|
SlightlyMadman posted:There was definitely something to be said for checking out a book full of video games from the library for free. Aha, yep yep. First exposure to programming right there when I was 6.
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 03:48
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 03:30 |
|
|
 Good times  I've decided that I want to learn OpenGL since I never took a graphics course and have been pretty terrible at geometry and trig. You know, something different for a change. So far I've used Manslaughter's lightning algorithm to generate a list of vertices, normalized them into a cube, and recorded the intersection with the boundaries so I can eventually draw something more interesting than a red square.  It's slow going but at least I've got time to play with a project outside of work these days 
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 05:08
|
|
|
Thermopyle posted:Typing code out of magazines was fun! I busted these out today to tweet them @ Sos Sosowski, they're where I learned to make games for my Amstrad. Still on my shelf. https://twitter.com/manfightdragon/status/259200205881217024/photo/1 Anyway, for a little content, instead of a screenshot here's a video cross posted from the making games megathread. Shows the tools I made for making content for my game in action, and then the level I make running briefly in the game engine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azG3XDUFHmI
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 10:11
|
|
|
It always makes me wonder: why don't they make programming books for kids anymore? BASIC is still around, and python would probably be just as easy to learn. And a good verbose API would make it a lot easier to understand than all the PEEKs and POKEs we had to deal with.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 14:22
|
|
|
SlightlyMadman posted:It always makes me wonder: why don't they make programming books for kids anymore? BASIC is still around, and python would probably be just as easy to learn. And a good verbose API would make it a lot easier to understand than all the PEEKs and POKEs we had to deal with. ... you know, I bet these days, kids would mostly be targeted with Unity based game dev books. Good UI tools, easy to ease them into the harder stuff, easy to get cool stuff happening instantly. I suppose I'm ok with this, and I bet kids stick with it better than the C++ books that take ages to get to graphics / barely explain how to make something more general than their narrow little graphics demos. EDIT: a cursory Amazon search shows a Game Maker book too. Makes sense. Shalinor fucked around with this message at 14:51 on Oct 19, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 14:48
|
|
|
SlightlyMadman posted:It always makes me wonder: why don't they make programming books for kids anymore? BASIC is still around, and python would probably be just as easy to learn. And a good verbose API would make it a lot easier to understand than all the PEEKs and POKEs we had to deal with. They have a ton of '_____ for teens' books in the stores  I haven't checked out that one, but some of the other ones are really bad. They'll show you how to use some tool/engine then they just jump into a pathfinding algorithm in C#
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 14:52
|
|
|
csammis posted:
Bob Morales posted:They have a ton of '_____ for teens' books in the stores
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 14:58
|
|
|
KoRMaK posted:I still think its a good idea to hand out Tandy color computers to middle schools and teach them some BASIC. Or can a 6th grader grasp C#/DirectX? Man they might be able too. If I learned that stuff back then by now I'd be able to visualize vertex data in real time like reading sheet music. Internet Janitor's emulator has me thinking that it would be interesting to write something similar, but that also has a full and verbose API. Hell, you could probably write it in flash or javascript and put it on a website along with the tutorials. Just disable paste so you make those little shits type it in because that's the only way you'll learn.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2012 16:04
|
|
|
SlightlyMadman posted:Nice, you type the line numbers in with your code, so you can go back and overwrite a line, or insert between them with a number between them? Something about that really made you think about what you were doing, and I'm sorry for people learning to code with text editors that they miss that. Suffering is character building 
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 18:19
|
|
|
SlightlyMadman posted:Internet Janitor's emulator has me thinking that it would be interesting to write something similar, but that also has a full and verbose API. Hell, you could probably write it in flash or javascript and put it on a website along with the tutorials. Just disable paste so you make those little shits type it in because that's the only way you'll learn. Rote learning is possibly the worst way to get people to think about what they are doing, and your 'learn to program by copy and paste by hand' lures them into spending their time fighting the environment to get it to work. I really don't think your combination of rose tinted nostalgia and thinly veiled hatred for learners makes for a constructive course on learning. I learned despite these things, not because of them. Please don't confuse your misanthropy for insight into education. You're basically advocating abuse. I hope no-one ever has to suffer under you as a teacher, and that you lose your hands in a industrial accident, so that you never inflict your ignorance upon the keyboard again. tef fucked around with this message at 18:26 on Oct 20, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 18:24
