Month: March 2014

Some links and information on Strings in PowerShell

More so for my Memory, here are some quick links on String processing inside of PowerShell.

Windows PowerShell Tips: The Strings the Thing

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee692804.aspx

Windows PowerShell Tips: Using the PowerShell “Here-Strings”

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee692792.aspx

Escape Characters in PowerShell

http://ss64.com/ps/syntax-esc.html

http://www.rlmueller.net/PowerShellEscape.htm

Quotation Marks

Either single or double quotes may be used to specify a literal string.

Single-Quoted Strings (‘)

When you enclose a string in single quotation marks, any variable names in the string such as ‘$myVar’ will appear exacly as typed when the command is processed. Expressions in single-quoted strings are not evaluated, not even escape characters or any of the Special characters listed above. If the string contains any embedded single quotes, they must be doubled (replace  ‘  with ”)

$msg = ‘Every “lecture” should cost $5000’

Double-Quoted Strings (“)

When you enclose a string in double quotation marks, any variable names in the string such as “$myVar” will be replaced with the variable’s value when the command is processed. You can prevent this substitution by prefixing the $ with an escape character. Any embedded double quotes can be escaped `” or doubled (replace  ”  with “”)

$msg = “Every “”lecture”” should cost `$5000″

$msg = “Every ‘lecture’ should cost `$5000”

$var = 45

“The value of ” + ‘$var’ + “is ‘$var'”

“The value of `$var is ‘$var'”

$query = “SELECT * FROM Customers WHERE Name LIKE ‘%JONES%'”

Book Review: Unity Android Game Development by Example Beginners Guide

A Little while ago I was given a copy of the Book “Unity Android Game Development by Example Beginner’s Guide” by Packt Publishing. Not being an Android Developer I was looking forward to digging into the content and topics in this book. The book ships with the normal electronic copies as well as the physical print, you also have access to the full samples listed in the book.

 

As you go through the book you are taken through 4 different game types and samples that take you through various different topics all related to not just Android Development, but Mobile development in general.

The first game takes you through the GUI Functions of Unity as well as theming and layout, the second game takes that a bit further but adds a 3D touch to a 3rd person combat game with a little AI. This leads to the third game which expands on the controls and hardware of most modern phones and adds tilt controls to a 3rd person flying combat game. And the final game introduces Physics to a classic game that we all know with a clone of “That Bird Game that knocks things over”.

Overall I liked the content and topics covered in the books, the author presented all of the topics really well and had them flowing as you moved forward. I personally would have liked to see the use of dynamic controls on the screen. For example having the controls for movement invisible and them appear as the user touched a zone on the screen.

The book was well written and I would recommend it for all beginners to the trade and topics, well worth the read.