The content of this page in no way reflects the opinions,
standards, or policy of the
United States Air Force Academy
or the United States government.
RAPTOR is a flowchart-based programming environment, designed specifically to help students visualize their algorithms and avoid syntactic baggage. RAPTOR programs are created visually and executed visually by tracing the execution through the flowchart. Required syntax is kept to a minimum. Students prefer using flowcharts to express their algorithms, and are more successful creating algorithms using RAPTOR than using a traditional language or writing flowcharts without RAPTOR.
Click here to see a picture of RAPTOR. For a paper describing the use of RAPTOR in a general education course, click here.
Did you know RAPTOR has modes? By default, you start in Novice mode. Novice mode has a single global namespace for variables. Intermediate mode allows you to create procedures that have their own scope (introducing the notion of parameter passing). Object-Oriented mode is new (in the Summer 2009 version)
Where/how are you using RAPTOR? I keep a list of what schools and universities are using RAPTOR and for what class. This helps me plan future advancements. Please email me and let me know.
SUMMER 2009 VERSION
You can get the Summer 2009 version (4.0) of RAPTOR from here (right-click and choose "save target as"). NOTE: requires .NET 2.0 Framework and also may fail because of a bug in the Microsoft.Ink DLL. Files generated in this version (except those in OO mode) can be opened with the Summer 2007 version.
NEW FEATURES: Added object-oriented mode. Fixed minor threading and RAPTORGraph issues.
If it crashes right away with a bug box that has "microsoft.ink" in it, then
install the Ink SDK
http://download.microsoft.com/
SUMMER 2008 VERSION-- posted 24 June 2008 (24 May version was missing code generators)
You can get the Summer 2008 version (3.9) of RAPTOR from here (right-click and choose "save target as"). NOTE: requires .NET 2.0 Framework and also may fail because of a bug in the Microsoft.Ink DLL. Files generated in this version can be opened with the Summer 2007 version.
NEW FEATURES: Works on Vista 64 bit. RAPTORGraph entirely rewritten in managed code. Can use back end of tablet pen as ink eraser. Prints symbol count when flowchart complete.
SUMMER 2007 VERSION
The Summer 2007 version (3.8) of RAPTOR is no longer distributed. Please use the Summer 2008 version. NOTE: requires .NET 2.0 Framework and also may fail because of a bug in the Microsoft.Ink DLL (fix available at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/900722) -- files generated in the this version can NOT be opened with the Fall 2006 version. This version will open files from the previous version, but once they are saved, they will no longer be able to be read by the Fall 2006 version.
NEW FEATURES in version 3.7: Use tablet "ink" to annotate flowcharts. Arrays can now contain strings as well as numbers. Input from tab-separated files now supported.
NEW FEATURES in version 3.6: Generation of Ada, C#, C++ and Java stub code, generation of standalone executables, procedures with parameters (intermediate mode only).
FALL 2006 VERSION
Fall 2006 version (3.5) can still be downloaded here. (Requires .NET Framework 2.0)
RAPTOR is freely distributed as a service to the CS education community. RAPTOR was originally developed by and for the US Air Force Academy, Department of Computer Science, but its use has spread and RAPTOR is now used for CS education in over 10 countries on at least 4 continents.
RAPTOR is free software, but donations to support web hosting, etc. are welcome!
Comments, suggestions, and bug reports are welcome. If you have a comment, suggestion or bug report, send an email to Martin Carlisle.
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