Processing A04/P02

Having left the pursuit of an IT degree at Purdue and making my way to IU to study audio, it only seemed natural to continue my interest with a minor in Informatics. As such, there is a natural progression of classes that must be taken for one to achieve said minor. Over the course of my four semesters at IU I have taken a number of classes ranging from the very basics of IT and databases, to C programming. Now in the fifth semester I am enrolled in I211, progamming in the Processing environment. Not knowing anything about the language, I was very excited at the challenges this would bring.

Processing itself feels like a hodgepodge of different languages. It is described by many as Java-lite, and I’ve found much of the syntax to be very similar to C. The main intent of the language is for visualization of a concept: audio, textual, or abstract. A number of examples can be found on Vimeo here. While I’m only on the ground floor of the language, I’m finding the challenge of manipulating shapes and variables and functions to do exactly what it is I want to be very enjoyable. Below I’ve linked the Java applet and source code for my most recent assignment. The goal was to create some kind of visualization using text. I chose to display the most used keywords from Steve Jobs’ 2007 Macworld keynote address. While the program is simple in operation, it demonstrates a number of essential concepts in using the Processing language.