And so, 2007 is gone.

It was a pretty sucessful year in my life. I switched job for a better position and conditions, the project I am in is interesting and challenging. I left the academic world... displacing and displacing my pending things until they fell through the end of year abbyss (acquiring a Java Certification, for example); however, I start my specialization next month, which is nice. (Corporate Financial Management)

In the emotional facet, it was a weird year... after having to say goodbye for a while to a special person, hoping things could be kept up on the distance, the year went on and on, with good and bad moments, the webcam, the messenger, the problems caused by the distance. By the third quarter of the year things just were not as expected and had to end (a very weird ending) (at least we can still be friends, can we?)

Afterwards I changed my way of thinking about many things, thus the new year opens with a great uncertainty.

As for my projects, all the resume has been put into http://szdev.livejournal.com

All in all, I enjoyed this year; apart from the astounting emotional whirlwind, I could share a lot of time with my friends Paola and Paula, the IAS and NetSac people, the MoPris and many others with whom time was spent; I felt that special girl with me most of the time, in spite of distance, a company I thank life for giving me. My family was always by my side, backing me up, and professionally I also grew a lot. So I hope 2008 will be as sucessful as 2007, or better! ;)

The only notable downside of the year was the death of Alejandro Yepes, all-life friend which we will always remember.

Well!
Its been three months since last post, and lots of things have happened:

• First and foremost, I left I.A.S. for a new job at NetSac, so far it has been nice, with some days having to work may be too many hours... but I guess that's just the cost of the job. We are also on a new office so it's been a bit hard to get accustomed to transport and time (I am not too good at getting up early :P)
• Second: I released CastlevaniaRL 1.26, the first official version since...November 2006? Info about that here: http://www.santiagoz.com/web

• What else? I still feel lacking many things on my life, but I have decided not to whine anymore... things ought to get better soon!

The day is over... another year has gone by

Emptyness, the feeling of lacking... of receiving nothing in return... of not being as relevant as one supposses to be.

The feeling of having always to beg for everything. Those feelings cover me this night.

What makes one person important? why is it important to be important? the endless struggle for hapinness through giving and sacrifice... uncaring sacrifice? no room for being selfish? I am selfish, it is just that I can endure and pretend I am not, but deep inside I feel it burns///

A constant trial, and inside myself a combat... the real man and the man the real man wants people to meet; the real man, whom can't still find hapiness and will never find it, because the unreal man won't give him a chance... all is reflected and bounces against his invisible shield... protection... that's what everything is about... unneeded protection, a walled border that hinders expansion.

Now, in this 21th birthday, and just in yet another change point of my life in many aspects, I feel more than ever the urge of letting loose my instincts, the risk... the certain result, the man people loves, he won't be loved anymore?

It is time to rest... We are gonna start this year with discipline.

Again, as usual, been a long time since my last post.

Lots of things have happened. First, and most important, my maiden girl has gone on a trip to another country for some months... it has not been easy, and probably won't be for the months to come, but I trust in God we will be strong enough and make it through together!

As for university, I finally graduated, and I had a good score on the national ECAES university test, which brought me nice things such as a masters' school aid, and the possibility to become a teacher in there. That is always nice. Pics at http://www.santiagoz.com/piclog !

Also, I made a website for us graduates to share our problems and jokes, it resides for now at http://www.santiagoz.com/udem

It's been a heavy year at work, lot's of responsabilities to finally make some projects profitable for the company, and doing it almost alone has been rough, but onward we go...

As for roguelike development, all has gone nice. I participated on this year's 7DRL contest with a new game, ZeldaRL, and have produced better versions of DrashRL (finally in the point I want it to be for now). A version of CvRL is in the works and comes with lots of new things, for a much more stable and fun game. Further info on all this can be found at http://www.santiagoz.com/web

I guess that would be it. I am going on a 7 days trip to the beach right now, hope to post back when I return. Wish me luck!

So, about a week ago a friend told me about this event google was arranging, a programming contest, so I got into it.

I signed up and then went into the practice rooms, wow! it was not easy, problems were complex and time was short; I practiced for a bit and then left.

Well, finally, the time for the elimination round came; only 500 persons would pass to the first round. There were like 1600 people, if I remember correctly. So I went in to take part into the contest.

The google code jam event, powered by TopCoder, puts the codemonkeys into a specially crafted arena (made in Java by the way), where they can chat, access their problems and generally get stressed because of the results.

