LOGO Programming 

Turtle Basics

The turtle looks like a little triangle in the middle of the screen.
The head shows you which direction he is facing. When the turtle
moves he draws a line behind him.

You can turn the turtle by telling him to turn

RIGHT or LEFT. This pictures shows how to
make the turtle turn in different directions.
Instead of typing out RIGHT and LEFT I use the
smaller words RT and LT, which mean the same
thing to the turtle.

FD 100

To get the turtle to draw a line, just tell him to move FORWARD a number of
steps (turtles take small steps, so you need to tell him to move FORWARD many
steps, like 100, to get him to move enough to see). I like to use the smaller word
FD instead of typing FORWARD. Both work the same way.
To get the turtle to draw a
shape, like a square, you can
give him the instructions he
needs to "walk" around the
shape of a square.

Comments or questions? Send me mail.

Copyright © 1996, Michael C. Koss.
  
Last revised: February 25, 1996

Basic Commands
Command What it does
FD 100 Move the turtle forward 100 steps.
RT 90 Turn the turtle to the right 90º.
LT 90 Turn the turtle to the left 90º.
BK 100 Move the turtle backwards 100 steps.
PU Pick the turtle's pen up off the paper.
PD Put the turtles pen back down on the paper.
CS Clear the screen and start over.
HT Hide the turtle (triangle).
ST Show the turtle (triangle).
REPEAT 3 [...] Repeat the commands 3 times.

Polygons
One of the easiest things to do in logo is use the turtle to draw various polygons. You
can notice that in order to draw a closed polygon, the turtle has to walk around the
edges, eventually turning through 360 degrees before coming back home. Since the
turtle makes N turns for an N-sided polygon, the size of each turn in 360/N degrees.

Triangle (3 sides)
Turtle Turns 120º
REPEAT 3 [FD 100 RT 120]

Square (4 sides)
Turtle Turns 90º
REPEAT 4 [FD 100 RT 90]

Pentagon (5 sides)
Turtle Turns 72º
REPEAT 5 [FD 100 RT 72]

Hexagon (6 sides)
Turtle Turns 60º
REPEAT 6 [FD 100 RT 60]

Septagon (7 sides)
Turtle Turns 51º
REPEAT 7 [FD 100 RT 51]

Octagon (8 sides)
Turtle Turns 45º
REPEAT 8 [FD 100 RT 45]
Draw the shape in the right box that goes with the turtle instructions in the
left box.
FD 100
RT 90
FD 100
RT 90
FD 100
RT 90
FD 100
RT 90

FD 100
RT 120
FD 100
RT 120
FD 100
RT 120

REPEAT 8 [FD 100 RT 135]

FD 100
BK 50
RT 90
FD 50
LT 90
FD 50
BK 100
PU
RT 90
FD 25
LT 90
 PD
FD 50
PU
FD 10
PD
FD 5
HT

Fun with Repeat

You can have fun with the REPEAT command just by changing three numbers!

Which three numbers make your favorite drawing?

CS REPEAT __ [FD ___ RT ___]

Try this! What does it draw?

CS REPEAT 100 [FD 10 RT REPCOUNT]

Make Your Own Words

One of the coolest things about Logo is that you can make your own words that
do whatever you want them to do. When you make a word, you can use it in
other commands and programs just as if it was part of Logo to begin with.

What if we want to draw a lot of squares. Each time we have to type in:

REPEAT 4 [FD 100 RT 90]

That's not a whole lot of typing, but wouldn't it be nice if we could just type:

SQUARE

You can teach LOGO what a "SQUARE" is like this:

TO SQUARE
    REPEAT 4 [FD 100 RT 90]
END

Now we can use our new word to make cool new programs. Can you figure out
what this does?

REPEAT 36 [SQUARE RT 10]

Words that Use Numbers

The words we know in LOGO can do something different if you type different
numbers after them. FD 100 draws a line with 100 steps in it, and FD 50 draws
a line with only 50 steps in it.

