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Oculus Connect 2: Live Coding Session with John Carmack [video]

96 points by agronaut 11y ago

neals 11y ago
Here is a man thoroughly enjoying his work. I envy him, he just keeps on coding while I feel myself floating away to management.
- GuiA 11y ago
  A good manager enables happy programmers. We always need more good managers in the world; there is nothing shameful about choosing to head into management. Source: am a programmer, not a manager, but am lucky to currently be experiencing an amazing programmer-turned-manager after years of awful managers.
  - pcote 11y ago
    "Choosing" is the keyword tricky phrase here. At my last job interview, the "what do you plan on doing 5 years from now?" question came up. After talking up things that interested me that could fill 5 years of time, he asked me about management aspirations. I confessed that I had no personal interest. He followed with something about how he wished it was "realistic" for himself to stay in non-managerial roles. Apparently, there are a lot of programmers out there that feel some kind of pressure to move into management at some point if they want to stay in the I.T. game.
    - pjmlp 11y ago
      Yes, even socially. Maybe some fellow countryman would speak otherwise, but in Portugal if after 40 you are not a manager of some sort, it is like you failed at it. It is also hard to avoid such situations when quite a few companies use senior developer, technical lead or technical architect as synonyms for team manager. So you only discovered what you really applied to, after being inside. After a certain age if you want to stay in development it is like dodging bullets.
- Ocerge 11y ago
  I feel exactly the same way. I used to enjoy programming in college, but now it's slowly turning in to an endless grind of new projects. Finish one, in comes another. I don't know if it's just me or my company, but I am definitely burned out and wouldn't mind some people managing for once. But then again, Carmack is an incredible man and engineer; I wouldn't be shocked if he's never burned out in his life.
  - rifung 11y ago
    To be fair I don't think it's fair to compare yourself to him in terms of being burned out. I'm sure he's wealthy and famous enough to get to work on whatever he wants to, whereas most people have to work for a living. I imagine if you got to program anything you wanted and only when you wanted, you wouldn't feel as burned out either. Carmack is definitely awesome, but I really don't think his awesomeness is what stops him from getting burned out, and more importantly I seriously doubt your getting burned out implies your lack of awesomeness.
    - Ocerge 11y ago
      Fair enough. Now that you mention it, if I got to work on whatever I wanted, I absolutely would be happy. Just gotta make time after work to reacquaint myself with projects that I find interesting :)
    - whitegrape 11y ago
      You don't need wealth and fame to work on what you want. John Carmack started out with neither but he's always had one thing to go along with his above average smarts and focus/productivity: an unwillingness to compromise on what matters. There were plenty of times in his early career where he challenged management and won (because management realized how valuable he was) but he was fully prepared to take the loss. Better to work as a pizza cook while furiously coding interesting graphics problems and games at night than bow to management's demands to patent something like side-scrolling technology on a PC. If you don't think it's some dimension of his awesomeness that keeps him from getting burned out, what do you think it is? The environment of getting to work on what he wants? Lots of people have that but still burn out, that can't be the only thing. Edit: I do agree with your underlying idea though that you don't need to be as awesome as Carmack to get the same benefits in terms of being highly productive without burning out. Your output will be scaled down accordingly to how much less awesome you are than he is, but it should be possible, even if very difficult, to transform oneself into a focused, disciplined, productive, and happy worker, even if it's very mysterious and individual-specific how to actually do that.
doctorpangloss 11y ago
