Natural Environment and Morse Code Concept on GCompris

GNOME Women Internship 2013 Proposal

Abstract

Environmental problems are the esteemed issue these days.Learning about environment functionality and issues would be a plus point for children at this very tender age. All the softwares developed on environment these days are usually very complex and confuses children in terms of terminology without talking about their operational behavior.

Learning about Morse code will extend their knowledge towards the encryption science.It will allow a secrative way of communication which would open their minds towards the more practical situations. Morse software for children will be a rare thing to find.

During the internship period,my tasks would be to develop an engaging user-experience by extending GCompris to kids between the age group(2-10), letting them to explore a variety of interactive activities theming Morse code and Environment Section.

Motivation

I chose this project since its rooted from FOSS and highlights the GNUosphere concept,bring linux to kids and kids to the practical science. This implementation will enable the elementary kids to discover our natural environment in more fun way. Implementation will allow kids to classify between good's and bad's of environment virtually and creating and sharing their idea's in the real one.

Introducing Morse world for those who are fascinated by Morse conceptas a kind of “secret code”.They will began to understand its significance for people who are in secret services in a play-way manner.

Proposal Design

The proposal for GCompris intends to focus on providing information , activities & game concept for a range of activities for kids under the age group of (2 to 10) .

Two sections which I want to introduce in GCompris are :-

➢ Getting kids more closer to our natural surrounding and helping kids to learn about organic gardens ,natural cycles and plants through games. Giving them way to classify objects which are not harmful.

➢To help them unlock the Morse code which is usually in form of dots and dashes ( forming a line of dots and dashes with specific spaces positions , arranged so that words and letters can be differentiated )

Creating 4 main section of activities touching 2 sections of the Gcompris Software

Categorization of Gcompris Environment Section

Envionment Section

Introduction to Organic garden Plant growing Stimulator

Environment protection

Intro to Recognizeplants plants

Garbage classification Oxygen cycle

Categorization of Gcompris Morse Code Section

Morse Code

Intro to Morse Code Encryption

GCompris Environment Activities

Part -1: Plant growing Stimulator

Activity -1: Plant growing Stimulator

Engaging kids to manage roots,leafs and flower growth of their own virtual plant.

What Kids can choose :- By Spending some Sugar + Minerals they can choose provided options like Leaf, Roots, Flower, Seed to fall, Bees(to pollinate flowers into seed), Grow seed(enlarge them in size for better productivity)

There will be Rains according to the Month's Weather and Insects that make some potential harm to kid's plant.

Kids needs to be very smart in terms of spending sugar+minerals. And they will need water for Photosyntesis of plants,CO2+water+sunlight = Sugar. With more minerals more water will be aborsbed and with more water, more sugar will be produced with sunlight(depends no. of leafs)

Part-2: Introduction to Organic garden

Activity – 2 :Introduction to Organic plants Mentioning all the information like botanical name,season,spacing,height and uses in garden & salads. Kids engagment – Here kids only have to learn about many diversity of plants and try to memorize them with pictrues.

I am planing to include these following plants :-A. Amaranth B. BasilC. BalmD. Bee BalmE. Burnet, SaladF. Calendula, Flashback mixG. CatmintH. CatnipI. Chamomile, GermanJ. ChervilK. Chinese Parsley (Cilantro)L . Chives, Garlic

-- And many more from Pantry Garden Herbs [1]

Activity 3 : Find me !!

Match the Shown Pics of Plants to their names in the graden.

There will be 5 different levels for this particular activity with every level number of flowers will increase as shown in the figure.

Kids have to select the correct name and then select the corresponding flower.

Part 3 : Environment protection section

Activity 4 : Garbage classification

There will be 2 levels for this activity.Littered Garbage will be classified according to the different types.

First level will be of classifing organicand non-organic things.

On higher level, things will be categories into Plastic,Glass and Metals.

Activity 5 : Simple oxygen cycle

As shown in figure, in activity there will be one human and some animal creatures and trees on along side and up above some air molecules will be shown.

This willl be a descriptive activity, molecule of CO2 will collaborated and goes in tree to help synthesis.Synthesized leafs will produce oxygen molecules in air.In air kid's selected molecule of oxygen will be transfered to human and he will be shown refreshed and energized.

Through this activity kids will be able to learn how respiration of humans and plants are related and air plays important medium part in it.

Part 4 : Morse Code Concept

Activity 6 : Learning the Morse code

Story narration of Samuel Morse and Alfred Vail life in a lively style. It will include introduction to their biography, their failures, discovery of Morse and its modifications.

