NewToy Lecture at Discovery Park

You may have heard of a game called Words with Friends. It's a scrabble-esque game for the iPlatform where two players slowly take turns playing through a game. The game could take hours, days, or weeks, and that's the beauty of always connected hardware and a turn based game such as this. It's one of those games you can play in your 4 minutes of spare time while in line at the cafe, bored at home, or while listening to the NewToy lecture (hehe). Words with Friends has been a top grossing iPhone app for just about as long as it's been on the app store.

"Toy Maker" Vijay Thakkar, developer at NewToy, came to lecture at Discovery Park to prospective Mobile device programmers to give some insight on what it's like to develop for mobile platforms.

"The average age people get their first cell phones nowadays is 8" Vijay explained, "with 35% of 8 year olds owning a cell phone." Clearly mobile devices is an exponentially growing field. Vijay goes on to explain that since smart phones are basically a compass, game system, camera, newspaper, laptop, and gps (oh yeah and a phone, too) all in one, it's no wonder mobile phones are on the up-swing.

One thing Vijay hit on was the vast differences between programming on a mobile device as compared to traditional computers. He said one thing you have to concentrate on is getting the core idea of your "app" developed 100%, and that your app should be able to perform it's core functionality all day, all night 24/7 with no problems. Even if that core feature is something very basic like make farting noises, parse XML, or run a scrabble game engine, your app should be able to perform that activity with 0 flaws. Traditionally, computer programmers have focused on developing full-fledged programs that can do A-Z but not necessarily be able to perform functions F, P, and Q very well. It's especially straining on a small development team or on a team with limited financial resources. With the ideology of developing the core function 100%, releasing, and building from there, your development time is cut in half and your users can provide feedback in order to shape the future of your project. In addition, if users reject your idea all together, you'll have saved that much more time in development whereas you would have spent all that time developing a full fledged app for nothing.

Needless to say, a lot more was said during his lecture, but I don't have enough space, time, or patience to share it all. There are, of course, many lectures held at Discovery Park outside of regular course work, and this was just one of them.

Oh and I felt like a tool for asking, but I got a picture with him specifically for this blog entry x)

Cool cats. Shame I didn't get a shirt EDIT 12-8-2010: My mobile dev teacher Dr. Garlick was gracious enough to give me a shirt. Thanks!!

Fort Worth Air Show

This weekend I went to the Fort Worth Air Show - a 15 minute drive from Denton. . I've never been to an air show before.. but upon getting there, I found out it's like a military parade but with planes.

Notice how I'm representin' Go Geek!

There were helicopters too. A lot of them. This orange one has got to be my favorite. This whole air show has only intensified my desire to learn how to fly and to skydive. Some day.. some day.
There were all sorts of things to see. An A-10 Warthog, C-130 Cargo plane which they nick named "Fat Albert", a Chinook, commercial airliners, and more. The things that they actually flew in front of us was a different story. They flew a million planes. I remember seeing the F-16
Falcon first, followed by the F-22 Raptor, and bringing up the grand finale was the Blue Angels.

All of the world's engineering efforts in the last century just flew over my head
The 1940's era P-51 Mustang with a 1970's era F-16 Falcon and a modern day F-22 Raptor as its wingmen

Their breath taking precision flying make them a sight to see.. In addition we saw several skydivers doing some tricks and Ross Perot made a guest appearance as a skydiver. I think I'm a bit too young to know exactly why he's famous but I know he ran for office at some point. There were also stunt planes tumbling through the air all day.

That will be me some day

There were plenty of familiar companies at the air show. Bell helicopters being one of them. They are the ones that manufacture most of the parts for the helicopters I saw at this show. They are at every single solitary job fair UNT's college of engineering hosts. In fact, my blog post from February of last year details every company that was at the job fair that year including Bell Helicopter Textron Inc. Seeing as Bell is right down the street from us, I'm sure it'd be easy to get a job there, if you set your mind to it in engineering.

Blue Angels playing chicken

Wish I could post all my pictures!

UNT Women's Lacrosse Tournament at College Station

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It was a beautiful day for Lacrosse, a day at the amusement park, going to the beach, and playing mini golf, but most importantly, it was a beautiful day for Lacrosse. The UNT Women's Lacrosse team traveled to College Station just this last weekend to compete against top tier schools for first place. The UNT Women's Lacrosse team is made up of about 26 players and is open for anyone to join and learn about lacrosse. This is one out of many many teams that UNT hosts out of its sports clubs - I myself play with UNT's Tennis sports club. It's surprising how many people have no idea what Lacrosse is. It's fun of course but it can be a little rough at times.

