InkBlog: The Random Musings of David Weller

Move your feed pointer to LetsKillDave.com!

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Sat, 10 Jun 2006 16:29:29 GMT

InkBlog, which has been my blogging space since before I joined Microsoft, will continue living as my personal blog. However, all blogging related to gaming and game technologies will now live on www.letskilldave.com. Get over there now :)

E3 musings from afar...

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Fri, 12 May 2006 22:29:31 GMT

While Microsoft may be swimming in cash, it is not the case that everybody in the Microsoft Game Technology Group goes to E3. Take my group, for instance. Apparently, there was a requirement that one person be left behind, and they picked the person that doesn't do any real work :-) On the brighter side, I get tons of email and information about what is happening at E3, and I thought I'd share a few highlights.

Gamespot has a great interview with one of my coworkers at E3, Rich Wickham. Rich talks a lot about the renaissance we will be seeing in PC gaming over the next couple of years, plus discusses how we're moving toward a "cross platform" gaming experience between the Xbox360 and Windows Vista.

In other news, it was interesting to see the comparisons different people made between the major announcements from Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft at E3 this year (great article by ExtremeTech here). Not too surprising (at least to me) is how quickly the novelty of "motion sensitive" controllers wore off on a lot of people. Microsoft did this over 6 years ago, and while the initial response was good, in the end there just wasn't a strong demand for it from consumers. It will be interesting to see what Nintendo does there. I continue to be underwhelmed by the PS3. True, I work at Microsoft, so Sony is our big competitor, but so far, this console hasn't impressed me. By volume, it's larger than the original Xbox. It weighs 11lbs (lots of heat sinks, no doubt), and has a price tag that will no doubt keep initial sales low.

Frankly, I really think we finally have things "right". Sure, it's still gonna take a year or so to stabilize, but I'm stoked about how we're enabling people to have a gaming experience on a broad variety of devices.

And I don't care what other people are saying, I think Shadowrun is gonna rock :-) I think it's a great combination of an FPS that adds magical elements. For those of you that are hardcore Shadowrun "pen and paper" players, my advice is to think of the game as something that contains elements of Shadowrun gameplay, but isn't meant to duplicate the RPG experience that you're used to. But I've talked to the FASA people, and they promise to not make it suck as bad as those last 3 Star Wars movies :-)

Happy Birthday, Coding4Fun!!!

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Mon, 17 Apr 2006 15:38:51 GMT

Can you believe it's been one year already? When Brian Keller and Co launched the Coding4Fun website on MSDN, I'm not sure they knew what kind of response they would get. It turned out that the response was overwhelming, with over 50,000 unique visitors in the first month alone! I'm still amazed at how it continues to grow, and look forward to even more cool things in its second year of life. One recent article by Stephen Toub taps into the current Sudoku craze by showing you how the Sudoko game can be implemented for tablet PCs (source code included, so go have fun :-) ).

One recurring theme in the Coding4Fun pages is gaming. Puzzle games, Arcade games, 3D games. They're all there. If you want to start getting a good overview of game programming, Coding4Fun is a great place to start!

Game Programming jobs at Microsoft

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Thu, 06 Apr 2006 01:53:38 GMT

Ever wanted to be a game programmer or artist at Microsoft? We have lots of openings! Here's a small sample of openings from the "Aces" team (the guys that bring you Flight Simulator plus other fun games!).

Is your game ready for Windows Vista?

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 15:05:39 GMT

My bud Brian pointed out that we have an excellent guide to help you make sure your apps are ready for Windows Vista. If you plan on your app running on Windows Vista, this is pretty much mandatory reading (not to mention some cool information in there to boot).

XNA Goodies Available Now!

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 23:20:53 GMT

http://www.microsoft.com/xna/ Need I say more? :-)

The first CTP for XNA is available next week!

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Thu, 16 Mar 2006 17:10:49 GMT

Check out Michael Klucher's post on the XNA CTP we're releasing next week!

Where to learn about XNA at the Game Developer's Conference...

