Managed Direct3D - Creating a VertexBuffer

In this latest installment in my Managed Direct3D series, we discuss how to build a VertexBuffer, which is one of the fundamental objects in the Direct3D API.

Which OS are you?

Brad pointed me to this site, which has you take a quiz to determine which OS you are most like.

To my horror, I'm Windows 98.

Storing Secrets

There's been a fair amount of discussion lately on the mailing lists I hang out on around security, encryption, and cryptography. This article does a pretty good job of talking about how to store secret data. It's very succinct.

You can also check out my brief introduction to cryptography for some background.

Taking the Plunge

So I took Keith Brown's advice and decided to change my lifestyle.I'm reinstalling my machine, and I'm going to try to live without running as Administrator all the time.

Oh. My. God.

Almost nothing I've tried to do so far has worked. Office probably will, but WinKey, one of my favorite tools, looks like it might not ever. Radio, in particular, took some gymnastics to set up. Particularly galling is the fact that it wants to write to its install directory. Strike 19, Radio!

Anyway, it's an absolutely fascinating study in how software shouldn't be written. I highly recommend it if you have an extra couple of hours to add to the install process - it is guaranteed to change the way you write software.

Longhorn - Ho Hum

Am I the only person that finds the leaked screenshots of Longhorn totally boring? Maybe I'm exposing my own ignorance (although I suspect that's hardly classified information) but all I see is XP with an extra task bar. Frankly, I always shut off the the XP UI features when I install - I like having lots of screen real estate, and the supposedly "friendly" features of XP/Longhorn just use up space. Not to mention make me take my hands off the keyboard, which slows me waaay down.

But then again I still use emacs, so maybe I'm just a caveman.

Radio Defections Continue

Sam Gentile is one of the many recent Radio defectors. His new blog is at http://dotnetweblogs.com/sgentile/Default.aspx. I think I'm one of the few left using Radio - I'm starting to think I might not be cool any more!

Anyway, I'll probably migrate to something else once I can find something that integrates site management with blogging. I want to be able to keep all the stuff I already have on my site in addition to flopping my random thoughts down on the digital page. Unfortunately, planning my upcoming wedding is eating into my play time. :)

Anyway, check out Sam's new page. He's been a good guy, sending people to my DirectX series even though until now I didn't even have him listed on my blogroll. What a bastard I am! No, actually it was just an oversight on my part. Of course, I'm still a bastard.

Managed Direct3D - Rendering Basics

As part of my continuing series on the basics of Managed DirectX, I've posted a mini-article about the basics of Rendering. A few more of these and we'll be able to draw rotating triangles on the screen!