SWXW 2008

I have a friend who lives in Austin now, so I thought it was a great time to expand my job search to somewhere a bit cooler. And do some more parent-funded networking. SXSW is so crazy. As people say, it’s like Spring Break for Web 2.0. Basically it’s an excuse to see some bands and movies while telling my dad I am looking for a job. I mean I did see some interesting speakers and have a few good conversations. One of my favorite was “Should Video Games Replace College?” It was an interesting discussion, and of course I am pretty biased. I would love to have had video gaming incorporated in classes. I mean, let’s be honest, how much work did I skip out on to play video games? There were others about how to stay productive in an always online world, but my favorite title was “Your Mom 2.0.” Sounds like the beginning a your momma joke session, but was really about how to make the internet easier to use (for your mom).

Anyway, Austin is all about live music, so I tried to get around and see as much as I could. Hey you never know, I could meet my next employer at a bar. Right. Networking. Anyway, I saw this great band called Your Vegas at a place called the Viper Room or something last night.

Code of Duty

I am thinking of making a little XBOX 360 game. Just downloaded XNA Game Studio Express and I’m trying to dig in.


Here are some simple GUI control elements for XNA games. This uses events and delegates to link the GUI elements to your game that I grabbed from codeplex

To create a panel and add it to your game:
DPanel panel = new DPanel(Game, 5, 5, 400, 400); // Panel at 5,5 and dimensions
400x400 pixels
Components.Add(panel);

You can add panels inside other panels:
DPanel childPanel = new DPanel(Game, 5, 5, 200, 200);
panel.AddPanel(childPanel);

To register events for your gui elements, you can do something like the following:
DButton button = new DButton(Game, 5, 5);
button.OnClick += new ButtonEventHandler(handleClick);
// Register the click listener

The basic language I think I’ll be able to get. It’s the game development that might be a little bit of a problem. No one needs a better solitaire. I’m better on the other side of the controller in that respect.

MIX in Las Vegas

Back home after being in Vegas for MIX. I’m pretty impoverished at this point, so I figured I could bug my dad for money if I mentioned “networking” and “Microsoft.” Totally worked.



The conference was good and I actually did do some networking/resume dropping/low-level pleading. We’ll see where that goes. One cool session I went was held by Dan Roam on solving complex problems with a visual approach. Apparently he’s worked with the Federal Reserve Bank (maybe not the best reference right now), the Navy, Wal-Mart etc. and they just love him. I have always been a visual learner, so it’s cool to hear that that could apply to jobs I have in the future (assuming they’ve listened to him). I’m gonna grab his book as soon as it’s available on Amazon (thank you gift cards). It’s called: The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures. There’s a quick review here.

Massive, Crippling Debt

Can I just say that I am so over student loans? They give you that year of bliss, where you think “this time next year, I am gonna be making so much money it won’t even matter.” Then they come. Those monthly reminders of how you haven’t done enough, how much you owe. Owe it to yourself to do more, do better. They are like credit card bills but with added guilt. Cause I really need more of that. Dad loves to start the “when I was your age” business whenever he can. How do you argue with a man who was working on a nuclear sub at my age? Engineers always have all the answers and my dad is no different. He thinks he’s seen it everything and he kinda has. After all his adventures and travels, I never have a situation that he’s hasn’t mastered years ago. Aggravating.

A little modeling on the side

I’ve been spending as much of my spare time as I can on subdivision modeling. I’ve been trying to keep my skills sharp while I figure the rest of my life out. I’ve been using Maya and XSI, one because I have license to them. But two, because they these offer me the most robust modeling tools which makes it so much easier to render objects without converting them to high polygon models. The point counts are so small that it makes it simple to manipulate. But I wish I had something specific and cool that I wanted to do. Practicing for practing’s sake isn’t very motivating.

I’ve so how managed to keep my spirits up with a little CoD4.

LOGO

What Became of the LOGO Programming Language?

From Wired: "Forty years ago, researchers developed a programming language that would become a brilliant educational tool."

Awww man! I used to looove . The little turtle. FORWARD 100. And you could change the pen color. I had forgotten all about that. I guess that was my first experience with coding. I think I just thought it was fun and remember there was one computer that was "my computer." I used to rush in before anyone else to make sure I got it. Good times.

Biker Geek

Oh man. Leave it to the internet to prove you’re not that special. Of course I knew there must be other developers into bikes, but this guy’s registered the domain.

He has posted that Indian is taking deposits on the 2008 models. Only $1,000 bucks down. Too bad I don’t have a thousand bucks, let alone the rest of the price. Well I wanted a classic one anyway.

xkcd on Python

Hahaha.

Programming as Art

“Demo writers went to great lengths to get every last ounce of performance out of their target machine. Where games and application writers were concerned with the stability and functionality of their software, the demo writer was typically interested in how many CPU cycles a routine would consume and, more generally, how best to squeeze great activity onto the screen. Writers went so far as to exploit known hardware errors to produce effects that the manufacturer of the computer had not intended.”

Programming as Art: IHC’s Fave Demos

Photoshop Express

The editing features on Photoshop Express are really, really fast. It’s amazing how many different effects you can apply at the same time like color saturation or soft focus. You can apply them accumulatively then you can -- at each step -- reverse your decision and when you are finally happy with what you have you can commit your changes. This is the photo editing software by far.

I uploaded one of my favorite pictures from France and touched up the color saturation (my camera has a tendency to wash out colors when there’s flash involved. It was super easy to specify how large the image should be on the embed instead of manually adjusting the height and width in the URL.