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 19:13:46 GMT

For those of you attending the GDC, you should make a point of attending these sessions to hear more about XNA:

“XNA Studio: Introduction to XNA”
Presenter: Brian Keller, Product Manager, Microsoft XNA
Wednesday (March 22, 2006) 12:00pm — 1:00pm, Room A8
XNA Studio is a new product Microsoft is building to help tame the costs and complexity associated with game development. This introductory session will provide an overview of XNA Studio and describe how game studios will be able to use it to help manage their content creation and content builds.

“XNA Studio: Advanced Features of XNA’s Build System”
Presenter: Frank Savage, Development Manager, Microsoft XNA
Wednesday (March 22, 2006) 4:00pm — 5:00pm, Room C3
XNA Build is Microsoft’s upcoming solution focused on content pipelines and game content builds. This demo-heavy session shows how XNA enables incremental content builds, dependency tracking, debugging and more. XNA can be customized to meet your unique requirements – whether you create a pipeline from scratch or adapt an existing one

Frank's presentation will also be given the day prior, Tuesday, as part of the Microsoft Game Developer Day. That talk will be from 10am-11am.

See you there!

Managed DirectX and XNA....

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 04:23:45 GMT

By now, those of you that follow Managed DirectX or XNA discussions have seen Tom Miller's post, as well as Mike Zintel's blog.

Just like Tom Miller, I (and about 100+ other people) was a part of the whole "Microsoft Gaming" merger a couple months ago. In my case, my workload has gone to insane levels because I'm picking up some other responsibilities on the XBox and XNA side. I think things will settle down a bit after the Game Developers Conference next week (look for me at the Microsoft booth if you want to talk!).

Speaking of XNA....we have some wicked cool stuff to announce and demonstrate at the GDC. We even have a prototype of a CLR-based graphics app running on a 360 dev kit! Drool-tastic :P

I do want to say one thing about Tom's departure from the DirectX team...it doesn't mean the end of DirectX support in the Common Language Runtime. Quite the opposite. We love the CLR and we are seeing more and more adoption and usage of the CLR in conjunction with DirectX applications. We will have some exciting announcements in the not too distant future about where we are going along that path. Stay tuned!

But I will also second Tom's request: Please let me know how you're using Managed DirectX, especially if it's for a commercial product. One of our biggest challenges is reaching the broad community and understanding how you're using our APIs, and I admit it's particularly difficult for Managed DirectX. We continue to be surprised about what companies are using it and how.

Burnout:Revenge is a dish best served cold^H^H^H^Hon HDTV

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 03:55:45 GMT

I've had Burnout:Revenge for the XBox for several months now and absolutely loved it, but I went ahead and got it for the Xbox 360. The gameplay tweaks are really nice, including ditching the odd boost-feature in the crashbreaker modes. But what has really made this game rock is the detail you can see when it's played on an HDTV system (the not-very-professional photo was taken on my TV). This is really a great example of where the experience with the 360 really rocks. Gamespot gave this one an 8.8 out of 10, but I think it's closer to a 9.5 (a few minor gameplay annoyances keep it from scoring the vaunted 10.0 :) ).

PS2 -- The high and the really, really low

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Fri, 10 Feb 2006 23:02:27 GMT

I'm going to take more time to talk about some of the games I play on my PC as well as consoles. Today's praise and beef goes to the PS2.

First, you gotta hand it to Sony when it comes to putting dynamite in small packages. The slim PS2 that I have is a real dream in terms of size. But the success of a console is determined by the games. Let's look at two PS2 examples:

Guitar Hero is, in a word, addictive. I've had several friends recommend I buy it, and I think it was Kim Pallister's blog post that did it for me. This game is soooo much fun, and I have yet to try it out in two-guitar mode. This one was very worth the money! The only problem is that every time I play it, I think about how much better of an experience it would be on the 360...the integration of XBox Live would change this from a great game to a perfect game. Hopefully the folks at Red Octane and Harmonix Music are thinking about this (and if you're from Red Octane or Harmonix Music and you want to hook up with the 360 people....write to me and I will have you talking to the right people in less than 24 hours!).

