Daniel Abolafia

daniel info

Site Index

Programming

I learned to program in Python freshman year. Ever since, I've been exploring computer programming. Below are a number of original programs.

  • Tetris++

    This version of Tetris has a number of built in modes of play. In addition to traditional Tetris, there is Pentris. All pieces in Pentris are made from 5 blocks instead of 4. There are three other built in piece sets, but users can create their own piece set and load it into the game. There is also random piece mode (see image) where the next piece is randomly generated on the spot, and can theoretically be of any number of blocks.

  • Trisweeper

    Similar to the classic game Minesweeper, except the grid of mines uses triangular cells instead of square ones. Each triangular cell touches at most 12 cells around it, not 3. Although this may seem more difficult than classic Minesweeper, there are trade-offs in strategy that make it equally as enjoyable.

  • Minesweeper2.0

    An extension of the classic game Minesweeper, Minesweeper2.0 includes an AI for solving games and giving hints. The AI does not "cheat" by simply looking at the hidden locations of the mines. It uses an algorithm that determines the probability of a mine being in each unclicked space and clicks the lowest probability spaces it can find. The AI makes moves in clusters of multiple clicks at the same time, which are indicated by a grayed out square (see image). The algorithm is optimized so that any calculation that takes more than one second will be halted, and the probabilities calculated thus far will be used.

Origami

Competitions

The Boston University Design Competition

http://www.bu.edu/eng/design/

The task

Build and program an autonomous robot to perform a series of tasks in under 20 seconds.

The robot

The robot has a catapult and servo arm. It uses an Arduino microcontroller which I programmed in C.

1st Place

My partner and I won 1st out of 62 teams. I'm on the right.

The Extreme Redesign Challenge

http://www.dimensionprinting.com/extreme-redesign//

The task

In the category of Art and Architecture, I designed a CAD model which I call The Impossible Triangle.
I printed out the Impossible Triangle in my school's Dimension 3-D printer a number of times. My triangle won 2nd place and I received a $1000 scholarship.
The images below are of an Impossible Triangle that Dimension Printing created for me.

The Impossible Triangle

The image above is how the figure should be viewed to see the illusion.
The figure below is from another revealing angle.

Music

Original Compositions

The two pieces below I composed for AP Music Theory and Advanced Theory. There are many more that I've composed on my own. I've prepared them both as MIDI files, images of the scores, and Sibelius files incase anyone has the program

  • Invention in C# Minor

    This is a traditional style invention. The motive is played by the right hand in the first bar and then countermotive with the motive being played under it in the right hand. Inventions imitate between hands, but not exactly, so patterns can be modified to develop the piece. Also there are so called "free material" sequences.

  • Chanson

    "Chanson" means song in French. I was not able to think of a title for this composition, and my theory teacher did not want me to simply call it "Song" or "For Piano." So I then sought out other languages for assistance.

Websites

The websites below were built and in some cases designed by me.

  • Congregation B'nai Israel http://www.bisrael.com/

    I volunteered my web expertise to my temple for more than a summer. What I gained was the experience at making a professional website. I used PHP and started from scratch based of an HTML template. I created a news and event database plus an administrative section using a MySQL database.

  • National Honors Societyhttp://sites.bergen.org/bca/nhs/

    Bergen County Academies Nation Honors Society website. Designed and built by me. I maintain it currently with one other NHS officer.

  • Dark Steel Roboticshttp://darksteelrobotics.com/

Websites that I am referenced in.