Simon Strandgaard

Work + GF

2010-03-16T15:58:00.001-07:00

Recent activities in my life. I have started working at Umloud as a programmer on web projects. Further more I have met a girlfriend (Katrine) in my neighborhood that knows a lot about old amiga games. Both activities takes away precious time from GraphicDesignerToolbox, which I used to work on every day from morning until night. When I have a free time I read up in some of the books I purchased two weeks ago, all about programming.

I wish I could travel to breakpoint2010, but sadly I cannot find time.

yay, I'm in love !

Bazaar - Shared Repository

2009-12-29T11:44:00.000-08:00

My first successful tests with a central shared repository accessed by 2 different clients.


$ pwd
/private/tmp/bzrtest4
$ bzr init-repo ./repo
Shared repository with trees (format: 2a)
Location:
  shared repository: repo
$ bzr init ./repo/MyProject
Created a repository tree (format: 2a)                                                                           
Using shared repository: /private/tmp/bzrtest4/repo/
$ bzr get ./repo/MyProject MyProject.dev
Branched 0 revision(s).                                                                                          
$ cd MyProject.dev
$ touch foo bar
$ bzr add foo bar
adding foo
adding bar
$ bzr commit -m Initial
Committing to: /private/tmp/bzrtest4/MyProject.dev/                                                              
added bar
added foo
Committed revision 1.
$ echo "test" >> foo
$ bzr commit -m Second
Committing to: /private/tmp/bzrtest4/MyProject.dev/                                                              
modified foo
Committed revision 2.
$ bzr push file:///private/tmp/bzrtest4/repo/MyProject
All changes applied successfully.                                                                                
Pushed up to revision 2.
$ cd ..
$ pwd
/private/tmp/bzrtest4
$ bzr get ./repo/MyProject MyProject.dev2
Branched 2 revision(s).                                                                                          
$ cd MyProject.dev2
$ pwd
/private/tmp/bzrtest4/MyProject.dev2
$ touch lena mandril
$ echo "hula bula" >> foo
$ bzr add *
adding lena
adding mandril
$ bzr commit -m "More stuff"
Committing to: /private/tmp/bzrtest4/MyProject.dev2/                                                             
modified foo
added lena
added mandril
Committed revision 3.                                                                                            
$ bzr push file:///private/tmp/bzrtest4/repo/MyProject
All changes applied successfully.                                                                                
Pushed up to revision 3.
$ cd ..
$ cd MyProject.dev
$ pwd
/private/tmp/bzrtest4/MyProject.dev
$ bzr pull
Using saved parent location: /private/tmp/bzrtest4/repo/MyProject/
+N  lena                                                                                                         
+N  mandril
 M  foo
All changes applied successfully.                                                                                
Now on revision 3.
$

The MacGraPhoto Bundle

2009-11-16T11:49:00.000-08:00

I'm pleased to announce that GraphicDesignerToolbox is participating in the MacGraPhoto bundle. This bundle started today 16 november, and runs until 30 november. It's a collection consisting only of graphics applications, so it spans very wide. I have yet to try out all the programs myself.

I was contacted by Kosta Rozen from Apparent Software a few months ago, if I was interested joining this exciting project. A really great initiative. The interest for MacGraPhoto seems to be massive.

Original price is $251. Bundle price is $39.99. It's an incredible amount of money you save.

File Manager - My new project

2009-08-12T18:26:00.000-07:00

I really need a good file manager. Since I haven't been able to find one, I have decided to code one myself. There are still a looong way to go before it can replace the Finder, but it's starting to take shape. On my A500 I had Direcory Opus and later on my 486DX2 66MHz I used Norton Commander, these two filemanagers was addictive because of their clever 2 panel layout and easy navigation.

This is how it looks like. And yes.. I need to find some better colors. So the first goal for this project is to put together an absolutely minimal version that is usable. No tabs, no FTP, no bookmarks, nothing. Reaching this point is getting much closer.

See all the screenshots here

Anybody here that have used Norton Commander?

