Processing (programming language)

Processing

Paradigm	object-oriented
Designed by	Casey Reas, Benjamin Fry
First appeared	2001; 16 years ago (2001)
Stable release	3.3 / February 12, 2017; 28 days ago (2017-02-12)
Typing discipline	strong
OS	Cross-platform
License	GPL, LGPL
Filename extensions	.pde
Website	processing.org
Influenced by
Design By Numbers, Java, Logo, OpenGL, PostScript, C

Processing Software IDE

A screenshot of the Processing IDE
Stable release	3.2.3 / November 7, 2016; 4 months ago (2016-11-07)
Written in	Java, GLSL, JavaScript
Operating system	Cross-platform
Type	Integrated development environment
Website	processing.org

Processing is an open source computer programming language and integrated development environment (IDE) built for the electronic arts, new media art, and visual design communities with the purpose of teaching the fundamentals of computer programming in a visual context, and to serve as the foundation for electronic sketchbooks.

The project was initiated in 2001 by Casey Reas and Benjamin Fry, both formerly of the Aesthetics and Computation Group at the MIT Media Lab. In 2012, they started the Processing Foundation along with Daniel Shiffman, who joined as a third project lead.

One of the aims of Processing is to allow non-programmers to start computer programming aided by visual feedback. The Processing language builds on the Java language, but uses a simplified syntax and a graphics user interface.

Processing includes a sketchbook, a minimal alternative to an integrated development environment (IDE) for organizing projects.

Every Processing sketch is actually a subclass of the PApplet Java class which implements most of the Processing language's features.

When programming in Processing, all additional classes defined will be treated as inner classes when the code is translated into pure Java before compiling. This means that the use of static variables and methods in classes is prohibited unless you explicitly tell Processing that you want to code in pure Java mode.