1. Alice: A Free 3D Animation World for Teaching Programming
Barbara Ericson
Georgia Institute of Technology
Oct 2005

2. Georgia Institute of Technology
What is Alice?
Free 3d animation software
From Carnegie Mellon University
Available from
Used to teach
Programming concepts
Objects and classes
Methods, functions, and properties
Conditionals (if and else)
Iteration (looping)
Recursion
Event-driven programming
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3. Georgia Institute of Technology
Alice Requirements
Modern Computer
500 MHz CPU or better
128 MB RAM or better
Video resolution of 1024 by 768 or better
VGA graphics card with 16 bit or better color
A sound card
Does work on windows and macs
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4. Georgia Institute of Technology
Why Learn to Program?
Number of CS Majors is down 40%
Since 2001
Predicted to be one of the fastest growing fields through 2012
US Dept of Labor
The number of jobs in computing is now greater than in 2001
And growing
We are facing a massive shortage of people
With knowledge of computing
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5. Why don’t Students want to Program?
Myth: all the jobs are going overseas
Less than 1% have
Myth: You have to be a nerd or geek
Programming won’t turn you into a nerd or geek
Students perception of programming:
Too hard
Not interesting
Not relevant
Not creative
Not social
Too math based
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6. Georgia Institute of Technology
Why Use Alice?
Students find using Alice
Easier than textual programming
No syntax errors
Motivating
People love to tell stories
Relevant
Students are used to 3d games and animated movies
Creative
Like being the director of a movie or play
Social
Share what was created
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Getting Started
Install Alice
Copy folder from CD
Start Alice
Double Click on Icon (Alice.exe)
Wait for Alice to start
Can take a few minutes
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Pick a World
Click on the Examples tab
And click on a world to open it
You might need to scroll down to see this world
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Playing the Movie
To play a saved movie
Click the Play button
The movie or game will start to play in a separate window
Click on target to play this movie
Most example worlds will just start to play
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Create Your Own Movie
Click on File
Then New World
Click on a template
Background and ground type
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11. Add Objects To the World
Click the Add Objects button
Select an Object Category from the Local Gallery
Select Local Gallery to get back from a category
To the list of categories
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12. Add Objects to the World
Select an object to add
Click on object to select
Click Add Instance to world Button
Or drag the object and drop it into position in the world
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13. Position an Object in the World
Once the object is in the world
You can move it by
Dragging it with the mouse
Or using the mouse controls
Click the Undo button to undo the last action
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Mouse Controls
Use mouse control buttons (from left to right)
To move object left, right, forward, back
Up and down
Turn left or right
Turn forward or backwards
Tumble the object (free rotation)
Resize object
Copy the object
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Deleting an Object
Click on the object you want to delete
The object will be displayed with a bounding box around it
Click the right mouse button
Select delete from the pop-up menu
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Posing an Object
You can move just a part of an object
Click affect subparts box under mouse controls
Select a part to move with the mouse
Mouse controls will affect just that part
Or use the object tree
To pick the part to move
To expand the object tree click on the plus sign to the left of an object. An object is made up of parts and each part can also be made up of parts.
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17. Ask Objects to do Things in Methods
In object-oriented programming we ask objects to do things
They can refuse
They ‘know’ how to do things
In Alice we will do this in a method
A named set of requests to objects
The play button executes
world.my first method
Please clean your room
Sure
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Viewing Methods
Click the Done button to stop adding objects to your scene
Click the object that you want to do something
In the object tree
Click on the Methods tab
To see the methods this object already knows
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Use Methods
Drag method names from the details window Methods area
to world.my first method
Can Group Methods
Do in order
One after the other
Or Do together
At the same time
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20. Moving and Deleting a Method
You can pick up a method and move it
Click on left (dotted) edge and drag it
Legal places to drop it will have a green line
To delete move to the trash can
Or right click and pick delete from the popup menu
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21. Posing an Object using the Menu
You can also use a popup menu to pose an object
Right click on an object in the object tree to bring up the methods
Select a method to execute it
Click on the Undo button to undo this action
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Quad View
Click here to see Quad View
Use the Quad View to get multiple views of your objects
Normal camera view
From the top
From the right
From the front
Can zoom
And move the view
If you don’t have these controls visible and you want them just click on the Add Objects button in the scene. Click the Done button when you are done.
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Camera Controls
Use camera controls to change the starting camera view
Move up, down, left, right
Drive forwards, backwards, rotate left, rotate right
Tilt (rotate) camera forwards or backwards
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Saving a World
Click on File and Save World
Tell it where you want to save it
Give it a name
To open a saved world
Click on File, Open World
Pick the saved world
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Creating a Method
To teach an object to do a new thing
Create a new method
Name the method
Drag other methods into the new method
When you are done use the new method in world.my first method
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Creating a Class
A class can ‘inherit’ from an existing class
Right click on object in object tree and rename it
Right click and select save object (really save class)
Create copies of the object using mouse controls
Know the same methods
To make the methods work on any object of the class
Add a parameter for the object that it is invoked on
To move sub-parts need part named function
Be careful typing the name of the part
Case sensitive
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Creating People
You can use the she builder and he builder to build custom people
In the people category
Control the skin color, hair, eyes, body, and clothes
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Saving a Position
Click the more controls button
Drop a dummy
At the camera
Or at an object
Can move the camera to a dummy
Can set an object to the dummy’s position
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29. What can you teach with Alice?
Basics of Object-Oriented Programming
Objects and Classes
Methods and Parameters
Inheritance (the concept of it)
Alice doesn’t fully support inheritance
Iteration (looping)
Conditionals
Recursion
Lists and list processing
Arrays
Algorithm design, implementation, and testing
Basics of Event-driven programming
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Alice Tutorials
Click on File then Open World
Click on the Tutorial tab
And then click on a tutorial to run
When you finish with one tutorial do the next the same way
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31. Georgia Institute of Technology
Resources
Web site
Book: Learning to Program with Alice
Wanda Dann, Stephen Cooper, Randy Pausch
Short Workshops at Georgia Tech
Check web site for teacher workshops
Summer 2-day workshops across the country
Curricular materials
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