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Pedagogical Bundle Lets You Pay What You Want For Educational Software

Posted by samzenpus on from the get-your-learn-on dept.

First time accepted submitter rycks writes "Following on the success of the various Humble Bundles for DRM-free video games and eBooks, there is now a pedagogical offer. It includes Mulot for mouse training, Fubuki the brain breaker with mathematical problems, Mental Calculation to learn and train with mathematical tables, Raconte-moi to share voice over pictures stories, and a package with drawings to paint on. The software is GPL'd, without DRM :) As with the Humble Bundles, you can choose how much you'd like to pay, and how the proceeds are split between any of the authors and others."

57 comments

  1. not the first, but the only post that matters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    slashvertise much?

    1. Re:not the first, but the only post that matters by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 3, Insightful

      slashvertise much?

      Yes, that's the first thing I thought, especially when the OP used a smiley in a sentence that's neither funny not ironic (The software is GPL'd, without DRM :)) Random smileys like that are a sure sign of the author trying to plug something and being slightly ashamed of doing it.

      --
      "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
    2. Re:not the first, but the only post that matters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not only that, it's a dupe.

    3. Re:not the first, but the only post that matters by flimflammer · · Score: 3, Funny

      You have quite a strange internal definition for the use of smileys.

    4. Re:not the first, but the only post that matters by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      While true its a slash-ad I have to say the humble bundles have been nice. For those that haven't picked it up yet the last bundle I saw had the original Torchlight which is quite fun.

      Between the bundles and GOG its never been easier to get cheap DRM free games and if more software follows that model? That's a good thing in my book. Although I personally have no problem with Steam DRM I AM glad to see the day coming when there is no more Starfuck or SecuROM to screw with systems.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    5. Re:not the first, but the only post that matters by flimflammer · · Score: 1

      The same could be said for you.

    6. Re:not the first, but the only post that matters by RMingin · · Score: 2

      Unfortunately the folks making this bundle have nothing in common with the Humble Bundle folks, aside from aping much of the HB style and phrasing.

      --
      The preceding comment is my own, and in no way construes an opinon of the Emperor of Mankind.
  2. No thanks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I don't want the pedophile bundle.

    What.... like a pure advertsiment deserves any better?

  3. Sigh by ledow · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And like all "educational" bundles, the actual educational value is near zero.

    Colouring books, "mouse training" (because my 4-year-old has such trouble using a mouse, and it's not like she picked it up in seconds after being told to keep it on the desk), and then jump to mental arithmetic and sudoku-like games.

    There are a million colouring book apps. There aren't a million mouse training apps because they will pick it up faster than you'll ever know and be more accurate and fast that you ever will (hell, even grannies get the hang of the mouse in the first ten minutes). There are a million sudoku-like games and, ignoring the jump in mental age required, their value in mathematically or even logical skills is virtually zero (either that, or they become impossible for younger kids to solve).

    The only thing of use is the "make a presentation" thing but that's hardly educational or pedagogical.

    I hate to advertise their products but have you SEEN proper educational software? 2Simple, RM Maths (Yeurch for the company, yay for THAT ONE PIECE of software), Sherston, etc. It's miles ahead of anything that you'll find even in GCompris or the Tux bundles of software.

    Literally, the best open-source piece of educational software is TuxPaint, and that's a dire warning for the state of open-source or even free educational software. I, and the schools I work in, would give their right arms for a decent, rounded, consistent, graded piece of educational software with a decent learning curve, data recording, coverage of multiple subjects (not just basic arithmetic and colouring in).

    Not being funny, but I've *written* better pieces of software for schools (within the past year even) - it's only the fact that they own the code, and that they are all similar things (e.g. times tables, etc.) that stops me sharing them. Their educational value is minimal. But we still pay thousands for site licenses for software made by BBC educational subsidiaries nearly 25 years ago.

