September 30, 2011

Being Productive

School's been going on now for... Is it a month and a half maybe? I don't know really but it's all going so fast, week after week is disappearing and I don't know where they go but I know that I'm at least not wasting them like I did most of last year!

Last year I managed school sure, but without doing anything special. Well if you don't count watching nearly every GSL live (from 06-09 or 11-13 on weekdays) which is pretty awesome. But that's also taking away a lot of time when I could've (and often should've) studied - sadly I skipped a lot of school last year. I admit GSL can't explain it all, I was lazy okay!

This year I'd like to a bit better and it has started out fine. I haven't skipped a single lecture yet (Java doesn't count!!) and I'm not too far behind in anything and a bit ahead in others, in summary I'm doing great, heh.

Aside from school though, which is almost even more important, I'm feeling good and getting things done. Our home hasn't burned down yet so that's some success right there, but I'm taking it even farther and taking care of some cooking and stuff too, of course with Veronicas help but anyway. I'm also increasing my Taekwon-do training, doing some reading and a bunch of other stuff. Programming too!

I took the advice of Cal Newport and now I actually plan my days, every day, on the morning or the night before. Here's an example:

• 0730 - 0900 Program
• 0900 - 1000 Call OnOff, electric company, DN, corren
• 1000 - 1100 Program
• 1100 - 1130 Food
• etc..

Of course I don't really follow it to each and every point, but it helps me know what I need to get done this day. Often I skip and I reorder and I do other stuff a lot but if I've done at least half of what I set out to do I've been more productive than I'd usually be! And I even remember to do stuff like make a prenumeration on DN which I would never had otherwise.

Something else that's helped me is a regular and healthy sleeping pattern - go to sleep and wake up at the same time, every day.

I'm feeling good about school and everything but I've got stuff left to do so don't see it as a perfect example - far from it to be sure, but it's a step in the right direction I guess.

September 16, 2011

Design for Hackers

I get these.. urges sometimes. Not like Dexter no, but sometimes I just have to buy a specific thing. It happened again yesterday (or was it the day before I don't know) when I saw this post on hackernews.

It's a book this time, again, but this is something a little different - it's about design. Now I know nothing about design but I've enjoyed designing some sites and I really like to design games but I don't have a clue how to do it in a structural manner. I just try different colors and different stuff until "hey that looks kinda good" and it's done! That's not how you make something useful or something that looks good - good design. But this book seems to teach you just that!

It's a book for hackers, in the original non-journalistic definition, and it explains stuff in a logical manner! Now I might get a feel for why I think something looks good and I might even be able to improve on it? Happy times!

The only issue is that I promised myself to not order any more programming books until I've gone through the ones I have - but this isn't one so it should be okay! So now I made myself to promise that I'll do the math assignments for the week and then I can order!

Instead of writing this I really should do them then.

Hrrmm...

September 12, 2011

10 Games in 10 Languages

For school we have this programming course for Java. It isn't anything special really and it would be really boring if I don't like to program, it almost is anyway, if it weren't for the fact that we're to create a game! Just any game will do and we're in a group of two and we have about a month to complete it. Mmh I like.

Me and Li, my conspiring friend, have a pretty decent idea of something we can make. The only minor thing is that neither he nor I know anything about Java. Turns out I've done some gamemaking in mostly C++ and it's really not different so we'll see how the game finishes.

Now this game me a bit of an idea, or rather it resurfaces and older idea, namely to make a few games in a couple of different languages. I like to explore different languages and I like to make games so why not combine them?

I'll try to make 10 different games with 10 different languages, starting with this Java game. I won't make this one alone but that hardly matters I guess, there's plenty of time to code in solitude later.

These are some I had in mind:

1. Java
   This one is slated for release in the middle of October

2. C++
   I'm not sure if this one is considered cheating? I mean I've made a few already.

3. C
   I haven't done much pure C, and this looks like a nice time as any.

4. Lua
   I've used you to change values without compiling before, but do you have more to offer me?

5. Clojure
   I do love lisp and as it runs on the JVM it shouldn't be too different from Java.

6. Scala
   Scala is one of those languages you just got to try someday. Also a JVM, piece of cake right?

7. Perl
   Perhaps my current favorite language, it's just so fun to write you know?

8. Python
   When you're gonna do the Ludum Dare many are recommending you to use Python with PyGame, it's time to find out why.

9. Coffee-script + html 5
   One of the more hyped up web technologies right now and I haven't used them? Shame on me.

10. Haskell
    Oh Haskell, I've tried to get you down the last two summers but you won't quite let me. Enough is enough, you're going down!

I might change one or two later on if I find something better to try out (C++ is a bit lazy to include) and I certainly won't do them in this order. There's a big chance I won't do them once a month either, but that's the general goal I'm setting up.

Now it's time to do some other, more boring, school work...

September 4, 2011

Back to Training

Five days of school now and things are starting to settle down a bit. The courses are pretty cool; we have linear algebra which is pretty interesting, we have a java course where we're going to make a game (!) and one about structures and algorithms. Pretty promising but we'll see how things pan out.

Taekwon-do practice has started and it's awesome. In the beginning it's so hard so I always wonder why I continue, but in the end it's really fun and it feels good after. If you haven't tried it you really should, or some other martial arts cause it's pretty cool.

It's a perfect training for both mind and body. You might think it's just mindless hardship thanks to all the martial arts movies/anime/manga with crazy training, but you're also training your awareness, your creativity and decision making and more. Especially when sparring it's absolutely paramount that your head is with you, doesn't matter how fast or strong you are, if you don't fight with your head you're pretty screwed. That's what I really like about it, it's a pretty smart training.

Easy! Or maybe not?

What I don't like however, and this is totally unrelated to anything, is the rain! I went to school five days and I got soaking wet five times! Hrblr... That's why I've decided to do absolutely nothing today, I might watch some GSL and read a bit. I've got Learn you a Haskell for Great Good, Effective Java and Thinking in Java who can hold me company a bit.

And then there's Taekwon-do training of course!