First comes a coding phase, where you have 1 hour to solve two programming/algorithm problems, one worth 250 points, the other 750. There's an in-arena code editor where you can read the problem, compile and test, in different languages such as Java, C#, C++, Python..

The points are assigned depending on how much did it take for you to submit the problem.

The 250pt problem was kinda simple, which was good news to me as I didn't want to leave the competition scoreless, so I went on and made it. It required to sort an array of int's so I tried using Arrays.sort; "Couldn't resolve name Arrays" he said, so I guessed it wouldn't allow me to use such libraries, but I thought... "No problem! I will hack together a simple bubblesort, that will do!" and so did I.

I got 203 points, which was good enough for me, so I went on with the 750 pointer.

Well, it was a very "geometrical" problem, about finding how many integer coordinate pairs are inside a triangle given its three vertices. It was not very simple, and you had to know some geometrical formulas beforehand, so I went on to search the web for a clue, and slowly started to put together a working algo. Well, in the end it didn't work for a reason I couldn't discern.

I submitted it for about 250 points, knowing it would be trashed in...

...the System Test Phase, where all the submitted problems are compared against a set of test cases, and if they fail their score drops to 0.

I hoped I would remain inside the first 100 of my set, so I could advance to the next round and perhaps perform better.

Things were going well, by the 8 AM of the next day, 1 hour before closing the contest, I was standing on about place 90th with my 203pts.

Then came the system test, and then this happened

Clic to see: http://www.santiagoz.com/share/perdi.png

So, that was a quick farewell to this year code jam, all caused by a naive mistake on the sort method. The examples were tricky, or I was unlucky, as I got the correct answers because of the actual data on the prices array.

For those that dont understand the error, or are in a hurry and cannot see it:

in the sort method, in the inner loop, I had

if (x[i] > x[j]){
int temp = x[i];
x[i] = x[j];
x[j] = x[i];
}

Which incorrectly doubles the value of x[j], as the third assignment does nothing. I had to use the temp variable.

Lessons:
* For the elimination round, concentrate on the 250 pointer
* Make your own tests to your code, don't rely on the provided examples
* Use utility libraries (if I had known this...)

It was saturday, January 6, I dont remember the time... I was having a morning nap at my girlfriend's house, if I remember correctly, then my brother called me... the word was that he was dead.

Off course, I couldnt believe it at first, we had just talked last week, he was so excited to have his wii... I had also wished him a merry new year last week. But it was true, and a bit after midday we were at the church, giving Alejo our last visit. Some friends came, some were missed, it was a sad moment, regardless of the words of hope everybody wanted to say. It was even more sad when I talked to his mom, and she told me Alejo was very fond on me.

I had to know... off course, we were friends from the school, but since he "changed" I think he kept losing and losing contact with his prior friends, due to his particular way of living and seeing life. I always tried to keep in touch, to hear him, to read his writings, I always found them amusing, although I must confess I was not ready (or willing) to fully understand what he wanted to say, and I know he knew that, but nonetheless, we were kind of happy to see we could get to understand and hear each other ramblings.

A month ago, he told me about http://alemeele.blog.terra.com/ there he put some of his writings.... later on, when he was gone already, I got to go to his house, I got to see his small collection of writings, which I now keep for the future. They are worth for the people seeing them, and I hope I can help him on this. I also got to see his last work, which I keep for me.

He had such a clear notion of life! at least, thats what he got himself to believe, and I believed him... but I am sad to see unworthy events made him lost that same sight, and fall to the limits of his own self due, as I see it, to a conflict between his idea of human life, and his own life, with problems and limitations.

I still cannot understand Alejo, why did you stumble uppon that small obstacle? or was the obstacle so big I couldnt see it? We have lost a person, a very special person which was meant to affect the world in a possitive way. I will always remember you Alejo. I will always remember you were waiting for the next version of DrashRL to test it. I will always remember your negative comments about CvRL. I will always remember your rightness on the way of talking and speaking, your choses on nouns and verbs, your vanity sometimes, when you recognized in your work a masterpiece, or at least something you thought you couldnt have written. I will always remember you, everytime I see a Nintendo console, or a pretty ingenious game which you would surely have liked, even though I may never again touch them, and don't ask me why. I will always wonder what would have happened if you had given me a call, but it is not worth thinking about it now. I will remember you, you can count on that.

And so, 2006 is gone.

