groceryfiend's messages

For Lightbot:

Functions are a set of instructions that are usually (though not necessarily) repeated in a program. In this game, suppose you had to jump up a flight of 4 stairs and turn each step blue. You could program it to jump-light-jump-light-jump-light-jump-light (8 commands in the main method.) Alternatively, you could program F1 to be jump-light, then program the main method as F1-F1-F1-F1. The game runs F1 (jump-light), returns to the main method for the next step, runs the function again, etc. That would be 6 total commands. Another alternative would be to program F1 to be jump-light-jump-light, then the main method would be F1-F1. Still 6 commands total. When you replace the main commands with functions, you want to keep an eye on whether your function is actually benefitting you in the end (what seems like a good idea sometimes just causes more problems in the end…) Hope that helps.