Design By Numbers is a book and a programming language that you can experiment with at this site. It is a simple language documented in Maeda’s book. The language is to introduce graphic designers to programming (designing by numbers!)
The book is a tutorial on using Design By Numbers, the programming environment John Maeda has created for graphic designers. I was dissappointed in the book – I thought there would be more reflection on graphic design by numbers (computation.) Instead it is an expensive how to book on a relatively useless programming language. Proce55ing seems more promising.