The True American: Murder and Mercy in Texas


Book Description

Describes how a Bangladeshi immigrant, shot in the Dallas mini mart where he worked in the days after September 11 in a revenge crime, forgave his assailant and petitioned the state of Texas to spare his attacker the death penalty.




Serialize


Book Description

Examines how designers approach the creation of a range of designs with a recognisable and continual element.




The Diezmo


Book Description

This novel of young men seeking glory in the Republic of Texas is “a surprisingly absorbing rendition of a terrible episode in American history” (The Oregonian). The Diezmo tells the incredible story of the Mier Expedition, one of the most absurd and tragic military adventures in the history of Texas—a country and a state, as Rick Bass writes, that was “born in blood.” In the early days of the Republic of Texas, two young men, wild for glory, impulsively volunteer for an expedition Sam Houston has ordered to patrol the Mexican border. But their dreams of triumph soon fade into prayers for survival, and all that is on their minds is getting home and having a cool drink of water. After being captured in a raid on the Mexican village of Mier, escaping, and being recaptured, the men of the expedition are punished with the terrible diezmo, in which one man in ten is randomly chosen to die. The survivors end up in the most dreaded prison in Mexico. There they become pawns in an international chess game to decide the fate of Texas, and with their hopes of release all but extinguished, they make one desperate, last-ditch effort to escape. “The best literary adventure story I've read since Legends of the Fall. Full of unusual history, exciting events, timely ideas, and stunning wilderness scenery . . . a wonderfully told novel of the human capacity for survival in the face of the very worst that war can do to us.” —Howard Frank Mosher, author of Points North “A vivid, graphic, harrowing tale of wild men and bad blood, a fable universal and timeless in its application.” —Kent Haruf, author of Plainsong “Terrific . . . powerful.” —Los Angeles Times




Mastering Data Serialization and Formats


Book Description

In this technologically interconnected world, data flows incessantly, traversing systems, applications, and platforms. The efficient exchange of this data is a core pillar in the architecture of modern software systems, and mastering data serialization and formats is essential for ensuring optimal communication and collaboration across the digital realm. "Mastering Data Serialization and Formats" delves deep into the intricacies of data serialization and various formats, serving as a comprehensive resource for both beginners and experienced professionals seeking to enhance their understanding of this critical subject. Whether you are a software developer, data engineer, or technology enthusiast, this book will empower you to harness the full potential of data serialization for your projects. Key Features: 1. Foundational Concepts: Lay the groundwork with a clear and concise explanation of what data serialization is, why it's important, and how it fits into the broader landscape of data management. 2. Exploration of Formats: Delve into the world of data formats, from well-known ones like JSON and XML to more specialized formats such as Protocol Buffers, Avro, and MessagePack. Understand the strengths, weaknesses, and best use cases for each format, enabling you to make informed decisions when selecting the most appropriate format for your specific needs. 3. Efficiency and Performance: Learn strategies to optimize data serialization for efficiency and performance. Discover techniques for reducing data size, enhancing data transmission speed, and minimizing resource consumption. 4. Cross-Language Communication: Grasp the intricacies of enabling seamless communication between applications written in different programming languages. Uncover the challenges and solutions for ensuring compatibility and interoperability across language barriers. 5. Real-World Use Cases: Gain insights into how various industries and domains leverage data serialization to solve complex challenges. From microservices architecture to IoT ecosystems, learn how serialization is pivotal in building robust and scalable systems. 6. Security and Compatibility: Explore best practices for securing serialized data and ensuring backward and forward compatibility. Understand the importance of versioning, schema evolution, and data validation to maintain the integrity of your data. 7. Hands-On Tutorials: Put theory into practice with hands-on tutorials that guide you through implementing data serialization in different programming languages. Develop practical skills that you can apply immediately to your projects. 8. Future Trends: Get a glimpse of the future of data serialization and formats. Stay up-to-date with emerging technologies and standards that are shaping the data landscape, such as GraphQL and Apache Arrow. In a world where data has become the lifeblood of innovation, mastering the art of data serialization and understanding various formats is a critical skill set for professionals across industries. Whether you're building web applications, designing APIs, working on microservices architecture, or creating IoT solutions, the ability to effectively exchange data is a differentiator that can elevate your projects from good to exceptional. "Mastering Data Serialization and Formats" is your roadmap to becoming fluent in the language of data exchange. Through comprehensive explanations, practical examples, and insightful case studies, this book equips you with the tools you need to conquer the challenges of data serialization and formats, unlocking new avenues for innovation and success. © 2023 Cybellium Ltd. All rights reserved. www.cybellium.com




