Geekdom

Recursive - see recursive

Robb Allen — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 12:26:18 GMT

Gah. My code I was working on last night hit recursiveville, a place I try not to go unless the fate of the entire universe depends on it.

It's hard enough writing a recursive function that returns everything below it and everything below what's below, but trying to get a 'path' that only returns actual matches gets sticky.

I could brute force it, returning all paths, then simply matching any of the result sets, but that just feel hokey to me, and this is an exercise in stretching my brain to keep it in shape, not just get something done.

Here's what I'm doing. The Mrs. and I love to play both Scrabble and Boggle. Finding words in jumbles of letters is a simple yet satisfying game. I'm trying to write a Boggle like application that will allow us to run the game on separate computers (learning the communications channels between the apps is my main goal).

I've built the grid of letters, but now I need to be able to search through each letter, the letters that surround it for the next letter in line until the end of the attempted word is reached or no path is found. To make it a bit harder, you can't reuse letters that are already in your path and at any point there are up to 8 'paths' that may or may not work for you.

So, I want to be able to pass in an array of characters, find all the paths that match the first character and have an open path afterwards for the next, then loop back into that function, stripping off the first character and then seeing where the next paths are available. Remembering where I've been the whole time.

Oh. Then the $#^*& Qu problem rears its ugly head. Granted there are a few non-u following q words like qanun, qat, qabab, and qepig (An Azerbaijani unit of currency), but in Boggle the tile is always Qu. So, I have to display "Queen" but actually search for "Qeen". And if you type Q without a U I have to put one in there for you. Sounds easy until you realize the computer is pretty dumb and doesn't think about these kinds of things for you, you have to tell it every last thing.

It's good brain exercise. Yes, I know there are already games out there I could download or buy, but that's like saying there's already someone else at the gym so there's no need for me to work out.

Missed IM conversations

Robb Allen — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 23:47:39 GMT

Joe Healy, the man all fish fear, popped up on my Instant Messenger earlier today. I missed him, but at least he left some comments that made me laugh

Joe Healy >««(o> says:
   hey gun boy
JOE'S FRIEND says:
   my uncle had one of those m5
Joe Healy >««(o> says:
   sharpasamarble.com
Joe Healy >««(o> says:
   you'll like him
Joe Healy >««(o> says:
   he used to be a coder
Joe Healy >««(o> says:
   now he's a NRA lobbyist - part time
Joe Healy >««(o> says:
   dam, he must be drinkin beer

That's some funny stuff right there, Joe. And I'm still coding, bud. In fact, I've been tinkering with the EnterpriseServices Libraries for the past few and working on a new, whiz-bang WPF application that's all visual!

What I have to deal with at work

Robb Allen — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 18:27:11 GMT

I'm a software developer. My clients may be fellow employees, but that doesn't negate the inanity that I have to deal with from time to time.

Right now, I have a "bug" that states "I put the square peg in the round hole, and the hole is claiming the peg is of an invalid shape."

*Sigh*

My job consists of me saving people from themselves. I'd make a good Leftist, wouldn't I?

Sing it with me!

Robb Allen — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 00:59:21 GMT

For Breda!

A design for Firefox

Robb Allen — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 02:36:25 GMT

I installed Firefox 3.0 the other day and decided to play around with Stylish. I made my own custom about:blank screen and uploaded it to UserStyles.org and you can use it yourself by downloading it here.

I like the design, myself. Nothing super fancy, just a little flame and dark lighting.

If you use it, let me know.

Back from the dead

Robb Allen — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 17:22:39 GMT

Server took a nap earlier. My lovely wife just powered it back on. I need a UPS, but I don't have the cash right now, but I at least need to reconfigure the server to turn itself back on after a power outage.

So, didja miss me?

Wii fit report

Robb Allen — Fri, 23 May 2008 14:07:05 GMT

Fun. But I'm actually hurting. My calves hurt like hell.

You know you're out of shape when a video game kicks your ass.

Quote of the day - Nothing left to do, then, edition

Robb Allen — Thu, 22 May 2008 14:56:34 GMT

From an IM conversation with Greg

i just finished reading the internet last week... nothing left to surf

Maybe I'm missing something here

Robb Allen — Wed, 21 May 2008 23:23:45 GMT

But I was under the impression that information cannot travel faster than light

Typically, they occur when a massive star - more than eight times the mass of the Sun - runs out of fuel and collapses to form a hot relic called a neutron star.
Their extreme brightness allows them to be seen in distant galaxies.
But observers cannot pick up this optical emission until several hours or days after the explosion, so a supernova's first moments are shrouded in mystery.

I thought Proxima Centauri was the closest star at 4.2 light years. If it were to pop, it would take 4.2 years before we knew it, right?

I have no idea what you were searching for

Robb Allen — Mon, 05 May 2008 18:44:09 GMT

But I highly doubt you're going to find this here

I like my tits dangerous, baby.