Just a brief one my audience of eager readers. I’ve been busy as usual and it’s paid off. I am happy to announce that the very first preview version of my Character Editor has been released. Go here have a look and comment about it. If only there was somewhere relating to me that you could comment about these things…
Why are you still reading? There’s a link to go and investigate!!
Someday, I’ll think of a way of starting these rather flitting entries that doesn’t involve me making a joke about greeting my obviously non-existant audience and alluding to my general brilliance, perhaps I could talk about how I do that in most other entries, or even talk about talking about most other entries. For the moment though, I’ll go with what works. Hello nobody. I rock. You don’t.
Now that’s done, lets get on with what’s been happening. Rather a lot has been happening, so it may take a while. Perhaps you should skip to one of the older updates, although they’re probably not that much better. There are some good links on the side there though, failing that, you could check your mail, or even turn the computer off (if you’re not on one of those communal/libary/lab computers that have all sorts of signs saying not to turn them off that is), and do…err…whatever it is people do when they aren’t using computers. I’m not really that sure. I wonder if it involves yoyos?
Right, news. Well, recently I had to visit my university to sort out how I’m accepting honours and all and I met a PhD student. Now, as people who know me (certainly the only ones likely to be reading at this point) may know, I’m reasonably comfortable with my abilities in computing. I have only really recently returned to programming and such in a modern sense and so I’ve been having to learn rather a lot of stuff, but all in all, I’ve yet to come across something that is really worryingly difficult.
Of course, when you meet a PhD student who’s actually done professional projects and hasn’t taken time off to do a double degree in subjects that they never really liked in the first place and now hate with abundance, you feel a bit uncomfortable. Inadequate even. But I knew more about DVD ripping and video compression. And the Commodore 64. So there, no insecurities here. Really. None.
And this is one of those shitful events that for some bizarre reason has a magnificently positive effect, because, ever since then, I’ve been programming almost daily on my character editor/mapper/other stuff for the C64 in Java. You remember that don’t you readers? It was the one that sort of got a bit stuck for a while and had promise but never really got anywhere. Well it works now, it’s almost complete and the moment it can be either an applet or application and can load and save, I will call it release..err…0.00something (just in case someone mistakenly thinks that this is all I can do). Anyway, here it is in it’s minimal but functional stages. More on this later.
I’ve also been reading through the backlog of entries on Eloqui’s always pretty site and I really would like to make this place look a little better, a logo of some sort is on the way, and I’ve taken the big step of changing the tagline to something else, I might even fix up the categories.
In what way have you copied an ending sentence from The Triforce today imagined readers?
Well, first off, Logo Adventure really is coming, for all of you who I know are waiting with ever bluer cheeks. Please continue holding your breath, I assure you it won’t be too much longer and it would make a very good news story if you died due to asphyxiation.
First off, I’ve been working on bits of things involving PHP and it’s new Object system. First impressions were extremely negative, since there are still some consistency issues, and the weak typing thing takes a bit of getting used to. However, now that I’ve done a bit in it, I can see that it could get quite useful. It’s a bit worrying that an interpreted language is taking a step that will clearly devastate any efficiency, but it seems that this is less and less of an issue nowadays. It’s also very sad to see that the ingenuity required to program things on a lower level is no longer required, there’s practically nothing that can’t be solved by either the basics of the language, a large amount of memory or processing time or a pre-written function. I can see why this might be a good thing, but it takes all the fun out of it.
In news of the same interest, (ie. none), I’ve been very busy not getting anywhere with Java documentation. It’s amazing just how difficult it is to get a serious description of the various things available at the GUI, or indeed anything that isn’t the newest thing. In particular, I’m trying to use only the AWT (Abstract Window Toolkit), which is not very nice, but has the significant advantage of not being entirely shit, unlike Swing. Despite all these serious setbacks though, my Commodore 64 editor/mapper/thingo bits and pieces are coming along nicely and I’ve provided the newest update on another server, because WordPress makes uploading applets far more difficult than I can be bothered figuring out. If only someone somewhere would write a system for webdesign which wasn’t plagued all these problems. Oh well.
Anyway, go here, be impressed, leave comments, but not about watches, gay marriage and stocks please. Thanks internet!
I’m so terribly sorry for not updating. Really I am. I’m sure there is at least someone out there who is mortally wounded by me not writing a new totally pointless post about something that has no point.
Right then. So what’s been happenng then? Well, I’ve gotten a sort of job thingy writing for somewhere else, so the scope writing here is going to be limited somewhat. This is probably a good thing because well, it might give this place a bit of an actual context rather than a random collection of passable and not-so-passable writing. I’d say most of it will now be about programming and such.
Aside from that I’m actually getting some programming done, some of which I may be able to actually talk about. I’m sure that will thrill everyone.
Coming soon! More logo adventure!
Well today heralds good and bad things in the land of somewhere. I have finally gotten all the bits of my computer to talk to each other after what seems an eternity now, but is most likely around two weeks. Unfortunately, this has resulted in my Linux partition not working, but it never really did to begin with.
