Re: [Tuxmath-devel] Is this project is alive? and some suggections

[David B. <db...@ta...>]

On Thursday 30 March 2006 16:50, Nick Marshall wrote:
> I was wondering if tuxmath is still alive?

I am working on it as actively as my time and family allow.  The source is now 
housed in a Subversion repository at: 

https://svn.tux4kids.net/tuxmath/

The earliest version in the repository is the same as the one in Debian.  The 
repository is up to revision 7.  The visible changes include addition of an 
initial speed control to the Options screen (thanks Yves Combe), addition of 
mouse support to the Options screen, support for allowing subtraction answers 
to be negative, and revision of the optional on-screen touchpad to support 
negative answer input.

> how did the code that David Bruce was working on go? 

My next commit to svn will be fairly major.  I have (almost) written a backend 
that I have called "MathCards" that encapsulates all of the code related to 
generation of math questions.  It allows much more fine-grained control of 
the question ranges and a lot of options, such as whether to recycle 
incorrectly answered questions into the "deck of flashcards".  The new code 
is contained in two new files, mathcards.c and mathcards.h and could easily 
be reused if someone wrote a new game with a different interface (say, a KDE 
game for example).  This also allows for a lot of simplification of game.c.  
I am trying to get the "official" tuxmath source in Subversion caught up to 
my private modifications, and the next commit will largely do that.

> David I am really 
> interested in your speed control code. I think an option to slow the
> comets down after an incorrect answer would be useful for the younger
> kids. 

Good idea - will do that.

> I would also like a option to set a goal or mission for the 
> kids. like to complete 5 waves.

As an option, the game finishes with "victory" when the player has correctly 
answered all questions in the list specified by various options, now 
contained in a struct called math_opts in mathcards.h.

I could commit the new code to svn any time, but I thought I should at least 
get it fully fleshed-out - should not be more than a couple of weeks.

The main limitation is that I want to be able to read and write the math_opts 
struct to disk as a config file that could be modified with a text editor.  
As it stands now, I can only make use of the fine-grained control by changing 
the defaults in mathcards.h and recompiling, which isn't very applicable to 
wider distribution.  Any help in this area would be greatly appreciated.  
Eventually I want to do a thorough overhaul of the Options screen, as most 
ordinary users will find editing config files to be unacceptable. 

Thanks,