Grasping the general syntax of any language can take effort. Which is why an interactive environment in which you can try out syntax at will can serve to enhance your learning experience. In this post Arjan Blokzijl presents a few tips and tricks on Scala's interactive environment or REPL as they are often called. Read Arjan Blokzijl's post 'Scala REPL tips and tricks': http://blog.xebia.com/2009/07/19/scala-repl-tips-and-tricks-trunk-only/