Re: [Pythoncard-users] Python distribution problems

[Phil E. <ph...@li...>]

On Mon, 2005-04-04 at 10:00, normanwinn wrote:
> Bruce Landon wrote:
> 
> > I would like to see pythoncard more usable for making education resources
> > and the single biggest difficulty for me was trying to make a stand alone
> > application from by code that I could distribute easily to students who are
> > general psychology students with limited computer skills (not enough to
> > install and use python in my experience).  Phil Edwards reportedly has
> > some variety of solution to this as per his posting..
> > 

Hi Bruce:

I'm not 100% sure what you mean by education resources or "Learning
Object", but it sounds to me like there are more issues here than just
the usability of Python and/or PythonCard. I'd be more than happy to
exchange some e-mails with you off-list about building and distributing
standalone applications if you want. I agree with you that it's a
tedious task, that's what prompted me to start coding a program to make
it easier for me. I'd be interested to hear your opinions on what would
make it easier.

> After an enthusiastic start with PythonCard I am not using it or, for 
> that matter, Python itself. The reasons are similar to those you give. 
> To be fair, this is not a PythonCard problem or even simply a Python 
> problem but a problem of open source software in general. By its nature 
> open source attracts the technically able - notably among the ranks of 
> those that maintain it. It is very difficult to get them to see the need 
> that to you and I is important. You get replies like, "Do A followed by 
> B. If C do D else do E. Then do F, G". This is fine for the pioneers but 
> not for end users.
> 

What else do the end users need? What you've described sounds to me like
exactly the sort of detailed, step by step instructions that are
required for a non-technical PC user.

> This is, IMO, the major existing barrier to the adoption of open source. 
> If Python and PythonCard are really to target the Visual Basic market 
> this problem must be addressed,
> 

Python and Pythoncard/wxPython/insert favourite GUI toolkit here are
*never* going to make a huge impact on the Visual Basic market. IMHO,
though, that's not a valid reason to stop using them. Burt Rutan knows
that he's never going to put NASA or ESA out of business, but he still
went ahead and flew Spaceship 1.

Personally, I still get a buzz from coding stuff using Python on my
Linux machine and watching it work first time when I drop the same code
onto a Windows machine.

-- 

Regards

Phil Edwards
Brighton, UK