Show HN: PickCode – An educational coding environment for students after Scratch

📰 Hacker News · csmeyer

Learn to code with PickCode, a visual programming environment for students after Scratch, and create chatbots, designs, and 2D games

beginner Published 25 Jul 2022

Action Steps

Explore PickCode's features and sample programs
Create a simple chatbot using PickCode's visual language
Design a 2D game using PickCode's game engine
Experiment with PickCode's visual design tools
Provide feedback on PickCode's current version and suggest features for future development

Who Needs to Know This

Educators and students can benefit from PickCode as a learning tool to introduce programming concepts in an engaging and interactive way

Key Insight

💡 PickCode aims to lower the barrier to entry for coding and enable students to create projects they're proud of quickly

Key Takeaways

Learn to code with PickCode, a visual programming environment for students after Scratch, and create chatbots, designs, and 2D games

Full Article

PickCode is designed for use on desktop and tablet, and supports creating chatbots, visual designs, and 2D games. There is plenty of functionality missing - you can't add media to games for instance, but the current version shows off the foundation of what I'm aiming at. I taught myself to code using MIT's App Inventor, so I have an enormous respect for block based languages like App Inventor, Scratch, Snap!, MakeCode, etc. PickCode is my attempt at adding options for students who want to learn more about programming without making the jump to text, or as an alternative to block coding for beginners coming to programming at an older age. The visual language is meant to lower the barrier to entry to coding but the far more important aspect for me is giving students the ability to make things they're proud of as quickly as possible. A JS/Python API for controlling the chatbot and game engine are in the works. As of now, there are sample programs to play with and

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