|
|
|
You see, kids today learn to cycle easy. They have training wheels, safety helmets. In my day they learned to cycle on penny-farthings, and that's the best way to learn to cycle. I haven't moved on since 1890, so why should I let them take advantage of progress - I certainly haven't. People should learn from my mistakes by repeating them exactly, because my mistakes have been refined and polished over the years. Who wants to learn javascript? Making simple things that they can share easily and show to others? They should be learning to program in my home-brew hello world environment. What do you mean you want to do something fun? I never got to do that. I spent the first five years writing guessing games. I hope you drown in your own bile. tef fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Oct 20, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 18:35
|
|
|
tef posted:You see, kids today learn to cycle easy. They have training wheels, safety helmets. In my day they learned to cycle on penny-farthings, and that's the best way to learn to cycle. I haven't moved on since 1890, so why should I let them take advantage of progress - I certainly haven't. Are you okay, man? You sound kinda angry.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 18:41
|
|
|
tunah posted:Are you okay, man? You sound kinda angry. Someone is advocating that the only way to teach people programming is to treat them as an unthinking dysfunctional photocopier, because they hate other people. In the hope that manually grinding through copy and paste will prevent them from copy and pasting in future. It's beyond ignorant, it's malicious. If you're not angry, it's because you're a sociopath, a misanthrope, or a sperglord happily functioning without empathy. tef fucked around with this message at 18:51 on Oct 20, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 18:47
|
|
|
tef posted:Someone is advocating that the only way to teach people programming is to treat them as an unthinking dysfunctional photocopier, because they hate other people. In the hope that manually grinding through copy and paste will prevent them from copy and pasting in future. It's beyond ignorant, it's malicious. I'm not angry. You're the one writing essays about how someone learned programming by copying Basic from a magazine, but I'm a sperglord. You're totally right.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 19:02
|
|
|
If you want to pick a fight about teaching, I'll respond in one of the other threads. I'll leave this one or pictures of neat things.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 19:09
|
|
|
tef posted:If you want to pick a fight about teaching, I'll respond in one of the other threads. I'll leave this one or pictures of neat things. I'm sorry, I don't want to pick a fight. I'm having a bad day and this thread is for pictures.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 19:20
|
|
|
Jesus Christ tef, he was just making a tongue in cheek joke about the good ol' days of learning to code. Cool off. Tunah, you're fine.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 19:31
|
|
|
SlightlyMadman posted:Just disable paste so you make those little shits type it in because that's the only way you'll learn.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 19:44
|
|
|
Volte posted:If this isn't a joke then I agree with tef completely. Yes it is a joke, holy poo poo. Here's a step by step on how I'm making a signed distance field bitmap font: A single character from a TrueType font:  After running 8SSEDT algorithm:  Scaled down:  And all together: 
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 20:01
|
|
|
Win8 Hetro Experie posted:Yes it is a joke, holy poo poo. Got any shots of these "in action"? I think I've only seen them in TF2.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 20:04
|
|
|
tunah posted:Got any shots of these "in action"? I think I've only seen them in TF2. Not yet, but generating the mesh to put some text on the screen is next on the to-do list. I've already got some ideas for effects that I want to try out.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2012 20:22
|
|
Thermopyle posted:Typing code out of magazines was fun! It was the longest time before I learned that a READ command followed by a long list of two to three digit numbers separated by commas was bare opcodes and data, no assembled code. Good luck figuring out what went wrong if you make a typo! :iamafag: e: Apple //c - 1989, just a line editor. Back then your programming environment was also your command prompt. The first time I ever saw 'C' I wondered where the line numbers were. Coffee Jones fucked around with this message at 19:50 on Oct 21, 2012 |
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2012 19:43
|
|
|
I suppose it's not screenshot Saturday anymore, but:   ... that's how Jones On Fire looks right now. Pink placeholder firehouse aside, that's pretty much final art. I have vague hopes of it hitting the App Store before November, but we shall see. EDIT: also, those signed distance field shots are awesome. I wish I has some excuse to implement that - seems like a really neat algorithm. EDIT: Vv thanks! Shalinor fucked around with this message at 00:13 on Oct 22, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 00:06
|
|
|
Shalinor posted:I suppose it's not screenshot Saturday anymore, but: Well that's pretty freakin' awesome!
