Recently development of my project has switched to the C programming language and that has seen development slow significantly. I've been programming in Python and Bash for the last few years and I can honestly say that I was not prepared for the control that C gives you over the machine your developing on. The language is simple in terms of the number of functions it allows you to use (at least without using too many extra libraries) but sheer number of uses you can put those functions to and way you need to think in order to successfully use them is a bit dizzying.
Currently, I'm working on the function that hashes kmers (smaller chunks of DNA) into numbers that can very quickly be compared to each other. This was somewhat simple in python as it comes with built in hashing functions. With C, I don't feel I have enough of a grasp of the language to use methods I don't understand so I'm building all aspects of the program. Luckily, the student I'm working with from the local Wuxi group has been kind enough to help me with the math behind the function. He has also filled in a lot of the gaps in my knowledge as I blunder from one line of code to the next. Not much to discuss this week as progress has stalled while I work this portion of the code out. Hopefully next week will see a significant jump in development.