Computer Science is Creative. Fact.

The Guardian has just produced an article with the rather depressing title “Britain's computer science courses failing to give workers digital skills”. You can read it here. The gist of the text is that ‘poor quality training’ and ‘sausage factory’ courses are not providing the skilled and useful people that industry needs.

Oh dear. I always feel a bit nervous when I read these things. I start to wonder if what we do at Hull gives our students a good experience and teaches them skills that make our graduates properly useful. I cheer up a bit when I consider that we actually do a pretty good job for our students with things like Three Thing Game and Evil Squash to get their teeth into and a taught Masters that puts them out into industry. Plus lots of other things I haven’t got space to mention here. And then I remember how our students actually end up doing quite well in industry.

However, I also wonder a little bit about the place of Computer Science in the world.  Some time back The Guardian (same paper) did a big feature called “Top Artists reveal how to find Creative Inspiration”. I found this really annoying. Not because the folks that were there weren’t creative, or that their tips were silly. No, the reason this made me cross was the unspoken assumption that only arty types can be creative. I reckon that Computer Science is the most creative thing you can do. A writer can produce a book about an idea. A composer can create a song about it. A playwright can write a play about it. But a Computer Scientist can bring the idea to life. Which would you rather have, a song about Facebook or Facebook?

Computer Science is the most creative thing you can do. One of the few things we know for certain about the future is that it will be built using digital technology. Everything around us is being converted into patterns of bits and connected to everything else. Of course there are some bad Computer Science courses out there and of course there is confusion about what the subject is actually about. But what it is really about is building the future. And you can’t get more creative than that.

Kinect Pop Art

This is the output from my XNA “Kinect Pop Art” program. I’ve had it running up to 100 frames each way and it just keeps going….

A Slice of History

I was up in the loft again today and I happened across something of great historical interest. I found a Computer Science Departmental Prospectus from 1978, the year that I graduated. I’d kept it because, ahem, I’m in it.

This is the cover. Any idea which language this is?

..and this is the money shot. I think I’ve probably still got those shoes somewhere. And that hairstyle….

The computer in the corner (yes, that is a computer) was a Prime machine and myself and the other chap (another prize for naming him) were allowed special access to it for our Final Year Projects. We then went onto create an unbeatable version of the “Fox and Hounds” board game that was so good that nobody wanted to play it.

Good times.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Went to see the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo today. I read the book some time back and enjoyed it. Then I read the sequel and enjoyed it somewhat less. Then I read the third book in the series and finished it because I’d paid for it and I wasn’t going to lose out on the deal.The first story is a good “Locked Room” mystery. The second, “The Girl Who Played with Fire” goes a bit nuts and the final volume “The Girl who Kicked over the Hornet’s Nest” told me a lot more about Swedish government history than I really wanted to know.

The film sticks very closely to the plot of the first book and is none the worse for it. Daniel Craig, with his Bond charisma turned down a couple of notches, is convincing as the journalist hero that no woman can resist. Rooney Mara is astonishing as the eponymous lady of the title. The book has some pretty gritty stuff in it, along with some raunchy bits as well. The film doesn’t flinch from these, although I did a bit.

If you enjoyed the book you will not feel short changed by the film. I’m not sure if I’ll watch the next two though.

1000 Downloads of TipLight

Some time last year I had a silly idea for a program where you could control the colour of your phone screen by just tipping it around. I spent around an hour making the code and adding some averaging so that the colour didn’t flicker too much when you moved the phone and then I forgot all about it.

Last year, just before Christmas I thought I’d get some more applications in Windows Phone Marketplace. (this has nothing to do with wanting to pick up some more points for the Windows Phone Rewards programme of course).

Anyhoo, just had my thousandth download of what is the silliest of all the programs that I’ve made. If you want a copy for your phone, you can get it here.

If you liked the program then you might like this one too (which is quite fun but could probably do with a bit of work on the difficultly levels )

The Red Nose game was great fun to write and you can get it for free here.

A Computer that talks to itself…

I’m still working on the Kinect voice controlled human painting program. First thing I need is a shorter name…

Today I added a feature I thought would be really cool. Voice response is one thing, but I also wanted the computer to talk back when I issued a command. Adding voice output to a C# program is a doddle.

First you add the System.Speech library to the references in your solution.

Then you add the speech synthesis namespace:

using System.Speech.Synthesis;

Now you can make your program speak:

SpeechSynthesizer speaker;

void setupSpeechOutput()
{
    speaker = new SpeechSynthesizer();
    speaker.Speak("Ready to Go");
}

This is the setup method for my speech output. Whenever you want your program to say something, just call the Speak method on the variable speaker. If you are worried about slowing things down you can use an asynchronous call to speak in the background while your program runs on. Works very well. In fact too well.

I had the program repeating the commands aloud and it worked wonderfully. I would say “Red” to select the red colour and the program would say “Red” back. Then commands started repeating, with the computer saying “Red” time after time. Took me a minute to figure out what was happening. Turns out that the computer is really good at recognizing computer speech. It would hear itself say the confirmation message and echo it, and so on. I added a timeout so that it ignores things for a second after a command and all is well now.

Kinect Skeleton Drawing Fun

I drew these pictures myself. With myself. This is the first ever picture from my Kinect Drawing program. This lets you use your arm to draw on the screen by waving it around.. You can use voice commands to select the colour you want to draw with or you can have the random rainbow effect that you see above.

