Programmer Follows Father’s Key Strokes

Inspired by his father, sophomore Mark Lindblad uses computer coding as a means of social service.

Lindblad’s father is a software programmer who creates NoSQL databases. “He’s always programming every time I see him, so I think that’s probably had an influence on me since I was really young. He’s always on the computer,” Lindblad said. “I’d want to follow in his footsteps and come up with an application that can help people.”

One of Lindblad’s most recent projects was a website for his Boy Scout troop to help them keep up to date with troop information. It was made with the programming languages JavaScript and HTML.

Lindblad has made coding an integral part of his life. “I don’t play video games. I do that [coding] instead,” he explained.

Linblad began coding when he was in 5th grade. On a platform called Roblox, which uses the programming language Lua, he began making games. He said, “Lua is a good programming language for people who are interested in learning to code for the first time. When you have errors it’s really nice, it helps to figure out what they are. And it isn’t too complex.”

In 1 of the 1st games he coded, the player’s avatar is trapped in a waffle factory and must go around the factory eating waffles to stave off hunger. Lindblad said the game was “pretty easy to code” and he enjoyed manipulating the sounds.

Carol Paymer, Lindblad’s Intro to Computer Programming teacher, said that Lindblad’s creativity, tenacity, and independence make him a great programmer. “Mark is interesting and creative and he does great things with his code,” Paymer said.

Paymer was impressed by Lindblad’s 1st major assignment, which used the programming language Scratch. For the assignment, Lindblad created a shooting game. “It was really elaborate and had lots of plot and it was amazing,” Paymer said. “I didn’t really know Mark before he started this class, but [for] our very first project, which was the Scratch project, everybody’s doing these little, itty-bitty projects, and his was amazing. And I knew I had something special on my hands.”

“He’s going to be a great programmer,” Paymer added.