Dinky Bomb Original Server Backend

Dinky Bomb is a cult classic multi-player online Flash game similar to Worms. The game was originally created by Liam O'Donnell and others, and has passed from owner to owner many times over the past four years. Dinky Bomb Delux is now owned by Atari, which has taken the game offline, but one of the sites that I develop for in my spare time, GamerParty.com, still holds the rights to the original version. However, when GamerParty aquired the game, there was no working server backend for it. I re-wrote the backend using Ruby, and the game can now be played at www.gamerparty.com/db.

Current Status: Finished and released version 1.0
Source Code: Available upon request

Beowulf Computer Cluster for Loyola University New Orleans

I started the project for two reasons: firstly because our collection of Sun Ultra 10's in the Sun lab were not doing anything other than taking up space, and secondly because the Chemistry department needed a cluster for running GAMESS. This project taught me a lot of valuable things about the UNIX family of operating systems and about the power of distributed computing. It was also a good chance to try my hand at a long-term, independent project... something I will be doing a lot of in grad school.

Current Status: Read the Writeup

amFM File Manager

amFM is a free, open source web file manager. The name stands for "I am a File Manager." amFM is designed to be simple and intuitive. It offers several attractive features, and is extensible for use on a wide variety of sites. You can see a live demo here.

Current Status: Finished and released version 1.8
Source Code: Available

Watchdog 2.0

I created this program for two reasons: Firstly, to combat the hackers that were troubling the WePlayHere games, and secondly so that I could use the game lobby from the command line instead of using the provided web interface. Watchdog connects to and interfaces with the WePlayHere game lobby and provides some additional information to the user about exactly what is going on with the chat traffic. This extra information makes it much easier for my fellow moderators and I to identify name hijackers and other troublesome users.

Current Status: Finished and released version 2.0
Source Code: Sorry, but I cannot release the source code or compiled code for this program as it could be very dangerous in the wrong hands.

ATOM to Javascript

This is an easy-to-use php script which parses atom files (news feeds in xml format) and turns them into Javascript arrays. The Javascript is dynamically generated on the server side, so all you have to do is import the script and, "Viola!" you can put a blog or news feed on your site with some simple Javascript.

Current Status: Done and available for use
Source Code: Available

Manly Name Generator

Need a name for your pet? Why not make it a MANLY name? Inspired by MST3K.

Current Status: Done and available for use
Source Code: Available

Jinx the Cat

This is a 'just for fun' experiment in A.I. Jinx the cat is my pet on the multi-user online community of ifMud. Even when I am not signed on, Jinx wanders around from room to room occasionally doing cat things. Other users can pet and play with her (or attack her), and she keeps track of users that are friends and foes. She also scans each user's inventory for any item containing catnip, and if she finds any, she will sniff that user's pockets until she gets what she wants.

This is a simple application of A.I. I want to see how many users will mistake this 'bot' for a real person who is role playing as a cat. This is also the ground work (Java superclass) for more complicated bots, so perhaps I will design some to imitate human interaction.

Current Status: Finished version 1.0
Source Code: Available upon request

Minions

Creating a free, multi-player online video game has been a dream of mine since I was in middle school. Now that I finally have the skills, resources, and time to undertake such a project, I am living the dream! This project is my pride and joy. It is requiring every ounce of skill and planning that I have, but it is worth it!

For a more detailed description and progress report, visit www.recursivedissent.com/minions.

Current Status: Finished version 0.1
Source Code: Certain parts available upon request

(TI-83 port of) Loom

This is a port of the classic LucasArts adventure game, "Loom" for the TI-83 family of graphing calculators. Due to the highly limited capabilities of the TI-83, this game is programmed entirely in assembly (using the ION shell). I did this primarily for the challenge of porting such a large and entertaining game onto such a limited medium, but after several months of coding, I realize that the game was simply too much work for too small an audience. I might take this project back up in the future if I get another craving to use assembly.

Current Status: Permanently on hold
Source Code: If anyone is interested in developing this, contact me for the source code.