Another semester is over and Christmas seems like its right around the corner. What better time to post an update than the chilly break between semesters?

I took two great classes this semester and completed several projects that I'm very happy with, for several reasons. Oddly enough, the finish products aren't of much use, but there are concepts and snippets that should prove to be invaluable. I wrote a post at Macsploitation about adding and using delegates in Objective C, and plan on sending some code I ported from MFC to Cocoa to another site, when I get a chance. I'm excited that next semester will be my last semester of formal coursework, which will leave me with a thesis to write in the fall. If anyone has interesting topics concerning computer graphics/visualization or distributed multimedia, I'm all ears.

Last night Kortney and I went to the Go Daddy holiday party, and it was out of control. The party was held at Chase Field. The reveal when entering the stadium was amazing: the entire field was covered with people, bars, video games, motorcycles, an indy car, and stage set up in center field. The sheer volume of people was overwhelming to me. Because I could, I ran into the outfield boards, pretending I was catching a long fly ball: the phantom batter was SO out! The Gin Blossoms headlined, and Busta Loadtest couldn't have been more thrilled.

Lately I've been trying to move into some esoteric new mode of development. I don't know how to describe it, but I feel as if there is a difference between the every-programmer and the guru and that I'm currently somewhere in between. To this end, I've been learning Smalltalk and running through problems on Project Euler. As always, I think my lack of focus is getting in the way.

Kortney and I will be spending Christmas at the Gray's again this year. I only have Christmas day off, but I'm guessing the work week will be pretty relaxed. I always enjoy spending holidays with family.

I hope everyone is having a great Christmas season. Hopefully your shopping is done, you're curled up next to a warm fire, and you have a hot cup of cocoa in your hands!

The views expressed on this site are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of Go Daddy Software, Inc. Heck, they might not reflect the views of anyone but me!

hohle.net has been quiet lately... too quiet...

I can attribute that to three things:

First: School is in session and their is no end to work. I'm taking a graphics class (always time consuming and programming/math/processor intensive) at ASU and an Operating Systems class online through ASU.

Second: Between school and work, I've been trying to juggle even more programming projects. From Cocoa to PHP to Ruby and back again, I've been keeping myself steeped in code and having fun with all of it.

Finally: I've been moonlighting on a new blog... That's right. I've been writing for a different audience. Based on comments that people (including my wife!) had no idea what I was talking about, I have decided to primarily move technical posts over to Macsploitation.

Subscribe to the feed if you're interested in reading Mac and Mac Development related entries, but I'll warn you: it's going to get nerdy!

In other news, I've joined twitter (Kortney is rolling her eyes), so if you're have an account, drop me a tweet.

Kortney and I had a school packed weekend: she had to go to class on Saturday and I worked on a project and ingested a few episodes of Distributed Operating Systems with Partha Dasgupta. We've had Akeelah and the Bee sitting in its Netflix envelope for several days, but decided to pass it up for a few more episodes of Alias (we're on season two).

Saturday afternoon I started an experiment in cooking which concluded in pretty good — but not great — boneless ribs. They had a nice flavor, but it was too subtle, and required some spicing up on the plate.

We ran several errands, including some before church on Sunday. We've started attending a new church, which we're both excited about. Then something profound happened. As we were walking into church, Kortney drew a pointed finger across my chest. I followed the imaginary line from the tip of her extended index finger to an icon which I would normally point out to her: an Apple sticker.

This single, subtle action touched me in ways I can only try to enumerate. It showed me Kortney takes a genuine interest in my interests, even when they are beyond trite and trivial. It showed me how she'll go out of her way to put a smile on my face. It showed me that she'll lend an ear to my dissertations about the qualities of this or that, and despite her lack of interest, will listen attentively, and build me up in ways I don't deserve (I'm hardly qualified to wax intellectual about most of the topics I choose to step on a soap box about).

Not only did that simple gesture express all of those things, it also revealed something else: she's drank the Kool-Aid. :P

It's been too long since I've seen Predator.

While I'm waiting for PHP to compile, I'll write a little somethin' somethin' about my birthday. Kortney surprised me yesterday with not one, but two treats: oatmeal chocolate chip cookies (undeniably the best cookie to ever touch the lips of man; the closest thing to ambrosia the world will ever experience), and Deutcher Kartoffelsalat (that's German potato sala for the non-krauts in the audience). The only thing that stopped me from eating that delicous, vinegar-laden treat was that I consumed every last drop I brought to work, and the oatmeal chocolate chip cookies kept me bunkered down at my desk.