    1. Re:Sigh by Moochman · · Score: 4, Insightful

      By supporting this bundle you are supporting open-source educational software and the project (AbulEdu) that is making the development of this software possible. If you don't feel like these particular programs are worth your money fine, but at least the idea is a noble one. Instead of complaining about the state of things and bragging about how you could do things better, why not try to get involved in one of these projects and actually make a difference that has the potential to benefit students around the world?

      Disclaimer: I don't work for the company or have anything to do with this project; I just found out about it via this news item. Just my 2c.

    2. Re:Sigh by ledow · · Score: 5, Insightful

      By supporting this bundle, I'm supporting people who apparently don't work in education to replicate well-catered-for sections of "educational software" (stretched to the largest definition), and encouraging them to produce more of the same.

      Or I can just not, and do what I'm already doing, which is working for schools and writing not only similar educational software, but better stuff too (and hearing left, right and centre that the "educational software" on the mass market - e.g. app stores, etc. is a complete waste of time and money and the staff would rather keep their 20+ year old software running because it does the job better than any of the modern rubbish).

      The problem is not the idea - it's the execution, and falls into the same trap that EVERYONE falls into: Education is simple and we can just knock something up that looks good and schools / parents will use it and do something positive for their kids with it.

      I deal with it every day for everything from business computer equipment suppliers (who don't understand that we need things locked down and durable, not bog-standard office supplies) to pushy parents ("Why can't we just use iTunes on all the PC's?") to software companies trying to "break into" the market (e.g. "We've made a wonderful piece of whiteboard software that does X, Y and Z, none of which you'd ever use in a classroom environment but we think they look cool when giving an exhibition at BETT so they must be helping the kids get better" - the fact you can't network it, can't run without admin permissions, can't save to network shares, can't stop it trying to go on the Internet (sometimes using Internet Explorer no matter what settings you have), we don't have a site licence, and you have to upgrade Flash twice a day or it just bums out, etc. are overlooked and are apparently "coming soon").

    3. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The problem is not the idea - it's the execution, and falls into the same trap that EVERYONE falls into: Education is simple and we can just knock something up that looks good and schools / parents will use it and do something positive for their kids with it.

      EXACT same thing with medical software.

      So far, every medical charting program we've come across has the providers scratching their heads saying, "This makes no sense." or "It's slow and a pain in the ass to work with."

      Seriously thinking of starting my own company - but the IP battles (and $$$$$$$$$) with McKesson don't appeal to me.

    4. Re:Sigh by Xest · · Score: 1

      I used to work in support for about 150 different schools in the UK and this post made me chuckle, because it's amusing to see that things haven't changed.

      I was always pained by how bad education software actually was, and remember even on the admin side the school administration software was always a pile of turd too. Between Capita's SIMS, Serco's CMIS, and RM's G2 it never really suprised me why so many school secretaries seemed to just sit swearing at their computers. I always wondered how the software could be so bad.

      I had an offer from a company that writes school management software the other week, but they gave such a weak offer that they were really just wasting my time, something I'm told, by a number of recruiters, said company is renowned for.

      As such I suspect I have my explanation as to how much school software is so bad, if educational software works in the same way then the only people these guys are going to recruit are people who are at the lower end of the talent pool because no one with any talent is going to accept their offers.

      I don't think these companies care however, they have a near monopoly/duopoly on their respective educational software areas so all they need is the cheapest talent to just churn something out that the schools will pay for. The market just isn't competitive enough so said companies don't even have to try and show at least some semblance of competence as they'll get the money anyway.

      As much as anything though UK education policy is as much to blame, I remember a couple of schools who were given a grant to buy software any just left it all in a box because the ICT coordinator didn't have the time to install it (I wouldn't have time either if I fucked off home at 3:30pm each day and got 13 weeks of holiday a year). Stuff like this doesn't help as the software is never even evaluated, so when the next grant comes along and they buy more crap again because they never even bothered to see how bad the last lot was it's just more free money and it doesn't matter how bad the software was.

