Well I definetly didn't lie about my knowledge. For instance, I admitted I knew OpenGL and not Direct3D, and GDI but not GDI+ for instance. What I wasn't familiar with was the platform they were working with, which was developed by them. With "plaftform" I am referring to the application they were developing.


As to the irritating remarks, it "could" have been what I said when I was surprised that one of the programmers had been dating a girl from the slums some years ago, which was very odd to me. Also when I expressed my amazement that a certain car cost a lot more than it should (a Volkswagen Fox), to which I expressed as being a "piece of crap", only to learn later that that was the car the guy owned. To both statements I made sure to clarify that I wasn't being derisive, only replicating their own banter language (though not in those terms of course).

So it's like referring in the states to a "piece of crap" Toyota Corolla or expressing amazement at somebody having a girlfriend from a village in Rwanda or something.

There was no matrix stack, none was made. Just one matrix that got multiplied by the new one as it was passed to the objects down the hierarchy. And it wasn't just the text draw methods that I had to rewrite, it was also the symbol drawing methods and ruler drawing methods (which themselves had text). I had to do the same thing with symbols (custom made line caps such as stars) since letting them get transformed willy nilly would make them lose their aspect ratio, in addition to being scaled by the amount speficied by the first container.

And also the point was that we had all agreed to the rotation issue.

Hows no matrix stack? How the matrix was reverted when you did return to parent?

I'd suggest that... next time don't make potentially offensive remarks, and whenever you want to write linear transformations yourself (or do similar unusual weirdness), ask in advance. I imagine your transformations, no matter how clearly written, would be perceived as total mess compared to use of matrices (or even, lol, complex numbers). I recall my first job when i was 16 or 17 and i had to deal with system that wasn't using matrices for transformations properly. It was total mess. I knew linear algebra already so I kept thinking to myself, "what total noob wrote this". If there's no matrix stack, even better, you just pass matrix to children as parameter (using regular stack for matrix stack), and matrix is all you ever need for any transforms.

Quote: Original post by Journey
only replicating their own banter language

The problem is, if you don't know the people that well this can still be taken the wrong way.

Again; you knew what you meant, they didn't.

In GDI+, you pass a matrix to a Graphics object, which is the one that does the drawing.

The interface to the library was as follows:

Graphics MyGraphics;

Matrix Mat;

Mat.Scale(Width,Height);

MyGraphics.SetTransform(&Mat);

Object.Draw(&MyGraphics, ClipRect);

Which meant you had to have all the transformations on a single matrix. And each object's Draw function sent new matrices to it's children concatenating them with the current matrix. But each object had only that matrix, so in the event that it had to figure out it's rotation for instance, it had to use all three coordinate systems.

As to that method you posted, I have never heard of it. And nobody at work even suggested it.

I tend to believe in elements of truth in most things. If they said you had "communication issues", or trouble relating with the rest of the team, there's probably some truth to it, and it is worth thinking about, but not worth dwelling on for too long. It's also damning that nobody spoke to you about this before they let you go. That tells me that hands down, you had a poor manager, or they never intended to hire you in the first place.

Some managers suck. Some work environments are bad. Some places rotate through staff on "3 month trials" with no intention of hiring at the end, and spend the time building an excuse to drop you when the time is up. Sounds like you probably ran into one or more of these to some degree. I've seen a few bad working environments. You don't want to get stuck there, no matter how much of a "dream job" it looks like on the job application.


At any rate, I'll give you my advice on a new job. Different situations call for different approaches, but here's my general advice: When you're new, be selective in what you say. Don't try too hard to make a strong impression, some people don't like that. Don't try anything particularly strong, eg, possibly offensive, in your conversation. Remember that you're around people you don't know, and you don't necessarily know what they will take offense to. That said, make sure you don't isolate yourself. If your collegues don't get to know you to some degree in the first month or two, chances are, they never will, and you'll probably find it hard to have a conversation with them. You need to find a way to strike up a balance, and you'll have to figure out how to go about that.

In terms of your work, just do what they ask you to do, how they ask you to do it. Learn their way first. Bring your own approach where you're given the freedom to do so, but when you're told to do something a particular way, make sure you do it how you're told.

This is my general philosophy. It's not a sure fire way to fit into a new job, but I think it's the best way to give yourself the best opportunity to do so. It's not all on you though. In a good working environment, your collegues will do their part to try and make you feel welcome.

Quote: Original post by Journey
only replicating their own banter language (though not in those terms of course).

Unfortunately most of us require others to earn their right to engage in banter with us - people you may have heard making jokes at each other's expense probably had well established relationships based on mutual respect or time served working together.

Quote: Original post by Journey
So it's like referring in the states to a "piece of crap" Toyota Corolla or expressing amazement at somebody having a girlfriend from a village in Rwanda or something.

That is...an interesting remark.

^^what he says. (edit: I missed the girlfriend remark originally BTW. That kind of behaviour is what can very well get you fired, very understandably so. I don't like any elitist remarks myself)

Quote: Original post by Journey
As to that method you posted, I have never heard of it. And nobody at work even suggested it.

Sounds like they suck then. Maybe that can make you feel better about losing job ;-)

There is a lot of ways to get rotation out of matrix, and none of those are magical tricks passed from wizard to apprentices, all you need is to study some linear algebra.
Even without linear algebra, you can, for example, transform text start position, then text start position moved to the right by some amount, then the difference gives you text direction vector. From which, you can get angle.

[Edited by - Dmytry on March 30, 2009 7:50:58 AM]

This is a really tough post to respond to without sounding offensive.

I've read every comment here and from the information presented here (which is likely a small % of everything), it sounds to me that your personality is what got you into trouble.

I've seen comments about arguing and fighting over work and personal comments that are nothing short of insulting. It doesn't matter where someone's girlfriend comes from and you have no idea what type of emotional events went on for the couple to get where they are.

If you can't get along with people, you will never make it in the workforce. Just being tolerated is not enough for many business related reasons. If people get along with you, they are going to be more at ease when dealing with work issues and questions. If people don't like you, they will tell you the minimum they have to and get away as fast as they can.

I knew a guy I worked with who had a hard time getting along with people. Every time someone came to him with a problem, he called them idiots. Now, how long did you think it took before people found someone else to ask for help?

If you are a constant source of confrontation at work, people will not want to work with you no matter how good your technical skills are. It's not just about how your performance affects you, it is also about how you affect the team you work with. If having you there makes it more difficult for everyone else to do their job, chances are you won't be there long.

So, take this experience (as upsetting as it was) and try to learn from it. Think about how you could have handled things differently and try to think about how people percieved you. Hopefully you can find something you can work with and do a better job next time.

John

Quote: Original post by borngamer
I knew a guy I worked with who had a hard time getting along with people. Every time someone came to him with a problem, he called them idiots. Now, how long did you think it took before people found someone else to ask for help?

Hey, that doesn't sound like a bad idea :p

But seriously, I do agree with what you said...