It’s easy to just lounge in front of the tv when you don’t have any projects to work on. It’s easy to sleep all weekend and to let blog ideas fade away. Getting started is the hardest part, though, and maybe if I can do that, it’ll make me that much more productive.
Step one: Come up with an idea
This was a project I was interested in doing while studying for Computer Architecture. It’s a simple web application that takes a MIPS instruction in machine code and then displays it in assembly code with details on the conversion. Honestly, the idea originated a semester earlier while learning the LC-3 toy language, and expanding the project to handle multiple languages is a possible future enhancement.
Step Two: Come up with a plan
The main reason I never really got started on this project before is because I always started with the architecture. I drew out diagrams of class hierarchies and debated the pros and cons of every possible design decision but never got to the coding part. To avoid this problem, this time I’m going with a pure incremental development approach and only a general overview of the desired end product.
As far as a technology stack, I’m using PHP mainly as a language refresher along with Git for my repository.
Step 3: Set up a repository
Subversion is my tried-and-true, so this is an opportunity to try another popular version control system that’s new to me. Fortunately, git has super easy set-up and hosting on github is free for open-source projects.
As everything is flif to me, you can find this project under the name Flif Risc. For now, it’s just an almost empty README, but it’s a start for things to come.