The language is named after Karel Čapek, a Czech writer who introduced the word robot in his play R.U.R.

Karel can also perform boolean queries about his immediate environment, asking whether there is a beeper where he is standing, whether there are barriers next to him, and about the direction he is facing.

This teaching project provides a cross-platform GUI for Karel experiments including single-stepping and spoken output.

Robot Emil offers a large palette of objects that can be placed to depict walls, windows (transparency), water and grass.

The author states that the program is free for use by schools, students and children.

Similar to the original language, this implementation features Karel in a grid world.

Programmers use and build upon Karel's simple vocabulary of commands to accomplish programming tasks.