Introduce Yourself

[mtgrares]

Sometimes it is hard to keep people separate when all you can remember is a person's online username. I had the hardest time NOT confusing Dennis and Rob to begin with, since they were just names and I didn't know anything about them. So feel free to introduce yourself and say as much or little as your want.

Hi, I'm mtgrares the programmer than originally wrote MTG Forge and now I let other people do it because programming is hard, lol. I still write my blog and it is getting harder and harder writing about computer programming when I'm not doing it (that means that I need to program some more). Currently I own cookingbybob.com and I'm trying to make a very simple and free cooking recipe site. It will have just one table in the database and NO login screen or usernames.

I enjoy cartoons like the Simpsons, Batman, Teen Titans, Superman, Justice League and Samurai Jack. (You have to make sure to scope out the kids DVD section in the public library because sometimes they have cartoons too. I just found a ton of new cartoons DVDs at my city's main library.)

I like TV comedies like The Big Bang Theory. I'm half Leonard and half Sheldon.

I play piano and electric guitar.

And I need a job, yeah.

I'm 30 and still finding my place in the world. (The only difference between 20 and 30 is 10 years, you are still just as lost.)

So far I've written 90,000 words for my blog. (I keep all of my posts in a long Word file.)

And I play MTG Forge for an hour or two a day for a week and then I take a few weeks off. Magic is just a great game.

[zerker2000]

I'm Anton Dyudin, 14, Russian, and an apprentice forge programmer. For about a month and a half I devoted most of my free time to forge, which resulted in a bunch of new cards, some abstract inputting and X cost ideas I am going to expand on at some point, and Mana Pool and Mana Ability code Dennis still has problems merging. At school, I am rightfully treated as a full-fledged nerd: my favorite pastimes are reading, math, and computers. For reasons I cannot explain, I am drawn to ASCII and pixel art though I have not had much success at it; I am the proud user of a Hitachi M1200 that looks like it's older than I am. I am not much of a fan for music, and a total disaster at anything related to dancing. However, I still wound up in drama somehow . The End.

[silly freak]

My name is Clemens Koza, 17 and from vienna. I have found forge not a full two years ago, because not many people in my school play magic
though it's an IT school, i'm definitely the only java freak in my class. I regularly start new projects, and it's a good feeling to participate in a project that works

I haven't really looked at the core of forge, and work more at the surface. I guess there are not many that enjoy programming the GUI, so it's probably a good thing for me to do

I like reading the Magic novels, although i'm a little anachronistic. I started with timespiral, paused, and continued with odyssey before there came some spoilers

I listen to most kinds of music, except techno, and also do some ballroom dancing

it seems from the blog comments we have many french here. what about them?

[DennisBergkamp]

I'm 27, currently live and work in the US, but I'm originally from the Netherlands. I'm a big fan of football (soccer for you yanks ), hence my nickname - Dennis Bergkamp is kind of like a Michael Jordan of dutch soccer.
I think I started messing around with MTGForge's source code about a year ago... since then I've added a bunch of new cards and features, and I try to keep up with all the bugs that pop up (an impossible task, it seems ). I enjoy JAVA, but I program stuff in PHP for a living.

It's funny though, I'm not even really that big a fan of the game magic itself, I used to play the occasional game with friends but I think most of my magic playing was spent on Shandalar back in the day. Currently I spend a lot more time coding MTGForge than actually playing it although I do play a game or two per week.
In my free time I like to play video games (DotA with my friends in particular), bike around, play hockey/soccer or watch movies. I don't really watch TV, unless it's a soccer match Or the show Dexter, that's brilliant stuff.
I'm also a bit of a part-time magician, I love practicing card/coin/whatever tricks and once mastered, tricking the heck out of people.

I listen to just about anything as long as it isn't rap, country or hip hop.

I play the guitar.

Oh, I'm a terrible dancer too

[Rob Cashwalker]

My real name's close enough to Rob Cashwalker that I answer to both... Rob really is my first name.

I'm nearing 32, and have a family - 2 kids 6.5 girl and 3.9 boy. I live in New York City, but in the Long Island suburb called Queens. I hate the city, BTW... too crowded. Yet at the same time I don't like the country much - too distant between places of interest... the supermarket's a 20 minute drive, at 50 MPH... my supermarket's a 10 minute drive, at 30, with stoplights and traffic.