It's a little disappointing he had to go out and criticize how "media people" used "Unity" to do these "simple things that game engines are total overkill for." He was talking about the last VR conference, where artists, non-programmers, etc. were showing their relatively straightforward panoramic stills and videos with an Oculus powered by a Unity app. That mentality sort of bodes poorly for Oculus. Of all things to say, why does he have to open with, essentially, 'The people who are actually getting things done and most excited about my platform are doing things wrong. I'm going to tell them they're doing things wrong, and then I, who haven't released a game people wanted to play in years, will show them how they should be doing things.' It's the opposite of inspirational. I know he's a phenomenal programmer and all. But he's such a blowhard. There are lots of blowhards behind all sorts of platforms, but usually those platforms have so much momentum that the platforms grow in spite of the blowhards, not because of them. Nobody is using Oculus. Facebook really nervous to specify the number that were sold. [0] And this guy right here isn't helping. And before you downvote me into oblivion, I'm mostly commenting on his condescension. VRScript will be useful to someone, like many tools out there, and I'm glad he's working on it. But his language like "media people" isn't so easily ignored as an advocate for the platform and a representative of the very best of engineering. If you're at Facebook in charge of this stuff, you should take a close look at this sort of rhetoric. [0] https://www.dropbox.com/s/s1fo7069mbokcc0/Screenshot%202016-01-27%2019.30.25.png?dl=0&preview=Screenshot+2016-01-27+19.30.25.png https://www.dropbox.com/s/s1fo7069mbokcc0/Screenshot%202016-...
- deleted 11y ago
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- ticklemyelmo 11y ago
  "why does he have to open with, essentially, 'The people who are actually getting things done and most excited about my platform are doing things wrong. I'm going to tell them they're doing things wrong" He's acknowledging that these people had to do things wrong, at least in the sense that they had climb a steep learning curve and deploy a heavyweight system, because they basically had no other choice. He's describing the gap that he saw that motivated what he demonstrated. Those artists aren't going to be offended that he attacked their deep love of Unity, they're going to be happy that they have an alternative that suits their needs.
AdmiralAsshat 11y ago
John Carmack, the man arguably responsible for Windows' popularity as the "gaming" OS, uses a Mac? I guess I shouldn't be surprised given that id used to write their software on NeXT computers, but still... EDIT: Since the downvotes seem to assume I am leveling a criticism at him, this is genuine surprise, not flame-baiting.
- moogleii 11y ago
  When you're engineering at that level, you probably aren't a fanboy, and more likely to be a rational engineer. He's been on record a number of times extolling the iPhone's architecture for gaming. Lots of peeps at Google use Apple hardware. It's just hardware.
- lmedinas 11y ago
  He also did several clients for Linux (doom3, quake etc...)
  - pekk 11y ago
    That was many years ago, and he has since had only scathing words for the platform, as far as I know.
    - douche 11y ago
      Probably with good reason, far as graphics go... Drivers are a complete clusterfuck over there, and OpenGL is such a confusing mess compared to relatively clean DX9-11 APIs.
- pjmlp 11y ago
  Carmack was never responsible for Windows popularity as games OS. PCs were already popular for gaming with MS-DOS. Carmack only started to like DirectX around DX 9, by then dozen of Windows games were shipped using WinG and DirectX. What made Windows popular for games was Microsoft as platform owner payed attention to the wishes and needs of game developers.
kacy 11y ago
I <3 John Carmack. “you know my 11 year old son is programming in racket. my creative director is programming in racket. it doesn’t seem that ridiculously complicated for me.”
vessenes 11y ago
My daughter (age 10) has been programming in racket, and recently finished her first game. I was super, super psyched to show her this, and super bummed to read that it's been put off for some time now, with no news about launch; looks like Carmack has had other things on his plate recently. I hope that this gets launched; tying a scheme-type learner's language to VR output is "epic" (her words) for junior developers.
- vessenes 11y ago
  Update; he just told me he's been working on positional tracking for GearVR; probably more important right now for Oculus. But, I'm still bummed! I would love to mess around with this, and almost pulled the trigger on a GearVR headset after watching the demo. https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/696842361976926208 https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/696842361976926208
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zdam 11y ago
Here are some rkt files if you are interested. Key files are vr.rkt and remote.rkt What is needed is the netHMD apk but I've not been able to find it. https://github.com/jb55/vrscript-samples https://github.com/jb55/vrscript-samples

96 points by agronaut 11y ago

neals 11y ago

Here is a man thoroughly enjoying his work. I envy him, he just keeps on coding while I feel myself floating away to management.

