This program simulates the Zen garden experience. Whether you discover the true meaning of Zen is up to you.

Place stones and rake sand in a pattern meaningful (or meaningless to find true Zen) to you.

The Road to Enlightenment

Just as Zen philosophy is open to all who would open their minds to its radical teachings, so too is the Zen Garden an open source application. See here for details of how to peruse the source of the Zen Garden application and possibly add some koans of your own. The Zen Garden application should be made available on as many computing platforms as possible.

This brings us to another paradox: Just as the fruits of a Zen gardener's labours are rapidly erased when perfection is reached; similarly, we try to adhere to the principles of Zen by working tirelessly to produce a work of art which is given away for free.

How Is It Done?

By holding down a key while moving the mouse pointer (or dragging your PDA stylus) over the garden surface, you can change the angle of the rake. Release a key and any further movement translates into rake marks on the sand. A stone can be dropped through the Drop Stone menu item. It is not easy to produce a neat pattern. To produce a pattern that leads you to Zen enlightenment is entirely up to you.

This page illustrates the current Zen garden application as a Java applet. If your browser does not support Java you will be directed to the appropriate download page.

Bandwidth kindly donated by Source Forge.