Following on from my previous list of HTML/JS game engines, I was informed about Construct 2 – a new visual HTML5 game development program for Windows, developed by London start-up Scirra.

As shown in the video, Construct 2 makes it insanely easy to make interesting and addictive games such as a platformers or puzzles. It has a large array of ready-to-use assets such as sprites, sound effects and animations. The program generates HTML5 code so is fantastically portable. One thing to note is that, unlike most other “no-code coding” programs – Construct2 does not feel as though it is dumbed down; it really feels like developers made this for developers.

The free version of the program has limited functionality but will still allow you to play around and get a feel for the possibilities of the app, whilst the full versions are limitless, allowing you to go crazy.

Whew. It’s been quite an intense, amazing, interesting and eventful few months. After going on a life-changing road-trip around USA and making the jump from full-time to freelance developer, its nice to take a bit of time off over the Xmas holidays to look back.

I’ve had the good fortune to work with some of the most talented and friendliest creatives and techies in London, working with them on numerous interesting (and challenging) projects such as the Kingsmill redesign, an interactive timeline for D&AD and a Facebook app for Argos and their Xmas campaign. I’ve been bouncing around from HTML5 to PHP and even some email builds thrown in for good measure. The interesting work has been supplemented to by working with some of the great talent that London has to offer and sharing one or two drinks with them.

Outside the standard office-work, I’ve been able to go to inspiring conferences such as Power Of One and the Facebook Developer Garage days which have given me the chance to look at how I work, what I should and shouldn’t do and how I can learn from others in my situation.

So what have I learned from these events? Firstly, I’ve found that there are some brilliantly talented people in London generating fantastic ideas. Secondly, for the hard-working web developer, there is work out there and that there are some fantastic agencies that will find work for you if you’re struggling.

Finally, and most importantly, I’ve learnt that the work doesn’t have to feel like it. By going freelance I’ve been able to work in different areas of London, meeting great people and getting immersed in the local area. A 30min walk around the area at lunch went a long way to remind me why I should continue to be excited by the work that I am doing.

Less of a tech post this time but relevant none-the-less. Today is the first day of my last week at my current job, Spook Media – this Friday, after 2 and 1/2 years, will see moving onwards and upwards into the world of contracting.

Not one to doing things in a simple fashion – I thought I’d also bundle my career change in with a life-changing holiday, namely the 6 week road-trip across America that I’ll be doing in a few days. After about a year in the planning, myself, my girlfriend and two friends will be going coast to coast on a 6000 mile adventure – from LA to NYC.

Being the developer that I am, I immediately thought “but what form of website can I create for this trip” and quickly created epicroadtrip.co.uk. It’s going to be used mainly to document our trip and to keep in touch with my family’s less computer-able’d members – without having to call them every few days (avoiding some epic costs). It’s very much a “just double click this icon every few days” kind of job.

So, as you can probably tell, the next few months are going to be hectic, amazing, stressful and exciting. I’ll be updating this blog with some content from the road… but for anyone interested in what I get up to, in full, around America, you can check out the epicroadtrip.co.uk blog here or check out these posts here:

• A little about us
• 2 weeks away
• Family meet blog… blog meet family.
• Avis and the case of the missing grand

See you on the flip side!

Over the past few years I’ve had the good fortune to work with a wide range of projects, from small single person business blogs to multinational systems. Interestingly, a common factor through all these projects has been “Can it be done quicker in WordPress?”.

WordPress has relatively recently begun angling itself towards the CMS market with varied success. The recent addition of custom post types in WordPress 3.0 allows developers to leave behind the idea of posts, pages & media. Additionally, WordPress has one of the most active developer communities; creating nearly 11,000 plugins for the platform. How far can these features be shoehorned into a site specification?

As of late 2010, WordPress powered nearly 8.5% of all websites showing that there is possibility to extend WP past its intended use. However, when you start using WordPress as more of a CMS, you run the risk of releasing your content to the multitude of drive-by hacks, security vulnerabilities and viruses. Definitely avoid using any of the free WordPress themes as they’re almost certainly riddled.

So, what’s the answer?

I have found that the “Duck Test” applies perfectly to the WordPress scenario. If it looks like a blogging platform, it probably is best used as a blogging platform. It feels that the legacy code may be holding it back from being a full CMS platform. Perhaps they just want to straddle the line to take advantage of both scenarios.

In the end, WordPress still works very successfully as a CMS. It is perfectly suited for small to medium scale websites and the plugin directory is an invaluable tool for rolling out a website in minimal time. I would, however, suggest that if you’re finding yourself Googling for plugins, hacks and cracks to get WordPress to match a feature in your spec, you should probably take a look at the other, more CMS focused, platforms out there – Expression Engine is a personal favourite and a natural evolution of the WordPress idea of simple-to-roll-out websites.

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A few months ago, I decided to start developing my first iPhone game, Little Devil, alongside my full time job as a Web Developer in Central London. I didn’t have much experience with Objective C or iPhone development so I knew that it was going to be quite a daunting task. Alongside this I have a girlfriend & a relatively good social life, all of which contributed to the issues with developing something difficult in my spare time.

