Gulp.js – an AMAZING build system!
Every once in a while, I learn something new that makes me just really happy to be a programmer. Recently, I started building a single-page javascript game, and discovered gulp.js, a build system where you write your build...
Cubone, the worst Pokemon
I’ve had this conversation a few times recently with my friends, and felt the need to share it with the wider world. So look at this guy: That’s a Cubone. The skull he wears? That’s the skull of his dead mother...
Rage-quit support for fish shell
I ran across a fantastically entertaining tweet this morning, advertising “rage-quit support for bash”: It’s hilarious and silly and excellent, except it only works in bash. If you run a less-common shell...
Is scarcity alone valuable? A social experiment.
Rare wines can cost thousands of dollars a bottle. Rare sports cards still fetch hundreds of dollars each. And in a disaster situation, scarce survival items like candles and generators appreciate in price remarkably. Clearly,...
Game over. New game?
Two years. Six major content releases. Twelve major event releases. The glorious return of tournaments. The less-than-glorious internationalization and Chinese launch (and then shutdown). Dozens of new mice, hundreds of new...
Online-only games are the future
You may not like it, and I may not like it either, but it’s true. You’ve probably heard about the rocky launch of the SimCity reboot. If not, here’s the skinny: EA shoehorned online-only DRM onto SimCity and...
Functional vs. Object-Oriented PHP
I was asked a seemingly-innocuous question lately that actually turned out to be pretty interesting: “Do you do much object-oriented programming in PHP, like design patterns?” (I’m paraphrasing, actually, I am...
Wait, nothing’s wrong?
I recently read a tweet that really set me to thinking: Nothing is quite so shocking as writing code which runs fine the first time. — cliffski (@cliffski) January 8, 2013 I’ve had this same thought many, many times...
Fine, eBay. Here’s your $2. I hope you choke on it.
Just a head’s up – don’t use eBay to sell anything. Save yourself the time, effort, and money. That’s the tl;dr. But here’s the rest of the story: So the iPhone 5 was coming out, and I very carefully...
Board game idea: Insider Trading
When I was younger, I enjoyed an afternoon playing the board game “Stock Ticker”. It was a new concept to me (no board to travel around), it dealt with money (and getting rich), and I was playing it with some really...