What are you working on? October 2015

[AwesomeX]

Thanks for your input everyone, this is definitely the best programming and development community around.

I decided to bend and make the handles look more natural, like it was a branch off a tree.
It's fairly subtle, so it may not look too different, especially just from one angle. But I'm happy with it for now.

[img_thumb]http://media.indiedb.com/cache/images/games/1/46/45491/thumb_620x2000/StoneAxeRender.2.png[/img_thumb] [img_thumb]http://media.indiedb.com/cache/images/games/1/46/45491/thumb_620x2000/StonePickaxeRender.1.png[/img_thumb]

[srobins]

[QUOTE=Map in a box;48918916]we weren't his friends he was just a stick in the mud we used to get by. glad i can say that now gosh phew weight off shoulders

[editline]16th October 2015[/editline]

don't tell him i said that[/QUOTE]

[img]https://i.imgur.com/m2a3eJS.png[/img]

[Karmah]

Today I started working on adding Screen Space Ambient Occlusion.

I don't know if its just because I'm not blurring the results, but I don't think this looks right:

[vid]http://webm.host/8651a/vid.webm[/vid]

But hey, at the very least I got some results within a few hours of starting it

[Map in a box]

[QUOTE=srobins;48918965][img]https://i.imgur.com/m2a3eJS.png[/img][/QUOTE]

the worst soccermom!!!!

[Wats]

[QUOTE=Wats;48861221]WAYWO, I need some advice! I made this alt account just in case.

So I recently started a new job as a graduate software engineer. The company sounded great, and we were promised programming training, hands-on experience, all that good stuff. They take on people of all skill levels, provided they have SOME prior knowledge of programming. Anyway, I got there earlier this week and everything seemed great – the people are really nice, and the company isn't too big that you never see the CEO, but not too small that you know everyone.

Anyway, a few days later and we were assigned our desks, and were called in to chat about what we'd be working on first. The project sounds awesome – I can't say much about it, but it's very interesting. However, things took a sharp turn for the worst when we were told what part we'd e playing in this. We are the testers. OK, not so bad right, at least I can write some unit tests? Wrong type of testing! The type of testing I'll be doing is literally just USING the software to make sure it works correctly. The client has provided requirements for what the software should do, and it's my job to operate the software in such a way so as to be able to demonstrate it works. I have to detail what buttons to press, what to type, what you see on screen, all in huge verbose, repetitive documents. It literally has so little to do with programming that the business grads who also recently joined are helping out.

Now, if this was for two weeks or something, I could live with it. Who better to do this job than the inexperienced graduates? But, it's not two weeks. It's three months.

Feeling this way, part of me feels very selfish and spoilt - hard work isn't easy, someone has to do the boring jobs, and it might as well be the graduates because they're cheap.
But the other part of me feels slighted, and lied to – I turned down some very promising opportunities for this job and now we won't even start TRAINING until January.

Honestly the work is so dull I think eating the keyboard would be much more fun at this point. I've lost all motivation and excitement for the job, and I'm finding it very hard to remain upbeat to my superiors.

So, what do I do? Do I suck it up and wait it out until the “real” programming starts? Or do I approach my manager and ask if I can help the “real” developers? If I ask my manager, how do I approach it so that I don't sound like some entitled graduate who thinks he knows everything? I understand that if they put me on the dev team, I'm going to be the least experienced developer in all liklihood, but I can learn pretty quickly and out of the other graduates I've probably got the most experience. I want to come across as eager but not entitled and self-absorbed. I feel a mix of emotions: I'm pretty upset as I feel I was lied to, but I also feel guilty for feeling this way because I know jobs are hard to come by. But I don't know if I can deal with it for 3 whole months. I was so excited now I'm just :([/QUOTE]

Update:

I finally plucked up the courage to speak to my manager today.
I don't think I explained my viewpoint very well - he doesn't seem to be a good listener, though he's a nice bloke. I basically said I was surprised because the work wasn't what I expected to be doing and that I was disappointed it would be for the next three months.

His response was formed in three points:
1. We're being paid to do a job, and this type of testing is just an unfortunate aspect of Software Engineering (he didn't say it exactly like this, but this was the overall gist)

2. He's doing the grads a favour by training us on this type of testing - according to him, he could outsource it for a lot cheaper. Again he didn't say it like this but he did mention that he's actively not outsourcing this task in order to benefit us in the long run, which I know is probably a lie because he's got people working with us who have been with the company for years.

