Adventures into iOS: the App Academy Experience

Introducing Trifecta, the first iPhone game to come out of the App Academy

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 19:19:00 -0500

10 months ago I found out my wife was pregnant. I was horrified. Don’t get me wrong - I wasn’t disappointed. In addition to being horrified, I was ecstatic. I’ve always wanted to be a dad. But I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to provide for my own child. We were currently burning more cash than we were bringing in. A lot more. I was struggling to get my second startup, Avalaunch, off the ground. For months I’d been stuck in the customer development cycle, creating mockups and interviewing potential customers but unable to find a product that really resonated with them. With Avalaunch, I had burned through our savings and we were staying afloat due to the generosity of my parents.

With the news of a baby on the way, my priorities changed. I knew immediately that my son would always come first. I can risk my own future but never his. So while I haven’t completely given up on Avalaunch, I was ready to put it aside and find a more immediate way to provide for my family.

The challenge was building a career from scratch when previously I had spent 8 years as a professional poker player. While I was fairly sure that a lot of the skills would cross over to other professions, convincing others of the same would be a hard sell. And while I’ll always be willing to do whatever is necessary to put food on the table, I really didn’t want to give up on the dream of doing meaningful work that I’m passionate about. In addition to protecting my own sanity and happiness, I want to be able to show my son a reality where life doesn’t have to be a grind, not even for 40 hours a week.

During the two years that I tried to launch Skilltree and Avalaunch, I learned a lot about myself. One thing I learned was that I love to program. Good code is beautiful. It’s a combination of logic and creativity that’s hard not to appreciate. And in a lot of ways, the skills needed to be a good programmer correlate to the skills needed to be a good poker player. In both you need to be able to hold a lot of information in your head at once, you need to apply a deep level of reasoning, and you need to be creative in your solutions. The big difference is that good code can literally change the world. It can provide a meaningful service for millions. And it can generate wealth. Poker, on the other hand, is a zero sum game. You help nobody but yourself and you do so at the cost of another.

Despite my new found love of programming, I wasn’t at all convinced that I could find a job as a programmer. I was self taught, only had 2 years of experience, and Ohio isn’t exactly brimming with developer opportunities in the same way that San Francisco is. So when my brother forwarded me an email about the App Academy, I was ready to sign up. Of course, it wasn’t that easy. First I had to have a long discussion with my wife. Taking the App Academy course would require borrowing even more money from my parents. If everything went as planned, it would mean relocating to San Francisco shortly after the App Academy was over. And perhaps most importantly, it would mean being away from my wife and our unborn child for 3 months near the end of her pregnancy. It would mean I wouldn’t be able to be there for her when she might need me most. And if she delivered early, it would mean missing the birth of my son.

Once we were in agreement that I should attend, there was still the matter of actually getting accepted. Since the end of App Academy, I’ve been asked a number of times what advice I can give on how to improve one’s chances during the application process. My answer is to show them what they’re looking for. Show them that you are capable of thinking like a programmer and that you’re willing to work hard at it. Show them that you understand the amazing opportunity that the App Academy presents and that you’re willing to treat it as such.

During class we always worked in pairs. We’d switch every day or two. And each time we switched, we’d start a new project. Each app we created taught us a new design principle or framework. They were barebones apps, of course, but would often show real promise. One of the apps that showed promise was a game called Trifecta. The project was to create a game similar to tetris or bejeweled. With any game assignment, there was lots of room for creativity. For Trifecta, Ran Tao and I built a game where you’re presented a board full of different colored blocks and the objective is to find 3 or more blocks of the same color adjacent to one another. It’s a race against the clock, but one in which you don’t want to rush. You do best by strategically removing blocks so as to maximize the number of blocks in future “combos”.

After class ended I moved back home to Ohio, found work as a developer, helped to bring my beautiful baby boy into the world, and continued to work on Trifecta. The initial intention of relocating to San Francisco didn’t pan out. No school would accept my wife as a transfer student because of how close she is to getting her bachelor’s. So while relocating is a possibility for the future, for now I’m happy to be working remotely from Ohio on contract work for a couple of companies in California.

