| Moar Gunz! |
[Nov. 30th, 2009|05:59 pm] |
As far as Infinite Ammo was concerned, the only problem with being a Human Form Combat Mecha was the lack of neuroplasticity. Sure, a screwdriver to the eye socket might let you access basic menu options like shutting down emotions, but the basic design of HFCM's meant that tinkering with anything beyond that was such low-level driver coding, the risk of giving yourself the cyber-equivalent of cerebral palsy, by way of a memory leak or unescaped loop, was too great.
Days like today, when he found himself surrounded by about twenty Hydra agents armed to the teeth, all he could think of was how lucky those guys like Ultron and the Super Adaptoid were, having complete access to their operating system and not being the result of some legacy code neural emulation meant they could hack and mod themselves all they wanted. If they messed up, they could just roll themselves back a version.
It was really irritating, too. Twenty-to-one odds weren't all that bad, but sometimes he felt you needed more than two arms and two guns to truly get into the spirit of a shoot out. |
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| Tinkerage |
[Nov. 30th, 2009|12:25 pm] |
I finally bit the bullet today, and built myself an original LEGO model and then ordered it... ( image behind cut )
The LEGO Digital Designer takes a bit of getting used to. Unlike the old Lego Creator, there's no way to control the Y-axis by itself, it's more of a snap-to system. This mostly posed a problem getting axels into place, but once I figured that out, the rest was easy.
It's not a cheap process, so I doubt I'll be doing much more with it. I would like to see if designing something more complex would be possible, since Tecnic parts are available. Maybe I'll build a Traction City out of LEGO's...yeah, that won't bankrupt me. |
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| Predator's Gold |
[Nov. 29th, 2009|07:03 pm] |
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Philip Reeve continues to impress. I finished Predator's Gold today, and was quite impressed. Maybe it's because post-apocalypse Scavenger World stories tickle my love of parts and junk, but his Hungry City books never fail to entertain me. I want my own traction city, something to ride in across the scorched remains of Earth. |
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| I am invincible! |
[Nov. 27th, 2009|01:17 pm] |
I am invincible!
I didn't even have to re-install the OS. It just picked up and worked with the new motherboard. Moving the hard drive around and backing everything up has mucked some permissions up, so I suspect this is, at best, a stopgap measure, but after two weeks without my Linux box, I'll take it. It'll last long enough 'til I can get started on a few things and buy a few parts to finish the new computer.
Bwa-ha-ha! |
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| Crap |
[Nov. 26th, 2009|12:46 am] |
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My wiki tables are hosed. Guess I get to do a rebuild sometime. |
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| SDholic |
[Nov. 24th, 2009|12:07 am] |
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My life this past week would have been a lot simpler if I wasn't determined not to lose my copy of as many of the scans from SD 1.0 as possible. I blame Pattern Recognition for implanting within me the dream of one day creating a self-contained archive of an online community. |
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| Opera Unite |
[Nov. 23rd, 2009|06:38 pm] |
I keep looking at Opera Unite and thinking I should do something with it. However, as soon as I do, I immediately think that Adobe AIR has 90% of the same features, will have 100% when I can launch external applications with it, and can run independently on all major platforms. So as neat an idea as Opera Unite is, considering Opera's market share, my incentive is kind of low.
However, the one caveat to that is Opera is an all but native app on the Nintendo Wii, and if they were to ever upgrade the Wii's internet channel to include Opera Unite, things could get very interesting. Disruptive technology interesting. Put a web server on every Wii, assume a bulk of them are online, and you potentially have a platform for something like the XNet, maybe not as underground, but an alternative, independent social network.
Until, then, I may poke at Unite, but given that the bulk of the world is still using IE or Firefox1, it still seems easier to use AIR, .NET, or AutoIT which can run without needing the overhead of a whole web browser2. Unite is cool, and the proxy service it offers is nice, but it still seems more complex than I think building widgets should be.
I'm still going to study the SDK and try to think of some way to use it, though.
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1. Which lets you use Plain Old Webserver similarly.