3. Grads cost a lot to hire and he doesn't want to lose us, so he wouldn't make us do anything he thought was pointless

After thinking about it for a while, here's my response (I didn't say this at the time because I'm too weak spined and was too overwhelmed at the time to have been able to form a counter-argument - even finding the courage to confront him on this issue was near impossible as I have no idea if it's appropriate or not)

1. Yes it is a job, but I didn't join for the money. If I wanted the money I would have worked for a bank. I was also frustrated because I didn't have an opportunity to elaborate on how my skills match those required of the project, so I feel like I'm still being overlooked and lumped in with the rest of the entry-level programmers

2. If he could outsource it for cheaper, why not do that and put us on the dev team to give us even better training?

3. Of course he's going to say this

I didn't mention that I've just moved across the country for this job because that might make him think I'm stuck there. He did say that we'd be off the project for sure in under 3 months because that's when the allocated funds expire, so he did reassure me that it would be no longer than 3 months. But then I look at all my fellow classmates who have gone to awesome companies at higher salary with less programming experience and I can't help but feel I fucked up :(

Current status:

1. Boss guy doesn't know my experience
2. Boss guy reluctant to move people to dev group because there's so much testing to do
3. Boss guy reassures me that we'll be moving on in under 3 months regardless of if the project is done or not
4. I'm stuck for a few months because I've just moved across the country
5. I'm tearing my hair out with boredom at work

What do I do?

[Map in a box]

feels more like the boss is downsizing you and the others' importance because he's outright lying

[editline]16th October 2015[/editline]

he's paying outsourced rates is what i'm seeing to graduates

[editline]16th October 2015[/editline]

you can jobsearch while in a job

[fpro]

Take up a night job as a pole dancer. It will counter balance the boredom from the first.

[Berkin]

Hey all you beautiful moist gorillas. Upon request by some random gentleman via email, I have released the source code of the [I]ORIGINAL MOIST BANANA[/I] on my GitHub, as well as the infamous story generator and editing tools that jumpstarted my career as a majestic cucumber demigod. Please enjoy thoroughly.

[URL="https://github.com/TheBerkin/MoistBanana"]GitHub Link[/URL]

[img]http://i.imgur.com/EvafCem.png[/img]

[leontodd]

[QUOTE=Berkin;48920643]Hey all you beautiful moist gorillas. Upon request by some random gentleman via email, I have released the source code of the [I]ORIGINAL MOIST BANANA[/I] on my GitHub, as well as the infamous story generator and editing tools that jumpstarted my career as a majestic cucumber demigod. Please enjoy thoroughly.

[URL="https://github.com/TheBerkin/MoistBanana"]GitHub Link[/URL][/QUOTE]

[QUOTE]One January midnight, 8 weasels from the double dildo at Supergluetown were playing a frosty game.[/QUOTE]

This is gold.

[editline]17th October 2015[/editline]

I want to put these generated books into production and leave them in libraries just so people will read them and question their sanity.

[Berkin]

[QUOTE=leontodd;48920682]This is gold.

[editline]17th October 2015[/editline]

I want to put these generated books into production and leave them in libraries just so people will read them and question their sanity.[/QUOTE]

I have contemplated doing this numerous times. I wonder if I could sell these as a novelty product...

[editline]17th October 2015[/editline]

If someone wants to work on a modern Rant port of this, I'll love you forever.

[Tamschi]

So I just found [URL="https://github.com/jbevain/cecil/blob/master/Mono.Cecil.Cil/OpCode.cs#L199"]this[/URL] in the Mono.Cecil source[URL="https://archive.is/5FJtp"].[/URL]
There's also [URL="https://github.com/jbevain/cecil/blob/master/Mono.Cecil.Cil/OpCodes.cs"]this[/URL][URL="https://archive.is/IRE1M"],[/URL] where those two static arrays are filled from the [URL="https://github.com/jbevain/cecil/blob/master/Mono.Cecil.Cil/OpCode.cs#L146"]OpCode constructor[/URL] (which also immediately undoes the bit packing from the previous site [editline]edit[/editline]though it's probably packed in the assembly)[URL="https://archive.is/XsVbu"].[/URL]