We can make our new words use numbers too. Let's change our SQUARE word
to draw squares of different sizes:

TO SQUARE :SIZE
    REPEAT 4 [FD :SIZE RT 90]
END

Now you can tell logo to:

SQUARE 50

or

SQUARE 100

Here's another cool program. What does it do?

REPEAT 100 [SQUARE REPCOUNT RT 10]

Draw the shape in the right box that goes with the turtle instructions in the
left box.
TO TRI :SIZE
REPEAT 3 [FD :SIZE RT 120]
END
 TO HEXTRI :SIZE
REPEAT 6 [TRI :SIZE RT 60]
END

TO POLY :SIDES
REPEAT :SIDES [FD 50 RT 360/:SIDES]
END

to star :sides
make "ang 360/:sides
repeat :sides [FD 50 RT 2*:ANG FD 50 LT :ANG]
end

Making Music with Logo

You can play music in the same way that you make drawings using Logo programs. In
order to make it easier to use, I've written a helper program called "player.lgo". You
need to load this file before using the commands in this lesson. Your computer needs
to have a sound card or MIDI instrument attached in order to use this program.

You can type in notes, and logo will play them in the same order you type them in:
do re mi fa sol fa mi re do

This makes a sound like a piano, but you can also make sounds like different
instruments:

banjo high do re mi fa sol fa mi re do

You can make notes that play fast or slow:

eighth do re mi
quarter do re mi
half do re mi
whole do re mi

You can play really low notes or really high notes:

dinosaur do re mi
low do re mi
middle do re mi
high do re mi

How to "Roll the Dice"

It's really fun to see if you can get the Turtle to do what you want it to do, but it's also
fun to have the turtle "make up his own mind". There is a word in logo (RANDOM)
that will pick a number for you. You can use RANDOM anyplace you need to use a
number in your program. This program prints random numbers between 0 and 11.

REPEAT 20 [PRINT RANDOM 12]

Let's use RANDOM to draw lines all over the screen:

TO LINES
    REPEAT 100 [SETXY RANDOM 200 RANDOM 200]
END

We can also make "random" music:

TO SONG
    REPEAT 24 [NOTE RANDOM 12]
END
We can even make a "picture" of the music:

TO SONG2
    REPEAT 24 [PLAYDRAW RANDOM 12 REPCOUNT]
END

TO PLAYDRAW :NOTE :WHERE

    SETXY :WHERE*12 :NOTE*12 
    NOTE :NOTE
END

Here are some cool new words. What do they do?

to sheep
    quarter mi re do re mi mi half mi
    quarter re re half re
    quarter mi sol half sol
    quarter mi re do re mi mi mi mi
    re re mi re whole do
end

to sample
    reset
    repeat 128 [instrument repcount
    quarter do re mi fa whole sol]
end

piano sheep
high banjo sheep
high flute sheep
Pumpkin

The text of this program can be downloaded from here: pumpkin.lgo.  Right click on

the link and select Save Target As... to save it to your machine.  You can then use the
File/Load menu command in MSWLogo to load the file.  Once you do that, type
"pumpkin 200" in the command window to see it draw on screen.

; Fillpoly
;
; Creates a polygon filled in with a color. The :size is the approximate
; diameter. :color is an RGB list. The polygon is created about the turtle
; at its center.
;
to fillpoly :sides :size :color
poly :sides :size
setfloodcolor :color
fill
end

; Draws the head of the Pumpkin (i.e., the orange circle)

to head :size
fillpoly 50 :size [255 127 0]
end

; Draws the mouth of the pumpkin - turtle starts in the middle

to mouth :size
local "dzMouth
local "ptSave
make "dzMouth :size/8
make "ptSave pos

pd
lt 45 fd :dzMouth
lt 90 fd :dzMouth
rt 90 fd :dzMouth
rt 45
pu setpos :ptSave pd
rt 45 fd :dzMouth
rt 90 fd :dzMouth
lt 90 fd :dzMouth
lt 45
pu setpos :ptSave
end

; A generic move function - always picks up the pen.

