I am E. Zachary Knight. I am a person of many talents, and aspirations. It is hard for me to pick just one thing that defines me, so I will have to just break this out into categories.
I am a Family Man
I am a husband and father. I have been married to my wife, Becky, for over 22 years as of this writing. I have 6 kids, and one grandkid. I love them all so very much and they are a tremendous bright light in my life.
I am a Religious Man
I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and have been all my life. My family are members and so is my wife’s family. I served a mission for the church in Manchester England. My wife and I were married in one of our Temples. This is an important part of who I am.
I am a Web Developer
I have been working in web development since 2007. I have worked for several web firms and contractors over those years. This has been a great career and a way I have been able to support my family.
I primarily work as a Full Stack LAMP Web developer. This work as has taught me a lot about PHP and the many libraries, frameworks, and software that it powers. I have learned to develop web applications that use native PHP, Laravel, Drupal and WordPress. I also know how to write my own MySQL statements and queries and have experience with other databases as well. I have also developed my skills in Javascript, CSS, and HTML to round out that full stack knowledge base. I even use Linux as my primary desktop and excel at Linux server management too.
I am a Game Developer
I have wanted to make games all my life. I gained this love of making games when I programmed my first game on the Texas Instruments TI-99a game console.. My family owned that console when I was a kid and when we learned that it had a built in game compiler, my mom bought a book of game code for use to play with. I loved sitting and writing out the games in that book. My mom then encouraged me to explore programming as I grew.
Now, I make games mostly as a hobby, but I hope that I will one day make a game that will make me millions. In the mean time, I make games that you can read about on this site, and play at HeroOfDermwood.itch.io as well as over at DivineKnightGaming.com. I have made a number of games that I am proud of and a few stinkers as well.
these days, I make my games primarily in Haxeflixel, a fun and feature rich 2D game engine. I use mainly open source technologies to develop the assets I need for these games.
I am a Writer
I like to write. I like to entertain. I like to inform. I don’t do enough of it. But it is something that has been a joy to me all my life. I especially like it when I can write to inform while keeping you entertained.
I have done various kinds of writing over the years. I have written about the games industry in Oklahoma. I have written general gaming news and reviews. I have even written more tech and legal stuff. I have also written to teach people programming in HaxeFlixel as well as PHP. I am also working on some novel ideas.
I have even written legal documents and briefs. Speaking of which.
I am a Political Advocate
I have always been fiercely independent politically. I seemed to pick that up when I was a kid. Today, I consider myself a classical liberal. But over the years, I have taken on several advocacy ventures that I feel have defined and rounded out a lot of my world views.
I worked with the Entertainment Consumer Association in its fight to stop the US from passing the internet threatening Stop Online Piracy Act. This bill would have made it nearly impossible to publish anything online and would have killed parody, satire, and news reporting in entertainment among other things. I also wrote for sites and participated in other communities that were dedicated to reporting on and discussing major legal issues in tech, IP, and consumer rights.
I have also worked as an advocate for Ballot Access and the rights of people to form new parties and run for office under those new party labels. In Oklahoma, I was a key figure in Oklahomans for Ballot Access Reform and wrote a briefing document that highlighted areas of needed reform in Oklahoma’s elections laws. I also wrote legislation and worked with State Legislators to get needed reforms pass. Due to my work the Libertarian Party of Oklahoma was able to form and get and retain ballot access.
I also ran for office a couple of times, once as a Independent for State House (I got 19% of the vote) and as a Libertarian for US Congress (I got 5% of the vote). I was also an Elector for President for the Libertarian Party, and almost an Elector for the Americans Elect party.
I am a Student
I graduated from high school in 1999. I was home schooled for those high school years. Later on, I did a semester at Oklahoma City Community College, a 1 semester class at Oklahoma State University, then finally went to Collins College in Tempe Arizona where I earned a BA in Game Design. After that, I have simply sought learning wherever I can find it.
I did some extra courses at OCCC, trig and Java. I took a C# class through Moore Norman Technology Center. Got a Certificate of Completion in Javascript, react, Angular and node from Udemy. I also got a Python Specialization through University of Michigan and Coursera. Now, I am currently working on a Bachelors in Applied Business Management with a specialization in Project Management.
But I also like to just learn on my own. A lot of my programming skills are self taught. I enjoy learning new programming languages and new ways to make the things I enjoy. I don’t think I will ever stop learning.
That’s Me
So that is who I am. I have had an email signature of “Programmer and Writer” for years. But honestly, that is just a small part of me. Thanks for taking the time to read this.