2. I say that, but if you embed an IE browser in an app, you've got the same overhead, it's just an overhead people have already accepted that ships with Windows. |
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| Peak Oil |
[Nov. 23rd, 2009|11:55 am] |
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I don't doubt a lot of the Peak Oil talk, I just hope light-weight, nuclear-powered mech suits get put on the general market before everything collapses. I don't think the Dark Ages were particularly, shall we say, handicap accessible. |
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| Re: Birthers |
[Nov. 23rd, 2009|09:37 am] |
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My theory: if you can't disprove that President Obama was born in Hawaii, your next best step is to deny Hawaii exists, and keep going from there. At some point you'll get to a level where you convince people that it's dangerous to trust a person who won't tell you both the velocity and position of their atomic composition. "He doesn't know where he is, he doesn't know where he's going, yet we're supposed to follow him? No, absolutely not." |
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| Top 8 Favorite Supercomputers (Real and Fictional) |
[Nov. 22nd, 2009|08:31 pm] |
Things seem to have quieted down, so while my backup system (which crashed) is backing up, allow me to present...
Top 8 Favorite Supercomputers (Real and Fictional)
1. Storm botnet - This was the first botnet as a major computing entity that was brought to my attention, so it has a special place in my heart. This is a similar model I plan to use in my future attempts to build my own.
2. JARVIS - JARVIS, from the movie, places because he's everything I'd want out of a powerful AI system: workshop majordomo, holographic interface, dry wit, and capable of being loaded into a portable armor system for a quick getaway. If I couldn't have a completely distributed AI, I'd want one with a built-in escape plan.
3. Intersect - I already have a pretty powerful supercomputer knocking around in my skull, so if I could apply a little better interface atop it, I'd be pretty happy.
4. Second Life grid - I once did a rough count, and at the time, by my figures, the network of computers that compose the Second Life grid was actually bigger than a few of the low end systems on the Top 500 list. I'm not a big fan of SL or Linden Lab, but as this is the biggest grid I've ever played with, it makes the count.
5. Cortana - Because Cortana is awesome, that's why!
6. Ancient database - Not so much because it ever showed itself to be that great of a computer in the show, but because I like to daydream about being the IT guy that gets sent to Atlantis to index all the files on various activated and unactivated systems, so people can search through everything...for, you know, like ZPM specs.
7. Worldmind - One of the reasons I like Nova so much is because they have a really fun, oddly powerful supercomputer for a character. Worldmind falls somewhere between JARVIS and the Intersect in terms of my ideal system, a snarky cloud computer that exists beyond physical space.
8. HERBIE - From the Fantastic Four: World's Greatest Heroes cartoon, because he makes me laugh. You can't beat a lovable, neurotic supercomputer when it comes to comedy relief. |
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| The new Star Trek film |
[Nov. 22nd, 2009|12:45 pm] |
Between the Starfleet Corps of Engineers novels and Trip Tucker1, my respect for Star Trek engineers had pretty much been drained. They all struck me as being too clean. Too nice. What Jimmy Palmiotti and Matt Fraction think engineers should be like.
However, I liked Simon Pegg's version of Scotty. Granted, my opinion is largely biased by the set designers' work. When I saw his outpost, I said aloud, "That's where I want to live." Whatever else I think of the movie2, I have to say this Scotty reminds me why I used to think Geordi La Forge was cool3.
I wonder if anyone's using that Starfleet outpost anymore. Seems an ideal setting for writing fanfic about the young Starfleet officer named McKay who got sent there for misusing tractor beam technology. Hmmm.
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1. Not to be confused with Connor Trinneer, who can play mad scientists quite well.
2. Not too bad of a movie, but I watched it with the same expectations that I watched Revenge of the Sith, i.e. a long-form, live-action episode of Robot Chicken.
3. While I had seen TOS before TNG, I distinctly remember by earliest Star Trek fantasies involving TNG characters, not TOS. |
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| SGU, Life |
[Nov. 21st, 2009|08:42 pm] |
Okay, anyone who doubted my drawing comparisons between Rush and Doxes can stop doubting, since Rush just did the same thing B5 did in "Legion Lost." You know what I mean. Yup.
Also, man, I really want Phineas and Ferb to show up on the Destiny. It'd be like:Phineas: So we're trapped a billion light years from home on an ancient space ship and you can't get access to the main computer?
Col. Young: That's pretty much it.
Phineas: Hey, Ferb, I know what we're going to do today.
Eli: Heh, but aren't you two kind of young to fix an ancient ship?
Phineas: Why, yes. Yes, we are.
Rush: It's not that simple you know, we haven't managed to break the master code.
Ferb: My spaceship master codes are always One Two Three Four.
Eli: Like it'd be that...
Sound F/X: Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Bip. Bing.
Eli: Simple?
Rush: Yes, well, we still don't have hyperdrive. The FTL drive will take eons.
