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Faces of Unity – Manuel Sainsily

Noutați

My parents always told me that art doesn’t pay – especially for minorities – and while I was talented and practiced different artistic hobbies, they hoped I would pursue medicine or law. But, I was obsessed with computers and design software, and was spending most of my time at home playing video games or creating worlds. So, when the time came to choose my path, I decided on a computer science program in Montreal. As a visible minority in a new country, I wanted to integrate myself and make a difference for my people. I started working in the tech industry as a designer, and always hoped to enter the gaming industry one day. Now, Unity allows me to do both design work and my own freelance projects in a very rewarding way, and I’ve found great communities and talented colleagues with similar interests. What’s a cool project you’re working on? A lot of my work involves immersive multisensory experiences and human-computer interaction, but the heart of my artistic process is my Caribbean culture, which connects me with music and nature.

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How to Run Linux GUI Apps on Windows Subsystem for Linux

Delphi, Noutați

Windows 11 recently had some major updates early this year that introduced us to a vast of new exciting features. These recent updates offered a great number of benefits to the developers and brought tons of changes to windows application development. Interestingly, one of the most amazing features of Windows 11 is the ability to run Linux GUI Applications using the new version of Windows Subsystem for Linux or WSL2. Windows 11 recently expanded the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL2) with full GUI and X windows support. In this video, Jim McKeeth will help us better understand WSL2. He will show us how it works, proper setup, configuration options, and learn to target it in your application development. How do I setup and configure Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)? Windows Subsystem for Linux was introduced in Windows 10 which replaced Windows Services for Unix in 2004. It is developed in collaboration with Canonical and others. Generally, Window Subsystem for Linux (WSL) can be defined as a lightweight virtualization technology that makes it possible to execute Linux binaries on a Windows system. The webinar aims to introduce us to WSL and will teach us everything we need to know about its new version from installation to configuration and proper application. It will demonstrate how to test and run Linux applications on your Windows desktop without the need for a second computer or the overhead of a virtual machine. In the new version, you can run an actual Linux kernel which improves overall performance. The webinar will provide a step-by-step installation guide and a brief walkthrough of some of the available Linux distributions. From here, McKeeth will demonstrate how to properly set up and configure WSL in order to smoothly run your Linux GUI application in Windows. How can I write Delphi apps to run on Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)? The talk will also briefly guide us on how to properly set up Linux Distribution CentOS using a Docker container as well as the use of FMXLinux component in Delphi that provides capabilities for building GUI applications for Linux. To learn more about WSL2 and how to effectively run Linux GUI applications on Windows operating system, feel free to watch the webinar below.   

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Extend TMS WEB Core with JS Libraries with Andrew: Interact.js + BigText.js

TMS Software

In the last two outings, we covered some big JS libraries.  Bootstrap and FontAwesome are wildly popular and with good reason. And getting started using them in your TMS WEB Core project couldn’t be simpler.  This time out, we’re going to explore a pair of much smaller JS libraries. And we’ll have to get a little more hands-on using JavaScript in our code to best take advantage of them.  Fortunately, there are plenty of code examples to draw from.  First, we’ll look at Interact.js which is used to add the ability to drag and resize HTML elements on the page.  And then we’ll pair this with BigText.js which is used to automatically scale text within an element to match its size.    Motivation Using standard HTML and CSS, it is possible to create elements on a page that can be resized simply by using the CSS resize property.  It takes values of none, horizontal, vertical, and both.  And it works as expected, adding the familiar small diagonal lines to the bottom-right corner of the element, indicating that it can be resized. It even respects standard CSS properties like min-width, max-width, min-height, max-height to limit how far the element can be resized.  But that’s about the extent of the feature.  And as developers, we’d like to have a few more options available. Styling options.  You get the diagonal lines in the corner.  And that’s exactly all that you get. There’s not even an HTML element for it. It’s just ‘there’, wherever it decides ‘there’ is. Aspect Ratio.  While it is possible to force elements to have an aspect ratio, it isn’t necessarily the easiest thing to do.  There’s a new aspect-ratio CSS property that may help simplify this if you happen to know that your visitors use a browser that supports it, but that’s often not the case. UI.  What if you want to start your resize from a different corner?  Or an edge? Not happening with the standard CSS resize. Event Handling. If your app needs to know about the change (perhaps to save the new size for later), then you have to dig into more obscure JS functionality involving Observers to get this to work. Not so fun. Dragging. The CSS resize property allows only for resizing.  Not really anything readily available to deal with dragging elements. Fortunately, Interact.js addresses all of these areas quite readily.  And, once setup, you can add drag and resize functionality to any of your elements simply by adding CSS classes to them!  Once you’ve got an element that is resizable, the next challenge is how to deal with its contents.  Often, it doesn’t matter – longer bits of text or other elements can be set to wrap automatically, and this is likely what will happen by default anyway.  And even the dimensions of the elements contained within or alongside the recently dragged and/or resized element can be set to automatically resize or flow in different directions, based on almost any kind of arrangement you can envision.  Sometimes, though, it would be better if the text itself could be automatically scaled to fit the new dimensions. This is where the Event Handling aspect is important, as knowing when the element has been resized can then trigger this scaling function.  While it is not a […]