Ran and I worked on Trifecta for a week or two after class to get it to the point where it was something we could be proud of. We added a lot of polish as well as another game type - unlimited - where the timer is replaced with the goal of preventing the blocks from rising to the top of the game board. While we were ready to submit Trifecta at the beginning of November, we ran into issues due to how hard Apple makes it for a pair of developers to release an app together. To do so and have both of us credited we had to form a company (R&K Labs) and obtain a D.U.N.s number which took us a month. We also had to change the name of the app from Trifecta to Trifecta Blocks Challenge as there’s already an app with the name Trifecta.

While the real reward of attending the App Academy is being able to provide for my family by getting paid to do something I love, the icing on the cake is finally getting to see an app I’ve built in the app store. So without further ado, R&K Labs is happy to introduce to the world Trifecta Blocks Challenge, available for free from the Apple App Store now!

This is awesome and a perfect example of how I like to learn -...

Sat, 13 Oct 2012 05:22:52 -0400

This is awesome and a perfect example of how I like to learn - by starting with first principles and working up from there.

If I can find the free time, I may just have to go from NAND to Tetris.

Goodbye San Francisco

Fri, 12 Oct 2012 03:53:54 -0400

Goodbye San Francisco. You were wonderful and amazing and I hope to see you again soon.

This morning before my flight I met with another company. I was exhausted but speaking with one of the founders was very energizing. I really liked the guy. He knew his stuff, he had a great attitude, and really brought the idea they were implementing to life. I could easily see working for them. I’d learn a lot and hopefully I’d be able to contribute a lot too.

The flight was good. I didn’t die. That’s usually the bar I hold flights to. Thankfully every flight I’ve ever been on so far has surpassed that bar.

And finally, after 3 months, I’m back in Cincinnati. And that means I saw my wife today for the first time in 12 weeks! At 8 months pregnant, she’s huge! And beautiful! In 1 month we’ll be mom and dad. That's a very surreal thought still. I’m nervous and I’m excited.

Last Day in San Francisco

Thu, 11 Oct 2012 05:35:25 -0400

Today was a good day. I began by making a trip to Oakland where I met the owner of a dev shop. They go beyond client work and are also developing a product line of their own. That went really well. I was offered a trial run with them.

I spent my evening at Eddie’s where he was hosting a pot luck. Many of my classmates as well as Jonathan and Kush were there. It was good food and good fun - a great chance to catch up with everyone and see how their post app academy adventures have gone thus far.

My flight leaves San Francisco at 1 pm tomorrow. I still have to pack and I’m chatting with another 500 Startups company in the morning before I leave. The most important thing for me to do now is sleep.

One more day

Wed, 10 Oct 2012 03:50:04 -0400

Today went a lot like yesterday. I spoke with a couple of companies from the 500 Startups accelerator (current and alumni) that are looking for a software engineer and discussed the possibility of my joining their team.

Overall I’ve been very impressed with the quality of companies that are either going through or have emerged from the 500 Startups program. Of those I’ve talked to, there are certainly a lot of differences between them, but there seems to be a common thread of determination and passion.

One of the alumni companies I chatted with today would be especially great to work with. They have an amazing product, great partnerships, and an awesome team. I could learn a lot working with them and I believe I could contribute a lot as well.

I spent the evening the same way I spent last night. I worked on Trifecta with Ran. We made a lot of little changes. The images are updated. The mute button and the pause button are a tad bigger. The background and the timer blink when you’re almost out of time. And so on.

Tomorrow is my last day in San Francisco. I have one interview in the afternoon and then tomorrow evening the app academy alumnus will be getting together for a potluck dinner. It should be a fitting “end” to this 3 month adventure.

Trifecta

Tue, 09 Oct 2012 04:38:54 -0400

Today I met with the founder of one of the companies in the current batch of 500 Startups. We had lunch, talked about his company, where it was going, what was needed, and so forth. It’s an awesome idea and I think he’s the right guy to bring it to market. Whether or not there’s a place for me at the table is still to be determined. At this point, it’s still a possibility though. If I were offered the position, which wouldn’t happen until I first successfully went through a technical interview, and if I then accepted the position, which wouldn’t happen until first talked to my wife, I would need to tighten the belt for about 6 months until after their demo day when the next round could be raised. I would be getting a pay check, but it would be small.

Later in the afternoon I met with Ran again and we spent a few hours debugging and adding features to Trifecta. We added sound effects and adjusted things a bit so that it can now be played on the iPad as well as the iPhone. It’s definitely shaping up to be a fun little addictive game. One of these days we should probably submit it to the app store and share it with the world. Maybe tomorrow.