Exhausting Math Exercises

2009-07-12T16:28:00.000-07:00

I have been busy coding new blocks every day for 1.5 month straight. Some of these new blocks have required lots of math and I'm exhausted. Today I finished coding one of the most difficult blocks so far, the Match block. It's not that the code is complex in any ways, it's just that it needed to be compatible with AppleShake, so I had to figure out what was going on by comparing color ramps.

I have 20 pages of splines and a lot of notes. It was time consuming to make sense out of it.

Soon I can announce next version of my program.

Now there are 95 blocks!

2009-06-17T16:35:00.000-07:00

An hour ago I uploaded version 1.1.2 of GraphicDesignerToolbox. Having tried out Apple Shake for the first time a few days ago I got really inspired for writing some new blocks, so in this release there are 5 new blocks and the Mix block has be seriously extended with the same compositing modes as in Shake.

I have made a comparison of similar mac programs.

Danger, Will Robinson!

2009-06-08T04:52:00.001-07:00

This morning I made this BIOHAZARD symbol.

And later today I made this skull and crossbones symbol!

Some time ago I made this nuclear logo.

Just Chaos

2009-06-06T00:50:00.000-07:00

Version 1.1 is out. Here are some pictures of what can be made with the new Chaos building block. It very diverse and can be useful for adding cracks to concrete textures, or creating symmetric organic blob, or make odd abstract art.

I have spend MANY hours toying around with it, just tweaking parameters.

The Chaos building block with some post processing. This no longer looks like an IFS fractal. Plus it's a seamless tileable texture!

I'm 30

2009-05-27T00:17:00.000-07:00

Yesterday it was my real birthday and we had a family dinner together and later a good friend (that missed the party) came by with his wife and newborn girl. The party was held 4 days ago and 14 friends attended.. most of them are into computers! It started out with massive rain and later the weather cleared up so we could be outside most of the time.

For a long time I have been worried about how this birthday would turn out.

Rant: danish media, weather, software complexity and my new project

2009-05-04T17:36:00.001-07:00

It's late 02:30 in the middle of the night. Let's see if I can put together a meaningful post before I go to bed. With all the recent focus on Mexican Flu it seems like the danish media has gone back to the regular news about a drug/gang war going on in Copenhagen, famous people and sports. Topics that gets way too much attention. The press releases I have posted has mostly been relayed unmodified to a lot of places (macworld.com). It seems that the regular news media works the same way.. just copy paste with a few changes. In the tech news this copy/paste seems widespread.

Also the weather outside my door is too good to do anything serious and its not even summer yet. It's too bright, too warm and there is too many active people outside making noise. In order to do work my curtains is pulled down and I wear a headset to cancel out the noise. Despite this I throw myself into ever more complex projects and I'm started questioning the whole way I do programming to avoid this complexity, however that is also complex to grasp. And soon its my 30 year birthday, so it takes up some brain cycles thinking about this. So it's too hot and too complex at the moment.

I have begun working on a Norton Commander clone for Mac, to take a break from GraphicDesignerToolbox. I wanted to write a big post about it, but there isn't anything to tell about it yet. I don't even know if I will publish it. Screenshots.. Later.

Update: see the screenshots here

Back from Breakpoint 2009

2009-04-21T14:48:00.000-07:00

It was an amazing trip to Breakpoint 2009 in germany. The last time I went to a such event was way back in 2000, it was huge and called "the party", it was before laptops was common, so you had to bring your CRT and heavy PC with you. These days everybody seems to have laptops. I traveled with the Danish bus with 40 people, mostly programmers, so there was a lot of things to talk about. All people I ran into at breakpoint was friendly and happy.

Anyways. I'm back in denmark now and doing some programming.

Going to Breakpoint 2009

2009-04-04T13:58:00.000-07:00

Last year I couldn't afford it. This year my economy is even worse, however I am going to breakpoint this year. Around christmas time 2008 I worked on a demo system so I could bring something with me, but it's not usable yet. I am traveling with the danish bus.. Really excited!

GraphicDesignerToolbox 1.0 has arrived!

2009-03-30T04:39:00.000-07:00

Today I have just released GraphicDesignerToolbox version 1.0!

I began working on this project in late 2004 and now all the pieces has finally been put together. It has been a long journey into the unknown.