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Vue JS vs React: Pros And Cons

Sencha

Vue JS and React are both leading-edge competing technologies popular for front end development. Vue JS is a popular Javascript framework for creating simple and clean user interfaces along with single page applications. It supports a virtual DOM with two-way binding. It also has a progressive design, allowing you to migrate your existing projects one feature at a time. The React library is also very popular amongst developers. It supports a virtual DOM with two-way data bindings. Following a component based approach, React enables you to rapidly build complex web apps. Are you a developer at crossroads, trying to decide whether to use Vue or React for your next project? To make this decision easy for you, we have compiled a guide with pros and cons of both Vue and React. Continue reading to find out various aspects of application development when using Vue JS vs React, both supporting the integration of Sencha ExtWebComponents as described in the end. What is the Core Difference Between Vue and React? When it comes to the core difference, Vue is a complete standalone Javascript framework with its first release made in 2014. On the other hand, React is a Javascript library, first released in 2013 and has to be used in conjunction with other libraries. They are both open source. How are Components Built in Vue JS vs React? One of the most significant distinctions between Vue JS and React is the syntax, and the way the view layer is developed and components are built. In Vue JS, developers use HTML templates to build the components. The view layer uses HTML templates by default but Vue developers also have the freedom to use JSX. On the other hand, in React there is only one option and that is JSX. JSX is used to express both HTML and CSS using Javascript. JSX stands for Javascript XML and it is a Javascript syntax extension. JSX requires a tool/compiler such as the Babel transpiler, for conversion of code that can be to be further processed by a web browser. Which is Better, HTML Templates or JSX? If you use HTML templates, there will be a clear separation of concerns into HTML, CSS and JS. The view will be separate from the logic. JSX on the other hand, contains both HTML and CSS in one, allowing developers to build self contained and standalone UI components that hold everything from styles and rendering instructions to logic. At the end of the day, it’s all a matter of personal choice. For novice developers HTML templates are easier to learn and work with. They have a simpler design and cleaner code. However, expert developers find JSX a very powerful and flexible tool for building components. How Does the Performance of Vue JS and React Compare? Benchmarking experiments have shown that Vue and React have almost the same speed of execution for most tasks, with Vue being slightly better on most metrics. Vue has more built-in smart optimizations, while React does not have any. This gives Vue an edge over React. However, we have to keep in mind that the final speed and performance of an app heavily depends upon the coding style, application size and optimization. What About Mobile App Development in Vue JS vs React? For mobile app development, […]

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Apocalypse Studios defines a new approach to narrative in Deadhaus Sonata