      The problem is that between most schools not having enough IT competence amongst their staff (this is thankfully changing as the younger, more inherently technically literate generations enter teaching), but being told to spend the budget regardless, and the market being controlled by predatory companies that sponge off exploiting public sector naivety like Capita, Serco, and RM, you just end up with a complete trainwreck of wasted public money.

    5. Re:Sigh by jimicus · · Score: 1

      Interesting to note that precisely nothing has changed since 1999 - the last time I worked in a school.

      Back then, the problems were:

      • Absurd licensing requirements: "You must buy one license for every PC you want to use this software on. We've written this software so it's only really useful if each pupil can use it independently or as part of a 2-person group. We've conceived this software to be useful for one very specific part of the curriculum at a very particular age, so it's only useful for maybe a week or two per year. We've priced this software so that the only way you'll ever be able to justify it to the people who sign the cheques is if it can be useful every single day of the year. We don't offer discounts if you want lots of licenses."
      • Absurd technical demands: "Visit every PC you wish to install this software on, insert the CD, go Start.., Run.., D:\setup.exe. Our installer eschews such niceties as MSI and installs slightly differently depending on what's currently installed on your PC so you can't easily capture what it does. There isn't a /silent switch or anything equivalent - come on, it's not that difficult! What do you mean, you've got 100 PCs, each PC takes two and a half minutes and so that's four hours work which you somehow have to schedule around classes?"
      • Even more absurd technical demands: "Our installer only puts a stub on your hard disk; you need the actual CD inserted into the PC in order to run the program. Our program expects to find everything in the root path of the drive you point it at. You can fudge things with a mapped drive letter but you've got another 27-odd programs to install with similar requirements so you're going to have to get creative somehow - either by bootstrapping our program with a script you write yourself (something we won't support) or doing clever things based on group membership."
      • Sane technical demands, absurd teaching demands: "Or you could copy the files to a network share and run directly from there, doesn't really matter. Unfortunately we don't know the first thing about how kids learn or even what they're expected to learn, so we've had to fudge that bit. Hope you don't mind."
    6. Re:Sigh by ledow · · Score: 1

      I have spent my entire adult career since leaving university going into schools and removing / repurposing their RM junk to actually be a functional school network.

      99.9% of the time that means wiping back the disks and starting from scratch without all their junky "network management" software (which I once used to crash an ENTIRE school network beyond recovery - as in we had to back out all the servers to a previous data and rebuild all the clients - by deploying an MSI package with a space in the filename).

      I spent ten years doing that self-employed and made more money doing it than anything else. Then I got bored and frustrated at the situation and took an offer from a private school who - in the job interview - called RM "shit" and that they'd never touch them. Still there, and still have a lot less frustration, until I get reminders like the above posters who don't get what education *REALLY* needs (besides giving monopolies a kick up the bum) in terms of IT.

    7. Re:Sigh by Xest · · Score: 1

      I think I still have my RM Connect certificate somewhere, I chuckle each time I stumble across it. We were an "RM Partner" and honestly, it was never pleasant. I remember seeing their assembly line for desktops when I went to their offices in Abbingdon once, and that was worrying to say the least. I certainly got my explanation as to why we sometimes got machines straight out of the box that wouldn't boot because stupid things had been missed like PSU cables not plugged into the motherboard and such. RM connect really was quite painful, rather than just teaching staff to use Active Directory, which would, honestly have been easier, they basically just created a horrible front end for it that regularly broke so that you'd have to fall back to AD anyway, except where you couldn't, because they'd mangled their software so badly into the system (including replacing some key Windows DLLs) that they'd even broken parts of that.

      Honestly, the reason they did so well in our LEA was because the IT management at the council who helped advise schools on procurement fancied the arse off of the sales girl and nothing more than that.

      I remember when the laptops for teachers programme came along and we received a number of trial laptops from different companies, despite the RM being some cheap crap from China low on spec, low on quality, low on design, it was what these guys instantly jumped towards simply because it said RM on and was a chance for them to get the sales girl up for a visit again but thus was the sad state of local government procurement.

