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I could say this about WPF as a whole, but when things actually work with WPF it’s so damn smooth I can’t help but feel somewhat accomplished. Nevertheless, I had a real pain trying to get an embedded flash player into my WPF app. Why Flash? Why not…dare I say, Silverlight? Well, I’m building a small app that plays YouTube videos, so obviously Flash makes sense. First, here’s some lessons I learned while on this wonderfully frustrating journey: Continue reading…

It’s running right now. Beneath those fancy windows. Under the hood. Shifting bits. Moving words in memory. And its scares the crap out of me.

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Don’t get me wrong. I’m not an expert on Flash. I haven’t even made anything special in flash. Yeah, I can tween a circle and bounce it around the stage, and that’s the extent of my Flash knowledge. One thing I do know about it: if you want to drive traffic from Google searches, you’re better off not using it. Some bloggers even claim its use to be evil. Now I’m sure there’s a lot of Adobe fans are ready and willing to tear me a new one by now with arguments about how Flex and AIR will change the face of the interweb, but it’s my opinion and always will be that your website’s MAIN content should NEVER be in Flash. Let’s look at the letters you type into that address bar of your browser at least once every day: HTTP. Hyper. Text. Not animations, or effects, but text. Until that protocol changes I doubt Flash will ever be used as a serious web design platform.

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I have a place in my heart for an obscure text based game called NetHack. This game is an archetype roguelike game, and I’ve been playing it for over a year now. Not a year in actual game time (yes, I used to play WoW, a lot), but I’ve been into NetHack seriously for the past 6 months or so, and it still kicks my ass. However, I’ve managed to ascend (beat the game) twice, and I can even play it on my Motorola Q.

How has such a game captured my attention for so long and directly apply towards my career as a software developer? Let me enlighten you as to why I think you should play it, and why it still matters so much.

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