computing
General
I don't really know what the distinction between computer science and computing ought to be but it seems that some people associate computing with software engineering and computer science with discrete mathematics and the theory of computation, but I just think of both. All the time.
I'd like to do something useful for computer science. Quantum computing and artificial intelligence are awesome. Watch this space.
Situation
I use a 15" MacBook Pro with a 2.4GHz Core Duo and 4GB of RAM. I'm currently running Mac OS X (specifically, 10.5). I use the excellent VMWare Fusion to run ubuntu and Vista Ultimate. I frequently mess around with UNIX whenever possible, generally causing kernel panics or, on a good day, remotely instructing a computer to speak as loudly as possible (thanks to OS X's say command...).
My current skill set is also rather disgusting:
- XHTML (competent)
- CSS (competent)
- Visual Basic 6 :-[ (competent)
- JavaScript (competent)*
- Java (getting there...)
The only one of these I've learnt formally is VB6 so I'll no doubt have some bad coding habits to get out of once I get to university. My main focii are computer science and of course mathematics and natural sciences. I'm also interested in psychology, philosophy and music.
Hmm... I designed and made this site (if you can call this mess "design"...) but have in the past created many disgusting things. At the moment my resumé is conspicuously empty but as Adam Zethraeus once told me, [I]'ll figure the web design stuff out
. At some point I'll put a CV up here, as well as links to any papers I publish (oh yes, I intend to do so...).
Programs
- This is the Tiberian Sun: Tactical Calculator! A JavaScript database of unit stats (with no database functions...) and a simple engine for choosing which units to use to kill other units. So far it only runs in Safari and Opera.
- A brief excursion into HTML-based graphics.
- A nascent graph plotter that I never finished. I'm sorry, did you say "splines"?
- Recursion, a trivial maths thing.
- Quadratics, a quadratic equation solver.
- Guessing - it doesn't take humanity into account.
- Binary, the obligatory dec to bin converter. Tries to do fractions, which is nice.
I was aware even as I started the graphics-related pages listed above that the HTML <canvas> element would supersede the table grid method I used. I will look into this at some point.
My computing AS-level project was in Visual Basic 6, but my A2 one may be in Java if I get any good at it.
(Tiberian Sun is one of my favourite games, along with Chess, Connect Four and Tetris (via the awesome Quinn). Although I have a Nintendo Wii, I no longer really play games. I am becoming a little too apathetic... hmm...)
Other
Psychology
Biology, psychology, sociology and politics have always interested me but of those I have only studied biology. Pretty interesting. It's a shame I have to prioritise like this.
Philosophy
I'm not very well read, unfortunately, but this will soon change. I have a general idea about postmodernism and Marxism and am a fan of the (quite recently at time of writing) late Jean Baudrillard (when I actually understand what he was saying). I am in the process of writing an essay on him which should be ready for September 2008.