PPA4C is a program to practice using pseudocode (informal language describing a program in English) to write C programs. The exercises included with PPA4C use an easy multiple-choice format and include reference background material for each topic to help study or review various topics in C programming.
Pseudocode is an informal programming language used to describe a program or algorithm, usually written in a natural language (e.g. English) that a human programmer understands. Individual lines of pseudocode can represent the same actions as lines of code in an actual programming language, but psuedocode is much easier for the programmer to understand. Pseudocode is typically used as a tool by programmers when designing an algorithm or implementation prior to writing it in an actual programming language. Courses involving programming also use pseudocode to describe programs since it does not require proficiency in a specific programming language. Pseudocode use is widespread; a programmer should be comfortable with understanding others' pseudocode, as well as be able to write good pseudocode when documenting their own programs, regardless of the programming language used.
The purpose of PPA4C is to help a student learn or review C programming by providing practice translating short pseudocode program descriptions into C, for which there does not appear to be an existing solution. PPA4C includes exercises for a variety of important topics in C programming. PPA4C was written in Java using Eclipse, and uses the Swing toolkit for the user interface. PPA4C runs on computers with Java Runtime Environment (e.g. Windows, OS X).
