A shred of hope.

As you may have guessed (as if there were someone actually reading this) the operating systems assignment didn't go well. Let's leave it at that. I also have to mention how I bombed a math exam and a network security exam.

There are only five weeks of classes left and I'm pretty sure I have failing grades in all my classes except one. This doesn't give me much time to catch up, but it can be done if I stop playing video games and start doing work.

I deleted League of Legends. I should be okay.
I also picked up a partner for my operating systems class. I'm not sure how to say this without sounding like a creep, but I have been inspired by his work. Working with him will make me a better programmer. Also, I'm worried that if I don't keep up, he'll drop me as a partner. This should help ignite that fire that I've been searching for.

Time for shower/bed. I think I'll wake up early tomorrow to go for a run to start my day off right before class. I'll let you know how it goes.

I didn't throw in the towel; I walked away.

I quit that job. They weren't doing good. I never finished my application. I can't keep focus and it's frustrating me.

I got my rank up in League of Legends. I started Star Craft 2 again. I watched 3 seasons of Breaking Bad. I've been keeping up with The Walking Dead. I haven't done any actual work.

I'm sitting here on a day I took off from school to do work. Obviously, I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing. Not a lick of work has been done and it has stacked sky high. The more work I have on my plate, the less I am able to do.

Halfway through the semester, I am at the point where I need to either pull myself together or completely fall to pieces. It's so easy to say that I'll get my act together; that I'll stop playing video games and spend my time productively. Then I'm sitting here staring at my monitor wishing there was a game running.

If only Operating Systems were half as interesting as League of Legends I'd be acing that class. Damn you, Eugene Stark.

I'm going to "do some work" now. Wish me luck.

More than I bargained for.

Going into this I thought I'd have to spend a little bit of time planning and a little bit of time writing code then I'd have an ugly little prototype.

Turns out I'm going to have to work a whole lot harder for ugly.

JSP isn't just learning how to take Java and apply it to HTML tags.
The setup alone took me half a day to figure out. The learning is clearly going to be the largest chunk of development time on this project. I don't know if I'm going to have that kind of time after this week.

Now if I can just fight the tiring effect of that muscle relaxer I took for my back, I should be able to setup my first dynamic page. If I figure that much out and have a working database, I should have all the pieces short of visual design.

Here we go.

So I can't get off the idea that I could help the company I'm working for.
I truly deep down believe it.

They battle with complete lack of organization, poor planning and lack of a pricing structure.
A simple web based application could take care of all of this and do some managing too.

All it has to do is keep track of projects from the point of a lead to completion.
There must be an owner of the project, he's the project manager.
The project manager assigns tasks to other users (designer, permitter, etc.)

Users can post status updates, such as "called and left a message" with a time stamp.
Once they've completed a task, they mark it as complete and the project manager is notified.

Another important thing is pricing. There must be a guide to pricing out quotes.
Common things like awnings, would be completely automated based on size of the awning.
It would give a range of prices based on amount of time to design, construct and install the awning. The range must also take into account the different types of materials that could be used.

I'm not certain that I could help this company.
It's pretty clear that I should be trying.

So close, so far.

I feel like I should be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
There's just too many things getting in the way of that.

My complete lack of a social life, my debt, my scrawny 10 year-old-boy body, my empty portfolio. Everything just gets in the way of the fact that I won't be stuck in this rut for too much longer. I won't have the pressures of project deadlines; the life of an undergraduate. I won't have the less-than-perfect schedule.

But where will I be? What do average grades and absolutely no polished works get me? Who's going to hire someone who only pays attention to part of the material, and how do I sell myself when I've got so many doubts?

Clearly, I'm not the worst at what I do. I've made it this far with all the challenges along the way. The person sitting on the other side of the table must deem me competent though. How am I supposed to convince them that I am while I don't believe it myself?

The worst part of it all is that I don't know what course to take from here. I should be applying for as many jobs as I can right now, I think. Or, I should be fixing up my old projects and get them ready to show my interviewer. Or, I should be starting something new, something exciting. Or, I should be drinking and doing drugs and try to enjoy the last semester of my college life like the frat guys at that school I failed out of.

