aignas: I have a bunch of stuff printed out from PowerSchool manuals.16:25
th1aI'll have to bring it to EuroPython.16:25
th1aStephan and I spent some time chuckling over the Centre code.16:26
th1aIt is pretty crude;  I know some people who use it.16:26
ACSpikeugh16:27
th1aAnother is OpenAdmin.  I haven't looked at their code though.16:27
ACSpikeyeah, I was looking through the focus-sis code again yesterday16:27
ACSpikeugh16:27
LumiereArlington uses eSchoolsPlus...16:29
Lumierenot that I can find a website for it16:29
LumiereI think it was hand written for Fairfax County right next to us.... and we grabbed it16:31
Lumiere*pokes th1a*16:31
* th1a shuffles some papers around.16:31
Lumieremorning th1a16:32
th1aHi jfroche_, jinty__, Lumiere, ACSpike, ignas...16:32
ignashello16:32
jfroche_good morning !16:32
ACSpikehi! :-)16:33
th1aOK... reports.16:33
th1aI spend more time working on my new ZIS last week.  It is at https://launchpad.net/wye16:34
th1aI still need to put in some time studying Paul's new gradebook stuff.16:34
th1aThose two things are my priorities for this week as well.16:34
th1ajfroche_: You're up.16:35
jfroche_up yep16:35
jfroche_got really busy last week16:35
jfroche_i am still writting the whole description of the grade book in jacqmain16:36
jfroche_describing the different usecases16:36
jfroche_no code yet for that16:36
* th1a is getting worried jfroche_ is busy with too many things other than SchoolTool.16:37
jfroche_i know, my fault. other things than schooltool will be reduced now16:38
jfroche_time management got messed up by deadlines of two other projects16:38
th1aIn the past mysterious periods of quiet by my developers have been followed by them taking other jobs without telling me or disappearing of the face of the earth.16:39
th1ajfroche_: Please don't do either of those.16:39
jfroche_th1a: schooltool is a really important project for me and be sure i won't let if off like that16:40
jfroche_i will be sending my grade book report this week on the dev mailing list16:41
th1aOK.  I'm looking forward to it.16:41
th1ajfroche_: Have you talked to Nicolas lately?16:41
th1aShould I send him an email?16:41
jfroche_no news16:42
jfroche_maybe16:42
jfroche_he could help me to review the grade book analysis16:42
th1aOK.  I'll ping him.16:42
th1ajfroche_: Anything else?16:43
jfroche_after the grade book i would like to know if some stories shouldn't be implemented16:44
jfroche_if they complexify too much the garde book16:44
jfroche_and would like to know if other working on their grade book have the same stories16:44
th1aI'm sure we can work that out.16:45
th1aThanks jfroche_.16:46
th1aignas?16:46
ignasth1a: got a working prototype of gradebook for teachers16:47
ignaswith a link for every lesson that leads to the gradebook16:47
ignasin which you can put grades for students in the section16:47
ignaswith sorting by surname and grouping by grade if needed (for multi grade sections)16:47
ignasand basic history of grades (write only at the moment)16:48
ignasso if you write 9, and then change it to 816:48
ignasthe system remembers that16:48
ignasonly need to clean up the code, and test some corners16:49
ignasthat's kind of everything i did this week16:49
th1aI'm looking forward to seeing it.16:50
th1aThe mysterious Lithuanian grade book ;-)16:50
ignasit looks crude, but helped me solve a couple of UI issues already ...16:50
ignasapparently you can't fit grades for the whole semester in one page16:51
th1a1 grade per day, no.16:51
ignaswith 5 lessons a week it got kind of huge16:52
th1aWhere are exams, etc. recorded?16:52
ignasso now i have it paged by month16:52
ignasno exams yet, just grades and attendance16:52
ignasstarting small ;)16:52
ignasnext - gradebook views for students16:53
th1aI mean, how should they work.  Is it a different book?16:53
th1aDifferent columns?16:53
ignasthey don't really belong to the journal16:53
th1aOH.16:53
th1aA lightbulb goes off above th1a's head.16:54
* Lumiere draws a stick figure version for reference16:54