The team during a match

As a bystander, I got to take pictures. That works out though because now I have a lot of material to use for this blog entry.

Lindsey taking on SMU

The team played their hearts out and played 3 games that day. We played our first match against Empire - a Texas A&M alumni team. Most of them had played before and UNT tried their best but ended up losing.

Round 2 UNT played against SMU. UNT lost 14-0
Round 3 UNT tied against Texas Tech 8-8.

Defense is critical

By the end of the day, everyone gained valuable experience, had tons of fun, and ate ice cream. Who doesn't like ice cream? Well done Mean Green!

Sarah after scoring a goal. Complete with fist pump and referee approval. Nice

Traditions - UNT Bonfire

Every school has traditions. Here's one of UNT's.

The bonfire being built

We build bonfires. Every homecoming, students put together a huge bonfire. I've heard it's the biggest hand-made bonfire in Texas. No cranes or heavy machinery used ever. Above is a picture I snapped of it the day before the thing was lit ablaze. You can sort of make out a few kids walking around on top stacking up more wood. Why have this tradition? I'm not sure, to be honest, but maybe it's to light the fire of encouragement and watch it spread freely and wildly until we consume our opponents in a furious unstoppable rage.

Or maybe it's because fires are awesome.

Hello World v2.0

It's been a while, but I'm still alive. And believe me I am still alive. And while you're dying I'll be still alive. I feel fantastic and I'm still alive..... still alive... still alive. (Portal, Still Alive)

It's a new semester and a new start. Now that I've settled into the new semester, gotten my classes well under way, taken a few tests and lost a few nights of sleep studying, I can start blogging again.

So what am I up to nowadays? I'm delving into the core of my degree plan. I have 4 classes; namely Database Systems and Information Integration, IT Systems and Administration, Mobile Device Development, and Discrete Math. I have another three or four semesters of school work to go before I can call myself a graduate. Perhaps if I continue to take summer school courses I can finish sooner but, I don't know if I've ever had a summer all to myself since I've started my college career. Summer school is just something that has to be done sometimes. It's for the betterment of myself and to get ahead. The sooner you finish, the better!

That said, I still had a fantastic summer. I got to go to New York state to visit my family and participate in paintball (it was my first time, and it was awesome), Kayak, and visit with all my family. The very next week I went to Florida to partake in an NSF conference. Luckily I had enough time to pay Sea World a visit! Some day I will swim with dolphins... some day.

Oh Happy Day

Today was move out day at the Dorms. Every May, each and every student must file out of their respective dorms and go find somewhere else to live while the building licks its wounds gets cleaned. Actually, the students are required to clean their rooms like big boys and girls and ask your local RA if it's ok to leave yet. I was there from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM just trying to leave the dang place. I was also helping a friend move out of her place! Poor girl has so much stuff left to move.

Anyway, where do I live now??

I've officially moved out of my dorms, cleaned up, and checked out with the Resident Advisor. I'm all on my own now! My roommate and I have moved into a nice apartment complex on the first floor of the building. Living in dorms really teaches you how to appreciate the little things in life. At first I was living in a house, under my parents' wing. That's probably a grade B living scale. Nothing too extravagant, but I was living comfortably. Then, I moved into college dorms. Granted it could have been worse, It's still a significant downgrade. I'd rate dorm life as a D on the living scale, with F being homeless. It's not that dorms are bad, per se, it's just that I have none of the common appliances that everyone is used to.

Now that I live in apartments, my living environment has increased substantially. Probably back up to level B. An A, by the way, would be like celebrity living in a mansion in Beverly Hills, or North Dallas. So I get my own Laundry facilities, a bathroom of my own, my own room, pets are allowed, a nice big refrigerator, disposal in the sink, fast internet (that's a biggie). Dorms really teach you to appreciate things in life!!

Good Luck

"Luck favors the prepared mind." Whoever came up with that quote has obviously never taken final exams at UNT. I mean, to know when your exam is, where it is, what questions are going to be on it, and what grade you need to get on it to get an A in the class requires at least SOME luck... right?... right.?..

It's exam week. I took 2 exams last week as a matter of fact, and this week I have another 2 exams. The fun never stops at UNT! This summer I've got a couple of summer courses I'm taking as well. Summer courses operate in a flexible fashion. You can take a Summer I, Summer II, or Long Summer course. Summer I and the Long Summer courses start June 7, and registration is already ongoing. Summer II starts in mid July, I believe, after Summer I courses end..

I myself am signed up for 2 Long Summer session courses in Information Technology, with Mr. Keathly! Anyway good luck with exams!