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List:       kde-edu
Subject:    Re: [kde-edu]: timestables
From:       Uwe Thiem <uwe () polytechnic ! edu ! na>
Date:       2002-08-08 7:47:27
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On Wednesday 07 August 2002 17:56, Michael Hofer wrote:
> Hello Uwe!
> 
> I've tried your ktt - it's a nice little app right now..... But what are 
your 
> future plans for it?

Well, so far, it's just a proof of concept. Necessary improvements for a 1.0 
version are:
Features:
- Make tables selectable.
- Ktt stores some data about the user's skills internally and tries to adapt 
to those skills. Save that data between sessions.
- Printed report.
UI:
- Fonts for kids.
- Give positive and negative feedback in graphics and sound. Sound, of course, 
must be configurable.
- Make the interface more graphical in general. For example: Let a hand show a 
card with the current exercise.

The whole UI poses an interesting question: Usually, kids can not read yet 
when they start learning timestables - or at least, they aren't good at it 
yet. How to design an UI for someone who cannot read?

> 
> Did you read my plans for a mathematic-training/competition-app I posted on 
> kde-edu? What do you think about joining efforts to develop such a package?

Nope, I haven't read kde-edu in months. Can you provide me with a link for the 
archive? Or, at least, send me the subject so I can search for it?

In general: I'm still very much attracted by the old UNIX philosophy of having 
small apps for small tasks instead of monster applications that can do 
everything. In this particular case, I think it especially important. All 
kids I know of hate learning timestables. That's quite understandable. It's a 
tedious though necessary chore. A program that is supposed to help learning 
those darn tables should do just that and should not distract from it by 
offering all kinds of other stuff.

Uwe

-- 
Nothing is fool-proof given a sufficiently skilled fool.

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