The class group assignment this week turned into a bigger challenge than we expected. In order to reach this point we have researched our HFOSS project, joined the mailing list and IRC chat, started talking with other developers and preparing to dive in. This week we were challenged to checkout and build the source code! That seemed like it wouldn't be a problem for our RapidSMS project, until we started looking for the code and trying to choose a specific project to join. At that point (late in the week) we realized that even the 'beginner' level tasks were far beyond our ability and understanding. Okay, maybe we could have figured it out eventually, but they went well beyond our confidence level and hope for success.
As we began researching alternatives, now finding ourselves way behind the rest of the class, we took advantage of some of their research. SugarLabs seems to be a big enough project with a variety of challenges, and two other groups have deemed it possible for a successful class project. Since one of our other interests originally was educational software, we decided that SugarLabs was the right choice for us.
Even so, at this late hour we were struggling to catch up with orienting ourselves to the project wiki, finding information, source code, IRC information, mailing lists, etc. This means we all had rather stressful and discouraging weekends, I'm sad to say. However, I do still have that glimmer of hope. One of my team members, Carly, shared a link she found for instructions to build to Sugar Emulator. We're not sure at this point if this is the source code we needed, or if there is more that we need, but following that link I was able to successfully checkout the source code and build it! You can imagine the celebration until I tried to run the emulator...
At this point I found that I couldn't access any of the activities! Fortunately I had a prior engagement that forced me to walk away from the problem for a few hours. I wonder when I will stop being surprised at how helpful it is to take a break! When I returned later in the evening and ran the emulator again, I had the bright idea to try right-clicking on the activities and all of a sudden a new option appeared: 'Start New.' Thinking to myself, "Well that looks promising," I chose this option and the activity opened! I was even allowed to play with it! There are still a few activities that are not working and this week I hope to understand those issues better - perhaps I am missing a dependency or skipped a step in using those activities. I'm sure that a little research and reading will go a long way in solving that problem. I know I've stated this in previous posts, but it is so refreshing to be optimistic about a project this big, especially since my last experience was so discouraging.
On other matters, I unfortunately still do not have the subversion server installed on my machine, at least not fully. I think I found the server through the Ubuntu Package Manager and I clicked 'Install,' but there is more involved in setting it up. I was unable to complete that task because I chose to prioritize the HFOSS project for now. Subversion can wait another day or two.
I still feel like we have a long way to go in order to be 'up to speed' in this project, but I feel empowered to do so and emboldened to ask the questions I need to ask. Maybe that is the desperation setting in, or maybe the second trimester of a pregnancy brings with it a boldness and sense of purpose. Who knows? All I know is that I'm starting to accept that change really can be a good thing, even though it often means there is extra work to be done.
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