GuiA 11y ago
A good manager enables happy programmers. We always need more good managers in the world; there is nothing shameful about choosing to head into management. Source: am a programmer, not a manager, but am lucky to currently be experiencing an amazing programmer-turned-manager after years of awful managers.
- pcote 11y ago
  "Choosing" is the keyword tricky phrase here. At my last job interview, the "what do you plan on doing 5 years from now?" question came up. After talking up things that interested me that could fill 5 years of time, he asked me about management aspirations. I confessed that I had no personal interest. He followed with something about how he wished it was "realistic" for himself to stay in non-managerial roles. Apparently, there are a lot of programmers out there that feel some kind of pressure to move into management at some point if they want to stay in the I.T. game.
  - pjmlp 11y ago
    Yes, even socially. Maybe some fellow countryman would speak otherwise, but in Portugal if after 40 you are not a manager of some sort, it is like you failed at it. It is also hard to avoid such situations when quite a few companies use senior developer, technical lead or technical architect as synonyms for team manager. So you only discovered what you really applied to, after being inside. After a certain age if you want to stay in development it is like dodging bullets.
Ocerge 11y ago
I feel exactly the same way. I used to enjoy programming in college, but now it's slowly turning in to an endless grind of new projects. Finish one, in comes another. I don't know if it's just me or my company, but I am definitely burned out and wouldn't mind some people managing for once. But then again, Carmack is an incredible man and engineer; I wouldn't be shocked if he's never burned out in his life.
- rifung 11y ago
  To be fair I don't think it's fair to compare yourself to him in terms of being burned out. I'm sure he's wealthy and famous enough to get to work on whatever he wants to, whereas most people have to work for a living. I imagine if you got to program anything you wanted and only when you wanted, you wouldn't feel as burned out either. Carmack is definitely awesome, but I really don't think his awesomeness is what stops him from getting burned out, and more importantly I seriously doubt your getting burned out implies your lack of awesomeness.
  - Ocerge 11y ago
    Fair enough. Now that you mention it, if I got to work on whatever I wanted, I absolutely would be happy. Just gotta make time after work to reacquaint myself with projects that I find interesting :)
  - whitegrape 11y ago
    You don't need wealth and fame to work on what you want. John Carmack started out with neither but he's always had one thing to go along with his above average smarts and focus/productivity: an unwillingness to compromise on what matters. There were plenty of times in his early career where he challenged management and won (because management realized how valuable he was) but he was fully prepared to take the loss. Better to work as a pizza cook while furiously coding interesting graphics problems and games at night than bow to management's demands to patent something like side-scrolling technology on a PC. If you don't think it's some dimension of his awesomeness that keeps him from getting burned out, what do you think it is? The environment of getting to work on what he wants? Lots of people have that but still burn out, that can't be the only thing. Edit: I do agree with your underlying idea though that you don't need to be as awesome as Carmack to get the same benefits in terms of being highly productive without burning out. Your output will be scaled down accordingly to how much less awesome you are than he is, but it should be possible, even if very difficult, to transform oneself into a focused, disciplined, productive, and happy worker, even if it's very mysterious and individual-specific how to actually do that.

