LinuPedia

The challenge

Teach languages, and then science, arts and hobbies, to Portuguese speakers: free for everyone, with no ads, no need for internet and nothing made up. Every fact and every example must come with its source.

What was built

• The course is an adventure: a map that leaves Antarctica and reaches the country of the language, with radio crossings, decisions and voice conversations.
• The linuhub, the app's home: a pixel art camp in Antarctica where Linu walks (by tapping, joystick or keyboard) to each area, with the island map and other people's penguins.
• Linu's shelter in pixel art, with light that follows the clock (day, midnight sun and a night with the aurora), where every object is a shortcut.
• Voice in every language: recordings by native speakers, the device's voice and a neural voice that works offline.
• Plenty to practice: branching stories, a diary with a corrector, dictation, a sticker album and 77 games.
• Accessible: light and dark themes, “reduce motion” and screen readers.
• Open content: lessons can be copied and adapted by teachers and schools (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).

Under the hood

• One codebase for Android, iOS and the web (React Native and Expo).
• It installs on the phone's home screen like an app and opens offline; progress is stored in a database on the device itself.
• The server publishes each new version on its own, but only if every test passes; people with the app installed see a “New version” notice when they come back to it.