My first time

Mon, 08 Oct 2012 01:46:43 -0400

Today I had my first technical interview. I was asked to solve a problem while the interviewer shared my screen remotely. Prior to today, the closest I’d come to a technical interview was being asked a couple technical questions by Apple.

I won’t go into details about the problem I was asked to solve other than to say that it wasn’t hard and that I was asked to use test driven development. Despite the simplicity of the problem, I was amazed at some of the simple things that didn’t come to me right away. I was definitely nervous and it showed. A problem that would normally take me 15 minutes took closer to an hour. Still, I did well enough that they want to continue the conversation on Tuesday. Of that I am quite happy.

I’m going to keep this short and go to bed early tonight so that I may be well rested for tomorrow. I’m talking with another 500 Startups company and I’d like to make a good first impression.

I love TED talks. They’re educational, entertaining and...

Sun, 07 Oct 2012 03:24:00 -0400

I love TED talks. They’re educational, entertaining and often inspiring. Being that I haven’t had a good night’s rest in a few days, and tomorrow I’ll be doing a code test, I’ll forgo my normal blogging habit tonight and instead share one of my favorite “Best of the Web” TED talks. Enjoy!

Nothing great in the world has been accomplished without passion

Sat, 06 Oct 2012 02:09:00 -0400

Lately I’ve frequently been asked what I’m passionate about. I don’t know what a ‘proper answer’ would be to give in an interview setting. I inevitably end up sharing only part of the complete answer and not as eloquently as I’d like. This is partly because I haven’t given this question a lot of thought recently and partly because a good deal of the answer has nothing to do with software engineering. It deserves some thought though, and I’ve given it that, and after doing so here is my complete answer. I’d still probably only share a part of this with potential employers unless they showed a great deal of interest.

I’m passionate about learning, about growing as a software engineer and as an individual. I love learning new technologies and I love reading. A lot. I’m passionate about programming. I think clean code is sexy, elegant, poetic. I’m passionate about startups and about business in general. I love tossing around ideas of how to disrupt existing players as well as discussing strategies on how to most effectively gain early adopters. And I love marketing. Baked In and Unleash the Permission Marketing were two of the first books that helped to change my perception of what marketing could and should be.

I’m passionate about helping people make meaningful connections with one another. That can manifest itself in many forms, directly or indirectly. I’m passionate about education. The entire education field needs to be disrupted. And there are plenty of exciting companies ready to take on that challenge.

I used to be passionate about running. I’d like to rekindle that flame. I am, however, still passionate about tennis and racquetball.

I’m passionate about board games and board game design. The best board games are those that challenge you socially as well as mentally.

And finally, I’m passionate about being a good husband, a good brother, a good son, and a good friend. Most of all, I’m passionate about being a good dad. I’m not one yet. That is, I’m not even a father yet. My son is due in November. I’ve not met him but I love him all the same. I have an amazing father and my son deserves one too. It’s overwhelming at times thinking of the responsibility that I’m about to take on but it’s also damn motivating. My son’s counting on me. He doesn’t realize it yet, but he is. I don’t ever want to disappoint him. I certainly don’t want to start before he’s born.

Thus, my goal is to provide for my family. Ideally I’d do that by finding meaningful work doing something I love. I can find that as a software engineer. And in doing so, I can show my son that life doesn’t have to be a grind, that even work is enjoyable if you follow your passions.

Do not use the elevators

Fri, 05 Oct 2012 04:44:08 -0400

Today I woke to the sound of someone shouting over my brother’s building’s PA system. Apparently someone decided today would be a good day to test the building’s emergency systems which, as far as I can tell, consist primarily of someone shouting over the PA system.

“A fire has been spotted! Please evacuate the building! Do not use the elevators!”

The shouting was a good excuse to get an early start on the day. The recording was set to loop every few minutes and was still going off when I left to go work somewhere - anywhere - other than my brother’s apartment. I took the elevator.

I found my way to Specialty’s coffee shop to grab some breakfast and start working. I began by touching up the scoring system on Trifecta and refactoring out 1 of 2 very similar methods that are used for displaying bonus messages. The scoring now takes into affect how many different colored blocks there are on the board. It’s much harder to create combos when there are more colors so it only makes sense that you be rewarded more points and more time when you find those combos on the harder levels.