Domain name transfer is completed

2009-03-27T14:51:00.001-07:00

2 days ago, it finally got resolved. So now GraphicDesignerToolbox is up!

And the new icon is there too.

Remaining is some software update issues that I need to figure out.

Then a version 1 can be made ready.

Now just waiting

2009-03-24T17:15:00.000-07:00

The domain transfer is still going on.. everything else is there. Today was my first day where I have been incredible bored, because I can't do anything until the domain starts working. Had I known about the huge delay with domain transfers then I had never initiated one, it has taken me +2 months and it still doesn't work! I am so frustrated. Why oh why!!?!

Being dependent on something unknown that you have no clue how long time it take.. is a very very bad thing that I try to avoid by addressing the big time consuming tasks first. However I was under the impression that this task would max take 48 hours for the DNS to propagate the changes. However just not in my case and now I stuck!

The web hosting company that I switched to has really nice reviews and supports all the features that I need. Now I feel bad about picking them. Domain transfers must be a special case. The web hosting company where I switched from couldn't figure it out neither. So go looking for a third web hosting company probably won't make the situation any better.

Argh, so annoying!

Today I finished writing the documentation for version 1

2009-03-14T17:08:00.001-07:00

27 pages. Lots of images. 1500 words. The PDF file has a size of 9 MB! The iWork Pages file has a size of 34 MB!!! I began writing this document after new years eve, then abandoned it for a while and picked it up again 14 days ago. It has been proof-read by 4 of my friends. It doesn't even cover it all, it's just the basics. It's better than the old tutorials, but if it's really good I don't know.

The only thing I'm waiting for now is that the domain name transfer is completed. Then I can start making the release, everything else is nearly in place!

Storing the 33 MB big iWork Pages file in GIT is causing the repository to quickly grow big (it's 250 MB now, last week it was 100 MB). I will need to rethink my backup solution.

Icon competition

2009-03-06T04:23:00.000-08:00

I have done something crazy today, that I long have wanted to try out. There is a homepage where they have these design-competitions where you can win money if you submit the winner entry.

I have created my own competition for designing a new icon for my program, GraphicDesignerToolbox. You can win $400 USD.

I really look forward to see what comes out of this.

Soon "What now?"

2009-03-02T11:21:00.000-08:00

The list of things that needs to be done before version 1 can be released is getting shorter. There are now about 10 items remaining of reasonable size. It has been a looong ride so far that stared back in 2004 and has taking me on an exciting trip. Over the past couple of months I have had a fairly good idea about how the future would turn out, but when version 1 is done I don't know what will happen. My list of things to do is nearly empty!

This may be the biggest milestone ever in my life. I look forward to it.

Time is usually fairly predictable. Except when you start on or quite from a job, or go on a vacation to a new world. You expect something and it turns out to be much different. I havn't given much thought to what to expect. Usually there is a big anti climax after a release and some weeks later a few people picks it up. However this time so many conditions are different, so I hope it will turn out better.

Will it change my life?

Deformed stripes!

2009-02-20T13:37:00.000-08:00

I experimented and came up with a really cool image. I find it so facinating and I need to share it with someone. Hope you like it!

Valentines day

2009-02-15T03:21:00.001-08:00

Big problems! It's my moms birthday. And one of my newer friends turns out to have his birthday the same day (27 years). Which party should one go to? I chose my friends party and it was a great evening. He had made Frikadeller, my favorite dish.

But I can't help thinking about what to do next valintines day.

I wish I had an iPhone

2009-02-04T11:23:00.000-08:00

Two of my good friends are making programs for the iPhone and I'm so jealous on the stuff they are doing. zenbound - computer game where you have to tear a rope around misc objects. It just looks so awesome. Good luck with it scoopr.

The Story So Far

2009-02-02T13:11:00.000-08:00

It's a looong story and goes back 29 years where I was born. I don't remember the first years at all. I was soon joined by a younger sister and a brother that are much different than me. I quickly became obsessed with Lego bricks and this has significantly impacted my future paths in life. It really took off when I reached the age of 12 where I purchased my first computer for my own hard earned money. I began programming and the rest is history.

These days I'm experimenting with running my own company and is working on my biggest project ever, GraphicDesignerToolbox. It's a really exciting period of my life.