Recreational Programming

[Handy]

Any computer programmers out there? If you are one, do you do any video game programming? What APIs do you use? What IDE do you use?

I'm an avid programmer in my down time (I just got a job as a software engineer over the summer, and currently work as a teaching assistant for a C++ course at my school, and am a computer engineering student, so I guess in my up-time as well!) and spend most of my free time making really, really stupid little video games, which frankly I'd love to share

I've heard we trans* folk are unusually well represented in IT, and am trying to discover if that's true.

[JamesG]

 In a former life I was a programmer and web developer. Everything from Assember on up to Java and Small Talk, my knowledge was broad (but shallow). That was years ago thought. I don't even consider myself one anymore I'm so outdated.

I do code when I have to. Mostly client-side Javascript and I've been playing with little ICs, Stamp and Ardiuno. 

[Kova V]

I did some programming once upon a time. I only do little JavaScript tools now, mostly as tools for helping me find things online or just for fun. JavaScript has really rounded out in the last 5 years, especially with html5. There are everything from javascript 3d engines to photo and video facial recognition libraries ported over c++. All running client side in web browsers. Kind of amazing when you think about it.

The next company I do is going to be a tech company though, the overhead to roi is way better.

Do you write anything other then games?

[Handy]

I did some programming once upon a time. I only do little JavaScript tools now, mostly as tools for helping me find things online or just for fun. JavaScript has really rounded out in the last 5 years, especially with html5. There are everything from javascript 3d engines to photo and video facial recognition libraries ported over c++. All running client side in web browsers. Kind of amazing when you think about it.

The next company I do is going to be a tech company though, the overhead to roi is way better.

Do you write anything other then games?

Apart from games I write programs to help me in creating games for instance I enjoy making roleplaying games and platformers, and typically I handle collision detection in those games with a 2D array. I wrote a little program to take in whatever map I'd created in photoshop/tiled/etc. and allow me to point and click points where I want a hit to register/connect to a different part of the map/etc. then export the array to a file which I could then use in my other projects.

Even when not explicitly programming 'games' I normally have games in mind; I do a lot of embedded systems programming (mainly in the form of Gameboy development (got a nifty little flash cart for it), and pic18 microcontroller assembly programming (I love robotics)).

I've also done some work with the Nexys2 FPGA using VHDL, but again it almost always boils down to, "I wonder if I can make a game with this?", in the case of the FPGA board implementing Conway's game of life