On the other end of the spectrum is an older game called "My Street" published by Sony. It was released three years ago, much to worldwide rasberries from reviewers in every corner, so I'm late to the scene in declaring that this game sucks like an inverted hurricane. Let me put it another way...I got this game for free and I still want my money back. Poor modeling, poor gameplay, no online abilities (Sony apparently shut down the network feature some time ago), poor user interfacing, poor camera work. This is one of those games that should be used in schools to teach students how NOT to build a console game.

I think I made my point. Now if you'll excuse me, there's a plastic guitar that demands I play "Crossroads" by Cream...

February 2006 DirectX SDK is now available!

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Fri, 10 Feb 2006 22:35:08 GMT

Well, if you lurk on the GameDev.net, you'll know that this news is already over 24 hours old, since one of my enterprising MVPs decided to upstage me on the forums over there :-)

Anyway...it's here! Cool stuff... an update to the Direct3D 10 libraries, the first actual (non-beta) release of the Cross-Platform Audio Content Tool (XACT), and another update to the MDX 2.0 beta.

Just as a quick comment..the Direct3D 10 preview _requires_ Windows Vista. At the moment though, there is no hardware that will natively run Direct3D 10 applications, so you're stuck with a software rasterizer that renders at about one frame per 20 seconds (and please don't send me a note saying we should speed the rasterizer up -- it runs slow because it was written for accuracy, not speed). Anyway, if you're serious about adopting and using Direct3D 10, be sure to register to get on the beta newsgroups (even if you don't already have Windows Vista).

Join The Waterfall Alliance now! (And a little tidbit about XNA)

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Fri, 27 Jan 2006 18:49:12 GMT

Nothing like parody about the world's worst software development method to make you smile:

http://www.waterfall2006.com/

I love the opening sentence from Ron Jeffries' "keynote": "Agile Software Development is over."

The only sad part is that I'm CERTAIN there's about 50,000 PHBs out there that still think that the waterfall approach, like digital watches, it a pretty neat idea (let's ignore the bizarre moment when Microsoft apparently endorsed the waterfall approach as part of a TDD development method. That was quickly rectified....I think the person responsible for that mistake can still be seen, gruesomely impaled on a high post beside the Microsoft flagpoles :-) ).

Those of you that knew me before I joined Microsoft and transformed into "Game Development Man" knew that I was a huge advocate and practitioner of Agile Software Development. I'm proud to call people like Ken Schwaber, Ward Cunningham, and Ron Jeffries my friends, and those with an even deeper history of me know of the work I did with a guy named Grady Booch.

So how does this all lead into game development? Why, XNA of course! You'll find me talking more and more about XNA in the upcoming months, expecially after we make some cool XNA announcements at this year's GDC. One thing that seems confusing to folks is what XNA really is. Many people think it's some kind of cool graphics modeling tool (it's not), or some amazing product where you lay your forehead on the keyboard and the game you're thinking about magically appears (give us another decade or so :-) ). The heart and soul of XNA is about the process of making games. Not just writing them, but all the other REALLY annoying stuff. Managing assets and work items, tracking progress (or "backlog"), plugging in 3rd party components, etc. Handling all this is what XNA is about: "Better, Faster, Cheaper."

More to come in the weeks ahead :-)

Finally have a PS2....

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Mon, 16 Jan 2006 04:10:03 GMT

So a coworker tells me he knows a friend that has a relative that knows somebody that works at a Fred Meyer store about 20 miles north of here that says they have a few Xbox 360s in stock.

