Snap! is a free, blocks- and browser-based educational graphical programming language that allows students to create interactive animations, games, stories, and more, while learning about mathematical and computational ideas. Snap! was inspired by Scratch, but also targets both novice and more advanced students by including and expanding Scratch's features.
Since version 4.0, it is entirely browser-based, with no software that needs to be installed on the local device, much like Scratch.
Video Snap! (programming language)
User interface
Reference Manual for Snap! is available for download by clicking on the Snap! logo (in the top-left corner of the screen). Screen is organized in three resizable columns containing five regions, which include the blocks palette of different categories (in the left column), the scripts area with all scripts belonging to a selected sprite, and the stage area (in the third column) with sprites thumbnails (also called sprite corral) below it.
In the interactively resizable stage area (full-screen is available, too) are drawn the graphical results (i.e. animations, turtle graphics etc) of the scripts running in the script area, and/or interactively double-clicked individual blocks in any pallete. Individual blocks can be dragged from the palette onto the scripts area to be associated with the selected sprite.
Categories of blocks include the Motion, Looks, Sound, Pen, Control, Sensing, Operators, and Variables groups as shown in the table below.
Besides the Script tab, there are two other tabs, the Costumes tab and the Sounds tab. An expandable bar at the right is Help area.
Maps Snap! (programming language)
Features
The most important features that Snap! offers, but Scratch does not, include:
- expressions using "nested functions", consisting of one or more "anonymous functions", each of which is represented by a block having one or more empty(ed) slot(s)/parameter(s) that are waiting for a "higher order function" (the one that is calling the anonymous one) to be filled by. (Their computer-science theorethical basis being First class functions, which in turn have "Lambda calculus" as their even more abstract, mathematical, foundation),
- lists that are first class (including lists of lists),
- First class sprites (in other words prototype-oriented instance-based classless programming),
- nestable sprites
- codification of Snap! programs to mainstream languages such as Python, JavaScript, C, etc.
History
The web-based Snap! and older desktop-based BYOB have been both developed by Jens Mönig for Windows, OS X and Linux with design ideas and documentation provided by Brian Harvey from University of California, Berkeley and have been used to teach "The Beauty and Joy of Computing" introductory course in computer science (CS) for non-CS-major students.
License
The source code of Snap! is Affero General Public License (AGPL) licensed and is available on Github and can be downloaded within Snap! itself. The earlier, desktop-based 3.x version's open-source code is available under a license that allows modifying for non-commercial uses and can be downloaded from the UC Berkeley website or CNET's Download.com and TechTracker download page.
Platforms
Snap! is implemented in JavaScript using an HTML5 Canvas application programming interface (API), and because of that it runs on the major web-browsers on Windows, iOS, OS X and Linux devices.
Recognition
Snap! has been recognized by the Logo Foundation, and reviewed in an online magazine for programmers. As of December 2014, 100 New York City (NYC) high schools will introduce University of California at Berkeley's "Beauty and Joy of Computing" as a new AP Computer Science Principles course in 2015, using Snap!.
Notes
References
External links
- Official website
- source code
- CNET Download.com and CNET TechTracker's BYOB for Mac download page
- CNET Download.com and CNET TechTracker's BYOB for Windows download page
Source of article : Wikipedia
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