Pq bamboo header

Bamboo

Official page: https://github.com/pandaqi/pq-bamboo
Official page for this project
(Developer) Diary: https://pandaqi.com/blog/news-and-updates/bamboo-my-own-coding-language/
A diary about the process of creating this project

Bamboo (or Pandaqi Bamboo) is my own coding language. I developed it to use in my programming tutorials, especially the introductory Learn to Code.

Why?

  • There aren’t many existing languages that you can easily execute right in the browser. And I didn’t want to tell readers to install or setup something (complicated)
  • The languages I was left with, contained too many syntax or concepts to explain to complete beginners
  • So I decided to create my own simple language on top of JavaScript.

The language was supposed to …

  • Read just like simple English sentences
  • Only support what’s absolutely needed
  • Both write, syntax highlight and execute (fast) inside your browser
  • Nudge people towards good coding habits (by simply not allowing the bad habits)

This turned into a huge journey into how programming languages work and how to create your own. The end result? Bamboo.

I’m very proud of it. I also realize it’s a very small and limited language, with an implementation full of inefficient code. Because, well, it was the first programming language I ever created :)

But it suits its purpose. It allowed me to make that course very interactive, because it’s full of small examples you can immediately change and play with. It also allowed me to teach coding without introducing complicated or overwhelming symbols.

You can read a summary of the full journey in my Bamboo devlog.

ongoing professional own project