Kathleen Log

Sat Mar 31, 2018 - Ubuntu on VirtualBox (cont)

• Asked Christian to take a look and go over rEFInd materials, he couldn't find anything either. Recommendation from the rEFInd author was to try an optical disk. I might do that eventually.
• Tried converting iso to dmg but that didn't do anything
• Confirmed EFI path on USB, looks good.
• Trying Virtual Box on desktop windows to see if it behaves better than Mac.
• Is this a new version of OSE Linux? What is the difference between FreeCAD and FreeCAD Daily?
• FreeCAD Daily seems more stable, should remove vanilla to not confuse users
• Neither is very stable, usability degrades until crashing or until I restart. Restarting seems to work pretty well
• RAM and disk size settings specified in the Windows/VirtualBox tutorial are not sufficient, RAM should be doubled or tripled, Disk size needs at least 23GB (I think) but I think it should be something like 40.
• Cant get the drawing to pad or pool into object. Keeps saying:

In order to use PartDesign you need an active Body object in the document. Please make one active (double click) or create one.

If you have a legacy document with PartDesign objects without Body, use the transfer function in PartDesign to put them into the Body.

• It's difficult to figure out where this "transfer function" is.

Mon Mar 26, 2018 - Ubuntu on VirtualBox (cont)

• After FreeCAD crashed on VirtualBox yesterday, today I tried to open from the backup (renaming fcstd1 file) but backup is corrupted as well.
• Possible steps moving forward:
  • See if there is a way to automatically version my saves and continue using VirtualBox
  • Ask my manager, Christian, who has more experience with EFI to help me with rEFInd (he thinks he can figure out the configuration)
  • Buy a cheap little Intel Nuc
• Created Talk:Developer Test page, I'd like to shorten it so it's clearer and less tempting to skip over portions.
• Modified subsection on the Developer test on the OSE Developers page so it refers to OSE Linux in a way that I would recognize from having done the video questionnaire (I think initially I didn't know that OSE Linux was the ubuntu distribution with preloaded software that I had been asked about)
• I finished my cube!
• There's a lot in the videos I'm not using. Fasteners workbench stuff seems buried.

Sun Mar 25, 2018 - Ubuntu on VirtualBox

• Installed VirtualBox
• Loaded it up with the following settings:
  • Name: OSE Linux
  • Type: Other
  • Version: Other/Unknown (64-bit)
  • Memory: 1024 MB
  • Create a virtual hard disk:
    • VDI
    • Dynamically allocated
    • Start with at least 25 GB

I haven't run anything yet so these might change.

• So far looking good, had one crash but was able to continue editing on restart. Had all my tubing placed in the correct orientation and was working on better placement when FreeCAD crashed and my file was corrupted again.

Sat Mar 24, 2018 - Ubuntu Live USB (cont)

• Installed rEFInd in recovery mode. Modern macs need UEFI and it looks like this is EFI, so rEFInd is supposed to help with that. I don't know much more than this.
• rEFInd boot menu _did_ show OSE Linux as a possible OS to start, but got stuck on the loader menu:

APFSStart:1454: Mounting with apfs_efi_osx-748.31.3
efi_fusion_pairing:632: Container xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx
efi_fusion_pairing:637: fusion uuid: 000000000000-000)-0000-0000-00000000
nx_kernal_mount:1369: checkbpoint search: largest xid 19950, best xid 19950 @ 103

er_state_obj_get_for_recovery:3711: No ER state object for volume Preboot - rolling is not happening, nothing to recover
er_state_obj_get_for_recovery:3711: No ER state object for volume Preboot - rolling is not happening, nothing to recover
er_state_obj_get_for_recovery:3711: No ER state object for volume Preboot - rolling is not happening, nothing to recover
Starting legacy loader
Using load options 'USB'

Please make sure that you have the latest firmware update installed

Hit any key to continue

Starting legacy loader
Using load options 'USB'

Please make sure that you have the latest firmware update installed

Hit any key to continue

Starting legacy loader
Using load options 'USB'

*repeats*

Thurs Mar 22, 2018 - Ubuntu Live USB (cont)

• Erased USB and reinstalled OSE Linux on it.
• Also couldn't get Mac to recognized mounted USB (suggests that it might be Ubuntu version incompatibility? Something about how USB is partitioned?)
• Tried the same but following instructions from Linux101, still unrecognizable.
• Still feel foolish that I missed the OSE Linux 101 page. I think I was too excited to google.

Tues Mar 20, 2018 - Ubuntu Live USB

• Was unclear that there was a specific OSE version of Linux. Looking back at the Developer Test page, I'm really not sure how I missed the whole Part 1: Install OSE Linux section. I think it might be because I went directly to FreeCAD 101 page?
• Looked up "Live USB" and found a Windows specific solution.
• Found a tutorial for creating a bootable USB which pointed to recent vanilla supported versions of linux.
• Installed mac application Etcher, used to create USB with Ubuntu 16.04.4 LTS.
• Booted up with it, but couldn't run FreeCAD.

Sat Mar 17, 2018 - FreeCAD Video Tutorials and Test Notes

• Got lost briefly at "Create a new sketch", "select the XY plain" @ :21 seconds. The different orientation of my menu put the sketch mode button in a different area, for some reason made it hard for me to locate
• Confused about how to select point, how to select multiple points. For selecting a point, "left mouse button" seems to be shift + click on a trackpad. I switched to a mouse after this. I still don't know how to select a region of points (square selection)
• Video started using resources I didn't have, so I watched them through once more but then wanted to start working with the models from the test, so maybe I could just start with that and use the video for reference as I tried to make my cube.
• I wasn't sure where to find 8 hole square tubing, got it confused with the rounded edges one, wasn't sure if I was supposed to find a single file, but did find it in its library after a few minutes.
• No trouble opening it in FreeCad.
• Made copies, moved some around, not bad.
• Rotating is HARD. Briefly caved and looked at an external resource, still couldn't do it.
• Stopped in frustration
• Started again and got it to rotate on the axis I wanted, still not sure how.
• Tried to move objects around again, behaved differently this time and I'm not really sure why,
• tried to align two faces, clicked on some "alignment" buttons, didn't find what I needed.

Summary so far

• Enjoyed the speed of the videos, but it was easy to get very stuck once I tried to do the test. Since I knew the videos covered more than I wanted to do yet (section about converting and cleaning meshes) I was more tempted to skip around to get where I needed to go, but it generally didn't get me unstuck, I think because there was something more fundamental that I was missing.

• Would really like to go through each step with the videos, so not having pre-constructed examples might help. Also some kind of linear progression that covers only those skills related to finishing the test. Something like: 1. opening the sketcher menu, 2. navigating in 2d space, 3. creating a point, 4. modifying the point, 5. turn the point into a line, 6. modify the line, 6.5 turn the line into a square 7. opening the part design menu, 8. navigating in 3d space, 9. turn the square into a pad, 10. modifying the pad, opening the draft menu, making duplicates of the part, aligning the parts (rotating the parts? :D ) etc.

• I will try again to just watch the videos all the way through a few times.

Sat Mar 17, 2018

• Installed FreeCAD for Mac
• Started reading the FreeCAD manual
• Stopped going through the manual, I'll be attempting to finish the CAD test with just the two instructional videos.

Fri Mar 16, 2018

• Installed kdenlive via macports following instructions here
• Recorded video questionnaire
• Edited video using kdenlive
• Uploaded video questionnaire to vimeo
• Created work log - found it was easier to look at how others had formatted their work logs, might make sense to provide a starter template