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 00:09
|
|
|
Sorry I should have put a smiley in there or something, but just for the record I don't actually think kids are "little shits" and should be abused. I do think it's a shame that fewer young people are interested in programming these days though. Screenshot for relevant content:  I'm starting to work on the combat routines, so I made a smaller ship to fight. It's a two-man fighter with no shield capabilities or cargo area but decent weapon systems. It's size and twin engines will allow it to make quick strikes with high evasion against return fire, and escape easily if things go wrong.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 02:34
|
|
|
Internet Janitor posted:Built a TinyBASIC interpreter/REPL for a class I'm teaching to middle-schoolers. I like how your complete REPL/JIT is 800 lines. Did you consider operator-precedence parsing? It might be more concise than the recursive descent parser
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 03:07
|
|
|
Scaevolus: Thanks! I went with recursive descent mainly because it's easy to keep hacking new features on, but I ought to look into operator-precendence parsing. Best way to find out whether it simplifies things is to give it a shot. The first week of putting the tool in the hands of kids went very well. Everybody had a lot of fun and while I did uncover a handful of bugs, there were no showstoppers. I spent a good chunk of today patching bugs and addressing feature requests, like an EDIT command to make it easier to modify previously entered lines of the program and additional intrinsic functions. I've taught classes to this age group with Java and Processing in the past, and I'm pleasantly surprised by how well my students took to BASIC. Line numbers and GOTOs can be hell in large programs, but they seem to make the flow of programs very intuitive. I'm sure my students will outgrow this environment in a few weeks and be ready for a "real" language, but but the tool has definitely served the purpose of introducing core programming concepts and being unintimidating.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 03:41
|
|
|
Internet Janitor posted:Scaevolus: Thanks! I went with recursive descent mainly because it's easy to keep hacking new features on, but I ought to look into operator-precendence parsing. Best way to find out whether it simplifies things is to give it a shot. Precedence climbing is quite straight forward, http://www.engr.mun.ca/~theo/Misc/exp_parsing.htm#climbing quote:The first week of putting the tool in the hands of kids went very well. Everybody had a lot of fun and while I did uncover a handful of bugs, there were no showstoppers. I spent a good chunk of today patching bugs and addressing feature requests, like an EDIT command to make it easier to modify previously entered lines of the program and additional intrinsic functions. From my early days with BBC BASIC, I recall 'RENUMBER', and 'AUTO' being rather useful. RENUMBER is kinda obvious, AUTO was a command that means number the following input as I type it in. quote:I've taught classes to this age group with Java and Processing in the past, and I'm pleasantly surprised by how well my students took to BASIC. Line numbers and GOTOs can be hell in large programs, but they seem to make the flow of programs very intuitive. You could always approach this by adding new structured programming concepts (while, for) to your interpreter, and explaining them in terms of GOTO. Admittedly, the BASIC I used also had GOSUB/RETURN as well as functions. (I'm also rather nostalgic towards turtle graphics too) quote:I'm sure my students will outgrow this environment in a few weeks and be ready for a "real" language, but but the tool has definitely served the purpose of introducing core programming concepts and being unintimidating. I'm really curious to know if you let them peek behind the scenes, and plan to let them start playing with forth too. It sounds like you and your students are having fun, and it's rather interesting to hear about. Keep posting 
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 04:02
|
|
|
tef posted:I'm really curious to know if you let them peek behind the scenes, and plan to let them start playing with forth too. It sounds like you and your students are having fun, and it's rather interesting to hear about. Keep posting Seconding this. I've been putting some thought into teaching my 3-year-old daughter programming in the coming years...
