Woah woah woah, wait a second. This list of questions includes "What is your favorite style of mustache and why?"!? Oh dear, I'm not going to be able to answer all these in a casual-style blog post. I better just list them out.
- Photo of yourself.
- E-mail address.
- sjones411 (a t) tamu ( dot) edu
- Class standing (e.g., 3rd year Junior, 7th year Senior)
- Fourth year senior. Fighting Texas Aggie Class of 2011.
- Why are you taking this class?
- For as long as I can remember, I've been interested in the design and interaction aspect of computers. I've loved experimenting with different styles of input, ranging from trackballs to touch screens and digital pens. I've also always been interested in user interface design, and hope to learn some skills that allow me to make easier to use applications.
- What experience do you bring to this class?
- I've got the standard Texas A&M background in Computer Science. Some C++ here, a bit of Java there, and even a little Haskell. As far as personal experience, I try to stay platform agnostic. I'm typing this up on a Mac currently, but I've got a machine running Linux (Ubuntu 10.10) within arms reach, and there's an aging Windows 7 machine humming quietly in the corner. As far as personal coding projects, I've tried to get my feet wet with a few different programming languages. Most recently I spent the Winter break studying Objective-C / Cocoa, and improving my web design background. On a personal level, I've always enjoyed doing graphic design projects in my spare time. I recently had a T-Shirt design chosen for use by Cepheid Variable, A&M's Sci-Fi & Fantasy organization.
- What do you expect to be doing in 10 years?
- I expect to be preparing for my 33rd birthday. Beyond that, I'm not the kind of person to pin any details down. My parents were in the military, so I've lived in ten different houses in the last decade. As long as I've got a job in the field of computer science, (and enough money to buy the latest gadget), I have a feeling I'll be happy with whatever cards life deals me.
- That's dodging the question though, isn't it? I'm not sure if I can truly expect this is where I'll end up, but if I had to choose my future, I'd be working at some small company, writing software people are excited to use. I'd love to be leading the team making the software that Apple, Microsoft, or Canonical never thought to make, the kind of software that has everyone in the tech world talking.
- What do you think will be the next biggest technological advancement in computer science?
- The next big advancement in technology isn't going to involve clock speeds, or have to do with the thinness of a particular device. Today's battery technology is quickly approaching a wall. Moore's Law states that the amount of transistors we can cram onto a chip doubles roughly every two years... but that's not exactly helpful in today's mobile world. The faster you make your chips, the more power hungry they become. You can work to make them power efficient, but baring any major advances in today's battery technology, our devices are quickly going to reach a point that they're "good enough" for the every day consumer.
- However, just as hardware advancement is slowing down, the software side of things is ready to completely revolutionize how people use computers. Apple's iPad has shown the world that people don't need a command prompt, file system, or even a windowed operating system to get things done. For a technology neophyte, a simplified, easy to approach device is infinitely more useful than a powerful but complex machine. While the keyboard and mouse will most likely always be with us, we're quickly approaching a day where all someone needs to compute on the go is the end of their index finger. Between the iPad (and Google's belated Android offerings), and motion tracking technologies like Microsoft's Kinect, the next technology revolution isn't going to be what we do with computers, but how we do it.
- If you could travel back in time, who would you like to meet and why?
- I wish I could go back and hear Carl Sagan speak. Few people have been able to explain why the pursuits of science are so important in such simple words.
- What is your favorite style of mustache and why?
- Something small and simple, paired with a beard/goatee. Enough where you know the person's trying to grow it for sure, but not too scruffy.
- If you could be fluent in any foreign language that you're not already fluent in, which one would it be and why?
- Living in Texas, Spanish is an obvious first choice. However, Japanese would be fun to know, if only so I could watch anime as it was originally made.
- Give some interesting fact about yourself.
- When I was a kid, I thought "Getting your tires rotated" involved putting your car up onto the lift and spinning the tires around.
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