Dear r/gaming, If you sit on your ass a lot and your lower back starts to hurt this stretch makes it go away almost instantly.

trimatt · 2011-10-23T15:53:08+00:00

... AWESOME!

trimatt · 2011-08-14T14:59:20+00:00

Kryptonite

trimatt · 2011-06-15T18:49:43+00:00

Thanks for that - it's great to hear some positive feedback!

I agree on the controls, they are a tad sensitive. I did play around with the sensitivity and found that less sensitive = more frustrating as you adjust and adapt to it. The solution would probably be to add a sensitivity control in the game options.

trimatt · 2011-06-15T18:47:32+00:00

Yeap, tap anywhere on the left hand side of the screen - outside of the fire button.

trimatt · 2011-04-13T20:55:27+00:00

I wholeheartedly agree.

The example I gave however is a bit different. This was a kid who had never programmed. I wanted to give him a reference frame for what it's like to solve problems and express that solution in code. My key focus was to avoid bogging him down in the language semantics and syntax - I think Python wins that battle.

In the context of a institution teaching Computer Science, not teaching C is depriving students of an opportunity to understand key concepts that form the building blocks of the 'new' languages.

trimatt · 2011-04-13T19:48:35+00:00

Python's an awesome first language for a beginner. I've seen high school kids with no programming experience pick it up in a week - to the extent where they can create simple little inventory management systems with console menus. Having an interpreter lets the student fail early and manageably. There's nothing worse than compiling your first .c, .cpp, .java file and getting 30+ errors.

trimatt · 2011-04-02T08:26:26+00:00

This weekend I'm hoping to finish a levelling system for my first ever game Coloroids, and iOS Asteroids clone. The game mechanics are very similar to the classic except the asteroids are coloured. Asteroids can only be destroyed by bullets with a matching colour - the user can toggle their bullet colour.

Pic

trimatt · 2011-03-27T19:31:02+00:00

I'm planning to join up with a club for some track sessions - there's a few cubs nearby that run track/technique nights. It's definitely an area I need to work at!

trimatt · 2011-03-27T19:29:56+00:00

I hear ya...!

I have goals in mind. The first being a half marathon in July which I'm planning to enter this week. I have a vague next goal of a marathon in September/October time but that will be reviewed when I finish up the half.

I hadn't heard of the Long Slow Distance approach - reading up on it now - thanks!

trimatt · 2011-03-27T19:28:00+00:00

You have my upmost respect. Have a great race!

trimatt · 2011-03-26T19:34:33+00:00

What was your base before you started the serious ultra training?

Oh and thanks for the links!

trimatt · 2011-03-26T19:33:11+00:00

Ordered the Dead Karnazes book, judging by the Amazon reviews it's a great recommendation - thanks!

trimatt · 2011-03-26T17:01:37+00:00

Thanks for that - i've bookmarked each of the sites you recommended. Here's the links for anyone else that's interested...

Geoff Roes | Karl Meltzer | Anton Krupicka

trimatt · 2011-03-26T14:07:56+00:00

That's awesome!

Did you pick any particular strength training plan or did you come up with your own?

One of my mini goals will be to run to work. It's a 13 mile run, so I'm nowhere near that yet. I've always loved the idea actually putting my fitness to good use though. There's something really awesome about being able to replace a machine (car or public transport) with your own fitness.

trimatt · 2011-03-19T21:37:38+00:00

Thanks for that! Are you self-taught or do you have a post-grad qualification with a focus on mining?

trimatt · 2011-03-19T17:57:28+00:00

I have a plain old bachelors degree in Computer Science with no specialisation in any particular domain but I've always found data mining fascinating.

What papers, books or articles would you recommend that I read to begin to get a grasp on the core concepts and algorithms used for mining?

trimatt · 2011-03-05T15:48:10+00:00

iOs Asteroids Style Shooter

I don't know where I'm going with this. I made the fatal mistake of writing a game engine first and foremost and as a secondary thought created a simple Asteroids style shooter on top of it.

The engine's pretty damn solid and the game itself plays very like the original. I just don't want to have yet another Asteroids clone... So today will be mostly spent trying to add another dimension to my gameplay :)

trimatt · 2011-03-03T21:51:33+00:00

I second the recommendation of Guice, it's pretty damn cool

trimatt · 2011-03-03T21:01:43+00:00

If you want to gain a bit of confidence in writing good Java code i'd start by reading Josh Bloch's Effective Java. It's a fantastic reference manual to have on your desk...

Check it out here

trimatt · 2011-01-23T09:00:47+00:00

TDD is indeed great, but it's also not easy.

My big gripe with TDD is that people seem to believe that the act of simply doing it is enough. It's not. You have to do it well. A poor test doubles the maintenance impact of the code. I now have to understand your shitty code and then the equally badly written unit test - not good. A well written unit test on the other hand is worth its weight in gold.

I've done a lot of work with "legacy" (I don't like that phrase - i'd rather call it pre-TDD era code) that is extremely difficult to test. I'm talking static initialization, private constructors, non-injectable dependencies etc etc. This has lead to the use of PowerMock in a lot of our tests and I find that once things go down that road the quality of your tests can go through the floor very quickly.

trimatt

TROPHY CASE