Introducting Computish

Computish is the programming language used in the SchoolYard environment: every control, instruction and action is ‘translated’ into a set of Computish- commands, which are in turn processed by a special interpreter. Based upon Macromedia® Flash™, Computish allows children to easily add graphics and telecommunications to their applications using simple, accessible tools.

Computish is a modular language. It is divided into small sets of commands. Each set is called an 'agent'. This modularity has many benefits:

• It makes the language syntagmatically and paradigmatically infinite, since any flash programmer can add functionality by writing additional agents.
• The ability to 'summon' and 'fire' agents provides great flexibility in that agents may be updated independently. This enables full customization of the environment’s appearance and capabilities. This flexibility also plays a part in the SchoolYard user hierarchy. As the child advances, she is provided with increasingly more ‘powerful’ agents that operate under stricter coding rules.
• Controlling the active agents through filtering helps the children concentrate on the tools necessary to accomplish their assignment’s goals.

Computish was designed for children. Thus, it pays special attention to language readability and language writability.

Readability refers to the the ease of reading written programme code. This means that the command syntax must be meaningful and yet concise enough to be memorized.

Writability refers to the ease of writing programme code. This is accomplished by combining graphical and textual development tools in the environment’s user interface.

These days, programming is thought to be complex, expensive and inaccessible. Computish challenges this assumption with its hierarchal development model, that only presents new tools and concepts after the user gains the experience required for their proper usage. The Computish Development Environment is freely available on the internet, and is, maintained by a lively community of volunteer developers.