; x and y are relative to the current heading of the turtle.
to move :dx :dy
pu fd :dy rt 90 fd :dx lt 90
end

; A Generic polygon drawing functions. The turtle is placed in the middle

; of the polygon. The :size is the approximate diameter of the polygon.
to poly :sides :size
local "step
make "step 3.14*:size/:sides
pu
bk :size/2 lt 90 bk :step/2
pd
repeat :sides [fd :step rt 360/:sides]
pu
fd :step/2 rt 90 fd :size/2
end

; Draws a pumpkin of a given diameter.

to pumpkin :size
local "dxEye
local "dyEye
local "dyMouth
local "dzMouth
local "ptCenter
make "dxEye :size/5
make "dyEye :size/8
make "dyMouth :size/3
make "dzMouth :size/8
make "ptCenter pos

setpensize [5 5]

head :size
tri :size

move -:dxEye :dyEye rt 180

tri :size
move -2*:dxEye 0
tri :size

pu setpos :ptCenter
fd :dyMouth rt 180
mouth :size

pu setpos :ptCenter
end

; A cool array of 7 pumpkins.

to pumpkins
pumpkin 200
repeat 6 [fd 210 pumpkin 200 bk 210 rt 60]
ht
end

; Draws triangular eyes and nose dimensioned for the :size'd pumpkin head.
to tri :size
fillpoly 3 :size/6 [0 0 0]
end

Recursive Trees

You can make some nifty pictures of tree by using recursion.

to tree :size
  if :size < 5 [stop]
  fd :size
  lt 30 tree :size*.7
  rt 60 tree :size*.7
  lt 30 bk :size
end

to rtree :size
  if :size < 5 [stop]
  fd :size
  lt 30 rtree :size*(((random 5)+5)/10)
  rt 60 rtree :size*(((random 5)+5)/10)
  lt 30 bk :size
end

Towers of Hanoi

The Towers of Hanoi puzzle may be familiar to you. It is a game of 3 pegs and a
number of disks. Each disk has a different size. The puzzle starts with all the disks on
one peg, with the largest disks on the bottom. The problem is to move the disks from
the first peg to the last peg without ever placing a larger disk on top of a smaller one.

A simple program to solve this problem is this one. It merely prints the "moves" to be
made.

to move :from :to

(print "Move "disk "on "peg :from "to "peg :to ".)
end

to tower :disks :from :to :using

if :disks = 1 [move :from :to stop]
tower :disks-1 :from :using :to
move :from :to
tower :disks-1 :using :to :from
end

A more complex version (with some satisfying graphics displaying an animation of all
the moves - type "towers 10" to start the demo...you can turn Trace on to slow down
the program to see the individual moves if the program is running too swiftly).
to drawdisk :disk :peg :height :fDraw
pu
setxy :peg*150-300 :height*10
ifelse :fDraw [penpaint] [penerase]
bk :disk*5
fd :disk*10
end

to move :from :to

make "moves :moves + 1
; (print :moves ". "Move "disk "on "peg :from "to "peg :to ".)

make "height (item :from :stacks)

make "disk (item :height (item :from :pegs))
setitem :height (item :from :pegs) ".
setitem :from :stacks (item :from :stacks)-1
drawdisk :disk :from :height "false

make "height (item :to :stacks)+1

setitem :to :stacks :height
setitem :height (item :to :pegs) :disk
drawdisk :disk :to :height "true

; show :stacks
; show :pegs
end

to start :disks
cs
ht
make "moves 0
rt 90
setpensize [5 5]
make "stacks (array 3)
setitem 1 :stacks :disks
setitem 2 :stacks 0
setitem 3 :stacks 0

make "pegs (array 3)

repeat 3 [setitem repcount :pegs (array :disks)]
make "firstPeg (item 1 :pegs)
repeat :disks [setitem repcount :firstPeg :disks-repcount+1]
repeat :disks [drawdisk :disks-repcount+1 1 repcount "true]
end

to tower :disks :from :to :using

if :disks = 1 [move :from :to stop]
tower :disks-1 :from :using :to
move :from :to
tower :disks-1 :using :to :from
end

to towers :disks
start :disks
tower :disks 1 3 2
end