Blog

Creating a Google News wrapper app for macOS and Windows in Electron

A mini project to explore Electron Over the past couple of days I’ve been exploring the world of Electron. Electron is a cross platform desktop app builder wrapped in a Chromium shell, allowing you to create a web app built natively for each different platform.  The reason why I decided to take a look into building an app this way was because I had a plan to build my own News app, similar to Apple News on the mac, which actually functioned well and was feature-rich instead of offering services Read more…

By George King, ago

Dark mode all the things!

This website now has dark mode! Dark mode is good. Dark mode is great. We all love the darkness! Seriously though, as a part of the usual website upkeep, I decided to update the theme with the help of a little API available within browsers now called ‘prefers-color-scheme: dark’. Using this CSS media tag, I’ve updated every instance to a more, let’s say developer friendly colour! What’s great about this method is that it will automatically turn dark when the user selects dark mode within their Operating System, so if Read more…

By George King, ago

An update (finally)

Back to the blog! So it’s been a sweet while since my last blog post. So much so that it’s tricky even writing this post after so long – a lot has happened in my life which I’m going to summarise within this post. To start off with, I had planned to do a multitude of other blog posts between this one and the first lot I did back in 2017, and I have them all saved as drafts ready to be written up and published at some stage. If Read more…

By George King, ago

Refining gameplay aspects

Addressing ‘The idea doesn’t have enough depth’ statements One of the main criticisms when I first proposed my idea for my final year project was that there was a lot of breadth, not enough depth to the idea. Initially I had hoped to just create an Android game using the knowledge I gained from my placement; having talked this over with my advisor I decided to expand upon that to see if I can get a working link between a high quality VR game and a simple mobile game. After Read more…

By George King, ago

HackUPC Autumn 2017

A quick trip to Barcelona – why not!? Whilst studying for my final year, an opportunity arose to attend a 48 hour hackathon in Barcelona at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia. Despite it being my final year, a quick weekend 900 mile trip was needed..!  The flights were covered by MLH‘s travel reimbursement policy so all that was needed to pay for was the hotel, which was also great!  During my time in Barcelona, me and my travel partner Brandon spent a bit of time exploring the city before starting Read more…

By George King, ago

Good design vs trash design

What makes a good design? This question is going to haunt me all year. For Interaction Design, we have a specific set of requirements to fulfill in building a prototype wireframe system, and one of the requirements is that it needs to be built for a Kiosk style help system. Aston Endangered Animal Sanctuary. What a name. Essentially, this system needs to be suitable for two different purposes: A self contained Kiosk system that can be used around this virtual non-existent park, and as a website for users looking to Read more…

By George King, ago