It’s still in beta, so it has some kinks to work out. But beta seems to be the new Gold Master these days. Umm, like Gmail. Love Gmail, but seriously, it’s still in beta? What’s it been, four or five years? I guess they think by leaving beta on a product, they insinuate that they are still working to improve it. Great, please do. And things on the web applications really don’t have version numbers. I get that. But please, take off the beta. It’s like leaving the screen protector on your new phone. Eventually you have to take it off and own it.

It’s about that time

Now that I am done traveling, for the time being, I guess it’s time I found a job. I have kinda looked at some postings, but nothing has really jumped out at me. I don’t just want any job. Maybe I am being a little naive, but I wanted something special for my first “real” job. I have a couple friends who are well-situated in their code monkey lives. They seem to like it, but they barely know what they are working on. You gotta get in on the ground floor of a project I think. Once it’s well established, you’re just completing someone else’s vision, good or bad. With bosses and more bosses.

All that said, I kinda just need to get a job at this point. I am broke and can’t travel anymore. And there is only soo much ramen and so much Star Trek: STTNG reruns I can endure. I have however learned of the arts of ramen from The Official Ramen Homepage. Some of my favorites include:

• Corn and Broccoli Chowder
• Vietnamese Shrimp Soup
• College Ramen Omelet (my friends and I totally did this before I found this)
• Easy Peanut Sauce Ramen Recipe (it’s good, I swear)

I really need to get a job. Anyone?

How to Recognize a Good Programmer

Got this one from Slashdot. I am thinking more about how I need to market myself as a programmer. I guess I always thought I would just talk to fellow developers, but this guy made me think about the business people I need to talk to. Especially if I go the start up route. A little long, but there’s some good stuff here. It’s a good read for anyone looking for a job.

How to Recognize a Good Programmer

New Year’s Resolutions

It’s that time when everyone pretends that this year will be different. Set huge goals that are mostly unattainable. So in keeping with that, here are my resolutions for this year:

• Get a freaking job
• Try to catch up with old friends
• Start looking for just the right bike (an Indian, please)
• Do something with all my photos
• Update this blog more often

How many of these will I actually get done? Well, I think I will go crazy if I don’t manage to get a job this year. Student loans are such a killer. Whatever happened to socialism? Sigh.

It’s funny how my parents keep talking about writing, say, “2007” on the their checks, for like a month into the new year. I can’t remember the last time I wrote a check.

Hellboy 2 Trailer is out

Hellboy 2: The Golden Army

Really excited for this one. I loved the first one and the trailer looks awesome. Guillermo del Toro is directing this one too, thank goodness. He directed Pan’s Labyrinth in the mean time, which only made me like him more. I hate when they switch directors in a series and it shows (ahem X-Men: The Last Stand). Anyway, lookie lookie and wait for the next trailer to hold you until summer.

Back Home

Whatever home is these days. Back in the States at least. Having traveled so much as a kid, home doesn’t quite mean the same thing to me as most people. I never got too attached to a place cause I knew we’d be leaving. We always left.

I remember my roommate in college got all upset when his parents converted his room into a guest bedroom. Seemed like he was over reacting to me, but then again he lived in that room for 18 years. Maybe I’d be upset too.

So Newport News is my home base for the time being. Nothing here quite makes me want to stay any length of time. But it’ll do until I figure things out.

Paris. Winter. Awesome.

Okay another quick one. Again having a great time. Funny how that works, when compared to Troy or Newport News. I wish I were staying here for New Years. But I told my mom I’d be home for the holidays. Oh well, at least I'll be able to see my new nephew.

Bozeman out.

Quick update from Sydney

Having fun. Too much fun really. I don’t really want to go back any time soon. I’ve been up and down the east coast of Australia, going through sunscreen like there’s not tomorrow. More later. Here’s some choice photos.

Off for while

…to Australia! I’m going to catch up with some friends there and just take my time and explore. Explore = bum around. But it should be fun. I’ll be kinda off the grid since I don’t want to worry about losing my laptop.

After that I think I will try to swing by France or Germany, since I love being on planes for days. Here’s to spending my savings and ignoring my bills.

The Green Man

I just got back from my first Burning Man. I am exhausted but had one of the best times of my life. The atmosphere there was like nothing I have experienced. Everyone is really friendly and chill. There is no money, no advertising. The only thing you can buy outright is ice and coffee (thank goodness for coffee). It’s all about bartering and sharing.

The art was pretty amazing. There were some ingenious contraptions, like the two semis bent into a ‘s.’ My favorite part was the scavenger hunt that went throughout the city. And it really was a city. There was a city plan and streets. Only bikes and only a few cars that were really more art pieces than cars. It even had an airport, which always sounds like a joke.

I am avoiding putting up any of the art here because the agreement Burning Man. I might put on some Adwords or something to this blog later and I don’t wanna break the spirit. But here are some pics pre-sunburn.







Of course there was the incident of the early burning. Being my first Burning Man, I was bummed to miss the first burning. Some of the people who had been year after year thought that the whole thing had become too commercial and too planned, so it was a return to what it should be. Anyway, it was rebuilt and the then we all got to share in the burning.

It was a lot of fun and I’m definitely considering going next year. I feel like I might need to rest a whole year to be ready for it though.

Scott Hanselman's 2007 Ultimate Developer and Power Users Tool List for Windows

Longest blog title ever. But still, the 2007 list is out. I have been looking at these lists for a couple years and they get better ever time (as one would hope). I kind of measure myself on how many I’ve heard of.

Some new ones from the list that I am particularly fond of:
• Process Monitor
• KDiff3
• Humanized Enso

There’s lots to play with there. Check it out: 2007 list