Introduction to Alice

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Introduction to Alice

Alice is named in honor of Lewis
Carrolls Alice in Wonderland
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Alice

• A modern programming tool
• 3-D graphics
• 3-D models of objects
• Animation
• Objects can be made to move around the virtual
  world (a video game or simulation implemented in
  3-D)
• Use the software from the CD
• Can download latest version from the web
• www.alice.org

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Kinds of Animations

• Two kinds of animations
• Movie
• Passive user watches the animation
• Interactive
• Active user clicks on mouse, types a key on
  keyboard
• Actions of user are called events

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What is a program?

• A set of instructions that tell the computer what
  to do
• In some programming languages, program statements
  can look quite complicated

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What is an ELEGANT program

• The set of instructions are efficient and easy
  for the computer program to understandandthey
  are efficient and easy for HUMANS to understand

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FLOWCHARTS?

• Flowcharts are used to show the programming steps
  in picture form, the same way that storyboard
  sketches show the scenes in a movie

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An example of a flowchart
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Flowchart standard boxes
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Flowchart - an example
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ALICE

• Alice is anobject-oriented program.
• We drag and drop objects into our virtual world
  and we plan ahead how to make these objects
  interact with each other and with the user of our
  program.

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Demo Start with a new world

• Open Alice as your teacher directs

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Objects

• An "object" is
• any thing that can be identified as unique from
  other things
• How is an object unique?
• has a name
• has properties
• width, height, color, location
• can perform actions (methods)
• associated actions it can perform
• tasks it can carry out

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3 Dimensions, 6 Directions

• A 3D object has
• 3 dimensions
• height, width, depth
• 6 degrees of freedom (directions of movement)

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Demo Saving a world

• Writing and testing an animation is an intense
  load on the computing system a crash can occur.
• Best solution
• save your world every 15 minutes locally
• (Or at least every half hour)
• also save to a backup system at the end of the
  class
• (for example to H drive)

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Assignment

• See lab1 saved on your teachers webpage