Turned out to be another false lead. I owe that guy The Flying Nut Kick of Death for getting my hopes up. Anyway, I soothed my bitterness by finally getting a PS2 (why? Three words: God of War). Anyway, I suppose I'll nab a 360 next month, so I'll have a trio of consoles to suck even more time away from what I should be doing (housework, bookwriting, paying bills, blogging, etc). I picked up Blitz: The League and The Incredible Hulk (then kicked myself in the ass because I bought the old one, not the nice "Ultimate Destruction" version), plus Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal and a used copy of Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow. A nice start to a collection :-)

Catharsis

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Sun, 15 Jan 2006 06:48:15 GMT

NOTE for my MSDN blog subscribers: This is an off-topic post regarding the passing of my father. While I generally keep such posts to my normal blog (at www.inkblog.com), I've had a few subscribers request that I crosspost it to my MSDN blog.

Preface: Over the last 3 or so years, I've been a semi-regular blog poster to www.inkblog.com (and my tamed-down mirror, http://blogs.msdn.com/dweller). The last 3 months of 2005, however, nearly sucked the life out of me. First the passing of my dog, Tucker, and then my father in late November. I'll even skip over the nerve I pinched in my lower back, forcing me to stay bedridden during my entire three week "vacation" at the end of the year. In any case, I spent my final weeks of 2005 working myself through both physical and mental recovery from some very life-altering events. I wish I could say, "Hey, I'm all better now," but the reality is that my father's death struck me far harder than I expected, and this blog post represents my first step back into the more "public" person that I really am. Here's hoping that 2006 doesn't suck as much for me as 2005 did.

The story below was written primarily for my own mental sanity. My final tribute for my father, I suppose, and my way of trying to capture a moment in time that was intense, painful, loving, exhausting, and surreal. Each of us has, or will, go through a moment similar to this. This is merely my recollection, passed through my personal muse, and offered to you for your own consideration.

Catharsis

I am swaddled in a blanket, uncomfortably stretched out in a recliner in my parent’s living room. The nurse touches my shoulder, gently rousing me from a sleep that has offered no rest. It is my fifth morning to wake up this way, only this time it has been the nurse’s hand that has cast off my fleeting slumber, rather than some craven lump in the understuffed easy chair. The ceiling fan is groaning, slowly moving the air around on this unusually warm late-November morning in San Antonio .

“There’s been a change,” she says in a quiet tone. The fog of my sleep quickly lifts, and I get up with a sense of dread. This will be a day I will always remember, but will always want to forget.

It’s 5am. The 6 hour sale at Wal-Mart has just started. Many eager shoppers are lined up at various stores to kick off the traditional Christmas shopping season. Shopping retailers call this day “Black Friday,” an irony that will not be lost on me in the hours to come.

The nurse wakes up Nancy, my ex-wife, who has also suffered through dream-filled combat with an equally menacing couch. Although our marriage has long been over, her loving relationship with my parents over the last quarter-century, and particularly with my dad, has made her a daughter in their eyes. We are fortunate that our divorce wasn’t bitter, and that our friendship was preserved. It will be particularly important today.

I walk into the master bedroom. The nurse is by my dad’s side, checking his vital signs. His blood pressure has started falling. He had been comatose for the last 36 hours, and was no longer responding to our voices. The huge array of pain medication that he took every 2 hours was stopped two days ago, as he was no longer swallowing water effectively. Only the pain pump, buried beneath his skin, continues to deliver high power morphine.

I walk out of the bedroom and fix some tea and toast for my mother, who has barely left his side. When I return, Nancy is kneeling beside the bed, holding his hand. My mom is lying on the other side on the bed, her head resting against his forehead, gently kissing it. His breathing is shallow. He takes gulps of air, but his lungs handle it poorly, half destroyed by the cancer that rages within him still. Sometimes his breathing pauses, and we all seem to stop breathing with him, then he continues to fight, and takes another breath. He is fighting his last fight.

Mom whispers in his ear, “It’s ok to let go. I love you.” She kisses his forehead again. It is hot with the 104 degree fever his body is enduring, but his low blood pressure has created a macabre effect: His hands are almost ice cold. Only by moving your hand up to his elbows do you feel the fever heat.

