Author Archives: Robert Dailey - Page 2

Quitting Aion

Posted by on March 30, 2010 No comments

Well, it’s been a fun ride, but the day has finally come where I quit Aion. While leveling up was fun, the game got extremely boring as far as end-game content goes. Additionally, if I’m playing Aion all the time I won’t have time for more important things in life, such as programming. I really need to start working on a project. So far I haven’t been very dedicated to the programming aspect of life because Aion used up most of my free time.

The one thing I’m going to miss about Aion is my legion, Marked Souls. They’re a great bunch of guys & gals. I look forward to reuniting with them in the next MMO I might play (TERA Online anybody?). Farewell, NCsoft!

Logitech Illuminated Keyboard

Posted by on March 10, 2010 1 comment

I guess you could call me a Logitech fan boy. I really love Logitech. They’ve always made peripherals that I’ve been impressed with. For many years I’ve been typing on a G15 (The older G15 with 18 macro keys, not the newer edition) or G11 keyboard. I’ve always loved the way they functioned and how smooth typing felt.

Logitech Illuminated Keyboard

At my new programming job I had to work on an iMac for the first few weeks. While I don’t like Macs that much, I do love the Apple keyboard. It has the feel of a laptop keyboard. Really, I think I loved it way too much because now I can’t go back to a G15/G11 keyboard. Typing on it feels too “bulky”. The keys are huge in comparison. This basically started a hugekeyboard battle. I started buying a lot of keyboards, trying to find one that wasn’t made by apple but had the “slim” keys that felt super nice to type on. I eventually came across the Logitech Illuminated Keyboard.

Coming from a G15 keyboard which is loaded with extra non-standard keys (media keys, macro keys, etc), you’d think that this keyboard wouldn’t be advanced enough. The thing is, it doesn’t have to be. It has all the features I need:

  • Media Keys: Pause/Play, Next, Previous (It is missing a ‘Stop’ key, but I can live without it).
  • Numpad (Yes, this is important. The diNovo Edge does not have one).
  • Volume control keys (Up, Down, Mute).

I never really used the G15/G11 macro keys for anything important. I used them for a few things in Visual Studio, but I can live without them. Anyway, if anyone is looking for a great and inexpensive keyboard, the Logitech Illuminated Keyboard is for you.

Evil C++ Macros

Posted by on March 9, 2010 No comments

Today at work, a colleague of mine pointed out some disturbing macro definitions in some C++ code. Obviously I can’t provide the exact code, but I’ll provide a close example.

#define private        friend class Foo; private
#define protected      friend class Bar; protected

Can you think of all of the things wrong with this code? I’m generally pretty hostile towards macro definitions for one major reason: It’s too easy to abuse them. Honestly the only macro I consider a good one is when they are used to ensure portable code, such as with include guards (since #pragma once is not entirely portable).

For the particular code snippet above, the biggest issue here is obfuscation. When a programmer sees the following:

class Fubar
{
private:
   int m_myStuff;
};

They are going to think that this class is as encapsulated as it could possibly be. They would be wrong, however, since another class now has access to its privates thanks to the evil macros I presented earlier.

A good rule of thumb when dealing with macros is to just avoid them at all costs. I won’t completely remove them from my arsenal, since there are very rare occasions when I’d actually need to use them in an unorthodox way. But for the record, I can’t remember the last time I used a macro for anything other than include guards.

Password Generator

Posted by on March 7, 2010 No comments

I’ve added a new section of pages under the My Work page dedicated to my C# projects and portfolios. The newest (and currently only) addition to my C# portfolio collection is the Password Generator.

The password generator here is just a simple project and really doesn’t display much proficiency in C# or .NET. I simply wanted to share it with the world because it is for better or worse my first C# project. The tool itself is actually pretty useful. It allows you to choose the length of the generated password as well as control what symbols are included in it, such as capitalization and non-alphanumeric characters.

Pretty soon I’m going to have to host pre-compiled versions of my portfolios on my website so visitors won’t have to compile the sources to get the tools. Up until this point I’ve simply assumed people are more interested in the source code, but I could be wrong!

Stay tuned because I’m going to have more “advanced” C# portfolios on the way.

Unity

Posted by on March 4, 2010 No comments

I’ve been working with Unity for almost two weeks now and I actually really like it so far. Quite possibly one of the biggest benefits is the short learning curve it has. I’ve had to ask very few questions to understand certain things. Most of what I figured out was due to an intuitive user interface and excellent documentation.

Apparently it’s not just programmers that find it incredibly easy to use. Artists practically drag & drop assets into Unity and it packages it up and makes it ready to use in the game.

Using Unity has been another opportunity for me to experience C#. The more I use it, the more I love it. For anyone that loves C# and video game development, Unity should definitely be on your list of things to try!

Martin Fowler Coming to Dallas!

Posted by on February 18, 2010 No comments

Well I’ve known this for a few weeks now, but Martin Fowler is coming to DFW! I’m very excited about this because I’m a huge fan of his. He’ll be discussing Agile, amongst other things, so I’m sure I’ll learn a thing or two. I’ll post back with more info after I have been to his presentation.

A New C# Project

Posted by on January 18, 2010 No comments

One of my old co-workers and I both wanted to think of a project we could start that involves using C#. After thinking for a few days we came up with the idea of writing a Twitter client. We just came up with the idea today so there’s not much to say about it, but we already know a few things:

  • We’re not going to immediately make it open source. Depending on how the project turns out over the next few months, we might try to sell it.
  • We’ll be using C#
  • We’ll also be using the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF). Word on the street is that WPF is the “new way” of creating forms for Windows applications.
  • We’ll be reviewing other popular twitter clients and devise a backlog from that. We also have a couple of our own unique ideas that we’ll probably implement (None I can share just yet).

I’m still very serious about moving in the direction of C#, if for no other reason then to expand my technical know-how. I’m pretty excited about this and I look forward to finally getting some C# experience. Over the next few days we are going to be planning out a couple of things and should get into coding soon. I’ll post more here when I have something to share!

Added a Portfolio

Posted by on December 28, 2009 No comments

For a long time I haven’t really had any work to show to employers that demonstrates my coding style and ability. I’ve created a new portfolio page that has a small project to download that demonstrates both. As that page will state, this is by no means a production-quality sample and is subject to scrutiny. It simply provides a basic overview of what I’m capable of. I originally ended up writing this code for a game company because they needed to see what my coding style was like, as well as what I was capable of. Please visit my new portfolio page to read more about the project! You can get to it by going to the “My Work” menu above and selecting “Portfolio” from the drop-down menu.

Resume Updated

Posted by on December 23, 2009 No comments

I’ve found over time that employers look at my resume and end up asking me questions that are clearly answered on it. My best guess for this is because employers really don’t want to have to read through my work history to get a grasp for what I’m capable of. To help solve this I’ve added a new section to my resume called “Experience Overview”, right under my skills list. This will give you a bullet-point list of things I’ve done and am more than capable of.

I recommend everyone give my resume another look. As always, I would appreciate any criticism and/or suggestions to improve my resume!

Method Solutions: More Layoffs

Posted by on December 13, 2009 No comments

I hear from an old co-worker of mine that Method Solutions cut about half of their employees today. This is no big surprise since I was hired on in Winter 2005 while the company was in a pretty big bind. I guess they might go under for good this time. Who knows?

UPDATE: Apparently only about 5-6 people were laid off, not nearly half as far as I know. Still significant, though.