Guido van Robot For Mac

Guido van Robot, or GvR for short, is a programming language and free software application designed to introduce beginners to the fundamentals of programming.

GvR runs on Mac OS X, Windows, and GNU/Linux, in a variety of languages! It's great in both the classroom and the home as a way of introducing people to the basic concepts of programming.

Guido van Robot is a minimalistic programming language providing just enough syntax to help students learn the concepts of sequencing, conditional branching, looping and procedural abstraction.

Its biggest strength is that it permits this learning in an environment that combines the thrill of problem-solving with instant visual feedback. In short, it is an interactive, introductory programming language that is excellent for learning the basic concepts of programming, applicable in any high-level language. Best of all, it's a whole lot of fun, too!

At this point, you are probably asking yourself, What is GvR, specifically? The gist of it is that it is a robot represented by a triangle on the screen that moves around in a world made up of streets and avenues, walls and beepers, which Guido can collect or set. His actions are completely guided by a program written by the user.

One other item of interest about GvR is that it is a student-created project. GvR was initially written by students at Yorktown High School in Arlington, Virginia, with the help of professional programmers serving as mentors. You can navigate to the History page to learn more about this part of the project.