    8. Re:Sigh by wisnoskij · · Score: 1

      Except I agree with the original commenter. There is nothing in this bundle worth a penny, so why would I want to encourage further development of useless apps.

      --
      Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
    9. Re:Sigh by smooth+wombat · · Score: 0

      By supporting this bundle you are supporting open-source educational software and the project (AbulEdu) that is making the development of this software possible.

      So then when you download a piece of music for nothing and don't pay the artist for their effort, you're choosing not to support them which means there is no reason for them to develop more music in the future.

      Got it.

      --
      We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
    10. Re:Sigh by ledow · · Score: 1

      I could give you any number of stories, but sadly no pretty sales girl (not to my knowledge, anyway).

      Machines arriving with BIOS POST errors because motherboard jumpers were missing (and no, not loose in the case / box, just entirely missing).

      Machines overheating because their default BIOS was set to never check the fans at all and never warn about temperatures (in a school, ffs!).

      Machines going off for repair six times in a row and coming back each time with "CMOS Error - Checksum Incorrect". Literally machines (plural) out of action for months because they didn't change a CMOS battery. I got my first big contract by spotting this on the little tour they gave me prior to hiring me, going down to the shops for some CR2035's and bringing several thousands pounds of equipment "back up" by replacing their CMOS battery that RM couldn't fix over the space of several years.

      Motherboards dying because of the capacitor-fatigue because of the cheap boards they used. Rather than replace, the RM guys would slap in a network card, then a year later a sound card when that cap blew, then a year later a USB card, then when there was nothing left that could be worked around, they'd sell you a new machine.

      Not to mention things like them claiming the cheque-printing software endorsed by the borough "had to" print a blank page after each cheque (and thus requiring pre-prepared stacks of cheque/paper/cheque/paper from the office staff all the time) after several YEARS and dozens of callouts, because they never noticed the printer they'd supplied was set to "manual duplex" or some such that told it to do just that. Changed that option and solved the problem in ten minutes and my fix lasted 5 years without anyone finding a problem with it.

      Or their "Connect" upgrade which saw a wireless trolley which didn't have enough "wireless" to cope with even a simple login from 2-3 machines at the same time, let alone run a full class of them from across the room. And who's solution was to upgrade. And whose "troubleshooter" from Abingdon (who we MADE come because it was so atrocious and he was supposed to be their main man for the whole of the South of England) was overheard by myself telling the sales guys who we'd brought back in until the problem was solved that "we can't install the newer drivers, they're not compatible with the other RM drivers we install and never will be" (also meant they had NOTHING to upgrade to past 802.11b for YEARS on that model, despite being brand-new and in the pre-N era). Their solution? But more 802.11b wireless routers from them.

      RM are in with the boroughs. The borough I worked in, dozens of schools got sick of the local support because they would ONLY endorse / sell / fix RM products, and their support was basically to go to RM, find out their fix, and then blindly apply the RM-style fixes themselves. The "exclusive" contract was written into the entire Borough's schools contracts, quite clearly.

      They also tried their best to sabotage and/or poke blame at me at every opportunity but never quite managed to pin anything on me that stuck when they were in the same room as me (apparently it was my fault the wireless didn't work because I was "overloading the system with logins" - from two laptops! Kinda backfired, that one, when I mentioned what I'd overheard). I used to get more schools in even a single borough phoning me for help from recommendations than I could handle and they all wanted rid of RM.

      RM are, basically, scum and I've walked (politely, but firmly) out of job interviews when I've realised that schools are using them.

      It doesn't mean they're the ONLY scum (I've met a lot of other companies trying to do the same, and the Academies program is RIFE with that sort of thing), but they are a well-established one.

    11. Re:Sigh by Fallingcow · · Score: 1

      Seriously thinking of starting my own company - but the IP battles (and $$$$$$$$$) with McKesson don't appeal to me.

