List Info

Thread: SMIL in high school
SMIL in high school
user name
 2006-01-05 04:04:10 

  


  

    I teach basic and advanced computer classes at a small private high school.  I recently did an experimental 3 week mini-section on SMIL.  I would like to briefly share my experiences.



To be honest, I bit off a bit more than I expected when I did this section.  The classes had studied HTML and picked that up pretty well, and I've done a lot of HTML coding, so I thought SMIL should be pretty easy to pick up and pass along.  I started using SMIL myself approximately two weeks before I started the section.  It took me a while to find good reference material, and longer than I expected to get up to speed on SMIL myself, so the class suffered somewhat from the fact that I was still learning techniques as I went.  The enviroment was admitted pretty primitive.  Kids wrote the SMIL code in NotePad and then ran it in Ambulant Player 1.45.  I gave them three or four worksheets to go through illustrating various aspects of SMIL.  I also did a fairly extensive example SMIL presentation which opened four parallel windows and displayed a sequence of pictures and videos while playing a background soundtrack.  



Results: Kids found the learning curve for SMIL much steeper than it was learning HTML using a similar environment.  The biggest obstacle was finding errors in their presentations.  Ambulant player typically just crashed or said something like "Error parsing document" when they got the syntax wrong.  I showed them ways to narrow down where the problem was (mainly by commenting out a bunch of lines and seeing if the presentation ran, then adding the lines back in one at a time until the error came back), but that is kind of tedious.  The kids were impressed by what I could do with SMIL and the Ambulant Player, but found writing their own presentations in this kind of environment daunting.



The future: I would like to try something like this again.  SMIL is a very nice tool for presentations and I would love to promote it in my small way.  It's also something the kids could use in a variety of ways.  The school doesn't have much (actually any) budget for this kind of experimental stuff, so Open Source has to be the way to go for us.  Ambulant Player seems to be the best Open Source player around, though the error-handling does need some work.  Does anyone here have any suggestions on how to improve the work environment if I try this again?  I looked for a SMIL IDE and actually found one but found figuring out how to use it harder than just writing SMIL code in NotePad.  What I could really use would be a Programmer's editor that checked SMIL syntax and highlighted problems.  Is there anything like that out there that would fit the class budget or lack thereof?  Also, is there any way that I (a mediocre C++ programmer but a pretty decent writer of documentation) could help make Ambulant Player a better environment for this sort of thing?   



Thanks,

Dale




  

  
  
   
     
    

  

    SMIL in high school
  


  

     user name

     2006-01-05 14:58:23
  


  

    
Dale,
thanks a lot for your report, feedback such as yours is very
valuable  
to us!

Let me address a few of the points you made:

1. On error messages: this is one area where we finally got
some work  
done for Ambulant 1.6 (which was released last month).
Especially if  
you use the Xerces parser with validation turned on (these
options  
can be set in the preferences dialog) you should get better
error  
messages. The popup message will still have a fairly basic
message,  
but the log window will have more details. And the popup
will  
actually point you to the log window. If you could have a
look at  
this and let us know whether it's sufficient or whether
there's more  
we could do that would be nice. Hmm (thinking out loud): I
wonder  
whether it's possible to optionally open notepad with the
line  
containing the error pre-selected...

2. On SMIL editors: there are really two choices that I can
think of:  
LimSee2 and GRiNS.
LimSee2 <http://
wam.inrialpes.fr/software/limsee2/> is an open source
 
SMIL editor from Inria that stays fairly close to the
XML-level of SMIL.
GRiNS <http://www.oratrix.com>
 gives a more high-level view of your  
presentation (and it's SMIL implementation is much more
complete).  
GRiNS is commercial but as it was done by a team that has
quite some  
overlap with the Ambulant team I thought I'd mention it
anyway. You  
can download a time-limited trial version from the website,
if you  
think it might address your needs it might be possible to
work  
something out.
You might also look around for XML editors. I know there are
some  
that can also validate your document while you're creating
it, but I  
don't have any personal experience with them, so I also
can't tell  
you whether they're good or not.

3. On helping us out: the whole documentation/user
experience area is  
something we could definitely use help...


On 5 Jan 2006, at 05:04, DaleCozaol.com wrote:

> I teach basic and advanced computer classes at a small
private high  
> school.  I recently did an experimental 3 week
mini-section on  
> SMIL.  I would like to briefly share my experiences.
>
> To be honest, I bit off a bit more than I expected when
I did this  
> section.  The classes had studied HTML and picked that
up pretty  
> well, and I've done a lot of HTML coding, so I thought
SMIL should  
> be pretty easy to pick up and pass along.  I started
using SMIL  
> myself approximately two weeks before I started the
section.  It  
> took me a while to find good reference material, and
longer than I  
> expected to get up to speed on SMIL myself, so the
class suffered  
> somewhat from the fact that I was still learning
techniques as I  
> went.  The enviroment was admitted pretty primitive. 
Kids wrote  
> the SMIL code in NotePad and then ran it in Ambulant
Player 1.45.   
> I gave them three or four worksheets to go through
illustrating  
> various aspects of SMIL.  I also did a fairly extensive
example  
> SMIL presentation which opened four parallel windows
and displayed  
> a sequence of pictures and videos while playing a
background  
> soundtrack.
>
> Results: Kids found the learning curve for SMIL much
steeper than  
> it was learning HTML using a similar environment.  The
biggest  
> obstacle was finding errors in their presentations. 
Ambulant  
> player typically just crashed or said something like
"Error parsing  
> document" when they got the syntax wrong.  I
showed them ways to  
> narrow down where the problem was (mainly by commenting
out a bunch  
> of lines and seeing if the presentation ran, then
adding the lines  
> back in one at a time until the error came back), but
that is kind  
> of tedious.  The kids were impressed by what I could do
with SMIL  
> and the Ambulant Player, but found writing their own
presentations  
> in this kind of environment daunting.
>
> The future: I would like to try something like this
again.  SMIL is  
> a very nice tool for presentations and I would love to
promote it  
> in my small way.  It's also something the kids could
use in a  
> variety of ways.  The school doesn't have much
(actually any)  
> budget for this kind of experimental stuff, so Open
Source has to  
> be the way to go for us.  Ambulant Player seems to be
the best Open  
> Source player around, though the error-handling does
need some  
> work.  Does anyone here have any suggestions on how to
improve the  
> work environment if I try this again?  I looked for a
SMIL IDE and  
> actually found one but found figuring out how to use it
harder than  
> just writing SMIL code in NotePad.  What I could really
use would  
> be a Programmer's editor that checked SMIL syntax and
highlighted  
> problems.  Is there anything like that out there that
would fit the  
> class budget or lack thereof?  Also, is there any way
that I (a  
> mediocre C++ programmer but a pretty decent writer of  
> documentation) could help make Ambulant Player a better
environment  
> for this sort of thing?
>
> Thanks,
> Dale
>
> _______________________________________________
> Ambulant-users mailing list
> Ambulant-usersambulantplayer.org
> http://www.ambulantplayer.org/mailman/listinfo/ambu
lant-users

--
Jack Jansen, <Jack.Jansencwi.nl>, http://www.cwi.nl/~jack
If I can't dance I don't want to be part of your revolution
-- Emma  
Goldman


_______________________________________________
Ambulant-users mailing list
Ambulant-usersambulantplayer.org
http://www.ambulantplayer.org/mailman/listinfo/ambu
lant-users


  


  

    
  

  
  
   
     
    






 [1-2]











   
 





about | contact  Other archives ( Real Estate discussion Medical topics )