The goal of this book is to explain elementary programming concepts such as loops, abstractions, composition, and conditionals to novices of all ages. It teaches the core programming concepts based on simple problems, involving the manipulation of robots or "turtles" as frequently seen in school learning environments. The ideal reader wants to have fun programming. And the reader does not have to be fluent in any programming language before they pick up this book.

The chapters of this book are relatively small. The idea is that each chapter can be turned into a one or two hour lab session. This book creates a path to teach object-oriented programming and promote the encapsulation of data, but most readers will simply appreciate the delightful sequence of fun and easy-to-do exercises with a robot/turtle.

About author

STÉPHANE DUCASSE obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis and his
habilitation at the University of Paris 6. He was recipient of the SNF 2002 Professeur Boursier
Award. He is now Professor at the University of Berne and the Université of Savoie.
Stéphane’s fields of interests are design of reflective systems, object-oriented languages
design, composition of software components, design and implementation of applications,
reengineering of object-oriented applications, and teaching novices. He is the main developer
of the Moose reengineering environment. He loves programming in Smalltalk and is the president
of the European Smalltalk User Group.

Stéphane has written several books in French and English: La programmation: une
approche fonctionnelle et recursive en Scheme (Eyrolles 96), Squeak (Eyrolles 2001), and
Object-Oriented Reengineering Patterns (MKP 2002).

If you want to discover why Stéphane is having fun with Squeak and actively participating
in its development, check out http://www.squeak.org/. Check out http://smallwiki.unibe.ch/
botsinc/ for the web site of this book.