As well as this, all the good work of me doing quite well in yesterdays exam has been removed by me doing appallingly in todays exam. Since they are both for the same subject this is really unfair, as I’d rather go well in one subject and fail horribly in the other, thus qualifying for special exams and having at least one good mark to my name
Aside from the usual mundane failures of my life, today I got thoroughly annoyed with the tram system. Now, I know that it’s unlikely that such a system will work perfectly all day and everyday, but it really is quite bad. Nearly every tram is late, and when you finally get the chance to get on a tram you can’t because everyone and everything has decided to get on the tram before you and are practically hanging out the windows, so you have to wait. And wait. And then you wait a bit more until you come to a tram that has room on it.
Now, you would assume that this would be it, but unfortunately, your way will invariably be a woman with a double pram (evil evil things), a large derro who looks as though all of his skin has been replaced with sandpaper that has been left in the sun for two weeks after being crumpled repetitively, or a large group of socialising Malaysians.
If you do decide to force your way through the lowest humanity can offer you, looks of annoyance will be received from your quarry, I can almost understand the first two, but why is it that Malaysians talk so loudly, (or should I say: tok so high larrrrrrr), their accent irritates me at the best of time, but this look as though I have done something wrong by wanting to get through their wall of indifference just makes me want to do something very bad with a lot of magnesium strips, matches and the offendees core body temperature measuring point.
This wall of slowly moving, really really loud, and highly irritating Malaysians occurs everywhere, actually. In crowded shops is, where they seal up entire sections because they have decided to tok about something incredibly inane whilst several people get really pissed off trying to get through, cues at fast food places (where they merrily annoy the hell out of everyone else by not ordering), and other places where generally you are forced to go out of necessity.
Enough about Malaysians. This story is about trams. Or something. Anyway, I had an exam to go to (not particularly pressing, granted), and this tram decided to just sit there for about 10 minutes. Needless to say I was nearly late, but what’s worse, is exactly the same thing happened to me on the way back from failed exam. I suppose this is what the %10 increase in ticket prices was to ensure, less reliability and more bullyish tram inspectors
Well, after a hard working weekend, or more precisely, a hard working Sunday night, I have handed in one of my overdue assignments. This leaves one remaining, but as I now have two days to study for two exams and much procrastination still to be done, I shall avoid this report until after that.
Anyway, despite this rather pressing deadline, I am quite relaxed about my situation. I have been to most, if not all, of the relevant lectures for these exams and I have studied a reasonable amount for them. Plus, if I fail, I simply try again, no questions asked. Seriously, though, I will definitely study. Soon.
On things unrelated to the shady and depressing side of my life that is university, things are not wonderful, but not bad either. I went and visited my old computer store, (where I got my computer originally), only to find that the part that I’d ordered had been sitting there for two weeks and they just couldn’t be stuffed telling me. Customer service and the computer industry seem to be mutually exclusive or perhaps inversly proportional. Either way, I got the part, smiled politely and quietly called them a bunch of arseholes, because they are.
My new, soon to be old, computer store has been really nice however. I took the box in for the card that didn’t work today and hopefully soon my computer will be back and functional. Maybe I’ll give them a bit more of a chance, but then again, maybe not.
Well after an exhileratingly horrible couple of days before the weekend I have managed to remove all assignments in my way with the exception of two. Normally this would be something to be happy about, except for the fact that both these pieces of work (although another word could equally well be substituted for work) are about three weeks overdue.
Combine this with the fact that they are about %10 each, and you have something that is too big to ignore and too small to really want to spend time on. Also consider that the work will take hours upon hours of painstaking analysis and you can begin to see why this is not such a wonderful situation. But I will somehow get them done, somehow.
As well as this exciting plethora of overdue work I have recently taken my computer into the shop whence the stupid IDE expansion card came to convince them that their card sucks. They took one look at it, and pronounced it fixed, to my great surprise and happiness. Then I took one look at their proof (they showed me that my computer now registered 3 CD devices and a zip drive), and realised that this particular bunch of retailers were, (as we say in academic terms), completely fucking stupid.
There is a program, a wonderfully useful program, called Daemon Tools. Most people who need something like it know about it. As I am sure you have already guessed, oh intelligent reader, this program gives you a thing called a virtual drive. Why is it useful? Apart from copying DVDs or CDs raw onto your harddrive to play at a later date in the virtual drive, it also allows you to check if an image you are about to burn works. Sure enough, the clever-clogged people at this store had mistaken my virtual drive for my DVD burner.
So, I did the only thing possible, I quietly disabled the virtual drive in front of them and watched their looks of satisfaction drown in a tidal wave of incomprehension. I think it is time, yet again, to find a new computer store.
You may recall from previous entries that I have not been a well chap for a while. Sickness constantly coming and going, mostly light colds but the occasional crippling illness has taken hold on me as well. Now it seems I have not only passed these problems to my friends but also my computer.