It was a pretty sucessful year in my life. I kept advancing on my job and I am really happy with it after a year, there are lots of projects and I feel comfortable working at them. I could finish the last university semester, altough my grades were NOT good and work on my university thesis.

In the emotional face, it was a good year... after a lone start in the first quarter of the year I got to a pretty chaotic stage on the second quarter in which I seemed to have lost my direction, but then got back to the lawful path with a very special person, with whom I feel very comfortable, even if the start was rough because of how things were.

I also updated my Photo Gallery and it has since reached a lot of people

As for my projects, all the resume has been put into http://szdev.livejournal.com

All in all, I really enjoyed this year; apart from the astounting confusion, I could share a lot of time with my friends, Sandra, Pa*la, and many others with whom much time was spent; and off course I always had maiden with me, a company I thanks life for giving me. My family was always by my side, backing me up, and professionally I also grew a lot. So I hope 2007 will be as sucessful as 2006, or better! ;)

The only notable downside of the year was the death of Andres Muñoz, friend from the university which we will always remember.

Como pueden pasar... sucesos que nunca hubieramos esperado y que sin aviso se llevan de nuestro lado a personas importantes, que aun cuando tal vez no compartieron mucho de su vida con nosotros, lograron dejar una huella importante, hasta el punto de hacer que su ausencia deje un espacio en nuestras vidas. Nuestros cuerpos no nos pertenecen, en cualquier momento y sin causa alguna su funcionamiento puede verse afectado, hasta el punto de que este mismo se autodestruya como una guerra civil, como un holocausto que al final destruye el campo de batalla. Solo queda el alivio del descanso más allá del cuerpo, y el recuerdo de una persona que que con sus actos y su existencia misma causaba alegría a sus compañeros.

Andrés Muñoz, dejaste una huella en todos y te vamos a llevar siempre en nuestros éxitos y en nuestras luchas. Para la eternidad.

Wow! it is been three months since the last post! Lots of things have happened, so lets recap everything :)

On October 5 I got to see the successful release of a project for the company I work on (http://www.ias.com.co) a simulator of imports and exports, you can find it at http://www.sitex-ias.com , well, we have been working on important upgrades and we hope the product gets a good welcome.

About CastlevaniaRL, lots of things went on! I released 1.2b and then 1.21. Since 1.21 the game has graphics now! thanks to the work of Mr. Richard Barrett and a lot of UI/Engine decoupling and graphics java development. It was then that I showed the game at the CREAR fair on my university; altough we didnt 'win' lots of people got to see the game and support the project.

Since then I have released 1.21a, 1.22, 1.23 and 1.24, each game better thanks to the feedback of the user community.

Also, since the original website went bananas, I had to upload a new one at http://crl.santiagoz.com .

Some updates to the roguelike world map (http://peltkore.net/~szdev/roguemap/) were made, not many... the add request forum was moved due to the new website/

Also, I participated on the Orange October Minigun 7DRL challenge with a new project, MetroidRL! ( http://peltkore.net/~szdev/mrl ) what I could make was a simple to play, fun an nonlinear game, I am pretty happy with the results and already working on an updated version.

About university, things remain almost the same, altough I already sent a proposal for my final work and I have been given green light to work on it. I plan on making a cellphone based exploration game, will tell more about it soon!

On the personal side things could not be better... (girl, you know how important you are on my life, never forget it!)

Well...

The deadline for a project at work draws near, so we have been working hard... coordinating marketing + business domain + development on a last month rush isn't simple, but has been a rewarding experience. Will detail about it when it is released.

I released CastlevaniaRL 1.2 and 1.2a; lots of things changed... music and LOS were added, lots of bugfixes and enhancements... as always it is at http://crl.santiagoz.com

I also finished the Roguelike World Map, you may find it at http://peltkore.net/~szdev/roguemap/ if you want to be added, follow the instructions at the CRL general roguelikeness forum.

And I still got to clear a lot of things on university before I can graduate... at least classes are over and I can concentrate on work and my projects.

Been working a bit lately using GWT (Google Web Toolkit); my first impressions: it is a well designed technology which brings an interesting alternative to web application developement; while JSF also takes the web development layered models a step closer to MVC, GWT has a different take on it, and as a result we have an UI development process very similar to Swing, obtaining client-side applications full of nice features and widgets without needing to know the details on their implementation.