ignashttp://ignas.pov.lt/gradebook.png ;)16:55
th1aSo is there also a gradebook for exams that is more like and American grade book?16:55
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Lumiereignas: so, your journal is more like an attendence module that also accepts a daily grade?16:56
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th1aThis also helps explain why calendaring was done first in SchoolTool.16:56
ignashttp://ignas.pov.lt/gradebook2.png - a day selected for data entry16:56
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th1aSince you can't even do a gradebook without knowing something about the calendar.16:56
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ignasLumiere: yes it is more like attendance16:57
Lumiereso, could your exam gradebook16:57
Lumiereshare code with pcardune's?16:58
th1aOne would think they would be more similar.16:58
ignasLumiere: in lithuania every student personally select what exams and of what kind he is going to have, there are 2 sets of exams 0th grade and 12th grade only16:58
Lumiereyea16:58
ignasso there are 2 sets of 5-10 marks16:58
ignasthat are varyiing year to year, person to person even :/16:59
ignasso it is quite different thing from any normal gradebook16:59
th1aSo what is on your report card?16:59
ignasreport card? the one you get when you finish the school?17:00
Lumiereor the one when you finish the grade17:00
ignasyou don't have exams when you finish the grade (most of the time)17:00
ignasunless school has special internal rules17:00
th1aIf I had been sent to visit a Lithuanian school the day after Mark hired me, that might have prevented years of confusion.17:01
ignasif it's special rules, then it is quite specific anyway, like - only having exams if your grades are bad etc.17:01
ignasth1a: if we worked on US school because you had more experience with them, it would have saved us years of confusion too17:01
Lumierelol17:02
th1aThe thing is that it is hard to explain the differences without knowing what your expectations are.17:03
th1aAnd schooling in particular is difficult because you literally grew up in the system, it just seems natural to you.17:03
ignasyes, schools are different, that's why I have discarded the original schooltool gradebook and wrote a new one17:04
ignasbecause ours is just different ;)17:04
th1aAlso, I took over after SchoolTool was started, and I couldn't figure out why you guys had started writing it the way you had and why it made no sense to me.17:05
ignaswell - i can't understand that part either17:05
th1aWe could have gone through both of our educational systems explaining them as if to Martians.17:05
th1aRealistically, if I'm ever starting something like this again, I'll have both sides visit each other's schools.17:06
th1aANYHOW... anything else, ignas.17:06
ignasnope17:06
th1aOK.  Thanks.17:06
th1aLumiere?17:06
Lumiereso17:09
Lumiere(sorry)17:09
Lumierepcardune spent the week finishing up the timeclock app for our interns17:09
Lumiereand doing some gradebook stuff17:10
Lumiereon the packaging stuff17:10
LumiereCanDo really needs easy to use ubuntu packages for distribution17:10
th1aYou mean as opposed to eggs?17:11
Lumierewell17:11
Lumiereeggs may work...17:11
Lumierebut I am afraid of the upgrade path on eggs17:11
Lumiereit's rather unfortunate that (ed)ubuntu doesn't follow a standard academic calendar17:11
LumiereI really don't think there are any schools that start in mid october17:12
th1aI guess the big question is whether or not having a deb that will work with Feisty is feasible.17:12
Lumiereyea17:12
th1ajinty__: ayt?17:12
LumiereI have a feeling that we're stuck with packaging the way we did for 0617:12
Lumierenot that I like it17:13
th1aA big .deb blob?17:13
Lumiereyea17:13
th1a(not literally a BLOB)17:13
Lumierecando-06 is a massive ugly zope3 included thing17:13
th1aIs upgrading that less scary than eggs?17:13
Lumiereyes17:14
Lumierebecause upgrading the package17:14
Lumiereupgrades everything in it17:14
th1aIf you guys make a new package.17:14