Add to that [URL="https://github.com/jbevain/cecil/blob/master/Mono.Cecil.Cil/Instruction.cs#L22"][I]Instruction[/I][/URL]s storing the previous and next ones each despite that not appearing in compiled assemblies themselves, and as such (probably?) not being reusable in multiple methods, and I'm seriously tempted to roll my own decompiler[URL="https://archive.is/l1O63"].[/URL]

The complete and utter lack of real documentation is just the cherry on top of everything else :disgust:

[ithon]

This might interest you Berkin
[url]http://larseidnes.com/2015/10/13/auto-generating-clickbait-with-recurrent-neural-networks/[/url]
[url]http://clickotron.com/[/url]

few of my favorites:
[url]http://clickotron.com/article/5579/this-guy-thinks-his-cat-was-drunk-for-his-five-years-he-gets[/url]
[url]http://clickotron.com/article/5830/top-500-girls-video-games[/url] << because the bot has learned to use women and lgbt topics for clickbait and the titles look real.

[Tamschi]

[QUOTE=Tamschi;48921780]So I just found [URL="https://github.com/jbevain/cecil/blob/master/Mono.Cecil.Cil/OpCode.cs#L199"]this[/URL] in the Mono.Cecil source[URL="https://archive.is/5FJtp"].[/URL]
[...][/QUOTE]

[URL="https://github.com/jbevain/cecil/commit/9230da36fb2068f3908a8a61d3b7f01c6c206a08?diff=split"]Supposedly this makes the assembly about 5KB smaller compared to just using strings.[/URL]

How that's worth the maintainability impact and slower loading time is beyond me though.
Especially since the library is still 280KB anyway.

[Darwin226]

It's a bit hard to find information on this, but does anyone know how much allocation time is dependent on the size you're allocating? For example, would it be safe to assume that allocating 1kb and allocating a 100 bytes is the same thing? What are the thresholds?

This probably differs from allocator to allocator, so if you know the answer for any of them, please share.

[DarKSunrise]

i'd assume that there isn't much of a difference at such low sizes

[editline]17th October 2015[/editline]

why do you need to know this? are you doing premature optimization?

[Pappschachtel]

[QUOTE=Darwin226;48922327]It's a bit hard to find information on this, but does anyone know how much allocation time is dependent on the size you're allocating? For example, would it be safe to assume that allocating 1kb and allocating a 100 bytes is the same thing? What are the thresholds?

This probably differs from allocator to allocator, so if you know the answer for any of them, please share.[/QUOTE]

i think it depends on the page size, the cpu architecture and the operating system...

[Tamschi]

[QUOTE=Darwin226;48922327]It's a bit hard to find information on this, but does anyone know how much allocation time is dependent on the size you're allocating? For example, would it be safe to assume that allocating 1kb and allocating a 100 bytes is the same thing? What are the thresholds?

This probably differs from allocator to allocator, so if you know the answer for any of them, please share.[/QUOTE]

If this is C++/something else that doesn't clear the memory, then [I]I suspect[/I] it depends mainly on the internal fragmentation of the process or the amount of additional pages that have to be cleared and allocated by the OS. Allocating the same amount most likely can take various different amounts of time due to this, with no clear threshold regarding single allocations.

With something like Java or the CLR that force-clears all new instances you'll also get that as additional proportional cost, but how that performs in practice definitely should depend on what exactly the OS and caches do since I can't imagine them not using [I]memset[/I] or similar internally.

[Potatofactory]

I've been working on an ingame marching band addon that's based off a fixed width for the football field it uses midi files to emit a specific part per player (or NPC). You can even adjust size of the same parts so you can have 10 trumpets and 22 clarinets or however unbalanced your mind wants it to be. I've also added a human error slider so you can go from the best band in the world to a piece of crap. And then we've got the "yelling system" this is where a bunch of other members of the same section will start yelling at each other for correction. Now I wish I had something to show you however in the time of this post I an currently working on animations and modeling the characters.