Something to note however, is that while the web application is written in java, this will only bring advantages on a quicker development and debugging, you cant really use the many tools already available to Java, there is just a subset of java.lang and java.util you can use; this is all because all of the java is ultimately compiled to javaScript, the VM dissappears and you are left with a set of HTML, css and js files which need no server to be processed. Also, these generated files are not trivial to mantain outside of the GWT once they are compiled, and thus there is certain dependence on the support that google brings to the tool in the future to ensure the maintanability of any application that uses the ToolKit.

There are still lots of things to do and to improve... GWT is a newborn technology, it is still a bit buggy and things dont always work the way one expects them to; but the design is clear, and with the sucess of tools like google calendar or google maps, from which the API was built, it is an option to be had in mind if one is to develop web applications focused on the client side processing.

All right, so after finishing university I feel better at work... at long last I can concentrate on one only thing... or I would...

Currently four things are on my mind, the upcoming release of a product at work which I lead and still must finish some functionalities, make the website and aid the arrangements for the release event, the next version of castlevaniaRL, a web project with a foreing friend and the pending final tests of yet another project at work. I am most worried about the projects at work, as time runs out and I still have many things to do, but I hope this week is productive.

I am not doing well at the world cup bets at work... I will never forget I missed the bet for the Argentina match, which would have given me some advantage! but well, still lots of matches left.

And I still have got to make all the arrangements at university for the upcoming graduation... need to validate my work as corporate practice, perform the English language tests and the corporate protocol course...

Finally, I met a special person and I am very happy with her, hope things work out with you girl, only time will tell.

Well, I am now 20... nice!

Made a party and invited some friends, we had a good time in the cold night of San Cristobal.

Because of the age increment my mind is thinking a lot of things about future and stuff, I guess it is a natural process triggered by the year increment...

I wonder for example if some things concerning my way of being with people are ok or not, perhaps there are some things to be changed... I must look forward for my own good, more than I use to do it actually, if I want to be alright and cool with my choices and get to be with people that actually value me and whom I can freely share my feelings with.

That seems to be, however, a random occurrence on life, and looking forward for it to happen is a nonsense, so lets just continue living on and seeing what comes in.

Well well...

Just got home, got my last 5 on university, my final final exam... I guess it is over...

I guess I must feel like I just finished an age on my life... but well, I have never been a man of ages... I live more ages at a time than I should, so I never notice these kind of sharp transitions...

CvRL 1.2 playtesting version was finally released, and a kind artist is working on the graphics for the tiled version of the game, which is to be released somewhen next semester... some ideas of developing Guardian Angel as a shareware project have risen... but that will have to wait...

For now, I want to rest... yes, I want to just work ('real life' work) and rest for some time, I want to rest from these continuous ideas on new things to do and concentrate on finishing the current tasks, I want to take advantage of the university being over and be passive... for a week or two.

And life goes on, I met an interesting person and another one deceives me a bit, or better said, another one makes me get a bit deceived of myself, for not applying the learned lessons again, but this is just me, I can't be or feel another way

Whosh.. I sure have lots of things on my head right now...

I must coordinate the release of a project on work, we are not behind schedule, but as I have other 2 projects in my head I dont feel totally confident; also, I have to work on a Numeric Methods projects for university, it is supposed to be made in teams, and up to now I havent been able to work with my teammates... that one is my main worry.. tough I have also got to finish this application for a construction engineering degree work...

Id also like to have more time to work in my roguelikes, I got to release version 0.2 of DrashRL, which was haunting my computer the last month and is much better than the original 7DRL release, and now it is almost a month since I announced I would release the playtesting version of CRL 1.2, but I still dont feel it is ready to be released, after many changes where made to its core features.

On the other hand, I am also thinking on writing some articles, boosted by a cousin and a friend, and I must also validate my university practice, or decide if I will present a degree work using a project... there is also the ECAES test, and the English and business protocol certifications, which are a need if I want to graduate this year..

Paseo a San Jerónimo en semana santa... nos fuimos por el tunel de occidente y nos demoramos menos de una hora (la teknología es increíble! :p) En general muy buen paseo, se conversó, se descansó, se piscinió, en fin... muy buena comida, muy buena compañía y se aprendió mucho. Por ejemplo, aprendimos que los monteros no se llaman pajeros sino pajareros, y descubrimos al discipulo que se durmió en la última cena. No nos perdimos la procesión de viernes santo que estuvo excelente y la vueltica por Santa Fé que estaba lleno de gente.