A breath in. A breath out. Another beat of the clock. I watch the digits mark off arbitrary increments, giving us all a sense of the inexorable march of time. The world is turning, and the sun’s morning light has revealed another rare event in this part of the world: A thick fog, wrapping the hardwood mesquite trees and brush of San Antonio in a dewy blanket, and giving a silence to the outside world that is almost as hushed as it is in this bedroom.

It is strange to sit here, looking at his body. There is little now that represents the military man that he was. At 6’2” and 200lbs, he was both tall and strong. The cancer that was discovered three years ago, held at bay for almost as long, finally took over and began devouring his body with an exponential ferocity. He is almost half that weight now. The pain pump, buried beneath his skin near his lower hip, is distended, the skin stretched in a bizarre fashion around it; almost as if his body was retreating from this last bit of chemical comfort.

It is a terrible fight. My father’s soul, bottled up in a body that is being destroyed from the inside, refuses to leave his wife’s side. A few days ago, when he had his last bits of consciousness, my mother told him it was ok to let go. He shook his head, almost violently. He moaned as he struggled to make the words, a pause between each one, as if to emphasize his determination: “Can’t… leave …you.”

It’s 8am, time for the hospice nurse shift change. They quietly talk together in the dining room. My mom, physically and emotionally drained, sleeps at the moment, her head still resting against dad’s, her arm draped lightly over his chest, feeling it heave and toss as it purchases small amounts of air. The oxygen cannula, feeding pure oxygen through his nose, is the only externally-visible technology that supports him now. His chest rattles gently, filling with fluid because he hasn’t been moving. The nurse has explained that this was expected, but the sound is still disturbing. I continue to watch him, hoping that somehow, against the reality of what is happening, he will show signs of recovery.

I eat a Pop Tart, nibbling at the sides before eating the middle. I chuckle quietly to myself as I sit by his side. I learned this from him. I begin to think of all the things he’s taught me and tears begin to well up in me in this dimly-lit room. I set my pastry down, now overly-wetted by my tears, and hold his cold hand again. His fingers are still large and bony, but they don’t respond to my touch. These hands that once held mine so firmly. Picking me up for a piggy-back ride. Holding me as we walked through a store. Showing me how to play a guitar. The person that was my father has already left his hands, and we all know it is only a matter of time before what is left of him is finally gone.

It is noon. The fog has long since lifted, and the warmth of the Texan sun begins to take hold. The 5 hour sale at Wal-Mart is over. Dad’s small dog is curled up by his legs, looking like somebody left a small dust mop by his feet. Mom is waking up now. The nurse tells us that his heart is beating strong, but his blood pressure continues to fall, and is now at 60/44. His death approaches. An instrumental version of “Love Me Tender”, playing on the radio, softly fills the room. Nancy is kneeling by his side again, resting her head on his arm and holding his hand. She looks up at him lovingly. She never met her real father. This is the only one she’s ever really had, and now he’s leaving.

I go to the kitchen for some coffee. The whiteboard still has errands he needs to do, written in his own handwriting. In the living room, his glasses still sit by his easy chair, where he wore them just a few days ago. A movie he wanted to see still sits beside those glasses, new and unwrapped.

Six days ago. It was a glorious, perfect weekend. I had flown my brother down to see my dad. Because of physical limitations that prevented travel, neither of them had seen the other in almost 13 years. The reunion was a joyful, tear-filled moment, and I was proud that I could give them each this gift to finally see each other. It is ironic, in a way, that it was almost as if he was hanging on for that last moment. To see me and, unknown to him at that time, my brother, was his last moment of grace. The cancer was beginning to already affect him mentally though. He would sometimes wander off in thought, or repeat himself. But he was still Dad, and he chatted away with my brother as if those 13 years of separation had never existed. We laughed and watched episodes of “Firefly”, his favorite TV show. We were a family again. But it was clear that the cancer was beginning to take him; but it was the elephant in the room that we all chose to ignore. It was our time, and we made the best of it. Three peaceful, happy days.

Sadly, only a few hours after we left to catch our respective flights home, dad’s transition started, and he was aware enough to ask my mom to call the hospice on-call nurse. I immediately flew back to begin my watch with my mom.

