"Chaotic Neutral"

It was about time! According to PowerFlasher a new (and free) update of FDT is due in October. But it will not support AS3/Flex, this will come in quartal 1/2007.
I still need to use AS2 very often for jobs so it’s good to see the Eclipse 3.2 incompatibility being fixed very soon. However I’m using Flex Builder (plug-in) more and more to get on with AS3 and Flex and it’s hard to miss all those great features from FDT there! Therefore it would be awesome if Adobe is providing an update for Flex Builder in between. Some very helpful features from FDT that I’d love to use for AS3 are templates (we all use them, they make coding a lot faster) and Mark Occurances (this might seem inferior but once you used it you know that it is the number one killer feature). Another thing that bothers me is that one needs automatic build active to have compile-time error reporting. It would be cool if the Flex Compiler would report errors on-the-fly like MTASC does it, so I can turn off automatic build and use Ant for building instead which I prefer.

I just had to refuse the second job offer this year where I would have to fix somebody else’s written ActionScript 1 spagetti code! I don’t know what is the reason for agencies trying to give such jobs but it’s save to say that the troubles of digging through the messy and often timeline-spread code is enough to justify an estimate that sounds too high for the client.

The question comes up why they don’t just ask the person who originally wrote the code! That could have many reasons but if a client comes back to me and asks me to fix something in a years old project then I’ll do it for a measly payment simply because I know my source code. It’s a total different thing to fix somebody’s code, especially if it’s pre-AS2.
I always feel uncomfortable rejecting jobs, even such ones so I would be interested how others handle this situation! Do you usually reject such jobs or do you accept them?

In ActionScript it was common knowledge that shorter Variable and Function names yielded better performance in situations were it depends but does that still hold true for ActionScript 3.0? I’ve ran a couple of quick tests to find a clear answer about this. I usually tend keep my Variable/Function names to 1-3 characters when performance really mattered but it might actually not be necessary. Consider the following test …

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package
{
	import com.hexagonstar.util.debug.Debug;
	import flash.utils.getTimer;
	import flash.display.Sprite;
 
	public class PerformanceTest extends Sprite
	{
		private var aVeryVeryLongVariableNameaVeryVeryLongVariableName:Number;
		private var num:Number;
 
		public function PerformanceTest()
		{
			var startTime:Number = getTimer();
			for (var i:int = 0; i < 4000000; i++)
			{
				aVeryVeryLongVariableNameaVeryVeryLongVariableName = (i * Math.random()) * 100;
			}
			var timeTaken:String = getTimer() - startTime + " ms";
			Debug.trace("timeTaken (long): " + timeTaken);
		}
	}
}

I’ve ran this code ten times with the 50 characters long variable name and then ten times with a 3 characters long one, both in their own SWF’s. The results ranged from 757ms to 820ms, more or less the same on both sides. The sum of the long variable version was 7924ms and the one of the three characters long one was 7903ms, not much of a difference.

The next test was similar but this time with a 50 characters long Method name and the other again with a 3 characters long one, the Methods returned a random Number for 4000000 times during this test. The results looked similar but the total sum of each test gave a 12044ms for the long name test and 15570ms for the short named one. A noticable difference of over 3 seconds. This might have been coincidence but I’ve ran the tests a couple more times and it turned out every time that the result were very close together. This is quite interesting because I was safely believing that short names would still have an advantage. It might be time to rethink this.

I’m currently developing a role-playing game in AS3.0 (non-fantasy themed!!) in my spare time. This has been and still is in the design phase since a while and I’m pondering whether to use isometric graphics or an orthogonal view (that has a slight tilt but still is fully orthogonal. If you remember Jagged Alliance you get the idea). Though orthogonal view would make things easier I feel that isometric view gives more visual freedom so I will probably end up with that.

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Being that old hardware DIY’er that I am (it started long ago with changing the kernel of my C64) I’ve so far always bought parts and built my PCs up by myself. This time I was pondering with buying the new Dell XPS 700 just because it’s case design is so ultra slick (around 100.000 times more slick than a Mac G5 Park Waste Bin ever could be if you ask me) but I’ve changed my mind after realizing once more that Dell’s sale policy sucks. That is because here in Japan the XPS is not available as customizable as in the US! While in the US the minimum parts required are the CPU and memory, here at Dell Japan you have to buy an almost fully rigged machine.

So instead of buying an XPS 700 with a flatscreen, DVD, keyboard, mouse and Windows XP Home, all stuff that I don’t need I’ve decided to go again and choose all required parts from the ground up by myself. Here is how my next PC will look like …

Antec P180B Case (looks like a mini frigde but is very quiet and cool inside)
Antec Neo HE 550 PSU
Asus P5B Deluxe Motherboard
Pentium D 945 CPU (3.4 GHz)
Zalman CNPS9500 LED CPU Cooler (have to double check if it fits on the mobo without probs!)
2x Corsair XMS2 2GB (2x 1GB) 800 (PC2 6400) (4GB)
Leadtek Winfast PX7900 GTX TDH (more silent and cooler than comparable Radeon cards)
2x HITACHI Deskstar T7K250 250GB 7200RPM SATA

… Not only is it cheaper (though still quite steep) but it also means more memory and quite a bit more silence in our room than with the XPS. My last mainboard was an Asus P4C800-E Deluxe and I’m totally satisfied with it since it is running stable for about two years now. I think I’ll turn the old water-cooled Pentium4 into our Linux Server after this.

The game is basically still the same since I left it! Many of the same old bugs and a gameplay that has only distantly something to do with RPG. Examples: Tried to continue the ‘Secret of the Syrens’ quest but the Black Sun Bunker at the waypoint never spawns,I want to call my mount pet inside the Kashyyk Hunting Grounds but it doesn’t spawn, I want to attack that imperial trooper that permanently shoots at me but I can’t because he’s stuck inside a wall … the list could go on for a while.

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