The rest of my afternoon was spent reading about and toying with iOS 6’s new Game Kit features. Two new features in particular could be relevant to what I’m trying to achieve. The first is a new challenge feature that allows any player to issue a challenge to a friend whereas the friend, should he accept the challenge, is tasked with trying to beat the initial friend’s score or achievement. If he successfully does so the initial friend is notified. This could be an interesting feature to include but is not exactly what I am hoping to do. The other new feature I was looking at is a turn by turn match feature wherein you can now transmit data from a player whose turn it is without passing control to the next player. Before you always had to pass all the data at once, which is less than ideal if your game involves a multi-step turn. I think this feature might be useful for the way I envision implementing Trifecta’s challenge a friend feature.

This evening I went to a 1 on 1 speed dating style interview meetup. It was very reminiscent of the day I graduated App Academy. There were 14 companies and about 25 developers. Two big name companies were present, Amazon and Living Social, along with a number of small to mid size startups. Each company got 5 minutes with each developer. Unlike last time, only twice did I “demo” an app. Typically the first half of each 5 minute interview was spent getting to know the company and the second half was spent giving the company a chance to get to know me. Also unlike last time, I felt comfortable and relaxed throughout. Last time there was an intensity to the event. It felt like an all or nothing moment, the culmination of 9+ weeks of incredible effort with everything on the line. I had to make it count. That was silly, of course. It was important to make a good first impression but that’s all a 5-10 minute interview can typically be.

Out of the 14 companies a few of them seemed genuinely interested while a few were simply not the right fit for me. They either required someone that already knew how to program for Android as well as iOS or they required multiple years of iOS experience. Tomorrow I’ll follow through with those that seemed the most interested as well as any others that are trying to accomplish something I’m passionate about.

In addition, a friend of mine whose company, Launchbit, went through the 500 Startups accelerator, forwarded my resume to their alumni mailing list. That lead to a number of emails from some truly exceptional startups. I’m excited to follow up with those companies tomorrow as well.

Slight Setback

Thu, 04 Oct 2012 02:10:54 -0400

Today didn’t start out well. I woke up and before rolling out of bed (and by bed, I still mean couch), I grabbed my laptop and began creating rspec tests for the solutions to the 4 Dimagi applicant programming problems that I solved the day before. I had created tests for 1 of the 4 problems and was working on tests for the 2nd when I received an email from Dimagi stating that they just filled the position. I was welcome to apply later, perhaps when I had more experience. Ouch.

I suppose the time wasn’t completely wasted. It did help me freshen up on Ruby which is the language I wrote the solutions in. I went ahead and submitted the solutions anyway. I figure it can’t hurt. Still, the ‘setback’ made it hard to stay cheerful throughout the rest of the day. Dimagi really is the sort of company I’d like to work for. They’re doing something amazing and I’d like to be a part of that.

I did receive one bit of good news later in the afternoon. I had previously met the founder of a mobile and web development firm and she requested to meet with me next week. Hopefully that’ll go well. I’m looking forward to talking with her.

I spent the rest of the day studying, both reading up on Game Center integration and going over Ruby procs.

The Apple Store is not Setup to Handle Pair Programmers

Wed, 03 Oct 2012 04:00:18 -0400

Today I spent my time coding, sending emails to companies, and brushing up on Ruby.

The first thing I did was complete a couple of programming exercises that Dimagi has available for applicants to show off their capabilities. I’ve yet to email them to Dimagi though. I think I’ll write up a few rspec tests for each first and then email them out tomorrow.

I spent the evening with Ran at the Creamery working on Trifecta. We added combo bonuses! Combo bonuses are awarded whenever you clear 7 or more blocks at once. For your efforts, you are awarded with bonus time. This, of course, is a feature for the timed version of Trifecta. We don’t have bonuses for the unlimited version (yet). We used CAKeyFrameAnimation to have the bonus text grow larger and then shrink away. The text also changes opacity (brighter and then dims to nothing) while scrolling upwards on the game board. It looks pretty good but Ran is going to spend a little more time styling it to make it look great. I’ll spend my time coming up with a better algorithm for the bonuses and for scoring in general. Right now it’s too easy to score big on the small level and too hard to do so on the xl level. And I want to make sure that it’s not too easy to stay alive forever with the new timed bonuses.

