Hi, my name is Noel Santos, I'm the creator of this website, VirtualCuriosities.com. I'm a Brazilian self-taught programmer graduated in IT from a FATEC, a type of technological college here in Brazil.
I noticed that the world grows increasingly reliant on computers, which grow increasingly complex, confusing, and difficult to understand and learn. I decided to employ my technical expertise in hardware, desktop applications, and web technologies to create a resource to help others understand the PC, the Internet, and to enable them to be more productive with technology. As writers can't know what readers don't know, this has resulted in something similar to a wiki, with every possible unknown term a link to its own webpage.
Besides defining computing terms and explaining computing concepts, I also review software. There are many reasons I do this, including for my own curiosity. After all, what is the best application to do X? The only way to know this is to list all features you care about of every application in the category and then compare them. Fortunately, if you write down the facts, it helps others make the decision as well.
Lastly, I love finding neat little websites around the web. Forums, web applications, blogs. There are as many websites in the web as there are stars in the night sky, and yet every website is the fruit of someone's labor. Sometimes a website disappears, sometimes it reappears. There are so many I can't possibly remember all of them, so I write them down, here, on this website. I'm a very forgetful person, you see. If you don't write something down, it may as well not have happened.
About Me
I really like retro aesthetic (obsolete hardware and software, pixel art, low-poly low-resolution 3D artwork). My favorite game genres are abstract puzzles (e.g. Tetris) and exploration or story-based (e.g. Hollow Knight). I don't know a lot about music, but I mostly enjoy instrumental and game music. On the Internet, I love to see photography of animals and places on my feed.
I'm not a fan of realistic graphics in games, animations in user interfaces, or video in general.
Favorite Programming Language
I've tried many languages at least once in my life: ActionScript, Bash, C, C++, C#, D, Inform, Java, Javascript, Typescript, Lua, Pascal, Python, Ruby, Rust, Scheme, and Zig. Languages I love:
- C#: definitely the language you'd use program on Windows. Unfortunately, I use Linux these days.
- Inform: too complicated for me, but I love that it exists.
- Python: it's just easy.
- Zig: very cool language.
Languages I don't recommend because they'll give you headaches:
- Bash.
- C.
- C++.
- Javascript.
- Pascal.
- Scheme (or any Lisp).