Well, I don't know any (programming) language that is similar to Scratch...
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block:
run code [some code] in
[dropdown: C++ / squeak / java / actionscript / pascal / assembely / GML ]
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maybe Basic, that is one of the simplest form of coding(apart from scratch). But I think the drag and drop system is fine for now.
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Good idea. Scratch is fun just using Lua. Imagine what you could do with Ruby, Python, C++, etc. Also, Scratch is great for learning how to script whatever language you're using.
Last edited by mrshanko (2011-07-31 15:07:54)
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It's an interesting idea in theory, but the reality is that it's extremely difficult to do. Just like real languages, every computer language has its own unique syntax, and a lot of things done easily in Scratch look very, very different in others. In some cases, you might need to change massive portions of code to accomplish one thing. And that's not even considering hurdles such as translating from object-oriented to non-object-oriented programming.
It may be possible in some cases, but in many it would just be too much work.
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Converting Scratch to another text-based computer language is very difficult as it scratch itself does not use text-based syntax. Not even Squeak uses text, I think. Text to text is easy, like maybe C++ to Java, but visual to text or vice versa is hard, so don't look forward to it.
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cygene wrote:
Converting Scratch to another text-based computer language is very difficult as it scratch itself does not use text-based syntax. Not even Squeak uses text, I think. Text to text is easy, like maybe C++ to Java, but visual to text or vice versa is hard, so don't look forward to it.
Actually, difficulty in converting scripts in one language to another language is more related to differences in syntax and how the language actually operates. Different languages have code that is structured differently, so a given script (or more importantly, collection of scripts) rarely can be directly translated to another language. (See hmnwilson's post.)
Besides, you wouldn't want to do this anyway, because that would teach bad programming habits. Ways of programming things in Scratch would be messy and superfluous in other languages, where there are other, more effective ways of doing things.
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Harakou wrote:
cygene wrote:
Converting Scratch to another text-based computer language is very difficult as it scratch itself does not use text-based syntax. Not even Squeak uses text, I think. Text to text is easy, like maybe C++ to Java, but visual to text or vice versa is hard, so don't look forward to it.
Actually, difficulty in converting scripts in one language to another language is more related to differences in syntax and how the language actually operates. Different languages have code that is structured differently, so a given script (or more importantly, collection of scripts) rarely can be directly translated to another language. (See hmnwilson's post.)
Besides, you wouldn't want to do this anyway, because that would teach bad programming habits. Ways of programming things in Scratch would be messy and superfluous in other languages, where there are other, more effective ways of doing things.
I understand that but what I really meant is that Scratch is too different to text-based languages. I don't really think syntax is that much of a problem but it is the way the language compiles programs and executes them. Syntax might be resolved by a text-editing program that changes ... to ..., I'm not sure if Notepad++ can, but if it doesn't, it's a good step since it can recognize languages and commands within a program.
The biggest problem for a graphic to text editor is converting the graphic commands to text. You can edit almost any text-based languages with wordpad or notepad, but if you open a scratch project there, you get stuff like: árrááááá(á(··· ····MÀÀÀx¿¹¹
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cygene wrote:
Harakou wrote:
cygene wrote:
Converting Scratch to another text-based computer language is very difficult as it scratch itself does not use text-based syntax. Not even Squeak uses text, I think. Text to text is easy, like maybe C++ to Java, but visual to text or vice versa is hard, so don't look forward to it.
Actually, difficulty in converting scripts in one language to another language is more related to differences in syntax and how the language actually operates. Different languages have code that is structured differently, so a given script (or more importantly, collection of scripts) rarely can be directly translated to another language. (See hmnwilson's post.)
Besides, you wouldn't want to do this anyway, because that would teach bad programming habits. Ways of programming things in Scratch would be messy and superfluous in other languages, where there are other, more effective ways of doing things.I understand that but what I really meant is that Scratch is too different to text-based languages. I don't really think syntax is that much of a problem but it is the way the language compiles programs and executes them. Syntax might be resolved by a text-editing program that changes ... to ..., I'm not sure if Notepad++ can, but if it doesn't, it's a good step since it can recognize languages and commands within a program.
The biggest problem for a graphic to text editor is converting the graphic commands to text. You can edit almost any text-based languages with wordpad or notepad, but if you open a scratch project there, you get stuff like: árrááááá(á(··· ····MÀÀÀx¿¹¹
Notepad isn't designed to read those files, so naturally you get gibberish when you try to open one. Were you to edit Scratch's source, however, you could easily, say, make it output some text to replace a script you had. The challenge is, again, overcoming the differences between the languages.
Anyway, long story short: I don't see this happening because it's not that simple.
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Harakou wrote:
cygene wrote:
Harakou wrote:
Actually, difficulty in converting scripts in one language to another language is more related to differences in syntax and how the language actually operates. Different languages have code that is structured differently, so a given script (or more importantly, collection of scripts) rarely can be directly translated to another language. (See hmnwilson's post.)
Besides, you wouldn't want to do this anyway, because that would teach bad programming habits. Ways of programming things in Scratch would be messy and superfluous in other languages, where there are other, more effective ways of doing things.I understand that but what I really meant is that Scratch is too different to text-based languages. I don't really think syntax is that much of a problem but it is the way the language compiles programs and executes them. Syntax might be resolved by a text-editing program that changes ... to ..., I'm not sure if Notepad++ can, but if it doesn't, it's a good step since it can recognize languages and commands within a program.
The biggest problem for a graphic to text editor is converting the graphic commands to text. You can edit almost any text-based languages with wordpad or notepad, but if you open a scratch project there, you get stuff like: árrááááá(á(··· ····MÀÀÀx¿¹¹Notepad isn't designed to read those files, so naturally you get gibberish when you try to open one. Were you to edit Scratch's source, however, you could easily, say, make it output some text to replace a script you had. The challenge is, again, overcoming the differences between the languages.
Anyway, long story short: I don't see this happening because it's not that simple.
That's the whole point of what I said : " so don't look forward to it" (in my first post)
BTW: Notepad++ is a third-party software that is completely different from MS Notepad
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