Customer Reviews

Karel the Robot: Gentle Introduction to the Art of Programming

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am a teacher in Universidade Sao Francisco (Itatiba, SP, Brazil), working with Computer Cience undergraduate studants. "Karel, the Robot" is the book we were looking for to introduce programming concepts. Once you started, it is dificult to stop reading: the concepts are presented in a clear and natural manner, from the basic ones to more advanced techniques. All the teachers that take a look in the book share the same opinions: the ideas behind Karel are powerfull and can help the studants to understand the foundations of programming. The primitives, the language and also the interface can easily be adapted to other languages and environments, making this book an exceptional one.

Its concepts are amazing to any programmer but, widely known, I learned just as much from my Instructor in my post-secondary class then I did in this book. The Karel code also gets a little boring. However, to be a good programmer you need to know these concepts through and through, so I do find it useful as an introduction to programming. I don't recommend it to anyone who knows their own logical style well already; it will be useless to you.

Tengo 10 años enseñando programación y gracias a Karel ahora mis alumnos entienden la programación más facilmente. Lo que facilita el aprendizaje de lenguajes más avanzados.
Es muy importante contar con el software para poder llevar a la práctica los conceptos, este es libre de costo si se utiliza en la Universidad, funciona muy bien y sin problemas en cualquier máquina.
Adicionalmente sugiero el diseñar previamente los mundos en el programa para que los alumnos trabajen solo en la programación y no en el diseño y asi no perder el objetivo de Karel.

I needed this for school, it was the required reading. Its good for beginning computer programming, dont expect much more than that.

The presentation of the concepts of programming and the building of layers of complexity was handled in a competent and easily read manner. However, the software simulator is completely out of date and does not run under windows 98. For beginning programming students with little or no other computer experience, this would be a good starting point...IF the software worked.

This book is very well written and I highly recommend it. It is interesting to read, and very comprehensive. Richard Pattis is my 15-127 professor. (I hope I get an A on the Mastery! ) Thanks.