Fotos en: http://www.santiagoz.com/gallery2/v/semanaSanta06/

Y aprovecho para comentar, que la galería nueva se encuentra en:
http://www.santiagoz.com/gallery2

---

Trip to San Jerónimo on holy week... we went thru the "West Tunnel" and it took us less than one hour (technology is amazing! :p) All in all a very nice trip.. we chatted, relaxed, swimmed, well... very nice good, very nice company and lots of new knowledge, we discovered the disciple who slept on the last dinner! We didnt miss the 'parade' of holy friday which was excellent, and the round trip on Santa Fe, which was full of people

Fotos en: http://www.santiagoz.com/gallery2/v/semanaSanta06/

The new gallery is at: http://www.santiagoz.com/gallery2

Ok, I dont really know what to do with this blog; what should I talk about here? my personal life? is that a good thing or a bad thing.. I no longer know... there are more interesting things to read than some links to a photo gallery... or ramblings about somebody personal life. May be I must do what people does, and put only content about new tendencies on technology or political movements. I have the devlog at szdev.livejournal.com for people to keep track of my projects... but this one... I dont know what to use it for...

Its been pretty heavy work lately... I have 3 projects at work, and I am in charge of a line of web developments and a package to be released. University is going fine.. altough I miss my former classmates and working full time doesnt let much time for working the classes papers.

Lately I am doing so many things for my projects that I am forgetting about living... dont get me wrong, it is not about being geekly in front of a computer all day long; it is about thinking all the time about the things that are pending to do, the future and the lack of time and capabilties to work on them. It is also about the validation of their worthiness and the thoughts of possibly time being spent wrongly, and the clock ticking against me and my possibilities to meet somebody to share my things with, even when I have persons by my side which seem willing to support me. It is about feelings that raise out of nowhere, in a night when I look at the moon, or in a bar when I look at the lights battery, or in the depths of a glass of beer; and she just shows up there, and stares at me devilishly, catching me back again... and then I land, and I think it is not really worth it... and the life goes on.

Well, long time since I last posted on this blog; vacations were all right, nothing very exciting given the season I got them on, but well, at least I got to relax a bit... only thing productive and worth telling was the release of version 1.1e of CastlevaniaRL. I also went with some friends to a farm on Guarne, it was a great trip.

I had to go back to work after the end of the vacations because of a very important project arising... well I guess it is ok...

On the other hand, I am feeling a bit confused on what to do with my life... I feel like I am losing a bit what I was before and pretending to change a lots of things on my behaviour... is this my normal course of evolution or maybe I am forcing myself into being something I would want to have been before? Only time will tell.

And so, 2005 is gone.

It was a midly sucessful year in my life. I got a new job and I am really happy with it after a year, there are lots of projects and I feel comfortable working at them. I could finish the 2 university semesters, altough my grades were NOT good, actually, they are the worst grades I have ever had in all the run, but I guess you can't pretend to excel at everything if you just dont have the time to study and attend all the university obligations.

In the emotional face, it was a poor year... after a big deception in the first quarter of the year I resigned to keep life for myself til the third quarter, when after a short time of feeling comfortable with a special one I had to give up against in front of yet another disappointment, a slow stab, contrasting to the big smash beginning the year. I guess life always bills you for the bad things you do, the wrong decitions you take and the injuries you cause to the others.

I guess it all left me as a emotionally stronger person, so I hope to have better luck this year.

I also keep a Photo Gallery which reached a lot of people... altough I had to shut it off at the end of the year due to server issues, I hope to get it up again by the end of January.

As for my projects, all the resume has been put into http://www.livejournal.com/~szdev

All in all, I really enjoyed this year; apart from the obvious disappointments, I could share a lot of time with my friends, Sandra, Pa*la, and many others with whom much time was spent. My family was always by my side, backing me up, and professionally I also grew a lot. So I hope 2006 is as sucessful as 2005, or better! ;)

Esta navidad la celebramos en la finca de tere, contrario al año pasado... Casi todos los primos fueron ya que en la semana nos habíamos comprometido en concenso... como siempre, hubo música, trago y comida por todos lados... se bailó de todo con las tías para cumplir con la labor de sobrino; no faltó el que se descachara con los voladores, esta vez el tío Jorge que se asustó cuando explotó un taco y solto el volador... afortunadamente no ocurrieron mayores accidentes... Al otro día nos fuimos pa la tienda de Juano en la bicicleta setentuda jejeje claro... no faltó el regalo del niño dios al lado de la cama al despertar

Fotos en: http://peltkore.net/~szdev/gallery/241205.htm