Sugar Labs has launched the first beta release of Sugar on a Stick, a new version of the open source Sugar Learning Platform that is designed to boot on conventional desktop computers and run directly from USB flash memory devices.

The Sugar software environment was originally created for the One Laptop Per Child project's XO laptop. It offers a unique child-friendly user interface and includes an assortment of applications that are geared towards education and collaboration.

The platform is currently maintained by Sugar Labs, a nonprofit organization that was founded by former OLPC software director Walter Bender. The organization is building a more inclusive and community-driven culture around Sugar development and is working to bring the platform to a broader audience of students.

The Sugar on a Stick (SoaS) initiative is part of a broad effort to simplify deployment of the Sugar platform and make it more accessible to students. The developers aim to boost compatibility with off-the-shelf hardware and conventional desktop computers. The goal is to provide a self-contained Sugar environment that students can boot from USB thumb drives and run easily at school or at home.

The SoaS beta, which was released on Wednesday, includes version 0.84 of the Sugar environment on top of the recent Fedora 11 beta. It can be run from a 1GB USB thumb drive, which is also used to store the user's data. This allows the student to have a complete computing environment that is both persistent and portable.

"Sugar is perfectly suited for children in the classroom with its simple, colorful interface, built-in collaboration, and open architecture. Sugar on a Stick lets you start a computer with Sugar and store a child's data on the stick without touching the host computer's hard disk," said Bender in a statement.

The beta includes several new activities, such as the InfoSlicer tool, which can be used by teachers to assemble bundles of Web content that can be edited and packaged for offline use. The beta also includes a new integrated IRC client and a command terminal.

I loaded the SoaS image in VirtualBox to test the new Sugar features. It ran flawlessly and performed reasonably well during my tests. I'm particularly impressed with the new source viewing utility which will allow students to see and modify the Python code of the Sugar shell. For advanced students, this could significantly reduce the barriers to getting started with Sugar activity development.

The platform offers several other very impressive tools to introduce young students to the basic principles of computer science. The turtle graphics visual programming environment reminded me of my own childhood experiences with Logo and Basic.

I'm also very impressed with the collaboration features, which are practically ubiquitous throughout the entire platform. Sugar has matured significantly since the latest time that I tested the software. The journal system, which serves as a replacement for a conventional filesystem, has also improved dramatically since prior versions. Although the enhanced journal system is beginning to look promising, I still find it to be too unintuitive.

Sugar Labs is encouraging parents and teachers to start testing the beta with children. Linux enthusiasts who want to contribute to the project are also invited to help with hardware compatibility testing, bug reporting, and many other tasks. Developers can participate by contributing to the core platform or creating new Sugar activities. Sugar Labs has launched a new website (modeled after addons.mozilla.org) for hosting activities.

Refer to the Sugar Labs wiki for instructions on how to download, install, and boot the SoaS environment.