Until I finish them enjoy this realistic representation of the human error setting turned to 100%

[video]https://youtube.com/watch?v=xVe3wWo11a0[/video]

[helifreak]

Been tolerating 20 second load times on a utility I made for myself for months since I usually leave it open for hours afterwards anyway and I don't intend on releasing it (don't really want to be responsible for murdering a server). Changed one loop from a foreach to a Parallel.For, a Mutex, and a sort and now load times are more like 4 seconds. This shit took 5 minutes, I'm so dumb. Parallel.For is amazing.

[Berkin]

[QUOTE=Ithon;48921827]This might interest you Berkin
[url]http://larseidnes.com/2015/10/13/auto-generating-clickbait-with-recurrent-neural-networks/[/url]
[url]http://clickotron.com/[/url]

few of my favorites:
[url]http://clickotron.com/article/5579/this-guy-thinks-his-cat-was-drunk-for-his-five-years-he-gets[/url]
[url]http://clickotron.com/article/5830/top-500-girls-video-games[/url] << because the bot has learned to use women and lgbt topics for clickbait and the titles look real.[/QUOTE]

Interesting, I've always wanted to do something like this. I wish the articles were longer.

Definitely going to give the Wikimedia API a shot for image searching now.

[AwesomeX]

Apparently IndieDB automatically publishes your game after a couple days.

So I have my game on there, with like 4 images and hardly any info.

[I][B]And I already have a watcher [/B][/I]:v:

[Karmah]

I got SSAO working! It turned out to be a texture filtering issue all along, so I think I now can solve why my normal maps were degrading in quality quite sharply over distance.

[t]http://i.imgur.com/0fwVEQw.png[/t]

[zenby]

I still don't have much to show for it but I've been hard at work generalizing from my example setup of nodes that enveloped a sine wave, triangle wave and an ADSR thing together and extracting that behavior into a component system so you can modular lay change node behavior and easily implement new behaviors

As soon as the setup for my base example has been boiled down to a minimum number of lines I'm gonna add the tools for changing wiring and creating/removing nodes and editing component properties. Then it'll be at a state where you can mess around and make diffident sounds without touching the code

After that is a workspace system that will allow you to save a network and then use it as a component in another workspace, which seems to be integral to getting complex behaviors in this kind of software

[editline]17th October 2015[/editline]

Then I get to the really fun part where I start implementing components for sequencers and filters and all sorts of audio things, and neural network stuff too

[AwesomeX]

[QUOTE=Trebgarta;48924723]..I believe in moddb-related sites you automatically watch your own stuff, upvote your own comments etc. so its never 0. I'm not sure though.[/QUOTE]

I've checked the list though, it's some random dude watching it.

[Arxae]

I used to do admin related stuff for desura. You mean it got authorized after a few days?

[Karmah]

I finished up tweaking my all of my lights to support using an AO map, and finally got to see how my ssao would look in a semi-realistic case:

[t]http://i.imgur.com/s677RXN.png[/t] [t]http://i.imgur.com/byguacr.png[/t]

[Pelf]

Been working on improving my analytics tools for my game. Today I managed to get it to upload analytics files to a server! I had no idea was I was doing when I started but I got it done and it works great so I'm really excited to get testing soon. After quitting, the game will collect all the analytics information and write it to a single file and upload that to an ftp server that's just on my laptop right now. Then I can easily download the files with filezilla and unpack everything with [URL="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13781308/ShareX/2015-10/2015-10-16_19-48-58.png"]my analytics menu in my game[/URL].

Here's a .gif I made from the snapshots that were recorded from my friend testing the uploading.

[IMG]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13781308/snapshots_mission1.gif[/IMG]

[r0b0tsquid]

Let's play spot the bug :disgust:

def fieldline(f, v, max_mag, max_iters):
	n = 0
	data = []
	while np.linalg.norm(v) < max_mag and n < max_iters:
		data.append(v)
		v += f(v) * 0.005
		n += 1
	return data

[Berkin]

[QUOTE=r0b0tsquid;48926308]Let's play spot the bug :disgust:

def fieldline(f, v, max_mag, max_iters):
	n = 0
	data = []
	while np.linalg.norm(v) < max_mag and n < max_iters:
		data.append(v)
		v += f(v) * 0.005
		n += 1
	return data

[/QUOTE]

What is this function supposed to do exactly?

[Zero-Point]

More specifically, what do you want it to do vs. what is it doing?