One things for sure; all of those new video games are not going to help me find what I want.

What went wrong?

It's been over three weeks since my team and I took third place in Stony Brook's game competition. I have to say that after everything is said and done that I don't think any of my group-mates or myself could have put any more effort into the project without taking unhealthy amounts of sleep out of our schedule. Still, this only got us the title of "second runner-up." We have no plaque, no photos and no stories of our triumph posted on local news web sites. It almost seems as if all the extra effort was a waste of time.

So, where did we go wrong? With a solid concept and a talented artist, it seems that the problem must have come down to lack of skill and experience. But, in my opinion, this wasn't the true reason we failed to take the crown.

We were a terrible team. As individuals, we were average. With enough effort we would be able to strive above the rest. I have to be completely honest and say that I stole the reigns on this one and nearly steered us into the ground. We managed to salvage what we were good at and beat most, but not all.



What I would do differently next time and things I recommend anyone working in a group on moderate/large project:

1. Define a clear list of steps that need to be taken and assign everything a priority level. It's important to realize the amount of work remaining on the full project so you have the opportunity to do a little less "pre-polishing" or make necessary cuts early on.
2. Meet often and make meetings worth while. Don't show up to a meeting with nothing or little to say and try to find something to talk about. Come prepared. Make sure your team comes prepared. Send out an e-mail and tell your team what you would like to discuss and invite them to raise their own topics.
3. If your team needs any piece of your code, explain it to them before they work on it. If you get stuck on a certain problem, make sure your teammate understands what you understand before they begin working. This will minimalism the doubling up of work on a particular problem.
4. Comment your code. All of your code. There should be more lines of comments than there are code. It doesn't take very much time to explain what you're writing as you're writing it, and will save you and your team time when it needs to be revised.
5. If you have an issue with how someone else is working, bring it up to them as politely and early as you can. If you don't agree that your team is doing enough or could be doing things better, let them know that you're in it together and that you're counting on them. Tell them the reasons you would do things a certain way. Bottling up aggression and saving it until the project is near due can cause a complete failure.
   

Here's a few things we did well and are the reasons we placed in the competition

1. Focus on your strengths. Your team must have some sort of assets. Seek them out and put them in the spotlight. In our case, we made sure to use our artist to her full potential. When our artist told us something wasn't good enough, I did my best to accommodate.
2. Keep in close contact with the client. In our case; our professor. People are understanding. Even professional projects are pushed back (more often in the video game industry.) Explain yourself when you run into issues and it may soften the blow.
   
3. Have a plan. Look at the big picture early on. Plan to get everything done, but be ready to fall short.
   

Now that the pressure of deadlines is behind us on this project; I think a portion of the team may regroup and take a new start on Tempus. With less pressure, we may be able to make a higher standard for this and create a valuable entry into the gaming industry. We could only hope.

Minecraft

If you're reading this blog, chances are you've spent countless hours perfecting your castle complete with a lava moat and a mine-cart system throughout your Minecraft world just as I have. This game has captured the imagination of millions of gamers of all ages, and has been the tool of creation for some very impressive things. It also took the crown at this year at the 13th annual Independent Game Festival. Not only that, it is also wildly successful and has quickly become a cult legend. At the time of this writing 6319969 people have registered and 1830202 people bought the game.

The only problem is, after I finished burrowing out an entire mountain, building a fortress, a mine-cart system, a monster farm and a waterfall from the sky, I still felt a little empty inside. I could never build enough to feel that I was done with my creation, and I did not even know why it mattered. The game lacks any sort of direction and produced very little meaningful play. Priced at $20, plus an international trade fee, I think I deserve at least a side of plot to my entrée of exploration.

Still technically in its beta phase, this game still has the potential to earn my respect. According to this article written in October of 2010, the creator says he has a plan to create a narrative to the game to drive the player forward. I'll give this game another chance when that day truly comes, but for now, my competitive nature probably would have cast it's igf vote to Messhof's Nidhogg. If only I could afford to travel to one of their competitions.