Scratch 1.4: Beginner's Guide: Learn to program while creating interactive stories, games, and multimedia projects using Scratch

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4.6 (8 Ratings)

Paperback Jul 2009 264 pages 1st Edition

$43.99

Paperback Jul 2009 264 pages 1st Edition

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Scratch 1.4: Beginner's Guide

Chapter 2. Installation

As Scratch programmers, we have the freedom to choose the environment in which we operate. In this chapter, I'll enumerate the installation choices you have.

I'll assume you know how to install and download software on your computer, so instead of offering a step-by-step installation guide, we'll focus on special installation options.

In this chapter, we will:

Install Scratch on Windows, OS X, and Linux
Run Scratch from a USB flash drive on Windows and OS X
Ensure our browsers are configured to view Java web applications
Review the Scratch license and distribution rights
Customize Scratch to work in networked environments

Sit down in front of your favorite operating system, and get on with the installation.

Customize your Scratch installation

Scratch 1.4 includes several options to help you customize Scratch for networked environments found in many schools, community centers, and other learning environments. In order to set these custom options, you must edit the Scratch.ini configuration file, which can be found in the root of the Scratch installation.

On a default installation, you will find the Scratch.ini file at C:\Program Files\Scratch\Scratch.ini.

The following table includes a list of several customizations that you could deploy in your Scratch installations.

Customization	Example Scratch.ini options	Description
Disable the share button	Share`=0`	By default, users have the ability to share projects to the Scratch web site. This option disables sharing.
Hide network and local drives	VisibleDrives`=Y:,Z:`	The VisibleDrives option restricts access to the drives specified. If the VisibleDrives option is not set, users can see all drives connected to the computer.
Set custom home folder...

Key benefits

Create interactive stories, games, and multimedia projects that you can reuse in your own classroom
Learn computer programming basics ñ no computer science degree required
Connect with the Scratch community for inspiration, advice, and collaboration
Provides hands-on projects that help you learn by experiment and play

Description

If you have the imaginative power to design complex multimedia projects but can't adapt to programming languages, then Scratch 1.4: Beginner's Guide is the book for you. Imagine how good you'll feel when you drag-and-drop your way to interactive games, stories, graphic artwork, computer animations, and much more using Scratch even if you have never programmed before. This book provides teachers, parents, and new programmers with a guided tour of Scratch's features by creating projects that can be shared, remixed, and improved upon in your own lesson plans. Soon you will be creating games, stories, and animations by snapping blocks of "code" together. When you program you solve problems. In order to solve problems, you think, take action, and reflect upon your efforts. Scratch teaches you to program using a fun, accessible environment that's as easy as dragging and dropping blocks from one part of the screen to another. In this book you will program games, stories, and animations using hands-on examples that get you thinking and tinkering. For each project, you start with a series of steps to build something. Then you pause to put our actions into context so that you can relate our code to the actions on Scratch's stage. Throughout each chapter, you'll encounter challenges that encourage you to experiment and learn. One of the things you're really going to love is that, as you begin working through the examples in the book, you won't be able to stop your imagination and the ideas will stream as fast as you can think of them. Write them down. You'll quickly realize there are a lot of young minds in your home, classroom, or community group that could benefit from Scratch's friendly face. Teach them, please.

Who is this book for?

Scratch is a teaching language, so it's ideal for people who want to learn how to program or teach others how to program. Educators and parents will learn how to program using Scratch, so they can use Scratch to teach the latest learning skills to their students and children. No previous computer programming knowledge is required. You only need to know how to perform basic tasks on a computer and this book will teach the rest. You can then use it as a platform to learn more advanced programming languages. Parents, stuck with a child who wants to play video games all night? Make a new rule. He can only play a video game if he programs the game first.

What you will learn

Design user interfaces, including sequence, characters, and controls.
Think critically and make decisions ñ based on need, program limitations and knowledge level.
Get to know the concepts of scratch programming such as loops, conditional statements, variables, arrays, Boolean logic, dynamic interaction, coordination, synchronization, threads, and event handling, and apply it later to other programming languages.
Develop a barnyard humor that let s you shine as a storyteller.
Debug problems in your design and code.
Revise your projects to fix problems and add functionality.
Collaborate with the Scratch community by remixing and sharing projects so that you can learn from each other.
Communicate with peers and students about the details of your projects.
Capture sound, light, touch, and resistance via an external PicoBoard and use it as input for your Scratch projects.

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Amazon verified reviews

David Roys Aug 25, 2009

Michael Badger, is an experienced author and his experience definitely shines through. This book was a pleasure to read and Michael's humour kept me amused and entertained throughout. The exercises are well-crafted and well-paced, guiding the reader through a series of tasks that gradually introduce new programming concepts and Scratch features. The concept of bugs and debugging was beautifully illustrated through a soccer-ball-heading game that resulted in some unexpected behaviour and a challenge to the reader to figure out the problem and find a solution. As always, Michael provides the solution later on in the section with a full explanation. If, on occasions, I felt lost in an exercise, the confusion was quickly cleared up in the "What just happened" section that followed.The production of this book is nearly flawless and the proof reading and editing team have done a fantastic job, although I'm not sure who was responsible for the little message at the bottom of page 99: "I learned how to use some additional markup tools in acrobat!." My money would be on the proof reader. Oops. The fact that that was the only error I could find worth pointing out is a testament to the quality of this work.The frequent Pop quizzes are a good and, although for the most part, the questions are quite easy, on at least one occasion I would have liked a list of answers to check against rather than having to skim back over the text I had just read; but these are minor niggles and I'm sure Michael could easily put a list of answers on his [...] site.Reading this book won't teach you how to write video games (at least not the sort I'm used to playing), but it is a great introduction to the world of programming and will give you the basic understanding you'll need to get started. If you want your kids to get more from the internet than access to mindless Facebook games, YouTube video blogs, and Tweets, I recommend you give this book a go and get Scratching.I'm a big fan of Scratch and this is a fantastic book. I'm looking forward to working through the exercises once more with my daughter when she's a little older.

Amazon Verified review

Anne Dec 26, 2012

It is just the manual I need to get further with Scratch. I like the no-nonsense format and the way it gets straight into doing projects.

MZ May 04, 2015

great reference book

eleudson Sep 12, 2012

With a practical approach, the book has helped me prepare lessons in logic programming using Scratch. The examples help to know the details of this great programming language

Kelly B Apr 04, 2013

My son and I have been playing around with Scratch programming software from MIT. I bought the Kindle version of this book and I love highlighting areas for my son to take a look at so that he can learn more about the software. The book has good illustration to familiarize you with the programming interface. It gives good examples to try with Scratch. I like being able to keep the book open in the Windows Kindle app and flip to refer to it while we're programming. This is a good introduction to Scratch.

Scratch 1.4: Beginner's Guide: Learn to program while creating interactive stories, games, and multimedia projects using Scratch

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Scratch 1.4: Beginner's Guide

Chapter 2. Installation

Install Scratch

Windows

Note

Confirm Java install

Customize your Scratch installation

Redistribute Scratch freely

Source code license

Summary

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