I was invited to write a piece for Josh Dallman's new blog over at casualindie.com last week, and upon his suggestion I wrote about blogs and how they can help you and your indie business when used properly and for the right reasons (i.e. - not having a blog just so you can say you have a blog and update it every few months). Head on over and give it a read - it was ruthlessly edited down for size but I'll be posting the full version up here next month.
New Resources
I've been horrible at keeping you all up to date on when I add new articles to the Resources section (which don't show up on the main page), my apologies. Although you can see them in the list of recently added content on the main page, here's a more detailed view:
- Multithreaded C++: Part 1: Pthreads - This is the beginning of a series of articles on multithreaded programming in C++. In this first article we will look at pthreads, which are generally considered to be the "assembly language of threading." We will start at the bottom and work our way up to higher concepts.
- Multithreaded C++: Part 2: Boost Threads - If pthreads represent the assembly language of multithreading programming, then boost::threads represent the C of multithreaded programming.
- Multithreaded C++: Part 3: RAII And Threads - If boost::threads represent the C of multithreaded programming, then RAII and automatically managed threads represent the C++ of multithreaded programming.
- Multithreaded C++: Part 4: Futures and Other Thread Handlers - We've covered the "Assembly Language", "C" and "C++" of the C++ threading world, and now we are going to try and move beyond that.
- DevHub - Tutorial 1 - SDL Tutorial Basics - Provides a basic game framework for initialization of SDL as well as common routines. These routines are split into separate files, defining the main functions of a game, Initialization, Events, Loops (Data handling, Rendering, and Cleanup. It provides a bare bones framework to help newcomers understand code re-usability, as well as practicality with integrating with SDL.
- DevHub - Tutorial 2 - SDL Coordinates and Blitting - This tutorial builds upon the previous one, demonstrating the basics of bliting (drawing) graphics to screen and loading files. You'll learn how to draw surfaces to screen while managing surface resources correctly.
- DevHub - Tutorial 3 - SDL Events - This tutorial helps the user design a reusable event class structure wrapper around SDL. The class is easily integrated into various classes via inheritance, allowing events to be checked easily by overloading a function.
- DevHub - Tutorial 4 - SDL Tutorial Tic-Tac-Toe - Using the first three tutorials, we combine them all together in a practical framework. Using this framework, we learn some key concepts of combining events, and surfaces into making a basic Tic-Tac-Toe game. We'll take the concepts learned earlier and bring them all together.
- DevHub - Tutorial 5 - SDL Animation - Building upon the previous framework we will add a basic animation class. We'll see how to do frame animation that is timed based, as well as oscillating an animation. This class is then used along with a surface to provide on screen animation.
- DevHub - Tutorial 6 - SDL Entities - This tutorial demonstrates the basics of creating and managing entities (sprites). We'll manage all the entities in a practical manner using lists. This tutorial will build upon the animation tutorial, bringing the two together.
- DevHub - Tutorial 7 - SDL Maps - This tutorial shows how to load and render maps using external files. Maps are built from tiles, and these maps are put into areas. These areas will be clipped according to a camera view, allowing for faster performance.
- DevHub - Side Tutorial - SDL Image - This side tutorial demonstrates how to stop using bitmap files within SDL. We'll see how to load and link SDL_image and integrate that into our existing surface class.
- DevHub - Side Tutorial - SDL SoundBank - This side tutorial demonstrates how to create a soundbank of sounds to play in your games. It will help you manage your sound resources with IDs for easy use.
I'll try to remember to be better with posting notice of new Resources.
