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Quick and simple sprite sheet packer source
For some time now, I've started moving away from monolithic and complex GUI tools in favour of more streamlined command line interfaces, generally using text based inputs like JSON or YAML.While there...
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An introduction to dithering images
When you reduce the number of colours in an image, it's often hard to get a 1:1 match, and so typically you can expect to see banding in an image - areas of unbroken solid colours where once multiple...
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Dithering an image using the Floyd‑Steinberg algorithm in C#
In my previous introductory post, I briefly described the concept of dithering an image. In this article, I will describe how to dither an image in C# using the Floyd–Steinberg algorithm.The Demo...
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Dithering an image using the Burkes algorithm in C#
In my previous post, I described how to dither an image in C# using the Floyd‑Steinberg algorithm. Continuing this theme, this post will cover the Burkes algorithm.I will be using the same...
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Even more algorithms for dithering images using C#
Although I should really be working on adding the dithering algorithms into Gif Animator, I thought it would be useful to expand the repertoire of algorithms available for use with it and the other...
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A brief look at code analysis with NDepend
If you're a developer, you're probably familiar with various tenets of your craft, such as "naming things is hard" and "every non trivial program has at least one bug". The latter example is one of the...
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Sending SMS messages with Twilio
Last week I attended the NEBytes technology user group for the first time. Despite the fact I didn't actually say more than two words (speaking to a real live human is only marginally easier than...
View ArticleWorking around System.ArgumentException: Only TrueType fonts are supported....
One of the exceptions I see with a reasonable frequency (usually in Gif Animator) is Only TrueType fonts are supported. This is not a TrueType font.System.ArgumentException: Only TrueType fonts are...
View ArticleTargeting multiple versions of the .NET Framework from the same project
The new exception management library I've been working on was originally targeted for .NET 4.6, changing to .NET 4.5.2 when I found that Azure websites don't support 4.6 yet. Regardless of 4.5 or 4.6,...
View ArticleWorking around "Cannot use JSX unless the '--jsx' flag is provided." using...
I've been using the utterly awesome ReactJS for a few weeks now. At the same time I started using React, I also switched to using TypeScript to work with JavaScript, due to it's type safety and less...
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Reading Adobe Swatch Exchange (ase) files using C#
Previously I wrote how to read and write files using the Photoshop Color Swatch file format. In this article mini-series, I'm now going to take a belated look at Adobe's Swatch Exchange file format and...
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Writing Adobe Swatch Exchange (ase) files using C#
In my last post, I described how to read Adobe Swatch Exchange files using C#. Now I'm going to update that sample program to save ase files as well as load them.Writing big endian valuesI covered the...
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Rotating an array using C#
I've recently been working on a number of small test programs for the different sections which make up a game I'm planning on writing. One of these test systems involved a series of polyominoes which I...
View ArticleTools we use - 2015 edition
Happy New Year! It's almost becoming a tradition now to list all of the development tools and bits that I've been using over the past year, to see how things are changing. 2015 wasn't the best of years...
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Reading and writing farbfeld images using C#
Normally when I load textures in OpenGL, I have a PNG file which I load into a System.Drawing.Bitmap and from there I pull out the bytes and pass to glTexImage2D. It works, but seems a bit silly having...
View ArticleGenerating code using T4 templates
Recently I was updating a library that contains two keyed collection classes. These collections aren't the usual run-of-the-mill collections as they need to be able to support duplicate keys. Normally...
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SQL Woes - Mismatched parameter types in stored procedures
We had a report of crashes occurring for certain users when accessing a system. From the stack data in the production logs, a timeout was occurring when running a specific stored procedure. This...
View ArticleImplementing events more efficiently in .NET applications
One of the things that frequently annoys me about third party controls (including those built into the .NET Framework) are properties that either aren't virtual, or don't have corresponding change...
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Adding keyboard accelerators and visual cues to a WinForms control
.syntax {max-height: 25em;}Some weeks ago I was trying to make parts of WebCopy's UI a little bit simpler via the expedient of hiding some of the more advanced (and consequently less used) options....
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Creating and restoring bacpac files without using a GUI
Almost all databases I use are SQL Server databases. They are created with hand written SQL scripts and upgraded with hand written SQL scripts - it is very rare I'll use SQL Server Management Studio's...
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