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“It’s easy to use and way faster than Perforce, by significant margins,” adds Dyack. “Pulling a build down takes two to three minutes, at most – before, it was taking much longer.” Migrating their game data from Perforce to Plastic took Apocalypse less than a day, and they were supported throughout the process by the Plastic team. Once they were up and running, Rogozinski, who had implemented Perforce previously, was shocked to see how much more efficient work became with Plastic – and not just because of how smoothly it handles large binaries: “I was very resistant to task branching at first. I didn’t want people working off-branch for a week or two, because you never know what’s going to happen when you merge it all back.” “I was totally wrong!” admits Rogozinski. “It’s working super well and the integrations are super easy, super fast. Plastic’s merge tools rival Perforce’s, easily.” Plastic SCM encourages a flexible “task-based branching” workflow that allows teams to work separately in sub-branches and conveniently merge changes without worrying about data loss or wasted work. With everything off of main, developers can pick and choose what they want to work with in the sub-branches, and stay off of the main branch for days at a time if necessary. “You never have to be afraid of breaking something,” reveals Pacheco. “You can bring the main branch into yours before you push it live, so you never have to worry about pushing content that breaks the build at five o’clock on a Friday.” “It’s a totally different methodology, and we really like it,” affirms Rogozinski.

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3 Trends You May Have Missed About Windows App Development

Delphi

In a recent survey of 65 000 developers, StackOverflow finds that Windows is still the most used application development platform. This, in part, is because Windows app development meets the four requirements users must consider before choosing a platform — reach, simplicity, speed, and future proof. This is quite reiterated in Microsoft’s Windows 11 launch publicity which focuses a lot on developers. If anything, this new version of Windows shows the direction of the development platform for the next several years. With innovative features like the new Microsoft Store, new distribution methods, WinUI3 controls, the Windows app SDK, etc., Microsoft is affirming its position as a dominant operating system.  With that being said, every software developer knows the importance of staying abreast of the latest industry trends. From rapid application development to low code solutions, application development trends change as fast as technology. To stay current, not only do you need to consider new platform features, but you must also pay attention to trends that can increase developer productivity.  This article discusses 7 trends in Windows program development you may have overlooked. Is visual development making a come-back?   Visual application development can be said to have originated as far back as the 1960s and 70s when developers sought improvements on typing numerous lines of code into a terminal window. Early on, the term Visual programming was often associated with Visual Basic, an IDE launched by Microsoft in 1991. This tool allowed users to develop applications by dragging and dropping code blocks and flowcharts. Borland then took the development world by storm with their launch of Delphi in 1995. With a similar “draw the user interface with a WYSIWYG interface but with a vastly superior experience due to Delphi’s ability to compile code natively – with a blindingly-fast compiler – with no dependencies which had plagued Visual Basic it quickly became the development IDE of choice for all sorts of developer scenarios ranging from small indie developers to large, sprawling blue-chip corporates where the reliability of Delphi apps which ‘just worked’ and kept on working made an awful lot of sense. In our fast-paced economy, developers are under increasing pressure to meet business needs. Demand to deploy new solutions faster, demand to deliver innovative and exciting features and a number of other competing requirements. Sometimes these expectations are unrealistic, but such has become the norm for developers today. Add to that the might of marketing muscles from organizations who were able to wield large advertising budgets to push and pull developer opinions things headed into all sorts of directions, not all of which were the best for the developer.  While there may be development methods that claim to speed up Windows program development, none quite does it, like visual development. Hence, we’re seeing developers move towards tools that enable them to incorporate visual development. One such tool is the Delphi IDE.  RAD Studio IDE, Embarcadero’s modern evolution of Borland’s phenomenally successful Delphi continues to pave the way for innovative Integrated Development Environments (IDEs), with what is surely the most advanced visual development toolset, an extensive array of unique features, shortcuts, and capabilities to improve development productivity significantly.  Is rapid application development coming back in fashion?  In 1991, James Martin, in his book, Applications Development Without Programmers, coined the term Rapid application […]

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How To Use Cross-Platform Programming Languages: Expectations vs Reality

