[Tuxmath-devel] GSOC, the TuxMath mobile port, and creating new Tux4Kids mobile apps

[Aaron S. <aar...@gm...>]

Hey all,

My name is Aaron Santiago, and I'm currently a senior at Bard College at
Simon's Rock, working on getting my BA in Computer Science this spring. I
have had a decent amount of experience with developing games, and
programming in general. You can find some of my previous work on my website
here: http://jabdownsmash.com/portfolio/
My GitHub account can be found here: https://github.com/sepharoth213

I was looking through the ideas list for Tux4Kids and I came across the
mobile port, and I was immediately struck by the fact that the current port
is written in Haxe/NME. I currently work in Haxe/Lime and the games in my
portfolio are written in Haxe/OpenFL and I figured that I would love to
work on the port.


I have a few questions though:

I tried building the current Haxe/NME mobile port and I didn't get very
far, which is most likely due to the fact that it was written years ago and
NME/OpenFL has changed a lot since then. Rewriting the port for OpenFL
would make the most sense, but would the port end up as a successor to the
original? A Haxe/OpenFL port would be able to support more platforms than
the original TuxMath, and might be easier to maintain.

I tried playing TuxMath and took a look at the Git repository and noticed
that substantial changes to the game haven't happened in a long time. Would
a port need to be a direct port, or would small changes make sense: adding
tweens, updating assets, rearranging menus, etc.? Or does it make more
sense to just create a whole new game?

If a new game were created, how should a more modern TuxMath or TuxMath-like
be made? I would personally love to work with a mentor and develop an open
source and modern educational math game with Haxe.

Anyway, those are my thoughts as of yet.  I would appreciate any comments
or suggestions anyone may have.


Thanks,
Aaron