We were hoping to submit our app to the app store tonight but that didn’t happen. The difficulty is that we each have our own individual iOS developers accounts but we can only submit the app through one of them. While we can attribute both parties in the description and perhaps on the splash screen of the game itself, only 1 person can be listed as the seller. Being that you can search for an app by the seller’s name, it’s not entirely trivial. Plus it would be kind of cool to see my name listed under the app’s name. I imagine Ran feels the same. Also only one of us will have access to login and check the app’s stats, which if nothing else, would be kind of cool to look at. The other option we toyed with was setting up a third shared account. This has two problems. First, it would cost us $99/year just to maintain a free app. That’s bad, but not completely out of the question. Second, Apple would still require we list the seller of the app as a ‘legal name’. This can be an individual’s name or a company name. So we still couldn’t list it as Ran Tao & Kris Fields or Kris Fields & Ran Tao. We’d have to choose one of our names or we’d have to start a company just for the purpose of submitting an app. That’s pretty ridiculous so in the end we’ll probably resort to flipping a coin. I pick heads!

10 Days Left in San Francisco

Tue, 02 Oct 2012 03:02:13 -0400

On the first of each month, a thread is posted on Hacker News called “Who is Hiring” and companies from around the world will post the tech jobs they have available. Being that I’m in the market for a tech job, I spent the afternoon going over each job listing and finding those that seemed the best fit for me. If it seemed like I might be qualified I’d further research the company to see if their mission appealed to me. Then I began writing cover letters and emailing each of those companies. I only emailed about half of the companies on my list before it was time to head off to a Ruby meet up.

The last couple of times I’ve gone to meetups I’ve arrived a little bit later and missed out on some of the networking opportunities that occur at the beginning of these events. Plus I end up eating cold pizza. I didn’t want to make that same mistake (I’m not overly fond of cold pizza) so I made sure to arrive on time. Unfortunately, at this particular event, there wasn’t any time set aside for networking before the presentations began. With a lot of work still to do before I can submit Kringle to the app store, I only stayed for the first presentation, which was given by Craig Muth on his project, Xiki. Xiki stands for executable wiki. It’s a shell console where you can run ruby code, execute SQL statements, write notes, browse the local file system, and a lot more. It was actually pretty cool and easily customizable too. Supposedly it only takes a few lines of code to set it up to run just about anything.

One of the companies I sent my resume to - Dimagi.com - auto replied with some programming exercises that they recommend an applicant complete to increase their odds of being hired. I only had a few minutes to scan them before heading to the meetup. They look similar to some of the problems I worked on as preparation for the App Academy. Being that Dimagi is a pretty amazing company that I’d love to work for, I’ll be setting aside time tomorrow to bang out solutions to each of their problems.

Momentum

Mon, 01 Oct 2012 02:45:46 -0400

During the App Academy, we consistently maintained a certain pace. It wasn’t a sustainable pace though. I was more than a little sleep deprived by the end of it. The trick since then has been finding a way to maintain momentum while simultaneously giving my body a chance to recuperate. I’m still working on that.

Today was a break from networking. As far as I could tell, there weren’t any tech meetups in San Francisco. Instead I spent my time working on my two favorite apps, Trifecta, and Kringle. Trifecta is the tetris/bejeweled game that I’m building with Ran and Kringle is my secret santa app.

With Trifecta, I found yet another bug and squashed it. Like before I found a glitch where occasionally a block will end up in the wrong place. I understood what was happening last time so this time tracking down the problem wasn’t as hard.

With Kringle, I set it up so that the user can choose what photo will be used for their profile. Before today, the user had no choice. It would always grab and user the user’s facebook photo. That’s not exactly user friendly, especially considering this photo will be shared with a complete stranger who will be tasked with buying the user a gift. To rectify the situation I added a uiactionsheet with 4 options: take a new photo with the camera, select a photo from the photo library, use the facebook photo, or opt out of having a profile picture altogether. Everything works like it should but I was a little disappointed to find out that the action sheet isn’t very customizable. I can alter the background but apparently there’s no easy way to change the buttons. And the hard way of changing them is really convoluted. I’d be better off getting rid of the action sheet altogether and using a modal view. Those at least are a lot more customizable.

The other big improvement I baked into Kringle is performance related. I’m now storing the user profile photo and facebook photo locally on the user’s phone as well as on Parse. That way if the user has already selected a photo for their profile, Kringle will grab it locally and display it instantly instead of having a slight delay. And I save 1 api call each time the user fires up the app.

