The home of Barnaby Smith
Header

Qt Framework + OpenGL

August 14th, 2010 | Posted by mvi in OpenGL | Qt - (0 Comments)

I’ve started looking at the Qt Framework. Produced by Nokia, Qt allows you to build cross platform applications and leverage some really powerful features. While Qt is primarily used for developing GUI applications it makes available a number of modules for integration of other elements, such as 3d (through OpenGL or DX), networking, multimedia and scripting to name but a few. Being able to target multi operating systems easily and professionally is something I’ve been desiring and Qt seems perfect, especially with its ability to tie into OpenGL in a straightforward manner. I’ve been going through the sample apps it comes with. It’s available under both GPL and commercial licenses, so as I intend to release my work under GPL, this works out fantastically. I’ll let you know how I get on.

Check out Qt here

Future Perfect Wallpapers

August 14th, 2010 | Posted by mvi in Future Perfect - (0 Comments)

I’ve uploaded two versions of the new Wallpaper that Lap has created for Future Perfect. These images show a region called District 3 on board the Ares II space station (which you can see an exterior image of in the previous post). This district is essentially where a lot of the less reputable affairs take place and is home to much trade both legal and otherwise. The colour version might be a bit harsh on your eyes as a wallpaper, so there’s a sepia version too.

Future Perfect

August 8th, 2010 | Posted by mvi in Future Perfect - (0 Comments)

My friend, Lap and I, have been writing a short story called Purity. Its a science fiction story set on a space station above Mars set over a hundred years in the future and follows the tale of a detective sent in to find out the source of sabotage which has destroyed a section of the station’s docking ring. It’s the first in a series of stories we hope to do, under the umbrella title of Future Perfect. We’ve been writing up a timeline and figuring out how the universe evolves from today to several hundred years in the future. It’s been a lot of fun and Purity is now almost on its second draft. We’re hoping to try and get the story published and already have ideas for the next two stories. Above is a picture of the station in question, Ares II, above a terraforming Mars. The picture is painted by Lap and you can check out others on his site here, the gallery will be updated as we get further and I hope to keep you posted on how it goes.

Some thoughts on static web security

August 8th, 2010 | Posted by mvi in Web - (0 Comments)

While web development is something I tend not to do, but despite that have somehow done quite a lot over the years (I’m still trying to figure that one out,) I was having a think about web security the other day. Now, with so many various web content management systems and forum scripts, it’s not surprising the amount of vulnerabilites they tend to accumulate.

Now many websites are essentially static content, but run content management systems because of the powerful functionality they leverage and how easy they make it to modify your site content. But as these systems become older and aren’t updated, there’s a tendency for the security vulnerabilities to be uncovered and exploited. So my thoughts were, how about securing the CMS really tightly (.htaccess and IP range locking, or whatever takes your fancy) and then bake the essentially generated PHP (for example) files to public html files whenever a change is made. The scripts which are susceptible to exploitation are locked away more securely than they would be otherwise. Just a musing.

What I’m currently playing

August 8th, 2010 | Posted by mvi in Playtime - (0 Comments)

I’m currently playing through the original Mass Effect on Xbox 360 (of course.) Enjoying it so far, but the game could do with a much clearer objective system and some of the combat feels a little counter-intuitive. Apparently the sequel fixed a lot of these issues, so I’ve got that to look forward to.

After borrowing my friend’s Playstation 3, I’ve also been playing Joe Danger. I first saw the game back at Eurogamer Leeds last year where the company I worked at, at the time had a stall. I’m pleased to say I found the game very fun and the level of polish is exceedingly high.

I’ve also just started on Uncharted 2. I was blown away by the graphics, which are really, really pretty. I’m glad to see they’ve managed to keep the camera system sensibly located as you move throughout the levels. The game has a really strong narrative and I had trouble putting it down. I can see why people raved about this game.