      Pft, please.

      Just do what every other startup moving in to an established space does: don't aim to compete, aim to be annoying enough (and to have a good enough product) that it's a better business move for one of the big guys to simply buy you rather than ruining you in court.

    12. Re:Sigh by Xest · · Score: 1

      It sounds like I was on the opposite side of the equation to you in that I was working for a borough's education IT division that farmed out support to the schools. Despite this I still completely agree with you, the whole situation really stank, but honestly it sums up my experience of local government altogether. Despite all the e-mails and courses and posters in local government about equality, anti-corruption and so forth I can safely say to this day that local government was the most corrupt, racism, homophobic, sexist, ageist place I've ever worked.

      The tie ups with companies like RM always made me sick, because even the management would complain about them fucking us around, for example as a partner we were meant to have a priority contact number, but we always just ended up in the queue with everyone else so just had to tell the school well, yes, we are a partner, but they still don't give a shit about helping us deal with your problem. Year after year though, we ended back with them.

      I got out of IT support altogether in the end when I moved to private sector and went into development (and now primarily software architecture) but if I hadn't done that I'd definitely have moved away from school support to get the hell away from RM and other educational software I got so utterly sick of dealing with. I think the final straw was moving to RM's school management software - RM G2. We moved 121 schools from their existing system over two it migrating the data one by one, and even after the first 10 schools it was clear the system couldn't cope, it just crashed, and froze over and over- obviously it hadn't been stress tested, or arguably even undergone any form of QA at all. That's why somewhat when I got the offer of a job working on a particular firms school management software the other week I was tempted, as I could take up the challenge and think I would've done well - it's pretty obvious how little effort is needed in that industry to produce a product that would destroy the competition, but as I say, they just weren't offering enough of a rise for me to justify it.

      The thought has crossed my mind once or twice about just writing some software in my spare time in this sort of market, because such markets are crying out for good software and producing something that far outshines the competition would be easy, but I think the time commitment is a bit much, and honestly, there are other things I'd rather write if I'm going to code in my spare time anyway. Seeing news stories or reading about RM though does nearly make me angry enough to do it! :)

    13. Re:Sigh by Nemyst · · Score: 1

      Even schools don't understand it. My university has managed to create a student portal with features such as video sharing, realtime chat, forums and more, yet it's still impossible to create a group assignment. Instead, professors need to individually grade each and every student, wasting hours in copy/pasting across everyone and making sure to correctly match often changing group members.

    14. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Unless they're not doing it for the money, or they've found an alternate business model. Wait... what does your comment have to do with anything, anyway?

  4. what about anatomy? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And by that I mean porn!

  5. But father, I don't want any of that. by Shag · · Score: 1

    Why would I want software to train mice? I don't even have any mice, let alone a behavioral research lab. The market for this sort of thing must be small. /I want to sing!

    --
    Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
  6. Hmmm.... by trickykungfu · · Score: 5, Interesting

    - Implies an affiliation with the humble bundles, but has none
    - All of the software is from the same developer
    - The options for where to send the money are 1. the developers, 2. a non-profit organization run by the developers, or 3. the bundle website, also run by the developers
    - The software looks really terrible
    - If it's GPL, where is the link for the free distribution of the source code?

    1. Re:Hmmm.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      You're bang-on. Eric Seigne has a history of spamming his software in inappropriate forums, e.g.:
      http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=321776

    2. Re:Hmmm.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Out of all the places he chose... the Debian big tracker to place his spam?

    3. Re:Hmmm.... by hweimer · · Score: 1

      - If it's GPL, where is the link for the free distribution of the source code?

      As long as you recieve the link once you buy the software, there is absolutely no problem with this.

      --
      OS Reviews: Free and Open Source Software
    4. Re:Hmmm.... by hweimer · · Score: 1

      Shocking, someone using the proper method for suggesting new packages to suggest a new package!