I've been a VB programmer most of my adult life, since about age 17. I went to college for Computer Engineering Technology. I work for a software company that provides software to the call center industry.
I also volunteer as a technical director for a community theater group, where I'm responsible for building sets, lighting design and sound engineering. I use my programming skills there too, I wrote a program to help with sound effect cues with playback through DirectSound.

I was never the smartest in class, because I don't like to apply myself, or do homework, so I would just get by, even though I know I'm pretty damn intelligent. Was always considered a nerd though, never did have a social life.

I started my online experience with Compuserve back in 1993, becoming an active participant in the Star Wars board of the SciFi Media Forum. When Compuserve dissolved into AOL, I got onto the REAL internet - dial-up Earthlink. Then when I moved out of the house with my soon to be wife, we got cable and I could never go back.

I like mostly Classic Rock and Electronica (kinda like techno to the uninformed) but can deal with anything others want to play on the stereo, unless it's country or hip hop... hey rap used be pretty good back in my day.
Through the theater, I run lights for a seasonal Battle of the Bands show the church youth group puts on. I'm exposed to a variety of music styles along the lines of Punk, Ska, Metal, and the like.
Can't dance either, but sure faked it for my wedding - my wife led me.

Magic came out when I was in high school and I didn't think it would amount to much.... I was dragged into it during Mirrodin by a friend who had just gotten back into it after quitting in 4th edition. I play in a few FNM's a year, and go to a couple pre-releases or release parties. I try to buy or otherwise acquire as much product as I can because I do like to keep current. I have been teaching my daughter how to play for a year now, with special cards I designed using Magic Set Editor.

I found MTGForge when Rares posted one of his blogs on StarCity somewhere around march of 2008.. I started playing it, fell in love with the idea of Magic solitaire. Then I was like, this is great.. but I need Overrun for my elf deck.... It already had Tromp the Domains, which was OK, because I could use Kodama's Reach to fetch singleton basics. When I started looking at the code, I was like "I could really clean things up if I could figure out a way to combine common card functionality." Before I figured out the mechanical keywords, I started off providing all the vanilla and french vanilla creatures that weren't already included. I also provided the landwalk change, because there was a simple canBlock routine that was easily modified.

[Chris H.]

I am 55 years old and I am an unemployed disabled house husband. I completed introductory classes In BASIC/Fortran/COBOL while in college. l started a class in Assembly and decided that I was not interested in writing on the metal, so to speak.

I started playing the real version of MTG shortly after Beta went out of print. There initially was a large group of people to play against at the local gaming store. Within two years the size of the group decreased to just me and the store owner. The store owner decide to close his store and he became a real estate agent. I burned out and sold my cards at the local comic book store.

The only TV I watch is the NFL and House. I like music from the 60s and the 70s. I am partial to the Apple Macintosh line of computers and wish they were easier to use. Installing Snow Leopard and configuring Eclipse has kept me busy the last several weeks.

My wife likes American Idol and other similar shows. I try to show an interest in order to be a good spouse. I have no talent for singing, music, art, drama, dancing or anything else … well I do a fair job of being an accomplished screw-up.

I got involved in the Forge project last year. I have tended to drift from one task to another and it is hard for me to predict what I will be doing in the future. While I have had a lot of fun making a contribution, I realize that the quality of my work product is sometimes lacking.

[apthaven]

Well apt are the initials of my name... haven is just an add-on to that.

I'm 19... from Asia, to be exact the Philippines. I wonder if there are other Asians here ?

Not a programmer, but I've been a fan of Magic for quite a while now. Still studying and unlike most of you I'm not a programmer... but I do love computers and anything thing pertaining to them.

My interests include my passion for music (used to play the piano), blogging (I do have a site where in I blog a real lot), internet, vide games like DotA, anime and manga, and mostly whatever grabs my attention, all the typical stuff for a kid my age. I used to play basketball but kinda stopped though, nonetheless I love the NBA. (Too bad Cleveland never won last year )

And as for Forge, I'll be glad to help out as much as I can

[mtgrares]

I didn't realize that this was such an international group of people. I live in the USA in Florida.