I'm honestly amazed that I made it out of the house last night without sampling those delicious morsels, but I digress.

Kortney let me open some, but not all of my presents before we went out to dinner last night. We're working to turn my birthday into my birthweek. We'll celebrate with her family this Saturday, when we can all get together, and she wanted to give me a present then.

Last night she gave me two excellent gifts: a LEGO Ice Brick tray, and an iGo Stowaway Bluetooth Keyboard to use with our Nokia N800. The ice cubes are really fun, and retain their LEGO-brick shape for much longer then I expected. The keyboard is wonderful as well: its about the size of a standard laptop keyboard and really is the only way to use an xterm on the N800 effectively.

I've already recieved a lot of cards, emails and gifts from family and friends, and it looks like there's even more fun to come!

Just a post to say Hi on Tuesday!

Now that classes are over and I have a little free time before next week's holiday rush, I thought I'd post the pictures I alluded to in my previous post. These are just a few of the pictures we took, but they cover a lot of ground. Enjoy!

Kortney and I have made it back safely from the east coast, and had quite an adventure. I have some video from the trip that I'm editing together, and quite a few pictures which I hope to post in the next few days.

Overall, our trip was fun, but I'll post more details when I get the pictures together.

It's been a while since I've made a "what's going on post," so here's what's going on!

In a week and a half, Kortney and I will be jetting across the country to the east coast for a (hopefully) relaxing, adventurous week in New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and then back to New York for a few days in NYC. For as much as I like big cities, I've never been to NYC. For that matter, I haven't really been up to the Northeast really. On our jaunt, we'll be trying to find some leaves, eat some clam chowda, and do whatever it is you do in New York City! (We actually have a lot planned for NYC, but that could be a whole post by itself).

I may or may not have posted that I'm taking classes at ASU, and that's been going, well, lets just say I've been busy. I'm taking two classes: Multimedia Systems (MMCCI, which has covered a lot of pattern classification, and multimedia feature extraction; and Operating System Internals - Linux, which covers a good chunk of the Linux source from an early 2.4 kernel (2.4.1 to be exact). So far, I've enjoyed the first class more then the second, but they are both terribly interesting and I'm glad that I have the opportunity to take them. I've learned so much, and its already affecting my development style.

My current assignment for MMCCI involves writing a pattern classifier, which is actually something I've wanted to do for a while. I'm hoping I can extend this code in the future, I think its a great starting point for more involved projects.

Projects at school have reinvigorated my like of C and C++. It's been a while since I've been able to program a "real" project in either of those languages, and it has been fun. I was a little rusty starting out again, but I feel like I'm more productive in these languages now then ever before. I really like the speed you get from a language that's compiled down to machine code. When thinking about projects lately, its generally a toss-up between Ruby and C/C++, but with Cocoa being Objective-C, that's always an option as well.

Between work and school, however, I haven't had much free time, and sometimes it even strains my relationship with Kortney. Despite finishing David Allen's GTD, I haven't really put his suggestions into practice. There's just so many things I want to do, and I find that overwhelming. After feeling overwhelmed, I decided to make a list of things to do, which again overwhelms me. It's really a vicious cycle.

This weekend I christened the first day in my second quarter-century. What? I turned 25. Putting that down in bits makes me feel much better about the whole thing. The pixely display of my age is not nearly as frightening as the idea or the number of candles on my cake (which didn't quite count 25, but were still frightening enough!).

Kortney completely spoiled me this weekend. Saturday we had a lazy day of shopping, visiting an Apple store I had never been to, a fantastic, homemade Mexican dinner, a night out at the movies (my pick: Cars), and we topped it off with Tiramisu at the Macaroni Grill. Sunday was presents, a great church service, lunch at the Skeptical Chemist, relaxation, and fun with Kortney's family for dinner.

So what about the loot? How'd I come out? Ahead by a long shot, that's for sure. As I said, Kortney spoiled me: a bluetooth adapter, some nice new earbuds, a slick mouse pad, and some delicious BBQ sauce. My mom sent me a label maker, so I can get things done, and a great shirt; money from Dad, Granny, and Granny and Grandpa; Kortney's parents got me a Dremel with all the fixins, and a grilling toolset; the Star Wars trilogy on DVD from Troy and Kelly. Quite a haul!

I thought that 25 was going to be a crisis year for me, but one day into it, and I'm not so worried. I feel like there is so much opportunity open to me (possibly too much!). I suppose every year is interesting in its own way. However, with no major life events scheduled to occur this year, I'm really looking forward to what might be in store.