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 04:10
|
|
|
I highly recommend everybody mentor a computer-oriented summer camp for a year or two. It's a really low-stress environment for the most part, it's a lot of fun, and it's a great learning experience for everybody. The camps are usually understaffed, so it's not too hard to get on the team.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 04:27
|
|
|
Suspicious Dish posted:I highly recommend everybody mentor a computer-oriented summer camp for a year or two. It's a really low-stress environment for the most part, it's a lot of fun, and it's a great learning experience for everybody. The camps are usually understaffed, so it's not too hard to get on the team. I have only vague memories of the computer summer camp I did as a kid. (We did awesome things with HyperCard and such)
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 05:40
|
|
|
Shalinor posted:What's the time commitment on that like? Wouldn't it be, effectively, a full-time job for a few months? Depends on the summer camp, and it also depends on how well you are around or love kids. One year, I taught at a camp run by a place called "CyberCamps", which looks like it's now out of business. It provided a lot of content for kids to run through, built on top of an intranet, along with management systems for the counselors. All the kids were in their own little work, being introverts on the computer, except when they needed from a counselor (which was often, mind you). The counselors were encouraged to play around with technology in the background rather than just sit around idle, which would hopefully inspire the kids to do more or learn something extra. I installed Linux on a few of the extra computers, which some of the kids were fascinated by (installing applications for free, from a weird command line thingy, blew their minds), and played around with 3D modelling a bit. Another, I taught at a completely different environment run by "iD Tech Camps", which had a set of goals for the students, and said "go". They provided some sample lesson plans and all the technology as before, but encouraged us to adapt them to the group of kids, and what they were interested in. The camp also required a group project at the end of the course. So it required a bit more effort to manage something like that, but I really enjoyed the collaborative environment that eventually came out of it, with the kids not seeing me as that guy they bug if they have issues, but their coworkers and peers along with it. We built a really simple Flash game by the end of it, with some people doing programming, some people doing animation and art, etc. Everyone was really proud of that. I can't really answer "time commitment" exactly. It felt like a mix of playing around in a learning environment, and work. Hopefully this helped answer, at least a bit.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 16:29
|
|
|
Maluco Marinero posted:Aha, yep yep. First exposure to programming right there when I was 6. I remember that book too. 6 year old me was very disappointed in the lack of 2012-quality 3d rendering in the fighter planes 
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2012 19:21
|
|
|
Currently working on my bachelor thesis, involving the research for new acceleration structures for ray tracing. Here's a picture of the Sponza scene which I currently use to test if the Build and Traversal for my structures are working. 
|
|
#
?
Oct 23, 2012 10:40
|
|
|
mkasu posted:Currently working on my bachelor thesis, involving the research for new acceleration structures for ray tracing. Nice, so far how is your result? How is your progress so far? Got any speed improve?
|
|
#
?
Oct 23, 2012 13:42
|
|
|
fcbarros posted:Nice, so far how is your result? How is your progress so far? Got any speed improve? In the picture, I was using a simpler acceleration structure (uniform grid). I'm currently implementing a lot of them to get used to the topic and ray tracing framework. Currently I am a little bit struggling with implementing my own approach. On paper it's done, though. My first goal is the data structure to be more memory-efficient than other fast approaches without losing too much speed. I'll get back to you in a while when I'm done with the implementation  .
|
|
#
?
Oct 23, 2012 19:10
|
|
|
mkasu posted:My first goal is the data structure to be more memory-efficient than other fast approaches without losing too much speed. I'll get back to you in a while when I'm done with the implementation Progressive CPU based ray tracers are probably going to keep using big, slow to build structures like SAH kD trees, because faster ray queries usually outweigh build time in the long run, but real time GPU stuff definitely needs something faster and lower memory. steckles fucked around with this message at 21:44 on Oct 23, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 23, 2012 21:38
|
|
|
Thanks for your link, and yes I already have heard from it. My plans are based on their work. It's definitely a very interesting area of research. My bachelor thesis might not cover the GPU part (as I have no experience in this field, yet), but it's the spirit to bring it to CUDA afterwards. I'm going to post some results here, when I am done with it (don't expect it before March or something, as I am just starting working on the thesis itself next month).
|
|
#
?
Oct 23, 2012 22:47
|
|
|
After having had more fun on my initial synthesizer app, that I wrote for Windows 8, I've been giving a fully modular one a try. Initial WIP: It works somewhat. Without actual dials (yet), there's only so much you can do. But it taught me one thing, after a goddamn long debugging session, and that is to test any "fast" methods for various expensive math for their accuracy before actually using them nilly-willy.
|
|
#
?
Oct 24, 2012 00:25
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 03:30 |
|
|
Not as exciting looking as some of the work people are currently showing (it has been great motivation to get me back into OpenGL work again though!) but I've been working on putting together a tour of the features provided by the website I help develop. I'm happy with how easy it turned out to be after finding the Guiders.js library and wrapping it up to provide keyboard navigation etc. Combat Pretzel - As a side note from someone who has just started getting into windows 8 development it has been great reading about what you have been facing when it comes to getting the apps through Microsoft certification and so on
|
|
#
?
Oct 24, 2012 23:59
|
|