Book Image

Scratch Cookbook

By : Brandon Milonovich
Book Image

Scratch Cookbook

By: Brandon Milonovich

Overview of this book

Scratch 2.0 is an easy to use programming language that allows you to animate stories and create interactive games. Scratch also gives you the capability of using programming to calculate complicated calculations for you. Scratch Cookbook will lead you through easy-to-follow recipes that give you everything you need to become a more advanced programmer. Scratch Cookbook will take you through the essential features of Scratch. You'll then work through simple recipes to gain an understanding of the more advanced features of Scratch. You will learn how to create animations using Scratch. Sensory board integration (getting input from the outside environment) will also be covered, along with using Scratch to solve complicated and tedious calculations for you. You'll also learn how to work through the exciting process of project remixing where you build on the work of others. Scratch Cookbook will give you everything you need to get started with building your own programs in Scratch that involve sounds, animations, and user interaction.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
Scratch Cookbook
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Introduction


Up until this point, all we have used for user interaction in our programs is the keyboard and mouse. In this chapter, we will talk about using a sensor board to interact with Scratch. Specifically, we are going to discuss using the brand referred to as PicoBoards, by PicoCricket (http://www.picocricket.com/). The specific PicoBoard we're using in this chapter can be purchased from https://www.sparkfun.com/products/10311. At the time of writing the cost was $44.95 plus shipping. A mini USB cable is not included, so you'll want to purchase one of those from any cable supplier. Note that there are other types of sensor boards (and even other outside devices) that can be integrated with Scratch. In fact, some have set up the Microsoft Kinect, Nintendo Wii, Arduino, and more. The PicoBoard is used here as an example of some of what you can do. You should always feel free to explore other technologies!

It is also worth noting that this chapter is the only chapter in this book that...