      --
      OS Reviews: Free and Open Source Software
  7. Lol by humanrev · · Score: 1

    So... do they provide Steam keys? How do they expect to get $1M without them?

    --
    Most people on Slashdot are fucking idiots.
    1. Re:Lol by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yea, we need more DRM! Maybe they can also add Securom, Targes and some proprietary online activation into the bundle, then put it on Steam and require Origin!

    2. Re:Lol by humanrev · · Score: 1

      Heh, look I was joking after all. I'm actually anti-Steam (in its current form) due to the DRM... it's more of a reflection of the fact that if it weren't for the Steam keys that you get with the Humble Bundles, they probably wouldn't be raking in quite so much cash as they do.

      --
      Most people on Slashdot are fucking idiots.
  8. Re:Hmmm.... - English buyers beware as well by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    From http://www.linux-archive.org/edubuntu-user/709900-pay-what-you-want-educational-bundle.html - As of 10/7 all of the software was french only. There are claims that the software has been translated into english but the QA guy inside me has to wonder exactly how good that translation was / is going in less than a weeks time.

    And for the life of me I crawled all over this guys ftp site, I can't find any source code either.

    Methinks someone needs a lesson in the meaning of free open source software. It doesn't mean randomly selling your software so you can hire people to translate it into english so you can sell more software.

  9. Education Bundle Terminated, sorry slashdotted by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Guess they weren't expecting such high traffic.

    1. Re:Education Bundle Terminated, sorry slashdotted by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Pics or it didn't happen; I just ordered it.

  10. Editor fail yet again by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    It's like they don't even filter submissions anymore, at all. The guy submitting is the "Director" of the company producing the software, and he's just using his work email! How much more obvious can you get?

    The last of many stupid articles on slashdot. This is just an advertisement for a lame, lame package of software that pretends it's a humble bundle to trick people into buying their crap. Only 17 people fell for this fortunately, as I'm writing this.

    Just remove this slashdot article already, before more attention is given to this jackass Éric Seigne.

  11. Re:Hmmm.... - English buyers beware as well by rycks · · Score: 1

    Hello guys,
    i'm sorry but since 1998 i'm working on free software for education and primary school ... in 2005 i've tried to put one of our software into debian, this is the "famous" ITP debian bugtrack

    do you know https://www.ohloh.net/p/abuledu-leterrier/ ?

    all repositories are open, do you want to commit and send us your translations or patches ? https://www.ohloh.net/p/abuledu-leterrier/enlistments

    but free software developpers needs money, this website is a try to make some money with our hand-made work

    Éric,
    "the spammer" ... woaw, that's new, i'm a spammer :)

  12. Warp Bundle . I gonna use this idea. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm going to launch the OS/2 Warp bundle. !!! I expect slashdot to post mine.

  13. Disgusting. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I hope the police arrest you and all the other pedagogs!

  14. DO NOT BUY. by ledow · · Score: 4, Funny

    When you make the front page of Slashdot, with software you've written yourself, sold under the name of your one-man company, with free slashvertisement by submitting them yourself using your work email, ride on the coattails of the completely-unrelated humble bundles (seriously - zero connection), offer a pay-what-you-want scheme, and still only get (at the time of writing) 26 customers, you know it's time to find another career.

    1. Re:DO NOT BUY. by jones_supa · · Score: 1

      Meh. Don't be so mean.

    2. Re:DO NOT BUY. by JazzLad · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I bought it. The downloads are crazy-slow (~62KBps on my 100mbps connection) & so far 1 (Coloriages) is not even a game, but a collection of JPG images in a zip file. Seriously. I will reply to this post with a simple review of the other "games" when the downloads eventually finish.

      --
      "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
    3. Re:DO NOT BUY. by JazzLad · · Score: 1

      Fubuki does not only not default to English, there is no English option in the game (odd given the bundle was posted to a US-centric site). Being a typical American (monolingual - at least as written languages go, I am conversant in ASL.) I couldn't get far in this game.

