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Comment by nirvana | Hacker News Reader

When I was 14, you couldn't just go buy a "personal computer", as the minicomputer revolution was underway. So, I had to build my own computer... and I did. (I think I started at 13, and finished at 15).

When I say, I built my computer, I mean I designed a PCB, laid it out, etched it, assembled it, then needed to build a display board to output to a TV, which was another several months of design, etc. And when I had all that... then I had to start writing some sort of software for it! (EG: I had to write software, build an EPROM programmer (because they were expensive) burn EPROMS ..... all to get to the point where I could start working on making an implementation of BASIC!

So, when people complain that "kids can't hack on iPhones" ... well, I think its silly. You buy a Mac and you get a fantastic IDE and development platform for free, etc.

To the OP: Congrats on making your game! It looks very professional. Keep at it!

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That is remarkable, yet the thread somehow more and more resembles this nice Monty Python's sketch: http://youtu.be/Xe1a1wHxTyo

Monty Python ? In my days, we were happy watching 'At last the 1948 show !'

This is one of my favorite Python sketches.

Oh the day I made spectrum joystick interface all on my own as a kid! I enjoyed that more than playing games subsequently. OP enjoy being a kid, the more you learn, the less your thinking is unbounded! Never forget that.

This deserves more attention. It's easy, as a kid, to crack doors open that would take a tremendous amount of effort as an adult.

I wish I was you, then ;(

Having to build a computer (with your definition of building, of course) as a young kid... God, that's the only Heaven I want. After those two years you can send me to Hell.

Why, when I was a young programmer we had to write the code in the snow with our pee, and a compiler was just a word for the pilot of the hovering dirigible that read the instructions and passed them to the ALU, which was another fellow with an abacus. They would wrap the results around a rock, and drop it on my house when the program would exit. We had to walk uphill...

"You buy a Mac and you get a fantastic IDE and development platform for free, etc."

Buy a Mac to hack on iPhone? I don't think that any IDE is so costly if you develop on any other phone.

Just for reference, a quick search reveals that MS VisualStudio can be purchased "from £502" (UK) and a new Mac mini starts at £499.

Eclipse and android SDK?

Of course. The comment was "I don't think that any IDE is so costly if you develop on any other phone".

That said, I'd happily pay £500 to not have to use Eclipse, but each to their own.

> That said, I'd happily pay £500 to not have to use Eclipse, but each to their own.

You must have gotten a lot of pocket money when you were 14, then.

Or you use Visual Studio Express C# which is free. Visual Studio (payed) combines all tools, all languages together and works with git, sourcesafe and many, many things more.

Or if you're a startup, you can receive all Windows stuff for free ;) (so you don't have to pay)

That's interesting! How can you get all the visual studio for free if you are a start up?

I think he's referring to the BizSpark program: http://www.microsoft.com/bizspark/

Thank you.

Woz? Is that you?

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