1) Opening scratch and its interface

Opening scratch and its interface

Scratch is a visual programming tool which can used to create interactive stories, animations and games.

Opening Scratch

Open scratch application by clicking on scratch icon in the desktop. Incase if the scratch icon is not found in the desktop then search for scratch application in the search bar and then click on the scratch logo from the search results.

The following window will appear:

This is scratch application!

Scratch Interface

This is scratch applications opening interface

The character in scratch animation is called as sprite. By default, when the scratch application opens, the cat sprite appears as selected.

1. Blocks Palette: This has two division. The upper part contains the categories of programming which act on sprite. Clicking on any of these category (Motion, Control, Looks etc) displays the possible blocks for  programming your sprite in that category.

2. Current Sprite Information: Displays the current state of sprite.

Coordinate x,y give the location of the sprite.

Direction: Gives the direction in which the sprite will move. For example, direction 90 indicates sprite will move horizontally. Direction 0 will make the sprite move vertically. Direction can be changed for clicking and rotating the sprite image.

3. Stage: This is the place where your scenes, stories and animations results are seen. You can customize the stage area by clicking on the various modes as shown in the image.

4. Sprite List: Contains the list of all the sprites for your stage. You can select any one of them and start working .

The above image shows Sprite1 is currently selected. You can also select a new sprite from star button options on top of sprite list. It has the three options : Create new sprite, Select sprite from file and Select a random sprite

5. Script Area: This is the location to place your script for any chosen sprite. Drag and drop blocks from the Blocks Palette to Script Area. Stack them one after another to make an instruction set. Double click on script block to run it.

6. Costumes : Select costumes tabs to see and edit sprite's costume. You can edit, copy or delete any costume from here. You can also create a new costume or import it from some other location. Scratch can recognize many different image formats: JPG, GIF, BMP, and PNG

7. Sounds: Select sound tab to listen and edit sound of your sprite. You can play, pause or delete the sound of your sprite. You can also record a sound for your sprite or import it from any other location. Scratch can read mp3 and uncompressed WAV, AIF, and AU files.

8. Toolbar: Use toolbar to copy delete grow or shrink any sprite. Just select the tool and click on the sprite image.

9. Green Flag and Red Stop Button: Green flag provides a convenient way to start script at the same time. Red stop button is used to stop the script.

10. Menu Bar: Menu bar can be used to perform basic tasks like creating or opening new file, saving file, undelete etc. Other features include:

• Language support: Allows you to change the language of the application.
• Import Project: Get sprite and background data from another project.
• Start Single Stepping: Scratch program runs one step at a time highlighting each step in script area. This feature is useful in finding bugs and helping new programmers understand the flow of a program.
• Help Page: Can be used to get help from internet.