Introduction to the course Aug 30, Day 1 Object-oriented Programming thru Video Games TIDE 1840 Harry Howard Tulane University

THE SYLLABUS 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 2

Rationale Today’s students have grown up in a multimedia world – and to motivate them, instructors must relate students’ classroom experience to that world. The Alice 3D programming environment is a teaching tool for such students. It uses 3D graphics and a drag-and-drop interface to teach introductory object-oriented computer programming with a more engaging, less frustrating experience. It makes it easy to create an animation for telling a story, playing an interactive game, or a video to share on the web. In Alice, 3D objects (e.g., people, animals, and vehicles) populate a virtual world, and the student's task it to create a program to animate the objects. With Alice's interactive interface, students can drag and drop graphic tiles to create a program, where the instructions correspond to standard statements in a production oriented programming language, such as Java, C++, and C#. Alice allows students to immediately see how their animation programs run, enabling them to easily understand the relationship between the programming statements and the behavior of objects in their animation. By manipulating the objects in their virtual world, students gain experience with all the programming constructs typically taught in an introductory programming course. 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 3

Objective For the student to learn the basic principles of object-oriented computer programming using Alice. 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 4

Outcomes For you to demonstrate your attainment of the goal of the course, you will perform the following tasks: ◦ Class discussion. Because the TIDE course meets only once a week, you are expected to attend every session and to come to class prepared to go over the readings assigned. (45%) ◦ Final project. On the last day of class you will present to the class a project that shows what you have learned during the course. (50%) ◦ Participate in an EEG experiment. (5%) 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 5

A happy subject of an EEG experiment 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 6

Other course topics Code of Academic Integrity Students with disabilities Please, no food or drink in here! 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 7

The textbook 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 8

Schedule of readings DateDay Topic Aug 30Day 1Introduction to the course; §I.1 Getting started with Alice Sept 6Day 2Discussion of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Sept 13Day 3§I.2 Program design and implementation Sept 20Day 4§I.3 Programming: Putting the pieces together Sept 27Day 5§II.4 Classes, objects, methods and parameters Oct 4Day 6§II.5 Interaction: Events and event handling Oct 11Day 7§III.6 Functions and if/else Oct 18Day 8§III.7 Repetition: Definite and conditional loops Oct 25Day 9§III.8 Repetition: Recursion Nov 1Day 10§IV.9 Lists and list processing Nov 8Day 11Presentation of final project 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 9

Contact Prof. Harry Howard (voice mail 24 hours a day) Newcomb Hall 322-D Office hours: MTW 4-5 & by appointment 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 10

Electronic communications I will send you on a regular basis – you must check your on a regular basis! ◦ If you want to use a non-Tulane address, e- mail me a message to that effect from the address. I will post my presentation to the course website after every class. ◦ 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 11

Course administration Go over roster 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 12

GETTING STARTED WITH ALICE Chapter 1 8/30/11 13 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University

Getting Alice The book includes a CD that should work. The most recent version is available at: 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 14

Why learn about programming computers? OK, you tell me. 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 15

How you will learn to program Again, if you already have experience, tell me. How Alice is different ◦ You create a program by dragging objects around on the screen using the mouse 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 16

Simple ideas that make up a computer program A list of instructions Ifs Repeating behavior Breaking things up into smaller pieces ◦ problem decomposition = stepwise refinement = top- down design == reductionism Compute a result "Learning to think about arranging a sequence of instructions to carry out a task is probably the most valuable part of learning to program" 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 17

Alice concepts Virtual world ◦ … which begins as a template for an initial scene Objects and 3D models From 3 dimensions to 6 degrees of freedom ◦ Each dimension has two directions of movement: 3D x 2 dir. = 6 degrees of freedom (dof) or 'orientation' Center of an object ◦ Set for each object by its creator, usually at the center of its bounding box or its center of mass Distance ◦ measured from center Position ◦ the point where the object’s center is in the world Animation 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 18

Getting started Tips & techniques ◦ Text ◦ 2D graphic images (billboards) 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 19

Exercises Island Winter Snowpeople pile Tea party Soldiers on deck 8/30/11 OOP thru Video Games - Harry Howard - Tulane University 20

Next time Chapter 2