Toni Westbrook dot Com

The Joy of Computer Science and Engineering

One of the best things about being involved in the world of technology, besides getting a front row seat to all the amazing advancements made every day, is meeting and talking with the creative people who make the magic happen. I think I’m especially lucky, having strong ties to a range of different areas such as networking and development, to have met a diverse mix of very talented people.

Web Developer Extraordinaire

To say business exists in a social media world where online presence and reputation is important would be the understatement of the century. Companies today live and die by their ability to harness the power of the web. And while there are many developers out there, a true burden lies in finding talented and experienced ones. Not only does Leah fall into this camp, combining expert design skill with seasoned web development knowledge, but she possesses something that many in the industry don’t – a real love and respect for what her customers are trying to accomplish with their website. This truly shines through both in her work, and how she treats her clients. It translates into a special website that speaks its goals and connects to its visitors like no other site could. It is the difference between a good looking site and a truly powerful site.

The Proof is in the Pudding

I’ve known Leah for a number of years, having had the privilege of working with her on a number of projects professionally – and her sites continue to really impress me. Some excellent examples of recent projects: Be Irreplaceable | Donna Heart.

I love these examples, as they show how she has taken a general framework like WordPress, and turned it into a beautiful site that really communicates the site’s message. They feel personable and comfortable when you visit them, unlike a lot of cold and bland sites out there. They have that truly personal touch which is key to connecting with the audience.

For even more examples of her work, check out her online portfolio.

So if you’re looking to build a new website for your business, or need to re-imagine the one you already have, I really suggest keeping Leah Creates in mind. She is amazing at both what she does, and how she does it – something setting her apart from so many other development houses out there.

LeahCreates

As some of you might have guessed by now, I’m pretty heavily into retro computers. I love them all in different ways, but the C64 holds a very special place in my heart in particular. It was my very first computer (and my only machine for 8 years) – and it introduced me into a world which I never escaped. I learned how to program on it, played my first computer game on it, and spent a great deal of my childhood on it. So while I might be biased as I write this, I’ll try to be as objective as possible.

1. The Game Library

The C64 has always been known as a gaming machine, and for good reason. While the computer has been used across all areas of computing, from music composition and graphic design to business management and financial accounting, its library of games is MASSIVE. Estimates come in at over 21,000 titles, and new titles are still being developed all the time (Check out the most comprehensive database at GB64). And like any media, from music to movies, just because the title is older doesn’t mean it’s not still enjoyable – there are some simply great games for the C64 that are still lots of fun to play.

2. Quantity Produced

The Commodore 64 is still the best selling computer to this day – and most likely will be forever. Saying it sold well would be a gross understatement – it crushed the home computer market. Jack Tramiel, founder of Commodore, did a lot of things right in his day, and one was the price point of the machine. While it started at $595, it eventually dropped to $200, and estimates of units sold range from 17 to 30 MILLION. Even with a large portion of owners throwing their machine away over time, 30 million computers simply don’t disappear. It is still extremely easy to pick up a C64 off of eBay, Craigslist, or other online sites.

3. The Community

While this is true of a lot of the classic computers, it is especially true of the Commodore line – there is still a huge following for this machine. It’s likely if you look enough online, you’ll still find a user’s group, yearly convention, or informal get-together that includes, or even focuses on, the C64. I’ve personally attended a couple conferences (TPUG‘s World of Commodore and ECCC), and have been in close contact with other groups (Commodore Computer Club and Users Group in Vancouver, WA) – and they’re all friendly guys and gals who have a common love for all things Commodore (and Amiga, and Apple, and Atari, etc…). They are the true heart that continues to drive the C64 onward!

4. The SID Chip

The MOS 6581/8580 SID is arguably one of the greatest sound chips to ever be produced. During its time, there was no other 8-bit computer that had the sound capabilities of the C64. Even in contemporary times, the unique sound quality of the SID is still a desired effect that modern musicians seek to take advantage of. Newer dedicated hardware, such as the SIDStation, has been used by groups such as Timbaland and Machinae Supremacy to produce the sweet C64-style synth sounds that can’t be gotten anywhere else.

5. Hackability

While computers today can render 3D worlds while playing a 20 part symphony and downloading a set of encyclopedias, this comes at a cost – and that cost is complexity. The beauty of a machine like the C64 is a hardware or software developer’s ability to interact directly with the machine. You can read and write directly from/to memory, tie into the system bus, and do a whole other array of low level things that 62 layers of hardware and operating system don’t allow you to do on a new PC. For those who love to tinker, this is a dream.

6. New Capabilities

Due in large part to #2 and #5, new hardware still being made constantly, which breathes incredible new life into the machine. From SD/CF card readers and Ethernet adapters, to mp3 players and accelerators, the Commodore 64 of today is a different beast than in its 80s heyday. When a machine with a 1 MHz processor and 64K of RAM can surf the web, tweet on Twitter, and can access files on an 160GB IDE hard drive, that’s truly amazing.

