[Tutor] Exercise suggestions

Sat Jan 22 23:35:36 CET 2011

Okay, here's another one.  I started this geez...30 years ago?  On a Texas Instruments 99/4A computer.  I've never gotten around to doing anything further with the idea.

It was a game called "Piledriver".  The idea was that in a distant future, energy demands had become so great that there were all these competing energy companies running nuclear reactors to generate power.  The reactors were run by human brains hardwired into the control systems, i.e. "Atomic Pile", or "Piledrivers"  (hey, I was 19 when I thought of this, okay?)

The player is, of course, one of these "piledrivers".  The idea was that they started with a basic nuclear generator set up, providing power to a certain area of a city, at a certain cost.  They had to take the profits from their efforts and build an "energy empire".  They had to deal with things like installing and maintaining transmission lines, additional power generating capability, etc.  They had to fund day to day expenses, pay for security forces, which served several purposes, to keep any "unauthorized persons" from stealing their fuel either for competitors or perhaps for terrorists wanting to build bombs, etc., or environmentalists wanting to shut down your evil, earth threatening facility... The security forces also act to prevent any other industrial espionage from competitors, terrorists, or over zealous environmental groups.

Also funded were your own espionage agents to do the same to competitors, infiltrate militant environmental groups, get blackmail material on politicians that could help/hurt your business, etc  There would be  R & D specialists who would periodically introduce new technologies to increase the efficiency or safety of the nuclear generators. (I had this sort of random name generator I made for the scientists creations, that would spit out things like "Your R & D department have created the hypertronic whatchamacallit, which increases your reactor efficiency by .02%", or somesuch.

You had to control the rate you charged customers for your energy.  Too much and they might switch to a competitor.  Too little and you couldn't afford to pay your security guys, PR department (advertising...or there to put a "spin" on things in case there was some sort of industrial "incident" at your facility), or R&D department.  You paid for advertising, public service stuff and other PR to keep the environmentalists of your back.

You could also do things like fund lobbyists or bribe politicians to get preferential treatment from the government.

Bad things could happen, like faulty equipment creating an "incident", or perhaps a competitor manages to infiltrate a mole into your R&D, PR, or Security forces.  You might end up with a horde of angry environmentalists at your gates, complete with TV crews, etc, and have to deal with that (causing energy subscribers to leave for competitors, or government fines, etc.)

My original idea also allowed for some hands on stuff.  There would be these little maintenance bots that you'd "drive" around the facility, looking for things like faulty equipment, or sabotage by competitors or terrorists...or even environmentalists.

...anyway, you get the idea.  Perhaps a lame idea in the context of today's 3D graphical games,  but if properly implemented...maybe it would be fun.

--- On Sat, 1/22/11, michael scott <jigenbakuda at yahoo.com> wrote:

From: michael scott <jigenbakuda at yahoo.com>
Subject: [Tutor] Exercise suggestions
To: tutor at python.org
Date: Saturday, January 22, 2011, 11:56 AM

I am new to programming, I intend to get an entry level job programming next year (or a little bit longer). I am switching fields and not going to college, but kinda "self teaching" myself through various methods. I currently understand concepts in programming in python up to classes (like I understand how to make objects, I understand inheritance, etc...), and I have experimented with building guis in Tkinter,  but I'm finding that I understand concepts, but have no real way to implement them.

So now my problem emerges... can anyone give me suggestions of exercises I should do to help improve  my knowledge of what I can "actually" do with the concepts I have.

My main goal is to get to the point where I can assist in fixing bugs in open source programs (I'll be learning
 C++ in a couple months as well), but when I look at bugs / source code of larger programs, I am just so blown away at how little I understand. So I need to find a way to bridge the gap between my current level and the level needed to contribute to open source programs. A lofty goal I understand, but it is my goal. And I am very dedicated to reaching it.

Anyways, given my situation, do you good people have any suggestions for me. I don't need a person walking me through it, a simple, "build a program that asks a user to give you a name and create permutations of it" is great. Of course that example is elementary, but that is the gist of the responses I'm looking for. I just have no idea of what kind of programs to build, my ignorance is holding me back in my opinion.

Any response is welcomed, but I do ask if you are critical of me, please offer a method for me to improve the deficiency / deficiencies  I have. Thank you so much for
 reading my inquiry :)
 What is it about you... that intrigues me so?

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