Day 39: Node.js

Fundamentals and OOP are done and now we're moving onto Node.js, or Nodejs as real developers call it (you'll get laughed at if you mention the 'dot' part). Node.js is a runtime environment for server-side application, a definition that I don't get but I've been using for the last half of the year. Before Nodes we had to run our javascript programs on our HTML browser but with this we can skip that part and run it on the terminal. My cousin had set up Nodes on my computer early on but I had forgotten what he told me about it until now. It makes it easier to run my javascript work.

This entire week VT has been pushing me to get started on my final MEAN stack project that won't be due until next month. I've been debating what it should be. Originally I had thought about an educational App but I felt like that wouldn't be good enough as I saw the more creative stuff others the previous class had done. During the Nodes lecture I started thinking back to my previous job at the startup and that one weekend where I participated in a game-themed hackathon. My group used a javascript framework called Cocos2d to create a simple game. They did most of the work cause I wasn't able to figure out how the framework operates but the thought of it lingered and I told myself that I'd make time in the future to properly teach myself Cocos2d. Javascript is the main language of this stack so why not use this opportunity to correctly learn the framework. So I asked the instructor if that would be a workable idea and he said yes. 

Lunch came and we went out as a group to Smoking Pig along with Michael Choi, one of the founders of Coding Dojo. All throughout lunch I kept thinking about Cocos2d and as soon as we got back I got to researching it. It was a little easier to understand it this time after many more hours of programming. I neglected my Nodes assignment and now I'm behind again. Fortunately I'll be here this weekend. 

Right now I need to run an errand. It appears I owe RS' friend a new blanket.