Newsletter for June 10th, 2010
"Second Summer Winds"
1. Newsletter EditorialGood evening and welcome to another edition of the DonationCoder.com newsletter -- brought to you from uncomfortably sunny Champaign Illinois. We begin this edition of the newsletter with a recommendation to watch a wonderful student-created animation called "Second Wind" about a giant cat; I'm not sure what it means but I'd be interested in hearing your interpretation of it.
The FIFA Soccer World Cup begins this Friday, which is the only sports event I ever watch. If you haven't checked out the Markov Chain Monte Carlo simulator and bet recommender that I wrote with DC member "Crono" in 2006, I hope you'll check it out -- it's been updated for 2010, and we're having a little contest to see who can come closest to predicting actual match scores. Even if you don't care about sports and gambling, you can learn a little about the fantastic world of MCMC statistics and leveraging the power of computers to brute force complex probabilistic interactions.
I've also released updates to my Screenshot Captor and Clipboard Help+Spell applications that users of these programs will probably want to pick up. Screenshot Captor got a nice new "Splice" tool, and Clipboard Help+Spell got the ability to set custom hotkeys for any group menu or formatter preset. You'll find these updates and other software written by DC members in sections 5 and 6 below.
Lastly, from now until the end of the year, the newsletter will contain a NANY (New Apps for the New Year) update section. This is part of our effort to really encourage friends and supporters of DonationCoder to get started early thinking up ideas for and starting planning of a great new application to release on January 1st, 2011. I have a few ideas for programs that I've wanted to get started on for quite some time and I'm looking for collaborators -- so if you are a coder or know someone who is, please stop by the NANY section of the forum and get started early pledging to release some great new software program at the turn of the new year. I'm also looking for a flash game coder collaborator to enter something in the JayIsGames flash game competition (see section 11 below) -- so don't be shy about saying hello on the forum if you are a coder but haven't yet taken the opportunity to post on the forum.
2. NANY 2011Don't be shy about helping us kick off the NANY (New Apps for the New Year) process early. If you're a coder, start thinking about some new program you can start working on. Or stop by and look for ideas and collaborators and helpers. If your not a coder, why not volunteer to help out in other ways, or try to reach out to other coders you know on other sites and see if you can't work together to come up with a great idea for a NANY application.
3. User-to-User: Your Input RequestedWe welcome everyone's participation on the forum, no matter what your level of computer knowledge or how long you've been a DC member. If you're still waiting to make your first post, see the links below for some good places to jump in.
4. June 2010 DiscountsThis month we have a 50% discount on a very popular file explorer, XYplorer, which has gotten rave reviews on the DonationCoder forum. You can also enter to win a copy between now and June 21st. The discount lasts until the end of June.
5. DC Stuff Part 1 - Software UpdatesNew software updates and member-written stuff since the last newsletter:
6. DC Stuff Part 2 - MiscellaneousNew software updates and member-written stuff since the last newsletter:
7. Website Discoveries, Debates, and DiscussionsWhat's new on the world wide web? What fun new sites have forum members discovered? What's the current hot topic and debate? Let's find out..
8. Fun, Games and Amusements on the WebIf you've read the newsletter up to this point, take a break and check out some of the lighter fare from the forum - humour, videos, and games..
9. General Software DiscussionAlmost half the posts on the forum fall into the category of general software discussions, questions, recommendations, etc. This is one of the most active sections of the DC forum and a great resource if you're trying to solve a software or hardware-related problem. We get so much traffic on this board that we've split the recent content into two sections in the newsletter - general software and specific software discussions.
10. Specific Software DiscussionThis section of the newsletter draws attention to some of the standout discussions about specific programs that have been started since the last newsletter.
11. Developer's CornerIf you're not a programmer, don't let the title of this section scare you away - there is likely something of interest to you here! It's more than just a forum for the discussion of software development, it's also where we discuss web design, entrepreneurial struggles, and general productivity issues. It's great to see that the section has been pretty active recently.