Delphi

Cross-Platform languages are not something new. For more than two decades, cross-platform development has been with us, but each programming language and technology evolved differently, adopted different architecture, and offered even more choices to consider.  Today we are going to talk about different cross-platform programming languages, why they are good and what are their disadvantages and, through this learn how to choose and use the right cross-platform programming language and frameworks. What computer languages are available for cross-platform programming? Most programming languages provide at least some form of cross-platform development. By this we mean that with one codebase – the program’s source code – you can target most major operating system and device platforms. They have their specific UI framework and architecture that can or cannot directly utilize hardware features and platform-specific functionalities. Here are the top cross-platform programming languages C++ Java Delphi C# JavaScript Dart It is not easy to compare these languages, but they all have great features and problems. For instance,  Java has a huge third party library pool with a high number of users but requires its Java Runtime Machine. JavaScript is everywhere but not secure & efficient as compiled languages. Microsoft’s C# has evolved so much, but its cross-platform frameworks are not the happiest. Dart with Flutter is getting attention because of its widget powered UI solutions for developing client-optimized apps. Still, it lacks third-party libraries and has problems with iOS development and is not an excellent choice for building server-side apps. C++ is a great choice, but it requires higher knowledge and practice about the ecosystem to develop apps fast. Delphi provides the fastest time to market option with high productivity when creating cross-platform native applications but has low open-source projects.  How to choose a cross-platform programming language? If you can efficiently utilise hardware components and system-specific features, that is a good sign, like accessing the camera, gyroscope, or OS-specific features.  Cross-Platform is one of the ongoing arguments in the software development industry. It is also noteworthy that Native and Cross-platform development is continuously evolving. While Native app development goes with a much more complex process, it stays true to the target platform, namely Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS or Android. To point out that these languages utilise a framework for building cross-platform responsive user interfaces and provide interfaces where you can use system provided APIs through them. Applications built with these frameworks should behave like native apps; if it does not, it breaks the user experience, leading to the decline of users from your product. For instance, applications built with web-powered components lack several ways that kill the native features, and it gets even hard to work with device hardware. What is currently happening in cross-platform development? Mobile market share is enormous, and most cross-platform languages target iOS and Android with their frameworks. Moreover, web apps can also do the job of a mobile app using technology like progressive web apps (PWA), which are web apps that act like a native apps albeit with some disadvantages such poor battery life and an inability to access many of the device’s hardware features.  One of the latest frameworks for building cross-platform applications is the MAUI framework by Microsoft. It is a .NET Multi-platform App UI framework for building applications with C# and XAML. It is the […]

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DevOps careers: SRE, engineer and platform engineer

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Even if you’re totally happy in your current position, it pays to keep an eye on your DevOps career path and learn about emerging roles, especially given the way the DevOps space evolves so rapidly. For example, you might be wondering about the role of site reliability engineer (SRE) as opposed to DevOps engineer (and the totally new position called DevOps platform engineer, more on that later). These are all engineering positions requiring tech expertise and coding chops, but they play distinct roles on the DevOps team. Here’s what you need to know: SRE: a seasoned role As the title suggests, at a high level, SREs focus primarily on reliability, solving operational, scale, and uptime problems. In 2003, Google originated the SRE role to safeguard the uptime of its site, but it has evolved considerably since the advent of cloud-native applications and platforms. Today, SREs concentrate on minimizing the frequency and impact of failures that can impact the overall reliability of a cloud application. According to Glassdoor, SREs typically require a Bachelor’s or graduate engineering or computer science degree. Salaries range widely, according to Glassdoor, hitting about $120,000 after 2 to 4 years of experience but can reach up to $300,000 and higher at the senior level. At least 1 blogger feels the SRE title carries more prestige and earning potential than DevOps engineers. Typical SRE responsibilities include everything from designing, developing, installing, and maintaining software solutions to working with engineering teams to refine deployment and release processes. Collaboration and communication are important job skills for the SRE role, as they need to work closely with multiple roles across the organization. At this writing, there were 4,000 SRE jobs on Glassdoor. Indeed had more than 5,000 SRE postings and ZipRecruiter showed nearly 12,000 posts for remote SRE jobs. Python, Go and Java were the most sought-after SRE skills listed on Indeed. According to Indeed, SREs transition to “DevOps engineer” at a high rate. DevOps engineers bridge the gap DevOps engineers, on the other hand, concentrate on removing obstacles to production and automation and making development and IT work well together. Like SREs, DevOps engineers need to be good at working and communicating with others, eliminating barriers to increase speed and quality of code delivery. With typically less need to be on call, the DevOps engineer may have a more favorable work-life balance than an SRE, who can have around-the-clock call. DevOps engineer work responsibilities include such things as analysis of technology utilized within the company and then developing steps and processes to improve and expand upon them. Project management is another key function, establishing milestones for departmental contributions and establishing processes to facilitate collaboration. The educational requirements for the two roles are comparable, with a Bachelor’s degree in computer science or engineering or higher the usual price of admission. According to Glassdoor, the salary range for DevOps engineers is slightly lower than that of SREs, from a low of about $63,000 up to a high of $234,000 for someone with 2 to 4 years of experience. DevOps engineer positions are easier to find than SREss. Glassdoor has more than 6,000 DevOps engineer job posts. Indeed has more than 17,000. And ZipRecruiter has more than 81,000 remote DevOps engineer listings. New to the game Cloud native development and the desire to […]

