Scratch Jr for Desktop - Open Source Community Port

About

A community open source port of a well-loved early educational programming tool.

We are very excited about the use of Scratch Jr in the classroom, especially for children in early school years. When we discovered the schools in our area did not have access to tablets, we decided to turn the tablet app into a full fledged desktop app. In order to do this, we have taken the original code recompiled it for Mac and Windows.

While we have chatted to the official Scratch team, they have asked us to let you know this important disclaimer about this experimental version:
Scratch and ScratchJr are trademarks of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which does not sponsor, endorse, or authorize this content. See scratchjr.org for more information.

Downloads


Download the latest install to your Mac or Windows computer.
For tablets, please see the official build.

Mac (Beta 1.3.2)

Download a DMG to install Scratch JR to your Mac.
By downloading this software, you agree to the terms and conditions of the MIT license.

Windows (Beta 1.3.2)

Download a setup EXE to install Scratch JR to your PC.
By downloading this software, you agree to the terms and conditions of the MIT license. (About Windows 10 Smart Screen: Since this app is unsigned, you will need to click 'More Info' and 'Run anyway' to install.)

The nitty gritty


Same app, new platform.

To port to the desktop, a small database and filesystem layer was rewritten, as well as access to video and sound.

This was accomplished using Electron for the app hosting, the original html source of ScratchJR and SQL.js for the project database. Electron is like having your own chrome browser to run one html webpage. And in our case, that webpage is ScratchJR.


Offline mode

Once installed, this app should not require an internet connection to work.


Deleting stuff (press and hold mouse)

Because this is a tablet app, there is no right click support. In order to delete stuff you need to click and hold the left mouse button until everything wiggles. When you get a red X, click this to remove characters and projects.


Where's the cat?

Sadly, the cat is not allowed to make an official appearance in our app but has sent along all of his friends. Everything (else) you know and love about Scratch Jr on the tablet is there.


Getting Started with your Class

Scratch Jr has a set of programming worksheets your class can follow.


Where's the data?

All projects are stored locally on the machine inside of a file (which happens to be a sql lite database.) Inside your documents/ScratchJR folder, there will be a scratchjr.sqllite file.


Reloading saved projects

For classroom use, sometimes it is handy to pre-configure a set of projects. All of the projects all save into the same Documents/ScratchJR/scratchjr.sqllite file. To set up projects beforehand, you can make a backup copy of this file.

Here's how.
  • Make starter projects for your class - set up Scratch Jr with the projects you want everyone to use.
  • Open up the ScratchJR folder inside of Documents
  • Copy the scratchjr.sqllite file to scratchjr.sqllite.restore
  • Re-open ScratchJR for desktop.
After completing, there will be a menu option for restoring the projects. This will reset all the projects back to a clean copy of your projects. This is handy for a shared classroom setting where you don't wish to save the work between students.


Thanks

Thank you to the official Scratch Jr team and their supporters. In addition, thank you to the folks working on Electron, ElectronForge, and Sql.js. Thank you to AppVeyor and Travis CL for contributing free Mac, Windows and Linux builds.

Finally, a special thank you to ScopeIT Education for donating their technical expertise to this project.
For more exciting projects by this author, see:

Support

Note we are working on a volunteer basis and only limited support is available.

Having problems? Here's what to do.