Many individuals are looking to break into a video game designing career, and it's no surprise. A $9 billion industry, the video game designing business has appeal to gamers and non-gamers alike. High salaries and high rates of job satisfaction are typical in the field.

In order to design video games, however, you need a certain skill set. Computer programming is first on the list. While games are made using almost all languages, the most popular programming language for video games is C++, because of its object-oriented nature and because it compiles to binary. The next most popular languages for games are C and Java, but others such as C# and assembly language are also used. A strong background in math is usually required to learn these languages. Individuals wishing to design games should also have an extensive knowledge of both PCs and Macs.

There are many colleges and universities that offer classes not only in programming but also classes specifically on game design. Some of these schools have alliances with game developing companies, leading to jobs for students upon graduation. Programming video games can be lucrative. The average game designer's salary is $62,500, with $55,000 at the low end and $85,000 at the high end.

Programmers are not the only individuals needed to make a video game, however. There are multiple career paths within the gaming industry, including specialists in audio, design, production, visual arts and business.

Designing a video game can be an long, expensive process. The average budget for a modern multiplatform video game is $18-$28 million, with some high-profile games costing as much as $40 million. Making the game, from conception to sale, can take several months to several years. Some games have taken a notoriously long time to make; for example, 3D Realms' Duke Nukem Forever was announced in April 1997 and did not make it to shelves until July 2011.

Video game programmers have a high level of job satisfaction. In a March 2013 survey conducted by Game Developer magazine, 29 percent of game programmers were very satisfied with their jobs, and 39 percent were somewhat satisfied.

If you're interested in a game development career, now's the time to get moving. Take advantage of the many online resources available regarding these careers and start learning right away.

Not too long ago, Apple added something phenomenal to the iPhone OS: a dashboard screen. If you have a Macintosh computer, you may be familiar with the dashboard that is available (regularly) by pressing F4. Otherwise, you can draw similarities to your Windows 7 Dashboard on the right hand side of your desktop, that shows you updates on your applications and widgets you add to it. Finding your dashboard on your iPhone is just as easy: just put your finger on the top of your iPhone screen, and drag down.

Here, in your dashboard, you will see all of the updates that has been pushed into such by your applications that desire to send you messages: things like new text messages, new updates to your subscribed magazines, your messages on payment applications. If you have reviewed a message set by an application by tapping on it, that message will automatically become deleted. However, if you don’t desire to go into the application to delete it, simply tap in the top right on the bar that categorizes that particular application, and tap again to clear all of the messages set by that application, and clear up your dashboard.

But, your dashboard isn’t all about your application. You not only get your messages, but you get important information set by default applications, such as the weather. If you don’t feel like scouting out your weather application amidst all your applications you have downloaded, simply go into your dashboard, and find out the forecast for the whole week, just by a simple swipe. Not only that, tickers for your stocks are displayed near the bottom of the dashboard.

1. The IRS is enabling taxpayers to download their tax transcripts over the internet from the Internal Revenue Service. The official secure URL for the transcripts download followed immediately after The White House fact sheet confirmed the decision. According to the Tech Crunch You Can Now Download Your Tax Returns From The IRS  article, there are some minor bug issues when registering. Given that security has long been problematic with the IRS, the best course of action for the public is to take some precautions when downloading personal information on mobile devices, pc’s and laptops. Installing disk encryption software on all your devices will protect your files reduce risk
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3. Cloutex, a cloud computing future enabler has just secured their first round of seed funding.  Cloutex is an Estonian tech startup, which connects and syncs various web applications such as e-marketing, CRM and accounting tools under one convenient hub. The United Partners, SmartCap and EstBan business angels seeded the start-up with $6000, 000.
4. Could you get everything important that you need to know about living successfully from a computer program? Ryan Dube seems to think so. In his 6 Life Habits That Programming Could Teach You Today  he speaks in flow charts, loops and program modules, in the same breath as paying off debt or buying a house.  How can your programming skills help in life skills by modeling some of the same principles?
5. 10 Incredibly Simple Things You Can Do To Protect Your PrivacyPassword protect your devices.  Put alerts on your name in Google; simple tasks that can be significant in protecting your privacy.
6. Adobe Brings 3D Printing Support to PhotoshopAmong the latest updates in Adobe, Photoshop users have the ability to design 3D models from scratch as well as being able to toy around with color, shape and angles.

If you're someone who's interested in computer programming, chances are you've considered pursuing a career in it. However, being a computer programmer is definitely not for everyone, as it takes some special characteristics to succeed as a computer programmer.

Good at Math

While you don't have to be a math genius in order to be a good computer programmer, being good at math really does help. In general, as long as you know your trigonometry and advanced high school algebra, you should be set for programming.

However, in a few instances, knowledge of more advanced math ends up being necessary. For example, for shader programming, you should be familiar with integration of multiple variables, matrix algebra, and basic differentiation. You will also require considerable math skills in order to program 3D.

Excellent Problem Solver

To be a successful computer programmer, you definitely need to be an excellent problem solver. It is vital for a computer programmer to break a problem down into small parts. They must then be able to decide the best way to approach individual pieces of the problem. Computer programmers also need to know how to anticipate and prevent potential problems. While problem-solving, they also need to keep in mind things like user experience and performance.

If you're not a good problem solver, knowing a particular language and syntax will be useless if you can't even identify the problem at hand. Therefore, excellent problem solving skills are a critical foundation for computer programming.

Patience

If you are not a patient person, you will quickly become very frustrated with computer programming. Problem-solving is not always easy and fast. In fact, it may take a very long time, especially if you're either inexperienced or working on an especially hard project.

Debugging after the coding process is also very frustrating and tedious. No matter how hard you try, you will always have bugs in your coding, and these bugs, while often easy to fix, tend to be very difficult to detect. Therefore, you will end up spending a lot of your time searching for bugs that take very little time to fix.

Well-Rounded Skills

Generally, computer programmers who are very skilled in one area tend to stick around longer than jack-of-all-trades, as specialized programmers are harder to replace with outsourcing than general programmers. Therefore, it will do you well to specialize in one area of computer programming.

However, while specializing is good, you should still know at least a little about everything, especially skills that relate to the area you specialize in. For example, if you're a core Java programmer, you should know about SQL programming and ideally a scripting language or some regular expressions.

As you can see, not everyone has what it takes to pursue computer programming as a career and succeed at it. In fact, just because you love to program doesn't mean it's a good career choice for you. However, if you feel that you possess all the characteristics listed above, then you should definitely consider computer programming as a career.