The Daily Ken

Android Fun!

admin — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 19:39:09 +0000

I have committed to learn how to make apps for android. So I’m currently downloading the correct SDKs for 2.1 and 2.2. I’ll start off easy with a simple HelloWorld. After that I’m going to make a search widget for an anime database – just for fun. It should be fun to work with the API.

I’m starting with the Pulsar package of Eclipse, for those of you who care. I’ll learn how to do create and compile the Java-based apps before I spend much time with OpenPlug’s Ellipis (a code generator that allows to write Flex Apps and convert them to Android or iPhone code to be compiled).

I’ll update this after I’ve gotten something working.

Update: Okay, I’ve gotten a simple Hello World to work on an emulator created by the one of the SDK tools. It took more time to install everything and add the Android SDK to my Path than it did to make the app.

For those of you who wish to try it on your own, I used this links: Developing In Eclipse, with ADT, Hello, World – both from the Google Android Developer Page.

Update: It works! Woo hoo! The USB driver that comes from Google is older than my phone so I used USBDeview to remove anthing associated with T-Mo or HTC and the installed PDANet on phone and pc. It took care of the right USB drivers 100%! Now I have a little app called ‘Hello World’ on my phone.

It’s not much, but it is a beginning!

Ennui

admin — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:59:40 +0000

Gray day – student web hosting acting up – no windows down here in the basement – stayed up too late. Ennui…

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I wish I were outside doing something… anything really.

Dusting off the blog

admin — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 18:09:51 +0000

Just for fun I added a twitter-stream and played with the CSS. Seems like I’ve not done much HTML/CSS-wise so I’ll probably be doing some more minor adjustments here and there. Been really busy reinstalling windows, grading midterms, and stuff – haven’t done much coding at all lately.

I’m looking for a good hit detection library for AS3. Hopefully that will allow my students to make some awesome gamey-games!

I need to build something… NOW!

admin — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 21:46:47 +0000

I feel like I’m walking through sludge! I haven’t used anything from the creative side of my mind and I’m worried I’m losing it. Some thoughts on what might be next:

A sources sub-site that has all my source files from Flash demo, etc.

A new front page that would have links to the blog, classfiles, and new sources site.

Ugh! That’s it?! I think of some more, but what the heck! (Hey, I’m Mormon – don’t expect me to swear!)

Holy freakin’ cow! 12 hour days Suck!

admin — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 03:16:10 +0000

Okay,
so my life is crazy. Now I’m teaching from 11am to 11pm straight with no break. Why did I say yes? Am I that in need of cash? (Kidding – who isn’t in need of cash?)

I was thinking about all of the things I need to do I’m wondering when am I going to get it all done.
Met with a former student/partner and we decided to do some collaboration. We were thinking of doing some flash components together and possibly selling ‘em on a place like flashden – any suggestions?

Ruby – where are the brackets?

admin — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 05:13:30 +0000

I’ve checked out a book on programming with Ruby and I’m pretty excited. It is sooooo object oriented that I’m starting to understand some of the OOP concepts from other projects a little bit better. Naturally, that has led me to Ruby on Rails, which seems to me as a very good way to learn more about the MVC (model view control) design pattern. I’ve also found a Ruby alternate to AMFPHP that uses Ruby, so I’ll be checking that out.

It seems that Rails and Flex may be pretty good partners as well.

The thing is – the syntax is very different from what I’m used to. No brackets, property definitions in objects are different, as well as the formatting of the conditional statements – not saying that I can’t look at it and understand it (mostly) but I am going to need more than a checked out library Ruby book to begin creating some useful code.

If you’re interested in learning about Ruby and Ruby on Rails with me, I’ve bookmarked a couple of good sites on my delicious account. http://delicious.com/spazzken/ruby

Objective-C can wait

admin — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 02:20:54 +0000

With no Mac, no Xcode, and no hope of getting a Mac in the near future, Objective-C is going to have to wait. I downloaded OpenFrameworks, and so I’m going to get a little C/C++, but nothing like what I was planning. Perhaps sometime soon…

Objective-C, here I come!

admin — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 00:04:57 +0000

Okay – I know I have zero time for doing anything, but it seems like it’s about time to add insult to injury and learn a new language. I know everyone and their mother’s duck is learning Objective-C, but I want to too. Mrs. Ken even seems excited about it. Any suggestions for my first app? Mayby something with yōkai?

My Head hurts o_O

admin — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 18:18:03 +0000

So I’ve got to make this script that will take a list of parented categories (list includes category name, category id, and the parent id of the category – made in MySQL) and create a tree with documents under each category (in Flex with AS3). I think I know how to make the tree, but perhaps I should request the documents as soon as the tree is expanded? Perhaps it could work.

Otherwise, I need to include the documents in the category tree – where they belong. It has been giving me a headache for a long time! When I get it done, I post it here.

Long story short – data visualization sucks!

Flashbelt was fun!

admin — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 16:43:17 +0000

Some cool stuff from Flashbelt:

Me getting to introduce Andre Michelle, audio/actionscript genius – (Yes, Andre – compared to me, you are a genius!)
Olives and Artichoke hearts for a rocking snack
Pleasantly surprised to meet up with Jed

How about a lovely photo of me looking silly? Ask no more:

To answer the question – yes, I’m following along in Flash CS4. The tips and tricks section rocked!