Víctor Caveda Blog

The Art Of Start

caveda — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 12:30:02 +0000

By Guy Kawasaki

This is an entrepreneurship guide that explains what it takes to transform an idea into a succesful startup company. The book describes the different difficulties any startup has to deal with. It tackles subjects such as: the business plan, the bootstrapping stage, funding,… We could say that it focuses mainly on IT companies although the general principles are valid for almost any company. The book is easy-to-read, does not ramble and is peppered with a pinch of entrepreneurial philosophy which is always encouraging when you’re about to choose the red-pill. I found particularly interesting the chapter about raising capital….valuable advice from someone who lives in the Valley and knows very well what it’s all about.

There are hundreds of books about running a business. I chose this one basically for the author: Guy Kawasaki. I first knew him when I read the foreword of Presentation Zen, and I thought that a guy that can write a so awesome introduction, must have lots of smart things to say.

To sum up, the book is good and sometimes brilliant. It’s not overly optimistic which is always welcome; can’t bear those stupid books that make you believe everything is possible if you try it, when we all know it doesn’t work that way.

This is a talk by Guy Kawasaki at Stanford University:

You can watch the rest of the videos here.

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Riptide GP: An Android Game Postmortem

caveda — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 18:44:22 +0000

The website Gamasutra frequently publishes articles where game creators talk about the development process of a game. These papers are called Postmortem because they are written once the game’s been finished/released and that’s precisely what it makes them so so valuable. They are no just about “how brilliant we are”, on the contrary, Postmortems usually focus on mistakes and lessons learned.

Although most of them may be considered a must-read, I’ve found particularly interesting the one about Riptide GP where the guys of Vector Unit describe the process of porting a 360 xBox game (Hydro Thunder Hurricane) to the Tegra 2 platform. Hot topics such as funding, monetization and piracy are also addressed in the write-up . Definitely a good read!

Postmortem: Vector Unit’s Riptide GP

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Android: Finding Memory Leaks

caveda — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 18:34:43 +0000

Recently while I was working on the next version of Archer Master, I’ve had to roll up my sleeves and find a memory leak. By and large, a memory leak in one’s application is frequently a synonym for having painful time, no matter which language you’re coding in. I have experience in finding leaks in the non-managed languages such as C/C++ but this was my very first time with a managed language (Java). In my case, the leak was caused by a lost strong-reference to a LinearLayout used to hold advertising, so each time a level was played, the entire activity remained in memory and wasn’t collected. As a result, after playing several levels (the number depended upon the particular device), a OOM exception raised and the game crashed.

It’d have been virtually impossible to find the leak without a tool like MAT. Moreover, a good understanding of the different types of references (strong, weak, soft…) and the concept of Dominator Tree also help.

When I’ve got a little more time I’ll write about the whole process I went thru (if anyone is really interested please let me know)… but meanwhile, this is an invaluable resource if you find yourself in a similar situation and don’t know how to start:

Good luck with your leaks!

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Archer Master weekly report – Week #2

caveda — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 17:15:53 +0000

I’ve published the weekly Archer Master report on Quoders website. The following chart shows downloads per day:

More? Here.

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Quoders and Archer Master

caveda — Sun, 17 Jul 2011 10:21:27 +0000

It’s been a long time since my last post and this time there’s a good reason for it I’ve been working hard to release the first version of Archer Master, an archery game for Android. Archer Master is free, so give it a try!

Moreover, I’ve co-founded a new development studio named Quoders.

Hopefully, this is the beginning of something great…

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Dordogne and Cádiz

caveda — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 11:26:24 +0000

Holidays finished . This year we’ve been travelling by car around the beautiful region of Dordogne (France). In our road-trip we met great friends and visited many small charming villages like Sarlat, Brantome, Perigueux… Take a look at the following Picasa gallery to check it out. You’ll want to go!

Previously (early September), we were visiting the South of Spain (this time we chose Cádiz region). Thanks to the good weather, we could confirm that the sunlight makes Cádiz different from anywhere else we’ve ever been. And we also realized that Almadraba tuna is one of the most delicious fish you can taste.

Now it’s time to back to work. Memories remain…

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InnovaEmprende: Conferencia de Axel Serena

caveda — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 20:57:53 +0000

El pasado martes 21 de Septiembre tuve el placer de asistir a una conferencia de Axel Serena organizada por NABUNBU Digital Business y Lan Ekinzta dentro del programa InnovaEmprende del País Vasco. Axel Serena tiene un impresionante currículum en el sector IT en España y la conferencia fue muy divertida y didáctica.

Básicamente se centró en explicar su faceta de Business Angel (concepto que para mí era un misterio hasta ese momento) y los criterios para seleccionar proyectos a financiar. Adicionalmente dió un repaso a los sectores online que más futuro les augura de aquí a 3-5 años: Juegos para Facebook, Redes Sociales de nicho, Clasificados, Clubs de Compra, etc.

Sin duda no será el último evento de este tipo al que asista, ya que la parte de negocio es algo que a la gente técnica siempre se nos resiste De la conferencia me quedo con algunas reflexiones que me llamaron la atención:

Las ideas no valen nada, lo que tiene valor es la ejecución de esas ideas.
“Los Business Angels no financiamos sueños“.
¿Quieres ser Rico o ser Rey?

Por cierto, para los que os queráis acercar por Bilbao, el 19 y 20 de octubre tiene lugar en el BEC el Emprende2010 cuyo programa está repleto de conferencias y charlas más que interesantes.

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How to market your (mobile) app

caveda — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 20:44:04 +0000

Due to the fact that I’m currently engadged in an Android project, seemed to me worthwhile to take a look at how other people are making money out there. I’ve found quite useful this presentation that shows a real business case of a mobile application for IPhone. So, no matter what your target market is, there’s always a lesson to learn when it comes to mobile app business.

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My New Nexus

caveda — Tue, 11 May 2010 20:59:23 +0000

It’s been six weeks waiting for the Nexus One and finally it’s here. The N1 runs smoothly and fast a Cyanogen ROM. Even though I’m using the same 3G connection (vodafone ES), now browsing the web is a delightful experience compared with HTC Magic. The battery lasts almost a couple of days with a normal use (email, web, rss, etc).

The parcel didn’t include any sort of manual except a couple of sheets with tips and tricks.

Here you can see more pictures.

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It’s been six weeks waiting for the Nexus One and finally it’s here. The phone runs smooth and fast even using the same 3G connection (vodafone ES), now browsing the web is a delightful experience compared with HTC Magic. The battery lasts almost a couple of days running a Cyanogen ROM.

The parcel didn’t include any manual except a couple of sheets explaining tips and tricks. Here you can see some pictures.

Developing Android Apps with Java Part 2

caveda — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 18:42:50 +0000

It’s been announced the second part of the course “Developing Android Apps with Java” by O’Reilly. It will start in May 18th and it’s going to consist of six sessions in which a Twitter client app for Android will be developed. Interested? You can register for free at the course home page. No excuses to learn Android Programming

I wrote a review of the first part of the course in this post.

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