513: I’m Sorry You Learned Something

Jason Turner of C++ Weekly and Empty Crate spoke with us about the joy of puzzles, the changing directions of an interesting career, and the C++ programming language. I mean, of course we talked about C++. But only a little. 

Jason recently published Programming Puzzles Big Book: 400 pages of fun for ages 7-99, a book of puzzles for the logically minded. It teaches programming concepts as engaging puzzles: recursion, binary, assembly, Lisp, regular expressions. You may not know what you are learning but you’ll likely find you know a lot more about how computers work afterward. 

For the puzzles, paper is better than electronic. But you can also get the electronic version on LeanPub (which is better if you like to get lost in Wikipedia links).

This is not Jason’s first puzzle book, he’s made them for C++ Object Lifetime and Copy and Reference (see his Amazon and LeanPub author page for other books as well). 

If you want to catch up on C++, check out C++ Weekly With Jason Turner - YouTube. Note the playlists are useful if you are looking for a deep dive on a particular topic. 

If you want to get more out of C++ in your organization, Jason’s consulting company is Empty Crate. His contact page is there as well (or look for lefticus on most social media platforms).

Transcript

If you’re interested in how 3D printing is changing design engineering, Mouser Electronics has some great resources to check out. Their Empowering Innovation Together platform is taking a deep dive into additive manufacturing—covering smarter production, faster prototyping, and breakthrough materials that move ideas beyond prototypes into real-world products. You’ll find podcasts, expert articles, and videos that keep you informed and inspired. Sound like your thing? Head to Mouser.com/empowering-innovation and explore.

436: 20 GOTO 10

Chris Svec joined us to talk about kids programming and how well the Joel Test has held up.

Svec’s son (“The Kid”) developed an interest in programming by playing games. Most of his programming desires are around building games of his own. 

Any time we talk about kids and programming, Scratch comes up. It really is that neat and is The Kid approved. Some resources to get you started (actually, getting started is easy, you may want a book to do more than the basics):

Digipen.edu had two courses The Kid (and Svec) took. Both are free on YouTube:

Finally, in a shockingly unrelated twist, we talked about the Joel Test for determining the health of a software development organization. No determination was made on how good The Kid finds his current position.

Transcript

434: I Love It, It’s Exhausting

Sarah Withee spoke with us about using an artificial pancreas, learning many programming languages, and FIRST robotics.

More about the Open Artificial Pancreas System can be found at OpenAPS.org or in their documentation. Some other pieces we talked about include:

 To get involved with FIRST robotics, the place to start is FIRSTInspires.org

Sarah’s website is GeekyGirlSarah.com. Her programming language comparison tool is Code Thesaurus: codethesaur.us/

If you want to see small algorithms written in different languages, check out Rosetta Code

Transcript

368: Amazing That Any of This Works

Al Sweigart (@AlSweigart) spoke with us about getting better at Python programming. 

Al’s book site is InventWithPython.com. You can find his books there as well as No Starch Press and Amazon. 

  • Automate the Boring Stuff with Python

  • Beyond the Basic Stuff with Python

  • Cracking Codes with Python

  • Invent Your Own Computer Games with Python

Al’s personal site (alsweigart.com) has talks, videos, and a lot of code to look at. Or check out his github repo including the small text based games: https://github.com/asweigart/pythonstdiogames

Al’s YouTube Channel, including his Calm Programming series.

We also talked about:

137: Pausing to Think (Repeat)

Dan Saks answers many questions about C++ in embedded systems: where it works, where it doesn't, and a path to getting started. 

Dan Saks is the founder and president of Saks & Associates. He was a columnist for The C/C++ Users Journal, Embedded Systems Design and several other publications. He also served as secretary of the ANSI and ISO C++ standards committee in its early years. 

We touched on some of his articles:

Andrei suggested Sams Teach Yourself C++ in One Hour a Day, Seventh Edition by Siddhartha Rao as a good primer for experienced C programmers reluctantly learning C++.

NOTE: The contest already ended.

 

172: Tell Forth You Me Please

James Cameron of One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) tells us about Forth, science fiction, and laptops.

We have some tickets for ARM's mbed Connect conference is Oct 24, 2016 in Santa Clara. Will you be in the area? Want to go? Contact us if you want one of our free tickets! (There are still some tickets remaining.) 

One Laptop Per Child is one.laptop.org. 

Some getting started information on Forth: Mitch Bradley's Forth and Open Firmware Lessons

James has been writing about putting C Forth on a Teensy (more on the Teensy from the creator's site). He also has a post on using Forth to snoop the Milo Champions Band's BLE. 

James is Quozl on most sites that require a unique ID (such as Github:  https://github.com/quozl). This is from a book called Quozl by Alan Dean Foster. The other older-sci-fi reference was to the Pern books by Anne McCaffery, specifically to the White Dragon. 

 

 

158: Programming Is Too Difficult for Humans

Fabien Chouteau (@DesChips) of AdaCore (@AdaCoreCompany) spoke with us about the Make with Ada Programming Competition.

Giveaway boards are GONE. 

The Ada programming language (wiki) is interesting in that it was designed for safety critical embedded systems (actually designed, requirements doc and everything!). The Ada Information Clearinghouse has a nice list of tutorials and books as does the very helpful Make with Ada Getting Started page. Elecia's favorite was Inspirel's Ada on Cortex.

Some neat projects in Ada that we mentioned on the show:

The platforms supported in the contest are on the Getting Started page but you can expand that by looking at the SVD files in the AdaCore drivers on github. (Also, SVD files are neat.) One of the platforms already supported is the Crazyflie nanodrone.