Kids Can Program Too!: Second Java Edition

---

Last Fall he told me that the game is corrupted because the JAR file snapshot has messed up the configuration. And that right away rang a bell in me as a Java Evangelist at Oracle. I learned from him that the game is written in Java, has a trial version that runs as an applet in the browser, and downloaded as a JAR file for desktop. The game is modular where the players travel through a world and chunks are loaded and unloaded to keep the memory footprint small.

Something unique about the game is the ability to modify the game from what it was originally designed for. In Minecraft language, this is called as a " mod " - short for modifications. For example, a mod can add new characters to the game, change look-and-feel of the play field, or make it easy to build new structures. The game has a server and a client component.

This allows the game to be played in a single player mode where a player connects to a server using a client and plays the game. Alternatively multiple players, using different clients across platforms, can connect to a server and play with each other collaboratively. Its very common to have a server run with multiple mods.

By professional developers for professional developers.

There are almost an infinite number of mods someone could do to make Minecraft a more amusing game to play. There is no official API to create these mods but there are several third-party vendors that provide that capability; Bukkit is one such API. The ability to write mods and alter the game play gives players more control over the game and gets them more excited.

My son expressed his desire to write a mod and so we started exploring further. Then onwards, he started teaching me Minecraft vocabulary and I taught him the Java programming concepts. Our discussions in the car, on the dinner table, during the breakfast preparation, and elsewhere changed to reflect that as well. He already played with Scratch and Greenfoot last Summer and that was extremely helpful during this learning curve.

We set up a goal to build a mod during Christmas break. After understanding the basic concepts and building a few mods, we decided to share the knowledge with a broader set of Minecrafters. And that's where the concept of doing a Minecraft Workshop was born. My son came up with a list of his minecraft buddies and we announced a date for the workshop.

Everybody invited for the workshop confirmed their presence right away. I chose to wrap the message in the deliciousness of 3D gaming because that makes it more fun for kids of all ages.

Teaching Kids Java Programming

We all want to create something amazing. My hope is that this book will enable kids of all ages to bring their ideas to life. And, if they fall in love with programming along the way, that would be great! The web—the world, really—runs on JavaScript. So JavaScript is a fantastic programming language to know. All a new programmer needs is a browser.

A browser and a great, online code editor like the 3DE Code Editor that this book uses. There is nothing to install. There is no barrier to getting started.

Learning to program is hard enough without the initial pain and frustration of installing languages and tools. Websites, web pages, web applications, and mobile applications are all built with JavaScript. People who know JavaScript are well prepared for the digital future.

Being practical does have some advantages—like being able to share games and embed them on your own web sites! And I have to admit that I love programming JavaScript. I have been programming JavaScript myself for years and never tire of it. I love it all the more for the incredible tools and libraries that have sprung up around it recently—especially the amazing Three. The book includes a nice variety of game types.

Much of the first half of the book is spent creating a 3D player in a 3D world with a focus on making it as realistic and playable as possible. After that, we learn space simulations, puzzle games, mini-games, and games that simulate real-world physics. Some games include scoring, others a countdown timer, and some a little of both. But you should see enough to know how to start building these on your own.

Java Basics

I cannot wait to see what you create! Programming languages are like spoken languages—there are lots of both kinds of languages and the more you learn, the better you get at learning. This book covers a ton of programming knowledge in addition to describing games and 3D concepts. Much of what you learn about JavaScript will be of use as you explore other programming languages.

Oracle Brings Code to Kids

That said, JavaScript is a fantastic first language to learn. It is the language of the web and you can use it to do an amazing variety of things—from creating web pages, to making web applications, to making games, to even programming robots! You could program only JavaScript for years and still learn something new every day, which is what makes programming so much fun! Do you teach cool new JavaScript features like ES6? I did it for the kids: To teach properly—especially with kids—it is super important to introduce only one concept at a time.

When experienced JavaScripters look at ES6 , we think how wonderfully expressive it is. But we overlook the concepts that it pretties up. Take arrow functions for example.

3D Game Programming for Kids, Second Edition: Create Interactive Worlds with JavaScript

They are wonderful little space savers for returning simple values from functions. But using them begs the question of what a function is, what a return statement is, what a bare function is, etc. It is better to avoid concept overload by sticking with with plain-old but still powerful named functions. And sure, the book could have taught the traditional approach first, then introduced cool ES6 features. Help Your Kids with Computer Coding: Learn to spin, scratch and produce your own mixes!

Star Wars Coding Projects: Packed with Scratch Coding Activities. Code a Space Adventure Game! Coding iPhone Apps for Kids: A Playful Introduction to Swift. So, You Want to Be a Coder?: Be What You Want. A Playful Introduction to Programming. Get to Know Us. English Choose a language for shopping. Amazon Music Stream millions of songs.

Introducing Kids to Java Programming Using Minecraft | The Java Source

Amazon Advertising Find, attract, and engage customers. Amazon Drive Cloud storage from Amazon.

Alexa Actionable Analytics for the Web. AmazonGlobal Ship Orders Internationally. Amazon Inspire Digital Educational Resources. Amazon Rapids Fun stories for kids on the go.

• Geometry of Principal Sheaves: 578 (Mathematics and Its Applications)
• Führung in Krisensituationen. Theoretische Ansatzpunkte und Implikationen für die Praxis (German Edition)
• Introduction to Soil Mechanics
• The Night We Kissed (Masquerade)
• Law and War (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought)
• In the Bedroom with the Rope 5: Freed
• The Essentials of Prayer and Power through Prayer (Brighton Christian Classic Series Book 5)