LeoNLaura.com

Particles everywhere!!!

I have been thinking about making a fireworks screensaver for a bit and one of the things I thought would be really cool to have is a good particle engine for generating and drawing sparks and such. I spent a few evenings working on it and came up with a good modular engine that can be used in other projects very easily. Here is my sandbox app for playing with it:

Particle Engine Sandbox

(Note: I have been told that this requires the .NET Framework 4.0.)

I just attached it to the mouse pointer for the sample since it really doesn’t do anything by itself.

I decided I would have all the interaction through a main class called “ParticleEngine” which would manage all the particles and I made it extensible by having particle effects. The effects are added to the engine and apply to all the particles when the engine is updated, normally due to a request to draw the particles. Currently I only have two effects: Gravity and ColorDecay.

I think it turned out really cool and can’t wait to use it in some other projects. Please let me know what you think.

Windows Phone Stuff

I’m having fun with Windows Phone at work. Made me think it might be fun to try some personal project at home. I started a Silverlight project and it is going to take a little more learning to get that going full bore but I’ve got a good start. I also started a game project using XNA which is going really well.

I’d just like to say that after using my iPhone for the past year, it is nice to be able program for a phone again.

End of an era in my life and the beginning of a new one…

I have been at my current job for over six years, now. It is where I spend most of my time away from being at home. I have really been confused about how I feel about the fact that after tomorrow, I won’t be going to work there anymore.

I guess I should explain a little more.

Apparently, my manager at work has been fighting to keep our office open for a number of years. I was blissfully ignorant of this fact because our office was consistently the most efficient and the quality of the software and processes that we produced were of note across the company. Unfortunately, the CEO, or whatever title they made up this year, has wanted to close us for a while. It seemed counter-productive to me but it made sense to someone since this past January we found out that the end of March would be the end of the office itself.

That was a pretty big blow. I was concerned because the job market has been poor for quite a while and I was not looking forward to job searching. Fortunately, there were a lot of opportunities available and I seemed to have gained the skills over the past six years that a lot of companies were looking for. I was initially contacted by more contract agencies for agency positions at Microsoft than I was aware existed. After letting many of them know that I was looking for more permanent employment, I got an interview at Microsoft for a vendor position that seemed somewhat promising. This was fairly early in the game, though, so I was expecting it to be a good opportunity to practice my interview skills. I interviewed with three separate people over three-and-a-half hours coding on whiteboards and enjoyed it, really. I struggled a bit with some of the questions but did come up with answers I felt solved the problems they gave to me. Shortly after that day, I was contacted by recruiters from Microsoft, HTC, and Amazon with opportunities for permanent positions. Then I got word that the team I interviewed with at Microsoft wanted me for the vendor position and I had an actual offer on the table. That was a tough decision. After lots of worrying and decision making, I let the contract agency know that I was not comfortable accepting the vendor position until after I explored the permanent possibilities. HTC seemed to be the first to pan out. I had the first interview which went well and things looked really good. I just had to wait for the decision makers to get back from overseas business trips in order to interview with them, as well. I was then contacted by a recruiter at Google but my phone interview didn’t go so well so I didn’t actually get an in person interview there. I then had a full-day interview with Amazon which was pretty interesting. I thought it went well but I found out that same day that they were “not going to go forward with giving me an offer”. That was a blow. I felt pretty un-hirable at that point and was pretty miserable for almost a day. Then I got word from HTC that they were going to give me an offer. I was very excited. That fixed my mood pretty well. I just had to wait for the paperwork to get processed in Taiwan for the offer. In the process of waiting, I had an interview at Microsoft. It was a full day. I thought it was over at about 2 or 3pm since that was as far as the itinerary they gave me went but I had three more interviews after that. Well, Microsoft came back on Monday to tell me that they were going to be making me an offer and I would receive it on Tuesday. I received it on Tuesday and it was so amazing that I couldn’t pass it up. I waited until Wednesday to give HTC a chance to get back to me but they still had not received the offer back from Taiwan. (It might still be there…) I let the HTC recruiter know that I was going to go with the offer from Microsoft.

I then filled out the paperwork for my background check and once it was finished (it took a week) I put in my notice and tomorrow is my last day at my current job.

I don’t really know how to feel right now, though. It doesn’t seem real yet I know it is. This job has been my sun coming up each day for so long that it seems weird that it is coming to an end. It has been a great place to work. My co-workers have been great and I am going to miss working with them.

I’m looking forward to working at Microsoft again, but this time I’ll be a full-time employee which is exciting for me. I’m also looking forward to working with the Windows Phone 7 Series. I love gadgets so much and these are truly the latest and greatest thing. It will be fun to be part of this project.

Nine-Tenths

I remember when I was young, around ten-years-old, I asked my mom why gas prices always ended in 9/10. She told me it was their way of making the prices higher without appearing to. It was a psychological tactic. I realized the other day that it has worked perfectly on me for quite some time. If someone asked me about gas prices I always would state a price that didn’t take into consideration that piddly little 9/10 that is always on the end.

I realized that I was annoyed by it. The signs will either have replaceable numbers for the price or a digital display ecept for that 9/10. It is always a permanent part of the gas price sign. It doesn’t change. It cannot be removed. It is always there. I think we ignore it because of that. It no longer registers with our conscious mind.

It makes me wonder if my mom’s reason was correct or if there was another reason, perhaps of a business nature. Wherever this 9/10 came from, though, is it really necessary? Maybe there is a tax that includes this 9/10. I would like that to be true because I feel a little sheepish since I realized I have been duped by the sneakiness equivalent of a three year old putting some form of contraband behind their back and saying that they aren’t up to anything.

Happy New Post!

So… I have done a terrible job of updating for the past while. I have been doing most of my updating on Facebook. That has good and bad points to it. Good is that I am more active in updating what I want to tell people. Bad is that all of my updates are limited to minimal sentences nearly on par with Twitter posts. (I refuse to call them by what the site calls them.)
New stuff has been going on, though. I have many pictures of Jillian I need to upload to Flickr and I have uploaded a number of videos from my phone to YouTube.
With my phone always with me, it would seem to be natural for me to be able to keep this blog updated but I guess I just need to figure out what I should post.
I will be thinking about what I can contribute here that is interesting to read and to write. I can promise that not all of it will be fiction.

LEGOs Rock!

Last weekend I was fortunate enough to go to the BrickCon exhibition. It was extremely cool. There were so many amazing builders there. I took a bunch of good pictures on Sunday. Check them out.

Unintentional light trails…

Just shows you that I had issues taking a picture of the moon at Tiger Lake this year. I think it turned out to be a cool shot but it was totally on accident. I like the dotted line due to 60Hz A/C power from the lights across the lake.

On a different note, I uploaded a ton of pictures of Jillian to Flickr. Check ‘em out.

I’ve been a bit lax…

I have a ton of pictures to put up on Flickr and I need to keep the blog up to date… I’ll be working on this.

Very nice…

The sun came out!

Oregon 2009

We’re here in Oregon on vacation. We were very pleasantly surprised with the rental house which has plenty of room for everyone and a great view of the ocean from every room. It is rather overcast due to the high temperatures inland, we were told. It doesn’t bother me. It is relaxing which is the main thing for me. We stopped at the Spirit Mountain casino on our way since we had to wait until 4pm to her into the rental. I plunked $20 into a slot machine and turned it into $67 in 3 pulls. So I stopped. Jillian is having fun because she has Gramma and Grampa smothering her with love as well as Aunty Sarah and Uncle Danny. We do not have any big plans and that is a great thing.