Hobby and Sport My main consumption of time these days, is unfortunately not used on homework, but on computers. Trendy words like 'Internet' and 'The Superinformation Highway' are both terms which seem essential in my everyday. When I though disconnect from cyberspace, and my computer and I are all alone, programming is what I deal with. I make small programs, and since practice makes perfect, that's where I'm heading. QBasic is an updated version of the worlds first programming language, Basic.With Basic you are, compared to other languages, quite limited, but good results can still be obtained, even as a beginner.
I first started to program after one winter vacation, where my cousin can to visit. He knew a bit of how to program, and taught me everything he knew. I immediately became an addict to the new world of errorlevels, internal and external commands etc. The first programs I made were simple and useless. For example a sequence which generates random circles, at random places, in random colors on the screen. Or a program which asks you how old you are, and how many cigarettes you smoke everyday.
Then it tells you if you smoke too much.These programs are not useful because they don't satisfy any of the two demands: 1) It doesn't fulfill any of my needs. 2)It's not suitable for a wider audience. Today, the list of programs I have made, satisfy in a much more professional way those simple requirements. I have made, in cooperation with a friend, a game which tests your short-term memory.
There must be a thousand of those on the market today, but 'RecoN' has a very nice graphical interface, and online help.We released the game as 'shareware'. This means that anyone can have a copy without paying for it, but if they after 30 days chose to keep it on their computer, they must send X amount of money to a specified address. Naturally we still haven't gotten any donations, but at least we know for sure, that the game has been copied to well over 250 persons, so it has satisfied some demands.
So how can programming benefit me in a more practical way? Well, I made one program, which works like an alarm-clock. It's simple, but it works.The knowledge I gathered from making that program, and all the knowledge from all the other programs, will of cause be essential, if I chose to become a programmer after IB. There I will need all the experience, I can get.