      The other 4 downloads were corrupt, re-downloading now at 24KBps. This fellow was not ready for /. despite posting it himself. I will have to reply to myself again in 30-60 minutes when the re-downloads complete.

      --
      "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
    4. Re:DO NOT BUY. by JazzLad · · Score: 1

      The download speeds picked up, I have downloaded & installed the other 3 (typo in previous post, 3 not 4 were corrupt), here is my review:

      Mulot is likewise not in English, no English option I can find. I did manage to get it to crash clicking around (not in menus but on the pictures - took 3 clicks).

      Calcul Mental is not fullscreen, nor can it resize. With a 1-level taskbar at 1440x900 it is slightly too tall (playable) and nearly as wide. If you run dual monitors and dare to move it to the other screen, every time you launch a mini game in it it sends it back to the other screen. It also ignores taskbar placement, so if the taskbar is at the top of the screen, you can't move the game without moving the taskbar first. Sigh. Despite the game defaulting to English (not great English, btw), the images are still all in French (words in pictures).
      The Multiplication Tables mini game has its own launcher (launched from the main launcher) and then it launches the game. All windows stay open, so you have to close each. The game also defaults to a way too fast setting for a child that would be playing this to improve proficiency - especially if played on a laptop (no 10-key).
      Finally, the scroll was a little choppy & since the problem is scrolling, this makes it harder to answer when you have to really concentrate to read - most notably on the "Add" mini game.
      Also good to note, children doing 1 digit plus 1 digit addition are the last ones you want to make something harder to read for, as well as their reflexes typing probably aren't up to getting 5 seconds to a) decipher the question b) do the equation c) find the right key to hit on the keyboard.

      Raconte with English selected is about 20/80 English/French. Unfortunately, all dialogue boxes appear to be in French and I have no idea what I'm being told. Clicking OK a lot didn't really do anything, making educated guesses I still couldn't actually get the game to do anything.

      Unless you know French, I have to agree with the prev poster and second his "do not buy." I am glad I only sent $3.

      --
      "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
    5. Re:DO NOT BUY. by JazzLad · · Score: 1

      Mulot went from v1.1.0 an hour ago to v10.1.2 13 minutes ago (he sent an email stating that it had been updated to "full english translation." Will review again when it finishes downloading.

      --
      "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
    6. Re:DO NOT BUY. by JazzLad · · Score: 1

      Still entirely French.

      --
      "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
  15. Re: THANKS FOR BUYERS ! by rycks · · Score: 1

    Hello ledow,
    please have a look at https://freecode.com/projects/abuledu or https://www.ohloh.net/p/abuledu-leterrier/ or https://www.ohloh.net/p/abuledu-leterrier/enlistments

    i'm not alone but yes i'm the leader of this distribution for primary schools since 1998

    in 1998 we started without any money, in 2000 i was a one-man company, called rycks (it was my nickname since university) and in 2003 i've setting up a free software company called ryxeo and we hire 6 people who works on educational free software

    i don't want to change or find another career, education is a vocation for us, okay we could do better and nicer, with the help of 26 buyers and all the others we would go on and "change the world" (we hope) for our childrens, far away from DRM and other non free software

    Thanks,
    Éric

  16. My Boss . . by hduff · · Score: 1

    Is afraid it contains pictures of underage boys and girls.

    --
    "I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
  17. purchased & scanned! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Bought it. virus scans by Microsoft Essentials and Norton 360 said every one of the programs contained a couple of viruses and trojans. Watch out and caveat emptor!

  18. Slashvertising malware? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Bought the programs and attempted to install them. Norton 360 says that leterrier-fubuki.1.2.0 and leterrier-mulot-10.1.2 exe both fail because they contain WS.Reputation.1 errors. So, choice is to run unprotected system to install or to let Norton 360 kill the downloads.
    Looks like a "deal too good to be true".

    1. Re:Slashvertising malware? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wonder how long until the slashdot censors kill this comment which isn't "look at the goody open source games" genre?