Tom's Tools

Google Colab
by Tom Smith, post on Fri 31 March 2023

Google Colab is Google's coding notebook tool.

Glitch.com
by Tom Smith, post on Fri 31 March 2023

Glitch.com is a site where you can create sophisticated websites. They can be database-driven websites, Node.js sites, Flask sites (Python), VR sites, or simple HTML sites.

VSTs
by Tom Smith, post on Fri 31 March 2023

VSTs (Virtual Studio Technology) are plugins that typically work with any Digital Audio Workstation or DAW, such as Garageband or ProTools or Cubase or even BespokeSynth. VSTs can add effects to your sounds, enhance your audio, or generate sounds themselves, like synthesizers or they may use samples (or recordings of …

A-Frame
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

A-Frame is a HTML-based framework with which you can create VR.

BespokeSynth
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

BespokeSynth is a visual tool to create music and audio

Gdevelop
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

Gdevelop is a no-code, open source, free tool to create 2D computer games, such as platformers or rogue-like or isometric style games.

You can create and edit games online, or download an app to do so. To create your game you don't code, instead you create a number of events …

Inkscape
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

Inkscape is an vector-based image editor. That is to say, instead of being focussed (like Photoshop, for example) on a bitmap graphic, where each pixel on screen is a coloured square, a vector image is made up of shapes that are made up of points and the areas are interpolated …

Markdown
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

Markdown is a very popular text formatting method. It was designed to be:

  • easier than HTML
  • Markdown files are just text files (so anything can edit them).
  • There are a number of (free) Markdown editors, but you can also just use a text editor.
  • They can be easily turned into …

My Favourite Markdown Editor
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

My favourite Markdown editor

Pictarize
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

Pictarize is a free web-based tool to create Augmented Reality.

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PyGame Zero
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

Pygame Zero is a way to make games using the Python programming language. What I like about Pygame Zero is how easy it is to create a sophisticated computer game.

Twine
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

Twine is tool to create interactive narrative games, similar to choose your own adventure books from the 1980s. It was used to prototype the interactive Netflix show, Bandersnatch.

To get an idea of the sorts of thing you can make with Twine go have a play with a couple of …

Processing and p5js
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 29 March 2023

Processing and p5js are coding frameworks to create art, visualisations, games and who knows what.

Pelican
by Tom Smith, post on Wed 01 February 2023

A Python-based Markdown Site Generator

Echoes
by Tom Smith, post on Sun 01 January 2023

Echoes is is a web-based tool for creating mobile GPS-aware audio walks.

MIT App Inventor
by Tom Smith, post on Sun 01 January 2023

MIT App Inventor is a tool to create mobile applications using a Scratch-like block coding language.

Note-taking
by Tom Smith, post on Sun 01 January 2023

Note-taking is a very personal thing. It needs to be easy, distraction-free, and quick. Logseq is one of many tools that approach the idea of digital gardening or knowledge management, in that you can create notes that link to other notes, creating a network of ideas.

Some of these tools …