Processing is a programming language I discovered a few months ago - it’s a domain-specific language meant to introduce and teach non-programmers the basics of computer programming, via a visual context. It has been aimed at artists and design groups, but despite offering a very low barrier of entry to graphic programming, I think that the majority of users come from a technical background (or perhaps technical/design).

The inimitable John Resig of jQuery fame, has by some super-human feat, managed to port Processing to JavaScript, calling it Processing.js.

Here’s a pretty example to look at if you’re in Firefox/Webkit browser. Watch out for major CPU use (heaven forbid CPU’s are used for processing!).

Shortly after this ridiculousness, I discovered Obsessing.org, which is a web-based IDE and runtime environment for Processing.js. The editing seems a bit um, poor - I couldn’t get copy/paste to work - but nevertheless, this is awesome.