All this Kinect fun and games is in aid of a book that I’m writing, “Start Here! – Learn the Kinect API”. It should be in the shops later this year.

All Terrain Robot

I also got this awesome “All Terrain Robot” kit for Christmas. Once you have spent a happy couple of hours building the individual components you can fit them together to make either a six tracked all terrain robot, a forklift truck or my favourite, the beer stealing ‘Gripper bot’ that you see above.

Actually, it can’t move a full can of beer – but it does look awesome. And I even got batteries included.

New Years Hornsea

For some reason we always try to go and see the sea early in the New Year. This usually means a trip to Hornsea. Today the weather and the tide were very kind to us, and so we had a little walk down the beach and I took some snaps.

The weather was nice, but very chilly in the wind. We sought refuge in an amusement arcade.

They have these “Penny Falls” machines where you try and push pennies off the a ramp. This looks like it is good to drop, but I reckon those coins are super glued into position…

The Gunstringer for Xbox 360 Kinect

When the Kinect was released I was hoping that some games would come along that made use of the things it can do to create different types of game. The sports simulation games are nice enough, as are the dancing ones, but I’ve been waiting for completely new game types.

The Gunstringer is certainly new. You use your left hand to control a gunslinging marionette in his (its?) quest for vengeance against those who done him wrong.  The right hand is used for targeting and shooting. The whole thing is presented in the form of a puppet show with a live audience who cheer you on and boo the bad guys.

There are daft cut scenes, some great voice acting and the whole thing is powered by a 3D engine that seems to be called “Beard”. It is all delightfully silly and great fun. You can download a demo version and have a play with that, and once you have had a taste I reckon you’ll be forking out for the full game.

New Years Eve Games: Dobble, Spot it! and The Resistance

We spent New Years Eve playing some games we’d not tried before.

First up was Dobble. This is an awesome little pattern matching card game with very simple rules and amazingly raucous gameplay. Great fun with a whole bunch of mini-games. While looking up links for this blog post I’ve found that Dobble is no more, but the game is now being sold under the much more sensible name of Spot-It. Same game but much cheaper. If you want to keep a bunch of kids (or adults who are a bit like kids) busy – but not quiet – then take a look at this game.

The Resistance is much more cerebral. You are either a loyal resistance member or a traitor bent on sabotaging missions. As the game progresses it is up to the loyal members to identify the traitors and the traitors to sow confusion amongst the ranks and thwart everything. This is great fun too, especially if you get to play as a traitor.

PlayMusic for Windows Phone

I seem to be on a Windows Phone application roll at the moment. This one has just gone live in the Marketplace too. I had the idea for it when I was driving into work last Tuesday. I built the application in around an hour, spent 30 minutes or so making it pretty and building the icons and then submitted it into Windows Phone Marketplace. And now you can load it.

It doesn’t do much, but I find it useful. I built it as a workaround to get music playing when I’m driving along. I like to be able to start the music playing using voice commands and I’ve not found a way to do this with the phone. I can start programs running (including Zune) but I can’t start music playing. This may be something that I’ve missed, but I enjoyed writing the application anyway so it is not a loss as far as I am concerned.

I can get music playing by just using the voice command “Start PlayMusic”. When the application runs it just picks a random playlist (or album if there are no playlists on the phone) and plays it. If the music is already playing it does nothing. The program also displays a pithy message (those took longer to think up than writing the actual program code). If it solves a problem for you, then grab a copy.

TipLight for Windows Phone

Some time back I had an idea for a Windows Phone app that displayed a coloured torch (flashlight) that you could control by tipping the phone. And now it is in Windows Phone marketplace. Just tip the phone to get the colour you want and then tap the screen to lock it. Tap the screen again to tip and select another colour.

Lego Camper Van Christmas Fun

This

plus this

equals this

Yay!

Best Christmas Present Ever?

This is what Charlotte gave her dad for Christmas. Great stuff.

Christmas Question

Is it called Boxing Day because you end up with lots of empty boxes?

Happy Christmas Everyone

Christmas would not be Christmas without some Lego Starwars action

Christmas Eve with Zelda and Link

I’ve always liked my Wii, in spite of not using it as much as I should do. Today we went up town for some last minute Christmas shopping. And I ended up buying a copy of the “swan song” game for this console, which is due for replacement next year with the Wii U.

Watching number one son play the game I was struck by just how good Nintendo are at constructing things like this. Everything works, everything is charming, and pretty much everything has a purpose. Just a great way to spend time.

Evil Squash on Windows Phone

There are now Evil Squash games in Windows Phone Marketplace. Yay! For those that haven’t heard of the game of Evil Squash; it is a kind of cross between Snakes and Ladders and Ludo. We invented it just for our first year programming practical work. And now some enterprising students have got versions running in the Windows Phone marketplace. Well done people.

I’m compiling an “Evil Squash” hall of fame for the Evil Squash site. If you are on the first year of our course and want your version promoting, give me a yell.

Gadget Box

Yesterday I got a box for all the Gadgeteer bits and bobs that I’ve been lent to pay with. In amongst the cables we have a soil moisture sensor, barometer, a bunch of switches and multi-coloured lights, compass, gyro, GPS sensor, SD card reader, network interface, Joystick, LCD panel, OLED panel, network connector, processor board, video camera, power relays and usb host connector. I’ve already built a little camera (that’s the demo application). Now I just have to think of something else to build.