Other than that, I spent my time browsing online for telecommute friendly jobs. I spent a lot of time doing that. I made a list of companies that I’ll be emailing tomorrow.

Growth Hacks

Sun, 30 Sep 2012 04:12:41 -0400

It’s tough trying to network first thing in the morning. You’re tired and you’re hungry. It’s difficult to convince your body that meeting new people and unearthing opportunities should be the top priority. That was my goal today though. Before breakfast, I made my way to the Hackers & Founders Growth Hack conference being held on Broadway. I was glad to see they were serving breakfast and coffee.

The conference was more about marketing than technology. I was initially excited about that. I think marketing can be fascinating. This conference, however, was not. Everyone I met was nice. Everyone I met was interesting. The actual presentations, however, were nothing more than a thinly veiled advertisement for a single SEO company. And they weren’t that good of presentations. The conference continued until 6 pm but I bowed out before lunch.

I spent the rest of the afternoon working with Ran on Trifecta. We split the game into two modes: Timed and Unlimited. In the timed mode, you have a limited amount of time to find and eliminate sets of blocks. In the unlimited mode, you have an unlimited amount of time but you will lose if any of the blocks reach the top of the game board area. We also added a pause button where you can choose to give up and exit to the main menu. When Ran and I parted ways, everything was working great with Trifecta save for one bug where occasionally a block would fall 1 spot past where it should.

I spent the evening skimming the Well Grounded Rubyist. I had read it cover to cover before the App Academy began but I wanted a refresher. There’s a lot to remember and I only got a quarter of the way through it. I’ll probably work through more of it tomorrow.

The last thing I did today was find and eliminate that bug in Trifecta. It had really been bugging me and I’m pretty sure I would have had nightmares. It was quite satisfying to find it and squash it.

1 Week Later

Sat, 29 Sep 2012 03:45:24 -0400

It’s been 1 week since we graduated. To the best of my knowledge, nobody has yet to receive an offer but I expect that to be changing very shortly. Everyone I’ve talked to has been interviewing and a number of students have been called back for second interviews.

My plan for today had been to go down to Hacker Dojo in Mountain View. They were having a pajama coding party and I was looking for an excuse to don my sunkist pajamas outside the home. Unfortunately I couldn’t get any of my classmates to make the trek with me and I didn’t feel like going alone.

My day wasn’t nearly as interesting back here in San Francisco as it could have been in Mountain View. I spent most of it in coffee shops. I emailed another 10 or so companies and I continued working on Trifecta. I added a few small features and I merged my changes with Ran’s. She made the splash screen look nicer, added in a high score feature, and made it so the easy levels have fewer different colored blocks than the harder. All of the changes were positive. Having fewer colored blocks was not only positive but necessary. Before that, the easy levels were the hardest. It was just too unlikely to find 3 of the same color block beside one another.

I heard back from a company that I met at the last Hackers & Founders meetup in Oakland. The company is called Sports Lab and they make designing football plays easier. They also make it easier for the coach to illustrate just how a play is supposed to be executed to the rest of the team. And it’s easier for the coach to choose the right play at the right time during the game. It’s actually a pretty cool project they’re working on. I’ll be meeting with them next week to see where I might be able to help out.

Balancing Act

Fri, 28 Sep 2012 03:20:35 -0400

The job hunt continues. My afternoon was spent sending out emails and working on existing apps. And I received a nice little note from hackidemia asking when I’d like to skype. With them? Anytime; they rock. :)

Even without the pressure of class, or perhaps without the focus of it, I feel like there are too many things vying for my limited time. I need to network. I need to continue learning. And I need to get an app or two in the app store. Most companies looking for iOS developers expect you to have apps in the store for them to download and try. Trifecta is almost there. I finally smoothed out the animation that has been haunting me for the last few days. I also added a couple other little features. Ran, who was originally my pair partner on this assignment, and I are trying to find time to get together to add some finishing touches before submitting it. Kringle, my secret santa app, is also close to being ready. I’d love to submit them both before this time next week.

I took a break in the middle of the day to talk with a future App Academy applicant. He had a lot of really good questions. Hopefully my answers were helpful. The App Academy really is an amazing program and a great opportunity for anyone that’s interested in becoming a developer.