It’s 1pm. His blood pressure has dropped to 49/36. I chuckle softly and ask my mom if anybody properly explained the rules about dying to him. Even in these last moments, Dad refuses to play by the rules. Mom smiles at me, you can see the exhaustion in her face, but she is being strong, and not in an artificial way. She has had a few months to mourn with my father, and this moment isn’t unexpected. Although she is tired, she is the perfect example of strength, serenity, and love. She whispers in his ear that Nancy and I are here, and how much we all love him. The nurse sits in the corner at a respectful distance, available to help us, but there is little we can do for my father now. There are no defibrillators in the room…his ribs, also eaten by the cancer, are mere shells. Any electrical current or sudden pressure on his chest would shatter what is left of his bones. Nothing is left between him and heaven, save his breath.

Thirty minutes later, and we now see another change. His breathing has become more ragged, and his heart is beating faster. Like a runner in the last strides of a marathon, it is clear that he is using up his physical reserves now. He moans softly now with each breath. Mom kisses his forehead again and tells him it’s ok. Her hand is resting on his, touching the wedding ring that has been on his hand for almost 30 years.

A breath in, a pause. A breath out, a pause. It is now 10 seconds between each breath. We are all by his side, holding or touching his hands. A breath in, a pause, a breath out. A long pause.

Longer.

It is 1:43pm. The person that was my father is finished with his body.

The weight of the moment sinks in. Mom looks at me, a mixture of both pain and relief in her face, and says in a hushed voice, “He’s gone.” Nancy begins crying on my shoulder as I hold her now. Mom quietly asks me to get the nurse, who is now in the living room. She comes in and confirms what we all know.

I hold his hand, still barely warm, and stare at his face. His eyes are closed and sunken, his face ashen white. Tears well up in my eyes, but I cannot find the strength to cry like Nancy does. I merely sit there, holding his hand, and remember who he was, while the pain pump continues to mindlessly deliver the morphine under his skin.

An hour has passed. I still sit at his side, touching his cold hands. His heart no longer beats, he no longer breathes, but it is still Dad. The mortuary service has arrived. We wait in the living room as the nurse helps them gather his body. They gently place it on the gurney, wrapped in a white sheet. As they wheel the gurney toward the door, mom asks them to wait. She gently unwraps the sheet from his head and kisses his forehead. “Goodbye,” she says, “I love you.”

We watch from the door as they take him to their vehicle. The house is so quiet. We have finished our tears now, and all that is left are the heartfelt goodbyes our thoughts are sending to him. Of all the sights and sounds I remember from that day, the one I remember the clearest was the door of the hearse closing.

Six days have now passed. We are driving past the thousands of gravesites at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery , pulling up to the memorial pavilion. It was to be a small service, attended by a few friends and family. To my surprise, over 50 people showed up, all gathered under the covered pavilion. A cool, gentle wind is blowing, while the sun spreads its light between occasional cotton-ball puffs of clouds.

The military honor guard marches smartly up to the small mahogany urn that contained my father’s ashes, and they solemnly performed their flag-folding ceremony. The flag is presented to my mother with both precision and dignity.

The presenting honor guard kneels before my mother, and speaks with solemn pride, “On behalf of the President of the United States , the Department of the Air Force, and a grateful nation, we offer this flag for the faithful and dedicated service of your husband. God bless you and this family, and God bless the United States of America .” He rejoins the rest, and they all march smartly to take their position for the 21-gun rifle salute.

The first volley of gunshots pierces the calm. Everybody visibly jumps at the sudden report. The commanding officer quietly barks out the reloading process. The second volley cracks out, as perfectly synchronized as the first. Another reload. The final volley is fired. The sharp smell of gunpowder crosses the air.

The bugler begins to play taps, each note in perfect tune. He has done this many times before. It is a song that unifies our fallen soldiers, and reminds us, the living, that all soldiers are remembered for the sacrifices they have made.

