Cympa.net

Introduction

Cympa.net is built around a new open source programming language called Cympathon, along with a text markup language called Cympatags. Cympathon is implemented in Java, and along with Java can be used to implement games, write extensions for a tool used as a math teaching aid, and develop online communities/apps which are smartphone-based.

Mandate

The primary mandate of Cympa.net is to foster the development of online communities of people with physical, intellectual, and mental health disabilities. The secondary mandate is to empower the subset of people with disabilities who are relatively tech savvy. Tech savvy members can either learn how to become or make use of the services of tutors, coders, and web designers.

Cympateach/Cympagames

Cympateach is a tool used for teaching math, and can also be used for teaching literacy and coding. The tutor and student communicate remotely using a split screen. Coding languages taught include Cympathon, Cympatags, HTML, Java, Python, and JavaScript. Cympagames use a multiplayer game engine. Both Cympateach tool extensions and Cympagames can be written in Cympathon and/or Java.

Cympanets

Cympanets (which run only on smartphones) are based on a mini-web server serving mini-web pages to a mini-web browser. The back end consists of MySQL databases operated on by JavaScript server-side code. The front end consists of a Cympatags-based mini-web browser, using Cympathon in place of JavaScript. The server-side code is written in Cympathon, converted to JavaScript and uploaded to the server. All Cympatags text is indexed to support Google-style searches. Cympatags is simpler than HTML, based on nested rows and columns. A row cell is divided into multiple variable-width column cells, and a column cell is divided into multiple variable-height row cells.

Cympajettes are Android apps (probably iOS as well eventually) which are written partially in Java and partially in Cympathon, they facilitate the development of extensible apps and make use of end-user programming.

• Freemium: Subscribers (called patrons) pay $10 for 6 months. People with disabilities pay no fees and have full patron-level privileges. All others lack those privileges and pay no fees.
• Cympateach: Patrons can use the teaching tool, as either tutors or students, in dual-user mode, all others can only use it in single-user mode.
• Cympathon apps: Users who pay no fees can use Cympathon apps (games and Cympanets), with restrictions. Cympathon apps have a free trial period of N click events, or at least 30 days. After the trial period expires, Cympathon apps revert to black and white (monochrome mode). Whenever the player avatar or mouse cursor turns red in monochrome mode, the user can press F11 to enable full color mode for a few seconds. At most 2 Cympathon apps chosen by the user in any given calendar month are exempted and don't enter monochrome mode. The value of N at any given time equals the total number of click events generated by the 2 chosen Cympathon apps in the previous calendar month. Patrons can use Cympathon apps w/o monochrome mode.
• Miscellaneous: Revenue can be generated by game/Cympanet/Cympajette authors in the form of user fees and in-app purchases. Cympa.net receives 15 percent of this revenue. Cympanet authors pay bandwidth usage fees if they exceed the bandwidth quota.

Three types of Cympa.net users exist: patrons, Clients, and blue-dots (corresponding colors: red, green, and blue). Only patrons pay donations of $10 every 6 months, all other users pay no fees. Only blue-dots lack full patron-level privileges. Clients include people with physical, intellectual, and mental health disabilities. Every user is color coded with one of 3 colors next to their username, one color for each user type.

Open Source

Cympa.net is partially open source and developed in part by volunteers. All volunteer contributors receive, on an annual basis, an honorarium: an equal share of 75 percent of the profits or $200, whichever is greater. In case of insufficient profitability which is ongoing, contributors who lack seniority receive less than $200. To qualify for the full honorarium, the contributor must make at least 3 contributions. Each contribution can be either a bug fix, a new feature, designing a new feature, finding a bug, or being the primary author of a section of documentation for developers or end-users. Those who only make 2 contributions qualify for a partial honorarium of at least $100 (or half the full honorarium), assuming sufficient/ongoing profitability.