That’s right, I managed to get a virus on my computer. Now, reader of mine blabber, you most likely know that I am reasonably good at things involving computers and for this reason I rarely worry about such things, so how did this happen? Well, bugger me if I know, but I’d say it’s been there for around two weeks before I noticed it. It’s nothing bad, it just alters some files (by adding bits at the start) to spread itself and occasionally delete things. To my knowledge nothing was deleted, so nothing was lost. What makes me feel a bit stupid is how long it took for me to realise it was there.
How did I notice you ask? Well, a while ago, notepad stopped working (this is quite normal for windows for bits to stop working), so I replaced it and went away again. After about a week several programs stopped working and just crashed the system. I re-installed only to find that they worked once or twice and then crashed again. Strange, thought I, the ever-intelligent type. At first I thought it was due to the programs use of other libraries, perhaps windows installer had been corrupted? It wasn’t until it suddenly occurred to me that the files might have been altered and checked by trying them on another computer (where they also failed to work), that I realised all was not tickety boo.
So I examined the files in question, found the bit added to the start and removed it. All was well. I then tried to search for a bit of code unique to this thing and found that at least 110 files had been corrupted. Bugger.
What does one do in a situation like this? Well, you can manually fix each file, which takes ages, or you can get a program to do it for you. The latter is known as a virus killer, so I got one and let it do it’s work. It removed the vuirus and another two I didn’t know about and I was happy.
Well I was until I tried to use the programs and found that the stupid program had not fixed the problem but simply deleted the files. How very very rude indeed, I guess the moral of the story is that if you want it done right, you do it yourself.
Oh, and I’ve got four things due tomorrow and I haven’t really started any of them. Again.
It has been some time since I’ve written some stuff here on this once regularly updated miracle of the modern building we call the internet. Well, if it was a building it would be filled with porn theatres and real estate agents, and don’t get me started on those bloody gnomes again.
I have been rather busy. Very busy in fact. Incredibly busy. I have actually almost finished that pile of work that I mentioned earlier, but not quite. At this point I have reduced this monstrous glob of paper wasting monotony to a mere 3 pracs, two questionnaires, one assignment and the usual yearlong stuff. It’s a monumentous achievement. Of course it meant that I had several 48 hour days and didn’t hand in yet another assignment that I was supposed to do, but in great battles sacrifices must be made.
My computer is still not entirely functional. I have to carry the thing into a small shop owned by a quiet little man who speaks English really badly but seemed more genuine than most shops. I am avoiding this task because of both lack of time and motivation, even though it would mean that I would have a fully functional computer. Still, more on this will be given as it developes.
What else has been happening, I hear you ask in an enthusiastic voice. Well dear reader, (and there is probably at most two people reading this, so perhaps I should say dear readers). Nothing. I have moped, lazed, slept, eaten (although not very much), and generally existed without soul or feeling, thought or enjoyment. The usual.
I did enter in the games competition at one of my more favourite sites though, but there are players far better than me and since I only started midway in this comp, my chances are less than small.
Anyway, since I have been hounded by requests to put a chatbox on this rather unused speck of personal dust in a storm of spinning crap, I have provided. I think it’s safe to assume that it will acquire a grand and total use of perhaps three comments, but it is there now.
Thus ends the lesson for today
Congregation: Thanks be to BOB.
I have a rather strange disease. It is a disease which is neither transmittable or hereditory, and it affects only one in a million. A disease with consequences so serious that I am forced to live in denial for the majority of my life. I have electrosensitive-negativity.
What is this terrible affliction? Why it is simple. If I buy any electronic or electric device it will invariably not work. Most of the time it will not work in some minor way, but I will still need to fix it anyway. This will result in other things not working and so on and so forth. Ironically, I love electronics. I love working with computers, sound, anything, but every time I buy something I have to thoroughly test it as I nearly always find something wrong with the damn device.
The latest to fall victim to this curse is a new IDE adapter which I just bought. This funky little device allows me to get my Zip drive to communicate with my computer again as I gave it’s spot on the board to my new burner. After carefully installing it and testing each component I put the machine back together and watched it not do anything. I tried changing the connections. Nothing. I tweaked just about everything I could tweak and it still fails to recognize the drive.
This seems quite trivial, I’m sure, if it wasn’t for the fact that a lot of my project work is sitting on Zip disks. As you can see, this is getting rather serious. The worst of it is, that the card is clearly not at fault. I know the card works, because all drivers are functioning and all programs are accepting the card. I know the zip drive is attached correctly to the card and it still works because when the machine is powered on the zip disk logs whatever is inside it’s mouth. I even know that the zip disk works because it reads and accepts disks, even if it can’t communicate with the computer.
Thus, there is some deeply hidden and essentially impossible to find problem within my computer that is causing some serious issues. And just when it was all going so well
In other news, university work seems to be going reasonably well. I have recently gotten a group for one of my worst assignments and done some work on one of the more pressing tasks. Still, there is a long way to go before I can safely begin procrastinating again.