Now, 5 months later, I’ve learnt quite a bit on how to balance my professional, social and development life and here are a few tips/pointers for anyone wanting to do the same.

Prepare Your Code

A clean, organised codebase allows you to be able to jump in and out quickly. Remember as you develop, to comment any areas that are complex because if you want to be able to develop during your 30 minute lunch break, you don’t want to waste that time figuring out what functionLongNameDoesThis(); actually does.

Keeping your code modular, following a Component or MVC model, will allow you to work on only the areas you have time to work on, with the security of knowing that any changes you do won’t have a damaging effect on the entire project. This is especially important if you are planning on opening up your code to multiple people to work on or going open source.

On the topic of multiple contributors to a project; it helped me to have my code under the version control system, GIT. Combined with a CodebaseHQ account, this allowed me to push and pull the code from many different devices. Had I been working with a team on this project, we would have been able to work in small bursts on our own areas without the risk of overwriting each others work. For a free alternative to CodebaseHQ, try Github. Each of these systems comes with robust ticketing systems which allow you to list out tasks, bug reports and to-dos.

As I developed Little Devil, I realised that to be able and want to work on it in the evenings, I had to split out the larger jobs into many smaller tasks. This made the development process a lot less daunting, taking a large such as “Implement Powerups” and turning them into procedural, bite-size steps (ie – create class, add methods, do graphics…). This also helped in making the entire task feel more achievable in my few free hours in the evenings.

Use Your Commute

As I mentioned before, I work in Central London however I live about 1 hour away on the tube, which gives me a good 2 hour period of my day where I am on my own, in my own little world (usually miserable looking with headphones shoved in my ears).

When I first started developing Little Devil, I used the commute time to watch video tutorials & podcasts. As I progressed in my knowledge and my project requirements changed, I spent the time typing out notes, jotting down ideas and doodling on pieces of paper.

The message here is that you can turn your daily commute into a productive few hours of your day. Use it to your advantage.

Find Your Zen

I am a very distracted person. When I’m comfortable at home, this distraction increases ten-fold. Whenever I sit down to code, it takes me around an hour to be able to get into “the zone”. Once I hit this zone, my best coding comes out and I fly through tasks. The important and most difficult part of this is the lead up to “the zone”.

For me, my zen was created by putting headphones on (to the annoyance of my other half) and attempting to code for an hour. Find out whatever works for you, whether it is your favourite album, a quiet room or even surrounded by friends giving input. Once you get into the zone, you’ll see your task list get smaller, quicker.

Keep Up The Day Job

Probably the most important thing about balancing your personal and professional projects is to ensure that your main job is stable and that you are not getting too distracted by your fun, new project. Always remember which of the projects pays the bills and puts food on the table.

This is not just to make sure you don’t get fired. It is also to make sure that when you find yourself able to code you aren’t distracted about your main job, worried about clients or deadlines.

You need to make sure that when you get into the zone, nothing is going to drag you back down to the real world.

Stop Developing!

The worst thing that can happen to a personal project is that you burn out. This will happen, no matter how interesting the project seems at the start. Once you compile, build or run the project and find 100+ bugs, you’ll want to just throw it away and start a new project.

To avoid this, make sure you aren’t running out of steam. Don’t code all the time and don’t fall into the trap of developing in every spare moment. Don’t feel guilty for forgetting about the project for a week or two and play the latest games or watch some junk TV.

Finally, make sure you are not forgetting your friends, family, peers and bosses. Eventually the project will be finished and these are the people that you’ll want to show off your hard work to.

Good Luck Out There

I hope these tips help you to finish your projects without turning your life into a nightmare of 24/7 coding.

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http://www.developerrights.org/

Each new generation of computing brings new ways to develop applications. Success stories become patterns, which become application platforms. Great platforms enable great applications. But in the past, “lock-in” has often been the price paid for embracing platforms. This must not happen again.

It’s been a busy few weeks.

Work is filling up most of my time with a decent CodeIgniter rollout using smarty and some nicely designed libraries. That hasn’t stopes me playing around with some personal projects (iPhone app development and a funky web app built for my teacher girlfriend)

On top of that I’ve finally booked the flights for my 6 week epic USA roadtrip! Holy balls, I need to get planning. The initial plan means I’ll end up going to 3 countries and 13 states. Epic roadtrip. Taking suggestions for a bitching name for the roadtrip. I’m thinking “The Roadtrip”.

I’ll be updating the blog in the next few days with some nifty tutorials and some (hopefully) thought provoking blog posts.

Stay tuned.

(ps – this post was done with the WordPress iPhone app. Ideal!)

Quick update to announce (maybe a bit too grand of a word?) that the “About me” page is up on the top nav-bar (yep, that’s the one!). Feel free to click it and learn all about me in the form of a Wordle.

Thank god for Web 2.0 tools, doing 99% of the work for me!