doctorpangloss 11y ago

It's a little disappointing he had to go out and criticize how "media people" used "Unity" to do these "simple things that game engines are total overkill for." He was talking about the last VR conference, where artists, non-programmers, etc. were showing their relatively straightforward panoramic stills and videos with an Oculus powered by a Unity app. That mentality sort of bodes poorly for Oculus. Of all things to say, why does he have to open with, essentially, 'The people who are actually getting things done and most excited about my platform are doing things wrong. I'm going to tell them they're doing things wrong, and then I, who haven't released a game people wanted to play in years, will show them how they should be doing things.' It's the opposite of inspirational. I know he's a phenomenal programmer and all. But he's such a blowhard. There are lots of blowhards behind all sorts of platforms, but usually those platforms have so much momentum that the platforms grow in spite of the blowhards, not because of them. Nobody is using Oculus. Facebook really nervous to specify the number that were sold. [0] And this guy right here isn't helping. And before you downvote me into oblivion, I'm mostly commenting on his condescension. VRScript will be useful to someone, like many tools out there, and I'm glad he's working on it. But his language like "media people" isn't so easily ignored as an advocate for the platform and a representative of the very best of engineering. If you're at Facebook in charge of this stuff, you should take a close look at this sort of rhetoric. [0] https://www.dropbox.com/s/s1fo7069mbokcc0/Screenshot%202016-01-27%2019.30.25.png?dl=0&preview=Screenshot+2016-01-27+19.30.25.png https://www.dropbox.com/s/s1fo7069mbokcc0/Screenshot%202016-...

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ticklemyelmo 11y ago
"why does he have to open with, essentially, 'The people who are actually getting things done and most excited about my platform are doing things wrong. I'm going to tell them they're doing things wrong" He's acknowledging that these people had to do things wrong, at least in the sense that they had climb a steep learning curve and deploy a heavyweight system, because they basically had no other choice. He's describing the gap that he saw that motivated what he demonstrated. Those artists aren't going to be offended that he attacked their deep love of Unity, they're going to be happy that they have an alternative that suits their needs.

AdmiralAsshat 11y ago

John Carmack, the man arguably responsible for Windows' popularity as the "gaming" OS, uses a Mac? I guess I shouldn't be surprised given that id used to write their software on NeXT computers, but still... EDIT: Since the downvotes seem to assume I am leveling a criticism at him, this is genuine surprise, not flame-baiting.

moogleii 11y ago
When you're engineering at that level, you probably aren't a fanboy, and more likely to be a rational engineer. He's been on record a number of times extolling the iPhone's architecture for gaming. Lots of peeps at Google use Apple hardware. It's just hardware.
lmedinas 11y ago
He also did several clients for Linux (doom3, quake etc...)
- pekk 11y ago
  That was many years ago, and he has since had only scathing words for the platform, as far as I know.
  - douche 11y ago
    Probably with good reason, far as graphics go... Drivers are a complete clusterfuck over there, and OpenGL is such a confusing mess compared to relatively clean DX9-11 APIs.
pjmlp 11y ago
Carmack was never responsible for Windows popularity as games OS. PCs were already popular for gaming with MS-DOS. Carmack only started to like DirectX around DX 9, by then dozen of Windows games were shipped using WinG and DirectX. What made Windows popular for games was Microsoft as platform owner payed attention to the wishes and needs of game developers.

kacy 11y ago

I <3 John Carmack. “you know my 11 year old son is programming in racket. my creative director is programming in racket. it doesn’t seem that ridiculously complicated for me.”

vessenes 11y ago

My daughter (age 10) has been programming in racket, and recently finished her first game. I was super, super psyched to show her this, and super bummed to read that it's been put off for some time now, with no news about launch; looks like Carmack has had other things on his plate recently. I hope that this gets launched; tying a scheme-type learner's language to VR output is "epic" (her words) for junior developers.

vessenes 11y ago
Update; he just told me he's been working on positional tracking for GearVR; probably more important right now for Oculus. But, I'm still bummed! I would love to mess around with this, and almost pulled the trigger on a GearVR headset after watching the demo. https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/696842361976926208 https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/696842361976926208

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zdam 11y ago

Here are some rkt files if you are interested. Key files are vr.rkt and remote.rkt What is needed is the netHMD apk but I've not been able to find it. https://github.com/jb55/vrscript-samples https://github.com/jb55/vrscript-samples