[Outside the display, a giant wormhole opens up, sucking the Destiny through. A moment later, Earth zooms into view.]
Sound F/X: Shwooop! Cooosh!
Phineas: Oh, there you are, Perry. And then maybe the stupid show could get people who were meant to be there or whatever. At this point, I think Icarus Base was where they sent people who accidentally discovered the Stargate program but were hard to kill. The SGC sticks them on a planet with an unstable core, lets some mad scientist plug a Stargate into said core, and wait for their problem to disappear. |
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| Okay. |
[Nov. 21st, 2009|01:40 pm] |
At first I was a bit irritated that DisneyXD was putting Kid vs. Cat between episodes of Phineas & Ferb, but now that I see there's a block of Prototype This! episodes followed by Some Assembly Required, I see the wisdom of their scheduling. It's a comparison and contrast between inventors in fiction and reality. You start out with the cartoon, finish the hour with the documentary, and see that while engineering in reality is more complicated, the spirit of adventure that drives both real and fantasy inventors is similar.
Nicely done, cable television. Nicely done! |
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| Turtles Forever |
[Nov. 21st, 2009|10:18 am] |
[The turtles have just landed in a black-and-white dimension, Turtle Prime, based on the original Eastman&Laird comic. The four original turtles attack them, their Leonardo speaking a thought-bubble-like monologue as he fights another Leonardo.]
Donatello: Why is he narrating? Is he crazy?
Michelangelo: Hardcore crazy!
Raphael: I love it here! Why can't comic books be this cheeky with their irony during cross-overs? |
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| Planz, I has them |
[Nov. 21st, 2009|12:52 am] |
My plans for this weekend are:
Saturday: get my Linux machine back.
Sunday: work on project for teacher.
Some time in between, combine that code I was prototyping the other morning with this to create a screensaver widget/app that'll display pics with or without a network connection.
For now, go to bed. |
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| I. M. Coder |
[Nov. 20th, 2009|08:34 pm] |
You know the best reason for not needing Power Girl on my pull list?
The Flickr API.
Heh heh heh heh.
BUG REPORT #00001: Pictures of Geoff Johns and Dan Didio are showing up, please add some kind of filter. |
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| Top 5 Things I Want (But Will Never Have) |
[Nov. 20th, 2009|11:27 am] |
Top 5 Things I Want (But Will Never Have)
My Own City - Maybe it's because I've always lived in little towns I have a naive view, but for some reason metropolitan areas fascinate me to no end. They're such complex and beautiful machines that seamlessly blend biology with technology, cybernetic superorganisms. I'd like to have my own city. Maybe not as the mayor or defender, but as someone who knew the streets inside out, who knew the people, who mapped the flows.
Warehouse Lair - I love open spaces, but I also like the privacy of an enclosed area. A warehouse easily provides both of those features. It's large enough to house many, many tables for projects; it would have installed wiring for my computers, displays, and other stuff; and an open floor like a warehouse is completely wheelchair accessible.
My Own Supercomputer - Actually, in my life time, with my hobbies and profession, I may end up owning a supercomputer, by definition, one day; what I mean here is something like the Batcomputer, the Asgard computer core on the Odyssey, or JARVIS. A one of a kind computer that wraps around a section of the room and looks like a coral reef mated with an organ and that offspring put on a plasma screen display for a hat. Ideally it's not just given to me, but something I built...likely during an adventure where I somehow gained a super-heightened intelligence that I knew would have to be removed or I'd die, and armed with the knowledge my even more vast than usual intellect was temporary, I'd spend my time building my supercomputer so once I returned to normal, I'd still have access to a portion of that enhancement by way of the fruits it bore.
Gravity Wrench - It's kind of like a Sonic Screwdriver, but not as omnipotent. The Gravity Wrench lets you set and shift points of gravity so you can lock onto tight bolts and apply nonlinear force, it creates gravity wells that attract pens that fall behind desks, and if you tweak it right it can slow your descent in free fall. It's an Unobtanium-powered multitool, and it has "wrench" in the title, because I like wrenches more than screwdrivers.
Cute, Blond Nemesis - The nemesis relationship is my ideal, a way of intimately connecting to another human sans the bothersome time and attention sinks of actually dating and it comes with deathtrap privileges. So, instead of a love interest or side kick, I'd like someone like Power Girl, Liberty Belle, Lady Lawful, or Sarah Walker to foil my schemes on a regular, maybe weekly, basis. |
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