I basically wrote MTG Forge because getting online was a pain and I wasn't enjoying Magic Online much even when I was online. I always wanted to use Wrath of God and other rares but I just didn't want to invest money in it. Right now I have more time than money, so I invest time, programming time, into Magic.

I own a few Mirrodin starter decks but physically I've only played a few games of Magic when I was just learning the game and it was enough to hook me. At first I thought that all trading card games were as good as Magic but for whatever reason Magic just stands out as the best. (Maybe Magic just has the longest history and a very strong current following but who knows what really makes Magic so good?)

Later I was very impressed with the rules that Magic Online enforced so I figured if they could do it, I could do it to. And to some extent MTG Forge works very well.

[indicatie]

My real name is David, I'm from The Netherlands. I'm 33 and have a 4 month old son.
Indicatie (which means indication) was just a nickname I created for a mail address to sent some files to my work mail. It's now an easy to use name for any site, where there's a possibility of spam (first name Indi, last name Catie)
I'm the financial manager of the Amsterdam home care facility of the Salvation Army.
I started playing magic at the end of Beta. I was able to get my hands on 3 starter decks and 15 booster packs of that series (I got my first mox (just an Emerald) out of them.)
I have an almost complete set of magic at the moment. But since I only play casual multiplayer, I sold my most expensive cards (goodbye Moxen, Library of Alexandria, Mishra's Workhop, etc). I do own a Collector's Editio, though.
As for MTG Forge, someone in my playgroup showed it to me some months ago and I've been playing it ever since.

[mtgrares]

As for MTG Forge, someone in my playgroup showed it to me some months ago and I've been playing it ever since.

I'm glad that the news about MTG Forge is spreading. I presume most people hear about it online but I'm glad people also talk about it in meatspace (real life).

[slappysquirrel]

im MIke, i havent yet tried mtgforge though. just finished installing manalink from the other page here. sounds pretty fun actually though, i like that there's not a 2,000 card limit. im also about 30, unmarried, no kids, gotta crappy job, and yes im just as lost as i was when i was 20. well a lil less lost. play elec bass, was awesome at it, a true natural, but well, there's no one to play w/ here. live in FL, the music scene sux, they are all snobs, and most of them suck go figure.

anywayz, ill check out this version of magic the gathering on a pc stuff.

thanx for all your hard work btw

[frwololo]

I'm Erwan, will be 28 this year. I'm French but I live in Japan, so hi there apthaven, not really Asian but I guess you can count me as "half" . .

I installed MTGForge more than 2 years ago when I started working on my own project. My initial goal was to port Forge to the PSP, but seeing the code was in Java and extremely messy (although I wouldn't say that my code is "that much" better )I gave up. However MTGForge's pros and cons have been a great source of inspiration for the initial design of Wagic.

[mtgrares]

Well I'm glad that you started your own project. I'm sure you have learned alot (so did I).

[CatzPaw164]

Hello all!

My name is Sherri and I am 45 years old and disabled - so I have a lot of time on my hands - and live in Georgia, USA. My 27 year-old step-son recently visited and got me hooked on Magic. There is an Anime' shop close by where I try and attend FNM as often as possible. I'm usually the oldest one playing - the regulars just call me "mom".

I am an Apple Mac user and have been since the beginning of Apple. I was looking for a way to work on my MTG skills so I can keep up with the kids. Since I am a Mac user, MTG Online was out of the question - that and finances wouldn't permit two collections of MTG. So I did a web search and on page 35 of searching I ran across MTG Forge. I downloaded it...had some problems getting it running on my old Mac - the folks in the forum were great and I am up and running now and looking forward to playing as much as time permits.

I've done programming from almost the beginning of time - so after looking at the code here and getting myself familiar with the program, I hope to jump in and help with the project! It's GREAT to have an application like this available cross-platform! Good work and keep it up!

[Huggybaby]

So, you like cats and you were born in 64?

Welcome to the forum BTW, forge is sure attracting a lot of programmers, must be the java. It seems that there are few programmers adept at the graphics/user interface part of programming for some reason, almost regardless of which program it is.