Playdate

Playdate is an "indie" handheld console that is coming out soon.

It is yellow and has a cool crank on it, as well as a screen that only does black and white graphics.

The Playdate SDK isn't out yet, but the syntax is apparently pretty similar to LÖVE2D. 

I figure it won't take too much work to update the code once the actual SDK is available for downloading.

I'll whip up some quick little prototypes to get used to using just black and white graphics.

Just a quick prototype to get used to LÖVE2D syntax again.

I'm pretty happy with the movement of the snow, plus how it changes direction based on which way you're walking.

This turned out super weird and cool. I didn't know where it was going when I started it, but I like where it ended up.

Cool little spinner experiment. Was cool figuring out how to make the wheel spin since rotation is tricky in LÖVE2D.

I also made it so the mouse wheel rotates the wheel each direction. I'm guessing that's a good estimate for the physical crank. 

I also found a cool site that converts images to 1-bit, so the wheel looks pretty separated.

Just a little horizontal shooter prototype.

I reused the snow falling from the other prototype, but changed the direction.

I also made a pause menu to try making a simple little GUI for adjusting options.

Maybe I'll add shooting to the enemies, add more enemy types, and possibly other weapons or power-ups.

Decided to combine the different clocks into one single application.

1) Analog Clock

2) Binary Clock

3) Digital Clock

I'll keep elaborating on this one since I can see there being a demand for something like this.

Maybe I'll add reading hints, other types of clocks, an alarm system, other colors/gradients, etc.

This is still a work in progress.

I think it is coming along nicely though.

LÖVE2D is VERY tricky with handling coordinates and rotation. It took a TON of work (and crazy math) to make the bullets move, to make the enemies look at the player, and then to figure out the collision detection.

The spin attack was a happy accident since I forked the Spinner prototype and noticed the jet would still spin.

The classic game of Hangman!

This was a lot of fun to figure out, and I think the design turned out really clean. 

The "keyboard wheel" turned out nicer than I expected. It currently uses the mouse wheel for selection, but should be analogous for using the crank on the actual Playdate.

The screenshot function turned out cool too.

Wanted to try a minimalist version of Snake.

The initial idea was 1x1 sized snake, but you can't see the snake if it is that small.

I'm happy with the rotating fruits and how the snake body extends. I also like how the boxes that change your direction ended up.

I was spending too much time figuring out where I wanted this to go, so I'm leaving it as-is for now. I'll come back to it later.

Thought something like this would be fun with the crank. It can automatically rotate too.

I tested it with a .gif, and it worked well, but it is hard to convert images to 1-bit in bulk.

Started out as just trying to make some decent looking card movement, but settled on Draw 5 Poker since the rules aren't too complicated.

I really like the way this turned out. I could maybe add other card games and flesh out the menus, track stats like how many hands played, how many of each winning hand the player gets, and a cash system.

Pretty stoked about the Full House at the end of the video!

I've been using Python almost exclusively for the last 18 months or so. On it's own and paired with Flask, I've made many different web applications to assist in automating tasks, generating Excel spreadsheets and Outlook emails, parsing emails and PDF documents, creating APIs, and even Telegram bots.

Courses Taken on Udemy:

Complete Python 3 Masterclass Journey

While this page isn't comprehensive (since some tools are hosted on other Replit pages), this lists a good chunk of the tools I've developed to help automate and streamline multiple different processes at work.

Some of these tools have been complete game-changers in how my department works and have been a huge help in allowing us to handle the increased volume over the years.

https://docketing-tools.tylerdickson.repl.co/

This web application allows attorneys and paralegals to quickly grab their dockets without struggling with the built-in search on our docketing system. It allows limiting results by country, client, date range, and action.

This tool is now hosted internally so I'm unable to provide a link, but I assure you that it is pretty cool.

This tool is designed to quickly split a file wrapper from the USPTO's Private PAIR system by the PDF's bookmark sections. 

Saves an insane amount of time versus splitting manually.

This probably doesn't work anymore due to changes at the USPTO.

I made this for my wife to use at work.

It allows you to split a PDF into manually selected chunks of pages, merge separate PDFs into a single PDF, and combine JPG images into a single PDF. 

I also made this for my wife to use at work.

It allows you to batch add names and data from a spreadsheet to a PDF form, quickly generating hundreds of documents in lieu of manually creating each one.

This took me an hour or two to create, but it saved my wife probably 30+ hours of work and a lot of hand pain.

I have five years of experience using AutoHotkey. It was my first true foray into the world of programming, and it prompted me to check out other programming languages.

I had a TON of ideas about things to automate at work, but I didn't have a way to get them out of my head. I started out using VBA in Excel, but this was very limiting and it couldn't do too much. 

Once I discovered AHK, I finally had a way to get the ideas out into the world. I've developed dozens (maybe hundreds?) of different scripts and templates at this point. 

These scripts range from simple text replacement hotkeys, to utilizing API calls and parsing JSON into Excel spreadsheets, to batch emailers and batch file renamers, as well as tons of other awesome things.

AHK is a surprisingly powerful automation tool, and I owe all of my other programming interests to it for getting me started as a programmer.

Coming soon, maybe.

Many of the tools I've made are quite niche and are only significant to those that use them, but those who use them seem to enjoy them a lot.

Many people have told me that they would have quit their jobs years ago if my tools weren't available to use, so that seems like high praise.

What surprises me the most about AHK is how I keep finding new ways to use it, and how it continually ends up being the best tool for the job.