My mother has asked me to read the eulogy. I have chosen to read a story I wrote for my father several years ago, a tribute, of sorts, thanking him for being the father that he was. I realize, looking back, how lucky we both were. Lucky that I took the time to say that I loved him in the form of a story, and for him to know the kind of impact he had on me, long before it was too late for us to talk about it. It was such an enormous struggle, to read this expression of love about him, and not break down in tears. I finished the story, finding an inner-strength I didn’t know I had, and only when the last words were read did I let the tears begin to fall.

The pastor read a few closing words, and then this small crowd of friends and family gave their condolences to my mother. It was amazing to see so many people, most that I didn’t know, and how much they loved my father. So many people had so many glowing comments or anecdotes about him. People spoke about him with a smile on their face; there was even some occasional laughter. This is exactly how my dad would have wanted it, not with sadness and tears, but of gentle smiles and remembrance.

As we solemnly walked back to the car, mom quietly said, “I don’t know about you, but I could stand to get something to eat.” I smiled inwardly at this decisively human moment, how we can take a moment of grief and find a way to begin recovering from it, beginning with food. We collectively decided on visiting a favorite Mexican restaurant of my mom’s family. This is amusing, in a way, because dad despised Mexican food, and it was the one taboo of dining out; nobody could suggest Mexican food. And so it was that over 20 hungry people sat down to honor my father, at a restaurant my father would have hated to go to. Later, when a friend asked me what we had at that meal, I replied, “Irony.”

My father was a master of humor and puns, enjoying the works of authors like Mark Twain, Erma Bombeck, and Dave Barry. Thus it was fitting that in that columbarium in Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery , the epitaph my mother chose for my father, a veteran of both the Korean and Vietnam wars, were these simple words: “His Presence Was A Gift”.

Indeed, it was.

December 2005 DirectX SDK is available!

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 19:21:39 GMT

I've spammed this everywhere...might as well spam my blog too :)

The Windows Graphics and Gaming Technology Team is proud to announce the latest version of the DirectX SDK, available for immediate download!

The latest SDK, as always, can be found at http://msdn.com/directx/sdk.

So what's new? Well, some of the really cool additions and updates are:

- Direct3D 10 Technology Preview: That's not a typo. If you have Windows Vista, you'll be thrilled to get your hands on this _very early_ preview of the new version of Direct3D.

- Microsoft Cross-Platform Audio Creation Tool (XACT Beta): Our audio geniuses are at it again.

- Managed DirectX for .NET Framework 2.0 (Beta): Much improved from October's SDK, this new version includes support for the retail version of Visual Studio 2005 family of products.

- Windows Vista Game Explorer (Beta): "Getting your game on" takes on new meaning in Windows Vista. Learn how to get your game integrated into the Game Explorer.

- DirectX Runtime: We've now created a cumulative redist to help you address some of the small (and not-so-small) annoyances with the runtime. In addition, we now offer a web installer that will incrementally update your end user to the latest DirectX runtime libraries.

- XInput: New and improved, with an article included on how to use DirectInput and XInput together!

- Tools: PIX and DxErr have been improved

- Samples: New samples on HDR, as well as numerous additions to help you learn Direct3D 10, have been added. Also returning by popular demand: the Pick sample.

- Technical Article Updates: We've added tons of new technical articles. Find them all in the DirectX SDK Sample Browser.

And now, for something completely different...

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 05:34:55 GMT

You'd think that people would be hip on the rather crude references to "Cornholing" in the 21st century. Anybody that's drunkenly watched one of the classic episodes of "Beavis and Butthead" or the hilarious "Arrested Development" can attest to this. It's common knowledge.

Except, it seems, Nabisco.

Yes, our proud cracker company has offered up "CornHole" the game!

Be sure to pick "Mouse Thrust" for extra giggles.

OK, in all fairness, if you live in a rural part of the midwest, you'll know that cornholing is a real sport that is, well, just like that darn Nabisco game. With rules and tournaments, rankings, equipment, etc.