For Details check this - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oo0hSZ9R_Xk

The Morse code will be taught in an interactive manner. It will be further classified into 2 activities :- alphabet & numeral .

As shown in the picture, for each letter there will be a separate lesson with explanation for the corresponding Morse code. See:- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JT9zM_-2S6g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJdCPWa5vIM

Activity 7 : Encryption

In this activity ,Kids will try to pass morse code to tux.

One letter will be shown to kids and they have to press dots and dash button in sequence, as shown in figure.

How to play– Kids have to first click on tux to show them any number .They need to click on DOT and DASH buttons according to that alphabet's morse code .For submission they need to click on tux.

Implementation

To begin with,implementation would include a deep study of interaction & code➢ flow between GCompris core (that includes all utility methods & menus) & activity plugins in GCompris game sequence.[2]

Create menus in xml formats for each activity including all important information ➢& fields related with activity.

To develop the activity,use of python programming language & Emacs.➢

Emacs with Python plugin & git as a version control system. ➢

Designing the User interface with PyGoocanvas to implement the canvas widgets ➢& PyGTK for creating the GUI.

Use openclipart & gimp for creating the icons,skins,etc .➢

Developing algorithms for each game activity. ➢

Integrating algorithms with the code. ➢

To get started with sample code of pythontest & pythontemplate activities. ➢

To code an activity,gripping over the set of functions implemented by plugin ➢activities both :-mandatory & optional entry points using GCompris python API. Creating a class for activity to form the python board structure of GCompris.

Timeline | Roadmap

June 17 - July 13

Further discuss the activity ideas with the mentor ➢

Final list of activities to be implemented under GCompris environment and ➢Gcompris Morse Code.

Read & study documentation on PyGoocanvas ,PyGTK ,Python and GCompris ➢API.

Setting up the development environment. ➢

Study the overview of game sequence & interaction between GCompris core & ➢activity plugin.

I would love to code in python using Emacs and Vim. Getting familiar with ➢writing a GCompris activity.

Assembling skins ,sounds ,content ;designing icons & logos using GIMP & ➢openclipart for the activities.

Formulate Algorithms and Use Cases for all activities.➢

July 14- July 31

Start Coding! ➢

Designing the UI for the activities : Part 1 ➢ Plant Growing stimulator and Part 2 Organic Garden environment.

Building up algorithms for these two parts i.e 3 activities .➢

Complete Code integration with the UI. ➢

Test functionality of written code.➢

Document the work ➢

August 1 Checkpoint

Submit all three complete activities of Part 1 Plant Growing stimulator and Part 2 Organic Garden environment along with documentation.

August 2- September 5

➢ Designing UI for Part 3 Environment protection section and Part 4 Morse code.

Code integration of both activities with the UI ➢

Document the work. ➢

Debug ,reduce code complexity. ➢

September 5 - September 17

Testing ,documentation & debugging. ➢

Code refactoring➢

September 18 - September 23

Buffer period(This time can be used for all the last minute tweaks as somthing➢ can possibly go wrong)

Student

Name : Pratibha Chhimpa

Email : pratibha.chhinpa1@gmail.com

IRC nick : flame

Blog : http://pythonhack.blogspot.in/

Git Url : https://github.com/pcakapratibha

Location : Rajasthan ,India

Timezone : +530 GMT

I am a third year student pursuing Bachelors of Technology in Computer Science discipline at The LNM Institute of Technology, Jaipur,India .I am a FOSS enthusiast & familiar with it for more than a year now .I am well versed with C,Python ,Java ,php,web designing and also with the community interaction of OSS projects.I use mailing list,IRC and version control system like Git and host all my code on Github so,I can start working on project early.

Some of my past projects are designed ISA and built Assembler and Instruction Set Simulator for an 8-bit microcontroller ,Process priority improver in PyGtk and Tkinter and designed a Website for Arcelor Mittal fest Vivacity[3].

I take Summer of Code as an opportunity to get engaged with Gnome Community and GCompris as a contributor and continue this association even after internship. I have reported two bugs (#698038)[4] and(#698039)[5] and also found a solution for the latter one and will be submitting more.

I would love to be contacted if any part of this proposal is not clear to you. Thank you for considering this proposal and for your time!

References

[1 ] - http://pantrygardenherbs.com [2 ] - http://gcompris.net/wiki/File:Overview.jpg[3 ] - http://vivacity.lnmiit.ac.in/index.php#home[4 ] - https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=698038[5 ] - https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=698039