Lumiereit includes any upgrade17:14
Lumiereof any of the zope3 svn/eggs that were made17:15
Lumiereit works fine... it just is absolutely outside the way that debian/ubuntu will let into the distro17:16
Lumiereand getting packaged in a sane way for ubuntu was a goal for at least me this year17:16
th1aSo practically speaking, none of this makes a significant difference.  Aesthetically, some approaches are uglier.17:16
Lumiereyes17:16
LumiereI just don't understand eggs that well17:16
Lumiereso I am not as comfortable running it17:16
th1aWell, getting CanDo into Gutsy, or Gutsy+1 shouldn't be a problem.17:17
ignasLumiere: you don't need to understand, just install ;)17:17
Lumiereignas: as a system admin17:17
LumiereI want to know wtf is going on17:17
th1aThis is why th1a is a lousy sys admin.17:17
th1aI'm happy to charge ahead into the void.17:18
LumiereI don't need to know every line17:18
Lumierebut I want to have a clue17:18
th1aLumiere: OK.  I guess that's settled.17:18
Lumierek17:18
Lumierethe upgrade path17:18
Lumierethat is hard17:19
Lumiereis feisty->gutsy17:19
th1aWell, it would be hard to make it graceful, but I would think easy to make it doable.17:20
Lumiereyea17:20
Lumiereit's just something I worry about17:20
Lumierebecause I know jelkner17:20
th1aSince the feisty packages are internal, it shouldn't be too hard.17:20
Lumierehe WILL do it17:20
Lumiereyea17:20
Lumiereif there were a truely bleeding edge ubuntu17:21
Lumierejelkner would be on it <_<17:21
th1adwelsh and I got each other worked up partly over the definition of "release."17:21
Lumiereyea17:21
Lumieredwelsh doesn't really worry about release outside va17:21
Lumierethe only thing he cares about is getting the local release out17:21
th1aRight.  And my perspective is the opposite.17:21
Lumiereand mine is to balance the 217:22
th1aI think everything is fine, though.17:22
Lumiereyes17:22
th1aAnything else before we wrap up?17:22
ignashas everyone tried out buildout?17:22
Lumiereit worked for me pretty much17:22
LumiereI need to beat on it some more17:23
Lumierepreferably on a system that doesn't suck17:23
Lumierealso17:23
Lumiereit would be nice17:23
Lumiereif it either fixed it self17:23
Lumiereor failed gracefully17:23
Lumiereif a download failed17:23
th1aI was able to build it.  I think I had to change the Makefile to specify python2.417:23
ignasLumiere: which download?17:23
Lumiererandom eggs17:24
Lumierethere is a wierd ass problem with ACC's firewall17:24
ignasoh17:24
Lumierethat just deadlocks downloads occasionally17:24
Lumierehappens all the time with our apt updates too17:24
Lumierethe only thing I can do is kill it17:24
ignashmm, i am afraid you must perform cleanup manually - ./clean.sh17:24
Lumierebut... with apt it at least starts from where it left off and restarts that download17:24
Lumierecan you add a readme17:24
Lumierethat talks through that17:25
Lumiere:)17:25
ignasmaybe ;)17:25
th1aignas accepts bribes in Lita or Euros.17:26
Lumiererofl17:26
Lumierehow about in drinks when he is in arlington?17:26
Lumiere;)17:26
th1aWe have to get him there.17:26
LumiereI thought that was going17:26
LumiereOH!17:26
Lumiereth1a: pcardune got the tickets17:26
th1aI think he is.17:26
Lumierefor europython17:27
th1aThat is good.17:27
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th1aThat ended up costing me an arm and a leg.17:27
th1apcardune is worth it, though.17:27
Lumiereyea17:27
th1aAny last words?17:27
Lumierehe's one of the most impressive programmers17:28
LumiereI have ever seen17:28
th1aThis is moving along: http://files.esd189.org/~ehall/SIFA/Stupski_SIF_Toolkit_Proposal_draft.pdf17:28
* th1a drops the bag of gravel.17:29
th1aHave a good week, folks!17:29
Lumierenice17:29
th1aLooking forward to gradebooky goodness.17:29
Lumierepcardune's last exam is tuesday17:30
Lumiereso... he'll be on it from then probably17:30
th1aExcellent.17:31
Lumiereoff to get ready for pain and suffering... aka17:35
Lumierework17:35
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