What I do?
I write code...
How I do it?
With style!!
Seriously, What Do You Do?
I am currently studying Computer Engineering at Bogazici University. And I've been developing software for (maybe) 6 years. In that time span, I worked with what my heart desired most. Here's a list of what I have experience with, together with estimated times that I worked with that specific area about software:
You can click on these items to hide show the useless stories about
how I began learning stuff in that specific area.
Just want the list? This button will collapse every single
description text on this page. It turns out, in the 21st century
nobody actually reads text anymore. For convenience, I've just hidden the
unnecessary information before hand. I'm too lazy to change the function of
the button below, lol.
-
Android
Experience: 3 years
I've worked with Android from 2013 to 2015. I've had small hobby projects though but Android has changed significantly,
and I think I have lost my proficiency in Android.Thinking about this again, maybe I just don't want to write Android anymore. -
Visual Basic 6.0
Experience: 1 year, this doesn't
really matter though since no one uses VB6.0 anyways :V
My first love! I've started my programming adventures with VB6.0. I still remember how easy it was to setup a form and quickly define some actions on buttons. Back then, programming was editing the code until it works. Although I've had lots of brilliant(?) ideas, the software design was not too brilliant. My persistence was the key for me to open other gates of the software world. I once debugged one of my simple games for a month to seek out one single line that broke the whole game!!
-
HTML/CSS/JS
Experience: A lot
Every programmer should have basic knowledge of this triplet. My story of how I met them is different for each one of them. So I'll keep things simple and say that I've been working with these since when I started programming, until today where I build this website. (With some help of jQuery though :V)
-
PHP
Experience: 2 years (at least)
I remember wondering how websites with login features were built. With some research and prior knowledge of scripting I've learned PHP. In high-school my mates asked me to find a website where we can store photos that we will select for our yearbook. And then, I, like every sane person would do, decided to build it by myself. Very few people used my site to store the photos. But it was a great experience for me in PHP. Also the reaction of my friends were priceless when I said I have built a site, instead of finding one.
-
Java
Experience: A lot more than
Android
I've learned Java by learning Android. (Yes, I never learned Java before Android) It was kinda painful, though. The great thing was, I've started learning the concepts of object oriented programming by examining the example Android code from different people. Since I've worked with it a lot, I'm very comfortable to write any kind of application with Java. (Frameworks kinda scare me, though) When I want to have some proof of concept for some application idea, I immediately open Eclipse and start designing it. I've written a Tetris game with Java Swing Library. And my last internship was about writing an application with JavaFX, which makes use of Java 8 lambda functions a lot.
Here's a list of also what I have experience with, but contents of this list include the things that I have much less experience with:
- C/C++Experience: 1-2 years
I've not written applications in C/C++. But used it in some everyday(!) cases like developing an operating system or writing Android Native codes with JNI linking.
- OS DevelopmentExperience: A few months (in total)
This is my latest trend I think. One day, I decided to build my own operating system. (Just like every sane person would think, right?) After fiddling around with x86 assembly codes for 3 days, I've managed to make a bootable USB drive that boots into a system that prints the text "Hello World!" on screen. Later that, I've managed to build more complex version of it (which can take keyboard inputs). Have the project on github, please have a look!
- Arduino/MicrocontrollersExperience: A few months (in total)
Arduino was a fascinating thing for me at first. The maker inside me was awakened, after seeing how Arduino can be used to make this. Later, I bought one and worked with it for some time. Then bought some different modules and experimented with them.
- Game EnginesExperience: A few weeks (in total)
(This should not be written here. I've very few works with these tools.) I've used Unity for some time, even developed plugins for it. Never developed fully built games with it though. Also attempted to make a game with libgdx.
- iOSExperience: Not more than one day
(This should not be here.). Thought I should learn it someday. Never learned, and I'm actually all right with it.
What have you done, so far?
Here's (yet) another list of what I have done so far. Click on the items of the list to get some useless information about that project.
- Caps Yapıcı / Meme GeneratorStatus: Sold
Caps Yapıcı was the leading application to generate memes that were becoming increasingly popular in Turkey. Caps Yapıcı was the first application that attempted to generate memes with red stripe and white text on it, which were really popular in Turkey. Caps Yapıcı was also my very first Android application that I've released. After a lot of reworks and fixes, (The application was full of bugs/crashes), the application climbed up to 500k downloads, which I was never thinking of. At 250k downloads I've sold the application which is probably the reason why I should never touch business related stuff in my life, later on.
- Asteroid RushStatus: Discontinued
Asteroid Rush was the very first game I've developed for Android. It had a very simple objective with complex controls, and was too repetitive. Later versions of it had online scoreboards but I took the game down, due to a copyright infringement notice from Atari who said it creates customer confusion(!). I took the game down, and shared its source code on GitHub. (With a different name, of course!)
- Video Player for CardboardStatus: Discontinued, on Google Play Store
This was my first attempt to create a Cardboard application. When the Cardboard was released, there was no video player (to my knowledge) that displayed 3D HSBS videos using 3D effects of the Cardboard. So I decided to build it myself. Learned how OpenGL 2.0 works along the way. Now, there are superior versions of VR video players, though mine sits there humbly waiting for its take down. PS: The old version of the application is on GitHub.
- ColorPickerView for AndroidStatus: On GitHub, not maintained for years
I needed a color picker view for my Caps Yapıcı application. Instead of searching for a library, I thought, why wouldn't I write my own. And there it comes, the ColorPickerView. Not developed for 3-4 years!
- Tetris(160)Status: On GitHub, too old, but the code is (kinda) well documented
The name comes from our CMPE course. In the course we were given the task of building a Tetris game. They've given us a graphics library which was dependent on Java Swing library. I didn't like that, and built my game directly on Swing, using a custom component to draw on. I was new to the Tetris in that times, so I've built my own rotation system, included hard drop, unlimited lock delay while you move the pieces, hold, 1-piece preview, and increasing difficulty and local multiplayer. Also had a very simple AI which was part of the assignment as bonus.
- KaOSStatus: Is being developed on GitHub
My operating system project. The name comes from my last name (Karaca OS). Also means 'chaos' in Turkish language. I dream of having releases with version names like: KaOS:Revenge, KaOS:Anarchy, which resembles chaotic things. This is actually a project to learn about how operating systems are developed, I don't really expect someting big coming from this. I like building my own components of software and sticking them together, so I actually enjoy building components of this project.
- UI Framework for CardboardStatus: Discontinued
This came from the Video Player for Cardboard application Using pure OpenGL was not the best for designing UI's so I decided to build a UI framework to work with it faster. The framework works fine, but in Unity, there are a lot better tools to work for better UI's, so I left the project in the middle. The current version was used on the Video Player for Cardboard though.
- GyroHandStatus: Currently working on...
This is my first hardware project. It's basically a glove with gyro sensors on it. It tracks the movements and transfers it to a computer via bluetooth.
Project Links:
Project Links:
Project Links:
Project Links:
Project Links:
Project Links:
Project Links:
Project Links:
So what will you do now?
I have absolutely no idea. I mostly do what I want to do in that specific time. Currently, I want to finish my OS project. But in the meantime, I can switch to working on the GyroHand project. The thing is, I develop software because it's fun. If developing software start being boring to me, I'll switch to something else for a while and probably return back to developing more software.
Can I meet u IRL?
Maybe? Send me an e-mail, or message, or ... I don't know. I go to meetups and developer conferences. Maybe some day, we can meet in one of them.