This may be a duplicate, but I have some suggestions on my own.
I don't think pen, note blocks and motion sensing should be turned into extensions.
This will confuse New Scratchers, as they will think they are not part of the full Scratch. Also, currently in 2.0 you are not allowed to upload projects with extensions (other than the ones for the lego and circuit board stuff I think), so new Scratchers who join during the transition from 2.0 to 3.0 might get confused.
You might say “They should be in extensions because they are advanced”
Well, to balance it out, they could do this:
- Have pen still in pen category
- Move note blocks and motion sensing into own categories.
What do you think?

I like the idea of motion sensing being an extension; anything that sort of requires hardware that is non-native, as not everybody even has a web camera, should probably be an extension.

Looking at the Scratch 3.0 GUI I have to realize that there actually is a benefit of having the pen blocks as an extension; that is, at the extension menu it tells you with a very short description what each extension does, and I can see this being very useful for people new to Scratch who would not understand what the pen does.

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

turkey3 wrote:

I like the idea of motion sensing being an extension; anything that sort of requires hardware that is non-native, as not everybody even has a web camera, should probably be an extension.

Looking at the Scratch 3.0 GUI I have to realize that there actually is a benefit of having the pen blocks as an extension; that is, at the extension menu it tells you with a very short description what each extension does, and I can see this being very useful for people new to Scratch who would not understand what the pen does.

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I agree with this.

Scratch 3 is focusing on extensions more than Scratch 2, so there is more extensions and easier access to extensions. I do not see what is wrong with that plan.

turkey3 wrote:

I like the idea of motion sensing being an extension; anything that sort of requires hardware that is non-native, as not everybody even has a web camera, should probably be an extension.

Looking at the Scratch 3.0 GUI I have to realize that there actually is a benefit of having the pen blocks as an extension; that is, at the extension menu it tells you with a very short description what each extension does, and I can see this being very useful for people new to Scratch who would not understand what the pen does.

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I agree with this. Minimal Support.

Scratch 3.0 extensions are very different compared to Scratch 2.0 extensions; don't carry over the prejudice from Scratch 2.0 that extensions are inferior.

dude341 wrote:

This will confuse New Scratchers, as they will think they are not part of the full Scratch.

Putting them in an extension might spark curiosity in the Scratchers.

dude341 wrote:

Also, currently in 2.0 you are not allowed to upload projects with extensions (other than the ones for the lego and circuit board stuff I think), so new Scratchers who join during the transition from 2.0 to 3.0 might get confused.

In 2.0 projects aren't allowed to be shared with any extensions, and I don't think it automatically loads them with the project. However, I believe in 3.0 you can share projects using extensions from the official library.

dude341 wrote:

You might say “They should be in extensions because they are advanced”

Extensions blocks don't necessarily have to be advanced; they can host any very specific set of blocks that normally wouldn't fit Scratch such as 3D, first class lists/multidimensional lists, and speech to text/text to speech.

Also, by putting already-existing blocks into extensions, it can help prevent people from thinking that any new blocks in extensions are inferior.

Sheep_maker wrote:

Putting them in an extension might spark curiosity in the Scratchers.

That's the whole problem. Everyone should have what they need right where they want it. They shouldn't have to go “explore”.

You know Mario Maker? It's a good game right? But one of it's major flaws is that almost all features are locked when you first get it. You even have to unlock the title screen! Nintendo says it's to encourage people “to explore”. But in reality, this doesn't work. No one liked that “feature”. They eventually added another way to unlock it all but that's not the point (and it still required you to “explore” in a way)

I hope you see why making people “explore” just to get a feature should not happen. I didn't even know it was a extension button at first.

Pen & Music Extension were added for New Scratchers' convenience.

ericrosenbaum wrote:

Some aspects of the music blocks can make them confusing for beginners, such as the use of MIDI note numbers for the play note block, and setting duration and tempo in beats per minute. These blocks are also used relatively infrequently. Moving them into an extension (as with the pen blocks) allows us to reduce the size of the blocks menu, allowing beginners to focus on things that are easier to tinker with. It also will allow us to provide support specific to the music blocks when you add them from the extension library. Note that the extension will automatically load for Scratch 2.0 projects that include any of these blocks (as with the pen extension).(Source)

apple502j wrote:

Pen & Music Extension were added for New Scratchers' convenience.

