Update

It looks like I'll be moving back to Maryland in the middle of April. I'm serious about going back into the technology industry either doing information security again or going into programming. I'd like to find a permanent position because I'm married and have family responsibilities, but I'm so serious about programming that I'll also do consulting and contract work.

I've done extensive work in C++ using Direct X. If you check out my projects page, you can see videos of two of my latest 3D engines. Yes Genesis Seed and Auxnet use different 3D engines. I've also started learning Android programming. I won't become an expert, but I'm giving myself 3 weeks to learn the basics, and then I'll move on to the NDK and OpenGL ES. I'll going to use the NDK instead of Java because I want to use my current C++ code to make a multiplatform 2D game engine. It looks like my partners need more time to get things rolling with Auxnet so I'll use the downtime to richly increase my skills in other areas.

I've also decided to purchase the squaredprogramming.com domain. I'll post my progress often to my blog there. You can follow me on Google+ or YouTube for updates.

Latest Updates - Starting Android Development

Today I've started looking into Java and Android development. I want to focus on learning the basics of Android programming through Java first, but I also want to improve my overall Java programming skills. So today I downloaded the Android SDK and I hope to try out some online tutorials. If necessary, later I may get a book on the subject as well. Once I get basic Android programming using Java down, I'll move on to the NDK and Android programming using C++. I've already built a simple tile based 2D graphics system for Windows, I'd like to port it over to Android. That's my long term goal. Here's a screen shot of the Windows version of the 2D graphics engine.

Don't criticize my art skills too much. I'm a programmer, not an artist. I'll provide updates on my progress. This is just a small side project that I'll be working on until things pick up again with Auxnet: Battlegrounds so I can't make any promises about how fast I'll be able to get it done.

Very Simple Base64 Reader

I've written this very simple Base64 reader. I wrote this as part of my loader for Tiled Map Editor files (see mapeditor.org). The code is very simple, but it works. The out_binary_data parameter is unsigned char * for simplicity as the code works in 8 bit chunks. Tiled actually uses 32 bit int variables so the pointer will need to be cast to int *. If you have anymore questions about the code, just leave a comment.

// converts a 6 bit value into the Base64 ASCII equivalent
unsigned char ASCIITo_6BitVal(char ch)
{
 if((ch >= 'A') && (ch <= 'Z')) return ch - 'A';
 else if((ch >= 'a') && (ch <= 'z')) return (ch - 'a') + 26;
 else if((ch >= '0') && (ch <= '9')) return (ch - '0') + 52;
 else if(ch == '+') return 62;
 else if(ch == '/') return 63;
 else if(ch == '=') return 64;
 else return 65;
}

// converts binary data to Base64, If the data will be used on a platform with a different endianness, the
// data 32 bit integers or the decoder will not be able to switch the endianness automatically
int Base64Binary(const char *in_base64_data, unsigned int in_base64_data_length,
                 unsigned char *out_binary_data, unsigned int in_binary_buffer_length, unsigned int &out_binary_data_length)
{
 out_binary_data_length = 0;

 for(unsigned int i = 0; i < in_base64_data_length; i += 4)
 {
  bool end_found = false;
  unsigned char b64_byte1 = ASCIITo_6BitVal(in_base64_data[i]);
  if(b64_byte1 > 63) return 1; // stop processing
  unsigned char b64_byte2 = ASCIITo_6BitVal(in_base64_data[i+1]);
  if(b64_byte2 > 63) return -1;
  unsigned char b64_byte3 = ASCIITo_6BitVal(in_base64_data[i+2]);
  if(b64_byte3 > 64) return -1; // this could be the end of the stream so it could also be '='
  unsigned char b64_byte4 = ASCIITo_6BitVal(in_base64_data[i+3]);
  if(b64_byte4 > 64) return -1; // this could be the end of the stream so it could also be '='

  int size = 3;
  // check for the end
  if(b64_byte4 == 64)
  {
   size = 2;
   end_found = true;
   b64_byte4 = 0;
  }
  if(b64_byte3 == 64)
  {
   size = 1;
   end_found = true;
   b64_byte3 = 0;
  }

  if(in_binary_buffer_length < (out_binary_data_length + size))
  {
   // the buffer is too small
   return -2;
  }

  out_binary_data[out_binary_data_length + 0] = (b64_byte1 << 2) | ((0x30 & b64_byte2) >> 4);
  if(size > 1)out_binary_data[out_binary_data_length + 1] = ((0xF & b64_byte2) << 4) | ((0x3C & b64_byte3) >> 2);
  if(size > 2)out_binary_data[out_binary_data_length + 2] = ((0x3 & b64_byte3) << 6) | b64_byte4;

  out_binary_data_length += size;

  if(end_found) break;
 }

 return 0;
}