Filling in the cracks

I’m a wee bit behind and I apologize. Saying it’s been a crazy week is an understatement. Let’s begin.

I think the program and myself included put an enormous amount of pressure on ourselves right at the ‘Go!’ of this semester. Coming over of flyin with no sleep, raging stress, and agitation, it’s incredibly hard to regroup in a few days before starting the biggest semester our program has. Everyone realized the workload would only increase as the semester went on and to that point have spent countless hours working on everything since the end of January.

And then this past week occured and everyone cracked.

And not in the most obvious of ways, but the tension and edge in the air was suffocating. Everyone did their best to hide their crazed eyes, but it was quite clear that a break was needed for everyone. With that, a reevaluation of ourselves and our work.

I myself have realized I need to calm down with my capstone. I’m a person that is going to get it done, so killing myself so early on is ridiculous when there are other events and projects that have to be done. Feeling guilty about going home around 8pm is ludicrous, there is plenty of time available so I should be able to sleep.

I could not get any work done last week than the barest of bare minimum. My brain was complete mush and could not grasp any concept or design any site. Nothing. Now, a lot of this is due to the lack of sleep I was getting because of an obnoxious neighbor above me, but midweek I just had to tell myself to stop. What’s the point of forcing myself to do anything if it’s going to come out as complete crap?

To top it all off, I had some sort of food poisoning or 24 hour stomach flu and let’s just say I felt like death. Still a bit hazy this morning, however getting myself away from so much school was the best thing I could have done for myself. Granted, I love my work and I love what I do, but everyone needs a break and needs to escape from pressure because you, we, I are all going to crack. And we did. I did.

In the end, I apologize for my lack of work and blogs but it was necessary and now I can get back to making really good stuff. Because I can do that. It’s what I do. I make good stuff.

The light of all things development is shining down on me…

Not so exciting morning: scrapping ice off my car when I am supposed to be living in the south.

Exciting morning: indulging in the <canvas> tag of HTML5 and learning how to complete my Capstone! Cue a less-stressed Carey.

Some of you may think my ‘exciting’ moment is not-so exciting. Well poo poo it is for me and if I could I would stick my tongue out at you.

Capstone is really starting to roll and I can feel the tension with our individual projects vibrating throughout the room. I’m personally trying to avoid the freak out by pacing myself as Cassie and I have created a very hefty first half of the semester calendar. Basically, we don’t want to be doing too much by April.

Anyways, I’m reading yet another fantastic, straightforward, easy-to-read book “HTML5: The Missing Manual,” and they dedicate an entire section on the canvas element, which is basically a drawing board in an HTML browser. (Have I told you how awesome HTML5 is? IT’S AWESOME!).

This drawing board is going to allow me to implement Cassie’s map into the HTML and (hopefully) draw paths over the map with this <canvas> function. And, yes, these paths are curved! Here’s a little code snippet:

var canvas = document.getElementById(“drawingCanvas”);

var context = canvas.getContext(“2d”);

// Put the pen where the curve starts.

context.moveTo(62, 242);

// Create variables for the two control points and the end point of the curve.

var control1_x = 187;

var control1_y = 32;

var control2_x = 429;

var control2_y = 480;

var endPointX = 365;

var endPointY = 133;

// Draw the curve.

context.bezierCurveTo(control1_x, control1_y, control2_x, control2_y,

endPointX, endPointY);

context.stroke();

It’s basic JavaScript, best implemented in a separate .html file for better browser speed. The bezierCurve is the line and the control var help identify the curving points of the path. Best part, I can repeatedly create start and end points, which is exactly what I need to make this app work!

Here’s an awesome little tutorial to learn how to create perfect path trajectory that you’re looking for. Basically how to do the math without thinking too hard:

http://tinyurl.com/html5bezier

And for all those nit-picky people out there, the <canvas> tag will work for a mobile app with Safari iOS. Version 1 to be exact. Let’s be honest, how bad would it suck if I did 3 months of work on this app, come to find it not working all because of compatibility issues. That’s why we should have universally browsing and code!

I feel like I have lost the elephant sitting on my shoulders. This worry weight of not knowing exactly how I am going to complete this app has been making me a cranky, whiney, negative Nancy for the past two weeks, so I apologize to my friends and classmates for my sourpuss attitude. I’m ashamed. In my defense, my degree depends on this project.

(Sidenote: Apparently, I have to pay $100 to graduate. 100 DOLLARS! Um… I believe I payed some big bucks cough3ograndcough to even come here, why does this school keep sucking money out of us? They should be ashamed. The principle of this policy is wrong and the school should really reconsider this charge because it makes them look like greedy SOBs.)

Here’s to a happier and lighter CB. Cheers!

Capstone

Spring semester of the Elon iMedia program requires all students to complete a very large and very solid project to display the skill set we have learned throughout our months here. Check back and reread months.  And some people may be thinking what could possibly be displayed as solid, groundbreaking, mind-blowing work after months of study?  Welcome to the iMedia program.

Cassie (my partner) and I are designing an iPad application that will repurpose the book series “A Song of Ice and Fire” aka the Game of Thrones series.  For those of you who have read the books, you know how extensive these books are, but also how they redefine the literary world.  The rich detail and profound character development creates blister fingers from the fast page turning, and then George R R Martin goes and kills that character.  He’s not afraid to do it, making him that much better of an author.

I love the development work I have learned and create from this program, but what I also love is reading.  I consider myself a bibliophile and I wish I could preserve all books in the entire world.  By joining these two forces, both Cassie and I have created a passion that is needed to complete these projects in the allotted time we have.

The app will be a companion to the series, allowing readers to follow the viewpoint characters in the book through the world map that Martin has created.  Character information, along with house and religion facts will accompany the app, yet it is important to have readers better understand and dig deeper into such a great series by comprehending it more.  I, myself, had to backtrack and reread past sections to understand all the plots and I read the five books (that are out) back-to-back.  It’s intense. And now its an HBO show and I could cry by the amazement of the show reproducing the story, but like all book adaptation, pieces get left out.  Hopefully, the show has led viewers to read the series, and hopefully this app will help those readers enjoy the series that much more.

Cassie will be completing the interface design, while I will develop the application in iOS.  The project is due in May, the 11th to be exact.  Hopefully, we will have heard back from the author and HBO on our project.  Till then, check back to see ugly, sleepless pictures of me as the weeks go by.  Did I mention we have to take other classes parallel to our capstone?  It’s gonna be fun.