My evening was spent at yet another meetup. This one featured two companies giving presentations. HotelTonight gave a talk on how they integrated Rails as the backend to their mobile app, the challenges they faced and how they overcame those challenges. And they’re hiring. Zendesk gave a talk about Carson, their Rails 3 engine host, and covered the technical challenges involved in delivering features as engines. And they’re hiring. Before either of those talks began, individuals had an opportunity to stand up and briefly share their own Ruby on Rails tales. Nobody really had a story to share so much as a desire to pimp their own company. It quickly devolved into a lightning pitch session, with each company inevitably ending their pitch with ‘and we’re hiring!’ Developers are definitely in high demand in silicon valley. It was a good meetup to be at for App Academy graduates.

A goal without a plan is just a wish.

Thu, 27 Sep 2012 03:23:27 -0400

Junior developers are usually in their early 20s, often fresh out of college. I took a different path to get to the same place. And I have a lot farther to go to get where I’m going. But I’m on the right path now. That I’m sure of.

I had a phone interview with Apple today. Some parts went well; some parts didn’t go as well. I was asked about hash tables and about the autorelease pool. I was asked about the MVC paradigm and I was asked how the MVC paradigm would take shape in a music player app. The questions were easy (except the autorelease question, which wasn’t easy for someone who’s only developed using ARC) but I stumbled occasionally anyway. This was the first time I’d ever been asked any sort of technical question, easy or not, in an interview. Honestly, as a former professional poker player, this was the first interview I’ve had in over ten years.

My evening was spent at another meetup. This one was hosted by SF New Tech and was showcasing indie game developer tools from a number of companies. Each of 6 companies presented for 5 minutes followed by a 5 minutes Q&A period. The demonstrations were great but not the reason I was there. My goal was to network and find out about developer opportunities. Unfortunately, I spent too much time talking with former App Academy classmates and not enough mingling with new people. After the fact, I learned of a number of interesting companies that were in attendance. Next time I will make a more concerted effort to be social.

Luckily, that will be tomorrow. It’s amazing how often there are tech meetups in San Francisco. There are often (usually?) multiple meetups each day with each often drawing 100+ people. And other than my former classmates, I have yet to run into the same people at multiple meetups. In Cincinnati, there is a tech meetup once every other week with an attendance no larger than 50 and it’s almost always the same people each time.

Hackers & Founders

Wed, 26 Sep 2012 03:52:00 -0400

The job hunt is on. Today I emailed more companies and attended a Hackers and Founders meetup in Oakland. It was a good experience. There were a lot of people there looking for developers. Unfortunately, most were looking for technical cofounders as opposed to new employees. While being part of an early stage startup is actually very appealing to me, I’m not in a position right now where I can work for equity only, which is all that most of the startups at tonight’s meetup had to offer. Still, there were a couple of promising leads and it only takes one. I acquired a handful of business cards and will be going through them tomorrow.

Of all the companies present, I think the most interesting was probably a company called Hackidemia. I don’t think they’re hiring right now though, which is too bad, because it’s exactly the sort of company I’d want to work for. From their site, “Hackidemia is a mobile invention lab that enables future changemakers to access and create a hands-on STEAM education that will enable them to solve specific challenges by developing and testing creative solutions and physical artifacts.” Basically they hold workshops around the world where kids can play with new technologies and use those technologies to create projects of their own. It’s an ed tech company with high ambitions to change the model of learning adopted at schools worldwide. And from listening to Libby, the “story wizard” of the company, it sounds likes they have some great ideas for how to turn that vision into the reality.

That’s the sort of company I could be proud to work at - one where I know what I’m doing is making a tangible difference in the lives of those around me - where my contributions are helping forge a better future for everyone.

If opportunity doesn't knock, build a door.

Tue, 25 Sep 2012 02:58:43 -0400

I’m trying to get over a particularly nasty cough so I took it kind of easy today. I wrote thank you letters to some of the companies that came to interview day and then I researched javascript frameworks. I think it would be useful to learn one but I’m not sure which. There are many but backbone and ember seeming to be at the top in terms of popularity. My initial impression is that Ember takes an approach similar to Ruby on Rails where a lot of things happen automagically. Backbone, on the other hand, appears to require a bit more effort on the developer’s part but might make it easier to tread off the beaten path. The question is, how often will that be necessary?

In addition to researching a new language, I put in a couple hours work on Trifecta. I’m still trying to smooth out one bit of animation but nothing I try seems to be fixing the problem. Hopefully I’ll figure it out tomorrow.