QtCon 2016

GCompris goes QtQuick

Transcript

1. GCompris goes Qt Quick QtCon’16, Berlin(Germany) Sagar Chand Agarwal, Bruno Coudoin, Johnny Jazeix….. scagarwal@kde.org
2. About me • Code • Community • Travel
3. • A project created in 2000 to provide educational content on GNU/Linux for children 2 to 10 years of age. • Used worldwide at home, at school, at the hospital, ... • Originally written in GTK+, ported to Qt Quick begining in January 2014 and still in progress
4. GCompris +KDE Edu Why we selected Qt Quick ? • Goal is to target desktop and mobile platforms from a single code base • Tested HTML5 • But Qt Quick is a better approach in our case as: ◦ Better development platform ◦ Better graphics (e.g. particles) ◦ Smooth animations ◦ Simple
5. Qt Quick ? • Provides a way of building custom, highly dynamic user interfaces with fluid transitions and effects, which are becoming more common especially in mobile devices. Qt Quick includes a declarative scripting language called QML. •Fast to develop •Fast to extend •Fast to render
6. Multiplatform The “good” side Qt is doing an excellent job in multiplatform. Platform specific code is limited to • Updating our CMakeList for the platform • Selecting the path to the resources and the translations • Adding in App purchase hook • Packaging audio file in a supported codec
7. Multiplatform The “bad” side • Supporting a platform requires to have the hardware to test it • Need to learn and integrate specific toolchains to make a package • Need to maintain app store product entries • Promoting the app towards a given platform
8. Multiplatform The “ugly” Side • On Android, particles makes GCompris crash (Still not a stable fix) • On Windows, could not find a suitable audio codec (Close to 100 %) • On MacOSX need qmake, IOS requires the commercial Qt version :( • SailfishOS with older Qt version (5.2.2) and QtQuick . Controls not packaged
9. Porting Strategy • Full rewriting in QML • We copy the game play, graphics, dataset and the translations from the GTK+ version • Screen resolution independence (Thanks SVG) • Major effort on the graphics and the user experience • Can run in landscape or portrait mode • Compilation chain in CMake
10. Why KDE? • GCompris has always been a community project •Major focus on i18n/l10n •Community helps and is a great motivation •Fit perfectly in KDE-EDU
11. What is a good activity ? • We don't replace teachers, parents and traditional approaches • A good activity helps the children acquire knowledge 'differently' •The computer must do something more than just giving the right answer. Quizzes are not enough ???
12. Demo Time
13. Statistics • Android demo has 260 installations / day (50000 so far) ... but 170 de-installs / day • Rated 4.30 • Very popular in France, growing slowly in other countries. • Windows (in GTK+) is 300 DL / day
14. Community & Commercial • Increased our audience with a Windows version in 2003 • But this version requires an activation code in order to : ◦ Give an advantage to the GNU/Linux version ◦ Fund the development ◦ Increase our audience by being distributed in commercial distribution channels and app stores
15. Status!! Currently more than 120 activities have been ported on the 140 of the GTK+ version, 10 majors are missing. •70+ contributors •Completed a rework of the graphics byTimothée Giet backed by a crowd funding operation •Available in Android, Mac OSX, iOS App stores •23 languages at 100% thanks to KDE-I18N.
16. RoadMap What is the current plan ? •Completing the port and killing the GTK+ version •Adding a teacher console – Let the teacher see in real time what the children are doing – Looking at achievements, detecting difficulties – Creating exercises – Assigning exercises to a child or a group
17. GCompris needs you... •Talk about GCompris to your friends, teachers, blogs, tweets, ... •Package GCompris on whatever platform you like •Pick a mic and give voice http://gcompris.net/wiki/Developer's_corner