alice-teacher Some interesting issues Mac vs PC versions

[David Fenton]

G'day all,

Uncovered some interesting issues that others may already be aware of. I attach a program from a student that illustrates these small issues.

1. If a method parameter (in this case 'howFar' in the bunny's hop method) is fed a value directly from the 'ask user for a number' - on a Mac it asks the user the number of times matching the first response. Eg. If I answer the question with a 3 it will ask me 3 times.

The exact same program saved from a Mac and run on the PC version of Alice, will ask only once - then it feeds the result of that answer to the parameter.

Silly 'bunny.a2w' sample attached - run it on a Mac, then run it on a PC, you will see what I mean. The solution, of course, is to hold the user's response in a variable, then throw that variable at the parameter method - which is the way I prefer it be done, but one of my students accidentally discovered what happens if you do it the other way.


2. when using the Mac version of Alice, methods cannot be 'right-click' renamed - the right click does not work in the object's details area. It works in the Object tree. One of my students found a way around it by simply creating a new method with the desired name and copying the code from the old method to the new method, then deleting the old method. But this is obviously not a satisfactory solution. It appears that many other Alice for Mac users are experiencing the same issues (if searching the net for solutions is any indication)


3. In favour of the Mac version - the bunny object will not change colour using Alice for PC. Try it. Run the attached program, enter 5 as the distance to jump. The bunny gets upset that this is too far and turns red. You will see the red, only on the Mac version. Run the exact same program (attached) on a PC and enter 5 for the distance and the bunny will not turn red.


Cheers 
David Ô¿Ô
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David Fenton (DipTeach, BEd, TTC, GradDipComp, DipBusAdmin, MInfTech, MACS)
Information Technology Department
UQ Foundation Year
International Education Services Ltd
PO Box 989
Spring Hill  QLD  4004
Australia
Web: http://www.foundationyear.com/
CRICOS No. 01697J

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