ethanrdoesmc / ethanrdoesmcshowcase

What I've made

Hey, I'm Ethan.

I'm a computer science and foreign languages student halfway through my third year of college.

I feel at home in C languages. I know a moderate amount of Swift and just a little bit of everything else.

Right now my current "thing" is No Man's Sky Retro, a community around the older "classic" No Man's Sky versions.

My aim is to work on things that objectively make the world a better place to be alive in. I never want to make anything that takes us a step back, no matter how small, just for the sake of profit. My personal belief is that technology and language share a lot in common -- they are powerful weapons, yes, but carefully used, they can save lives and change the path we walk.

short bio

Bio

I've always been interested in making things on a computer, and in 2017 I stepped over the threshold into programming. I was self-taught and I made very little progress until early 2020. (Click on the Dawn repository to see that progress! It was localized into 17 different languages, by the way.)

I have a bit of a raw talent for reverse engineering that I've been turning into a skillset over the years. In early 2021 Beeper commissioned me to research and build an iMessage client/Matrix bridge, which I called Brooklyn. It's not what they use today, but it provided a lot of the foundational research. (That's quite the accomplishment for someone who learned what a return type was a year prior!)

In late 2021, a bit overwhelmed with depression and attending a college I couldn't really afford nor wanted to attend, I resorted to hobbyist development to keep myself afloat. KBPulse and TouchBarFun are the result -- pure reverse engineering of the MacBook keyboard backlight, and an implementation of the macOS menu bar in the Touch Bar! Disclaimer: it's not very... ahh... efficient.

I am now attending a state university. It's a lot cheaper and I'm a lot happier with the program and the university. As a result I've had less time for completely original, massive projects -- because I am actually doing my schoolwork now lol -- but I keep myself involved in whatever interests me. For that, see any repos committed to since August 2022.

the fun stuff

the fun stuff

• the music: alternative, indie/math/post rock, electronic, world
  • 65daysofstatic, ODESZA, Solar Fields
  • afterhours, Tom's Story, maybeshewill
  • keali'i reichel, pure heart, KODŌ
• the rig
  • ryzen 5 2600, rx 580, 2 ssds, 1 hdd, 4 fans
  • windows 11, macos 11
• the phones
  • iphone: 3g, (3x) 4, (3x) 4S, (2x) 5s, 5c, (2x) 6, (2x) SE, 7, and my daily driver 13 pro max