It's just that, well, the thought of watching a "Cornholing tournament" makes me giggle uncontrollably. This must be a "Red State" versus "Blue State" thing :-)

So long, Tucker

dgweller@msn.com (David Weller) — Mon, 10 Oct 2005 17:56:15 GMT

It was weekend after the 9/11 terror attacks. The whole country was still in shock, but life went on. My ex-wife, Nancy, asked me to go to the pet store to get some dog food for my german shepherd, Nikki.

I came home with Tucker.

Nancy was upset with me at first, but I jokingly told her that I stuck to the list. I had brought home "dog" and "food". That weekend was the monthly "animal rescue" show, where dogs and cats sat huddled in wire cages, waiting for adoption. Tucker was sitting in one of the cages, and had this kind of "aware but reserved" look about him. He was merely observing, and not exhibiting the desperate barking and whining of other puppies. For being only 8 weeks old, he was already showing some smarts.

I walked past the cages of puppies, ignoring their pleas for help, in spite of the softer side of me wanting to take them all home. I'm a dog person, and it breaks my heart to see an unloved dog. But, I already had two dogs at home, and they were hungry, so past the cages I went, in search of food.

But then Tucker spotted me, and suddenly stood up and barked at me. He had made his choice and wasn't about to let me pass by unnoticed. He, it seems, had immediately adopted me. And so it was that this dog, a cross between a Belgian Shepherd and an Akita , became part of our pack.

He integrated very well with the other dogs, but it was Nancy that he took a special liking to. Constantly at her side, he was a "leaner." Even as she took him through obedience training, Tucker wouldn't sit up straight like the other dogs. He would do everything else perfectly, hand signals, instant command obedience, etc. He even mastered protection training, and was able to put on the face of a ferocious defender in an instant, and just as quickly become a loving, face-licking puppy at a single command. But he needed to constantly touch Nancy . Always. So when he sat next to her, he would lean against her leg, and lovingly look up to her. We collectively gave up on teaching him to "sit up right"...he refused to obey that one command because of his love.

He constantly demonstrated unbridled cleverness as well. Often we would put him in a "down-stay" on his favorite pillow in our wood-floored living room. He would obey faithfully, until he wanted to play with another dog, or move up next to Nancy , at which point he would use his hind legs to slide himself and the pillow across the floor. He would look at me as if to say, "Hey, I'm obeying you...technically".

He was a dog of great beauty as well, with soft fur and very strong muscles. When he ran at full speed, you'd think a herd of horses was galloping at you. Pretty impressive for a 65 pound dog. In tall grass, he would leap like a gazelle, bounding with a ceaseless energy, and clearly taking delight at his power over gravity. But even with all that strength, he was a "high maintenance" dog emotionally. He needed to constantly touch you and be petted. He would lie in your lap for hours as long as you were petting him. If you stopped, he'd sit up and give you "face snuffles" or nibble on your ear to get you petting him again. Tucker loved with all his heart, and often asked for the same in return. And Nancy never disappointed him.

A few months ago, things started going wrong. He started losing weight, and then had a bad reaction to some antibiotics the vet gave him. He recovered, but his weight wasn't coming back. A few weeks ago, the vet diagnosed him with a pancreatic failure. In effect, although he had an appetite, his body wasn't digesting the food. He was starving to death on a full stomach. The vet prescribed some special powder to add to his food, but there was no appreciable effect. Tucker's body was gaunt, his ribcage and hip bones were clearly sticking out, his eyes were sunken, and he was beginning to lose his muscle mass.

Nancy took Tucker in to the vet on Saturday to see what else could be done, but the news was worse. His body had started to shut down, and very shorly would start having internal organ failure. Nancy was faced with a choice no pet owner wants, and agonizingly decided that he needed to go to a better place. At 12:15, Tucker took his last breath, while Nancy held him to her telling him how much she loved him. He left this world the way he always wanted, touching his momma and looking in her eyes.

He lived a life that every dog would want, being loved from the beginning to the end, and loving right back in return. But at a mere 4 years old, Tucker's time here was far too short.

So long, Tucker. We love you.