7. Strong Emulator Support

Using a Commodore 64 doesn’t necessarily mean you need the hardware anymore. Since the advent of faster machines with emulation capabilities, many developers have been working on virtual versions of the hardware counterpart. Many years have passed, and these are now solid, amazing, and free applications that allow you to use a C64 on a variety of devices, from computers and laptops to PSPs and iPhones. Even if all the hardware one day disappeared, emulators never will. Two of the most popular ones are VICE and CCS64).

8. FPGA Implementations

In the same vein as #7, some hardware wizards have gone the emulation route, but instead of producing a software version, have reimplemented the machine in FPGA hardware. In this manner, the C64 exists as firmware on a programmable chip, which allows for smaller, cheaper, and easily upgradable/hackable versions of the C64. And since the machine exists as firmware, many of these devices have different models of computers on the same device – flip the switch and go from using a C64 to an Amiga 500. Examples include Jeri Ellsworth’s DTV and the MCC (Multiple Classic Computer).

9. The Scene

Since the beginning, due to its powerful sound and graphics capability, the C64 has been used to demonstrate elite programming skills through dazzling shows of animation and music. While it started in large part as intros to software cracks, the demo scene grew into a beast all of itself. Some of the greatest artistic, musical, and programming talent to ever hit a computer has gone into software demos. And to this day, programming gurus continue to show off their talents on the C64 – not only because it’s a great platform to program for, but feats are all the more impressive when accomplished in minimal space/computation. A list of upcoming Demo parties can be found at Demo Party.net

10. The Shameless Plug

And the C64 is the only place to find Shredz64 (Guitar Hero for the C64)! It’s just fun to show your friends that a machine made in 1982 can do the same things that a new PS3 or Wii can do. (Sorry, had to do it)

So if you’ve never tried a C64, or haven’t touched one for a long time – find an emulator, pick one up off eBay, or borrow a friend’s – and find out for yourself why it’s still the most amazing computer ever made!

If you’re anything like me, once you learned how to code, you would take any chance you could get to write little programs for fun. I remember once I finally “got” BASIC on my Commodore 64 growing up, I would spend hours writing the cheeziest (looking back) programs. A favorite of mine was writing countless “Question and Answer” programs, where the computer would ask “How are you?” and depending on your answer, the program would issue a different (and probably inappropriate given my age at the time) response.

Time Marches On

As time went on though, and I got better at programming, learned the fundamentals, studied Computer Science – things started to change. I still loved to program, but my goals became larger and more complex. Pet projects would take days to complete, then weeks, then months. Once I started doing it professionally, that added a whole new level, where the projects were for money, and project management, sustainability, fiscal viability, etc, all became factors. I had to specialize and focus on specific areas to remain competitive. And the technology changed – whereas once I was communicating directly with the processor and memory I/O, now I was communicating 17 levels up to a a COM object or framework API. It was just a different ballgame – which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but sometimes working at such a high level for different purposes can make you lose site of the underlying CS. Sometimes it’s important to keep your CS skills as fresh and sharp as your software engineering ones.

Some Fun Ways to Up Your CS Game

Luckily, there are some sites out there that are awesome for keeping those little grey CS cells active in your head.

Project Euler
This is by far my favorite one. Euler offers a large number of problems (currently 300) that require a computer program to solve. They are generally geared toward mathematics of different levels and areas (generally the higher the problem, the more difficult it is), and you can solve them using any method or programming language you wish. The website keeps track of how many you’ve solved and how you’re faring with the rest of the members, but really you’re competing with yourself to write the best program you can. As you get into later problems, even your efficiency matters, as your first solution might take 3 days to complete, whereas the better one takes .25 seconds. They have discussion forums for each problem as well (once you’ve solved it), where people show their solutions and help each other out. Some example problems on the site:

1. Add all the natural numbers below one thousand that are multiples of 3 or 5.
7. Find the 10001st prime.
15. Starting in the top left corner in a 20 by 20 grid, how many routes are there to the bottom right corner?
109. How many distinct ways can a player checkout in the game of darts with a score of less than 100?
157. Solving the diophantine equation 1/a+1/b= p/10n

As you can see, there are a large range of problems targeting different areas and algorithms. I’ve solved 34 to date – sometimes I’ll spend a lunch hour working on a problem, they’re great fun and you can do them at your own pace – and learn new techniques in the process.

Hack This Site!
No, that wasn’t an invitation! Hack This Site . Org is an interesting site that offers a number of security, reverse engineering, and application development missions. While I’m actually against the practice of unauthorized computer access (especially being a IT Manager by day) – penetration testing is a great thing for a network administrator to know, and reverse engineering is a fantastic thing for a programmer to know. In the high-level development world we now live in, getting back to the processor and memory level is definitely a plus – and studying the binary structure of an executable certainly achieves that. Not only does it strengthen your machine language skills, but it also gives you great insight into how compilers work, how operating systems link DLLs, management memory, and achieve IPC.

Many More

Project Euler and Hack This Site are the two I focus on (and between the two of them, there are enough problems to keep me busy for years), but if they aren’t your cup of tea, here are a list of other programming problem related sites:

Bright Shadows
Electrica
Programming Challenges
Python Challenge
TopCoder

Have fun, and get your CS in shape!