ohjelmoijaan

ohjelmoijaan is a free and open‑source integrated development environment (IDE) created in Finland in 2019 by a consortium of university computer science departments. It is designed primarily for educational use, providing a lightweight editor, visual debugging tools, and an integrated version‑control console that supports Git and Subversion. The name is derived from the Finnish word “ohjelmoija”, meaning programmer, with the suffix “‑aan” indicating “to/for” the target audience. It is written in Java and runs on Windows, macOS, Linux, and on the Web via a native‑image bundle.

The core features of ohjelmoijaan include a context‑aware code completion engine, a built‑in package manager for popular libraries such as JUnit, and an interactive “sandbox” mode where users can experiment with snippets without affecting the main project. The IDE also offers plug‑in support, allowing extensions for languages other than Java, most notably Kotlin and Python, and for continuous integration pipelines. A key design principle is accessibility; the UI is optimized for low‑resolution displays and includes a high‑contrast mode for visually impaired users.

Since its release, ohjelmoijaan has been adopted by over 300 secondary schools in Finland for STEM curricula and by several university introductory courses. The community around it hosts an annual international conference, currently called the Ohjelmoijaan Summit, where educators and developers share best practices and new extensions. Open‑source contributors from outside Finland have added support for cloud IDE sessions, enabling remote collaboration on coding projects.