ericrosenbaum wrote:

Some aspects of the music blocks can make them confusing for beginners, such as the use of MIDI note numbers for the play note block, and setting duration and tempo in beats per minute. These blocks are also used relatively infrequently. Moving them into an extension (as with the pen blocks) allows us to reduce the size of the blocks menu, allowing beginners to focus on things that are easier to tinker with. It also will allow us to provide support specific to the music blocks when you add them from the extension library. Note that the extension will automatically load for Scratch 2.0 projects that include any of these blocks (as with the pen extension).(Source)

How is it convenient to click through multiple menus?
That's the opposite of convenient!

dude341 wrote:

apple502j wrote:

Pen & Music Extension were added for New Scratchers' convenience.

ericrosenbaum wrote:

snip(Source)

How is it convenient to click through multiple menus?
That's the opposite of convenient!

They said “New Scratchers' convenience,” as in having less blocks that they feel like they have to learn would benefit them. Making one click more times to access a group of blocks isn't exactly a problem a New Scratcher would have.

Additionally, these extensions have blocks that are more commonly used in larger projects that take longer to complete, and since extensions automatically load with projects, going through that process wouldn't be that common to cause a nuisance.

It seems to me that they are testing Scratch 3.0 with real kids, so I think they know what they're doing.

Sheep_maker wrote:

They said “New Scratchers' convenience,” as in having less blocks that they feel like they have to learn would benefit them.

I agree with this, no support.

Bump.

turkey3 wrote:

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I have to agree. I don't really care if they are extensions.

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

turkey3 wrote:

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I have to agree. I don't really care if they are extensions.

The problem I see is that people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch.

dude341 wrote:

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

turkey3 wrote:

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I have to agree. I don't really care if they are extensions.

The problem I see is that people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch.

It doesn't take long to find them as extensions.

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

dude341 wrote:

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

turkey3 wrote:

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I have to agree. I don't really care if they are extensions.

The problem I see is that people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch.

It doesn't take long to find them as extensions.

That's not really the point, like I said, people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch and 3.0 extensions are “customised” Scratch. 2.0 extensions are “customised” Scratch, but 3.0 are not, but there is nothing to say this, confusing people.

dude341 wrote:

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

dude341 wrote:

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

turkey3 wrote:

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I have to agree. I don't really care if they are extensions.

The problem I see is that people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch.

It doesn't take long to find them as extensions.

That's not really the point, like I said, people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch and 3.0 extensions are “customised” Scratch. 2.0 extensions are “customised” Scratch, but 3.0 are not, but there is nothing to say this, confusing people.

Pen and Sensing blocks are vanilla 3.0, just as extensions now.

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

dude341 wrote:

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

dude341 wrote:

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

turkey3 wrote:

At the moment I am sort of indifferent to it all, I don't really care if these blocks are or are not extensions.

I have to agree. I don't really care if they are extensions.

The problem I see is that people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch.

It doesn't take long to find them as extensions.

That's not really the point, like I said, people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch and 3.0 extensions are “customised” Scratch. 2.0 extensions are “customised” Scratch, but 3.0 are not, but there is nothing to say this, confusing people.

Pen and Sensing blocks are vanilla 3.0, just as extensions now.

…
Please read my posts before replying.

dude341 wrote:

TheAdriCoolManDude wrote:

snip

The problem I see is that people might think that pen and motion sensing are not vanilla Scratch.

I don't see how that's a bad thing. There was no discrimination between normal projects and projects requiring extensions other than the fact that projects using extensions weren't very easy to run on the Scratch website.

Well how about two extension sections, to make it eisier for the new scratchers to see which ones are simple or not, mabe music and translate would be catogrised as “not needing any extra hardware”, Video motion, music and speech recognition would be “webcam”, “speaker” or “microphone”. And the others would be named “extra hardware needed”. So basically this would help newbies see what's simple or not, and if an extension requires special knowledge, it is classified as advanced.

Seam49 wrote:

Well how about two extension sections, to make it eisier for the new scratchers to see which ones are simple or not, mabe music and translate would be catogrised as “not needing any extra hardware”, Video motion, music and speech recognition would be “webcam”, “speaker” or “microphone”. And the others would be named “extra hardware needed”. So basically this would help newbies see what's simple or not, and if an extension requires special knowledge, it is classified as advanced.

Perhaps.