CppOnSea

I meant to write about CppOnSea for a while. The event is already a month in the past. So I better write down my impressions as long as I can remember anything. My comments will probably be shorter than had I written it down earlier. Last year I learned from a podcast about a new… Continue reading CppOnSea

revisiting enable_if

It was roughly 2008, when I wanted to make a template function for serialization, only available to container types. Template stuff can become complicated at times, and from reading the documentation boost::enable_if seemed to be just what I needed. I didn’t get it to work, and I blamed Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 for not being… Continue reading revisiting enable_if

Adding a display to rfid time tracking

More than a year ago, I blogged here about using RFID to track presence times in the BORM ERP system. I used the system a lot since then. But the BlinkM was really limited as the only immediate feedback channel. To use it with multiple users, a display was needed. The default Arduino compatible displays… Continue reading Adding a display to rfid time tracking

accelerated ray tracer

In all the great online classes I attended over the last year, there was one topic missing. Finally I found an offering for a Computer Graphics class. After all, that’s the field I ‘ve been working in for the last five and a half years. The class is offered at edx.org and is from Berkley.… Continue reading accelerated ray tracer

RaspberryPi reading analog input using an AtTiny through i2c

The raspberrypi has some GPIO (General Purpose Input Output) pins. That’s great for experimenting with electronics for example sensors and actuators. It’s totally different than an Arduino in many respects, but that’s something they have in common. Some of the pins have special functions. For example SPI, I2C, UART … There is a breakboard adapter… Continue reading RaspberryPi reading analog input using an AtTiny through i2c

Optimizing compile time of a large C++ project

The codebase of our PointLine CAD is certainly quite large. sloccount calculated roughly  770’000 lines of C++ code. I know, this is not a very good metric to describe a project, but it gives an idea. Over time the compile time steadily increased. Of course we also added a lot of new stuff to the product.… Continue reading Optimizing compile time of a large C++ project

OpenCL First Steps

There is an increasing noise about GPGPU computing and how much faster than CPU (even parallel) it is. If you didn’t hear about all that, GPGPU is about using the computer’s graphics card(s) to do general purpose computations. The key to the performance lies in the parallel architecture of these devices. From what I read,… Continue reading OpenCL First Steps