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These 3 Tools Provide Powerful Solutions For Web Development

Delphi, Noutați

In this video, we will learn not just one but THREE powerful solutions for web development in Delphi. The webinar will highlight three popular frameworks that represent three different ways of coming at developing for the web. These include TMS Webcore, IntraWeb, and DelphiMVCFramework. While Delphi already comes with powerful tools for web development, these popular frameworks can help you build more compelling web applications that deliver both the functionality and performance that once required native windows development. Joining this webinar are Dr. Holger Flick of TMS Software, Jackson Gomes of Atozed Software (IntraWeb), and Daniele Teti of bit Time Professionals (DelphiMVCFramework) to explain their respective products. TMS WEB Core is a cross platform solution for web development using Delphi TMS WEB Core is a web development tool that allows you to create web client applications from Delphi using RAD development methodology and a component-based framework. In this video, Dr. Holger Flick will introduce us to the framework and how to employ Delphi in web applications. He will also highlight some of the powerful and easy-to-use features of TMS Web core that allow you to build web applications surprisingly easy and fast. IntraWeb allows programmers to produce web apps using Delphi Jackson Gomes will discuss the advantages of using IntraWeb in Delphi. He described IntraWeb as the VCL equivalent for the web. It is an equally powerful framework for building web apps in Delphi with the goal to close the gap between Delphi developers and web development. The video will also demonstrate some of IntraWeb’s new features including HTTP.sys, IWreCaptcha Component, Intraweb Certicifate managers, and as well as the things we can expect from their upcoming IntraWeb 17 edition. Do you know how the DelphiMVCFramework can help your web app development? The DelphiMVC Framework is mainly designed to be a powerful and easy-to-use Open-source framework for web solutions. According to Daniele Teti, the framework is currently the most popular Delphi library on GitHub today. Interestingly, this framework supports RESTful and JSON-RPC APIs development. In this video, Daniele will briefly show how to create some kind of APIs in Delphi using DMVCFramework. While these frameworks are all designed for web development, each of them is distinct in its own way and you just have to find the right framework that provides the web development solution that you need. To learn more about these powerful web frameworks, feel free to watch the webinar below.    

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4 creators who will inspire you to invest in our planet

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Gazooky Studios recently launched Muster, a meta playground for team learning and development. Muster replaces traditional carbon intensive company offsites with richly immersive multiplayer experiences that foster team building without the environmental footprint. The project was created after CEO of Muster, Tim Lambert, calculated that his 2019 company travel to Poland added up to an equivalent of 1,431,000 lbs of CO2. This trip sparked a question for Lambert: could there be a better way for clients to access learning and development services but still meet sustainability targets? Rosemary Kay, CEO of Gazooky Studios, believes that Muster has the potential to make a massive difference. “Our platform has an emissions calculator which displays the total amount of avoided CO2 for a given event. Team members simply input their location and the platform does the rest. The immediate data visualization of avoided emissions can spark an interesting and positive conversation among team members, who can see the benefit of choosing a remote learning and development platform before the fun has even begun. Companies can also use this data in their ESG reporting. Shifting an entire workforce to this sort of model would have a huge impact on both a company’s bottom line and their ability to reduce GHG emissions.” Muster uses Unity to build their 3D environments and avatars, and Kay shared the benefits of using such a “plug and play” tool for development. “Our 3D avatars and environments are what allow us to design such engaging games, which in turn drives our core value.” Learn more about Muster’s mission

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