Understanding Compression


Book Description

If you want to attract and retain users in the booming mobile services market, you need a quick-loading app that won’t churn through their data plans. The key is to compress multimedia and other data into smaller files, but finding the right method is tricky. This witty book helps you understand how data compression algorithms work—in theory and practice—so you can choose the best solution among all the available compression tools. With tables, diagrams, games, and as little math as possible, authors Colt McAnlis and Aleks Haecky neatly explain the fundamentals. Learn how compressed files are better, cheaper, and faster to distribute and consume, and how they’ll give you a competitive edge. Learn why compression has become crucial as data production continues to skyrocket Know your data, circumstances, and algorithm options when choosing compression tools Explore variable-length codes, statistical compression, arithmetic numerical coding, dictionary encodings, and context modeling Examine tradeoffs between file size and quality when choosing image compressors Learn ways to compress client- and server-generated data objects Meet the inventors and visionaries who created data compression algorithms




Serialization in Popular Culture


Book Description

From prime-time television shows and graphic novels to the development of computer game expansion packs, the recent explosion of popular serials has provoked renewed interest in the history and economics of serialization, as well as the impact of this cultural form on readers, viewers, and gamers. In this volume, contributors—literary scholars, media theorists, and specialists in comics, graphic novels, and digital culture—examine the economic, narratological, and social effects of serials from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century and offer some predictions of where the form will go from here.




JavaScript


Book Description

A revised and updated edition offers comprehensive coverage of ECMAScript 5 (the new JavaScript language standard) and also the new APIs introduced in HTML5, with chapters on functions and classes completely rewritten and updated to match current best practices and a new chapter on language extensions and subsets. Original.




Programming .NET Components


Book Description

'Programming .NET Components', second edition, updated to cover .NET 2.0., introduces the Microsoft .NET Framework for building components on Windows platforms. From its many lessons, tips, and guidelines, readers will learn how to use the .NET Framework to program reusable, maintainable, and robust components.




Game Physics Cookbook


Book Description

Discover over 100 easy-to-follow recipes to help you implement efficient game physics and collision detection in your games About This Book Get a comprehensive coverage of techniques to create high performance collision detection in games Learn the core mathematics concepts and physics involved in depicting collision detection for your games Get a hands-on experience of building a rigid body physics engine Who This Book Is For This book is for beginner to intermediate game developers. You don't need to have a formal education in games—you can be a hobbyist or indie developer who started making games with Unity 3D. What You Will Learn Implement fundamental maths so you can develop solid game physics Use matrices to encode linear transformations Know how to check geometric primitives for collisions Build a Physics engine that can create realistic rigid body behavior Understand advanced techniques, including the Separating Axis Theorem Create physically accurate collision reactions Explore spatial partitioning as an acceleration structure for collisions Resolve rigid body collisions between primitive shapes In Detail Physics is really important for game programmers who want to add realism and functionality to their games. Collision detection in particular is a problem that affects all game developers, regardless of the platform, engine, or toolkit they use. This book will teach you the concepts and formulas behind collision detection. You will also be taught how to build a simple physics engine, where Rigid Body physics is the main focus, and learn about intersection algorithms for primitive shapes. You'll begin by building a strong foundation in mathematics that will be used throughout the book. We'll guide you through implementing 2D and 3D primitives and show you how to perform effective collision tests for them. We then pivot to one of the harder areas of game development—collision detection and resolution. Further on, you will learn what a Physics engine is, how to set up a game window, and how to implement rendering. We'll explore advanced physics topics such as constraint solving. You'll also find out how to implement a rudimentary physics engine, which you can use to build an Angry Birds type of game or a more advanced game. By the end of the book, you will have implemented all primitive and some advanced collision tests, and you will be able to read on geometry and linear Algebra formulas to take forward to your own games! Style and approach Gain the necessary skills needed to build a Physics engine for your games through practical recipes, in an easy-to-read manner. Every topic explained in the book has clear, easy to understand code accompanying it.




C++ FAQs, Portable Documents


Book Description

In a concise and direct question-and-answer format, C++ FAQs, Second Edition brings you the most efficient solutions to more than four hundred of the practical programming challenges you face every day. Moderators of the on-line C++ FAQ at comp.lang.c++, Marshall Cline, Greg Lomow, and Mike Girou are familiar with C++ programmers' most pressing concerns. In this book, the authors concentrate on those issues most critical to the professional programmer's work, and they present more explanatory material and examples than is possible on-line. This book focuses on the effective use of C++, helping programmers avoid combining seemingly legal C++ constructs in incompatible ways. This second edition is completely up-to-date with the final ANSI/ISO C++ Standard. It covers some of the smaller syntax changes, such as "mutable"; more significant changes, such as RTTI and namespaces; and such major innovations as the C++ Standard Library, including the STL. In addition, this book discusses technologies such as Java, CORBA, COM/COM+, and ActiveX—and the relationship all of these have with C++. These new features and technologies are iconed to help you quickly find what is new and different in this edition. Each question-and-answer section contains an overview of the problem and solution, fuller explanations of concepts, directions for proper use of language features, guidelines for best practices and practices to avoid, and plenty of working, stand-alone examples. This edition is thoroughly cross-referenced and indexed for quick access. Get a value-added service! Try out all the examples from this book at www.codesaw.com. CodeSaw is a free online learning tool that allows you to experiment with live code from your book right in your browser.