Jan

23

After not really getting into the Oblivion or KoToR I finally gave up and asked my buddy half a nation away to name his game and I would play it online with him. Being an old IL2 fan he said “IL2″. So, I loaded it up and started practicing my flying. Although they are passe now flight sims are the old standard of computer gaming.

Although flight sims are the most advanced type of gaming in terms of realism that is available on computers there is one aspect that has interfered with compelling gameplay. That aspect is the one of looking around. In other games you point to where you are “aiming” or you have a third person style view. However, in flying (and driving for that matter) it is common to be going one direction and looking another. You have to in order to maximize your situational awareness.

With this in mind I started to want a way to move my head around to dictate where I was looking out of the airplane. My buddy first link this to me. I quickly dismissed it as being counter intuitive. After all, you may be moving your head around but you have to keep your eyeballs straight ahead. I thought this wouldn’t work.

So, I started looking for headtracking VR goggles. Wow, even after 15 years of promises this technology’s price point is still way to high for me. Not only that but many of them don’t even have headtracking as part of their functionality.

But after reading forum ravs on IL2’s website about the TrackIR and watching video of it’s use I started to come around. I decided that if I got serious about playing that I would get one. I probably would have bought one yesterday if they were carried at Fry’s or Best Buy near my place of work.

After remembering that I have a pretty nice webcam and I wondered if I could use that somehow to do the headtracking. Well, I found Cam2Pan. I was pretty happy to see you could demo it before you bought it. Last night I tried it out to see how well this headtracking technology really worked for flight sims.

The Bad

It would now be a good time to explain how the software appears to work. The software uses an algorithm to recognize the ambient light coming off of your nose. As it tracks the movements of your head it sends that data to NewView who then translates that into a view position that it tells IL2 to use. This can be some of the cause for the “Jitters” because if it’s not fine tuned then the translation for where it wants your view in the game to be will be arrived at by using large steps instead of small steps (or something like that I think). This is also the cause for loosing center. If I moved my head around where the tracking software lost my nose or had trouble keeping a track on it then when it found my nose again it might not recognize exactly where it should be (again, something to that affect I think).

The Good

After I was done I went to spend time with my wife. However, I continued to think about what it would be like to go back to playing the game without Cam2Pan and whether I could do it. I decided that I don’t think I would want to play the game without it anymore. It really is that intuitive and adds that much to the game.

TrackIR

I don’t have, nor have I used TrackIR. However, after trying Cam2Pan out I think I could take a guess at how well it would work.

I think it would be smoother. The new versions of IL2 have TrackIR capability built into the software. This would decrease background CPU required, increase smoothness and likeness to mouselook and allow more CPU for graphics and the program.

I think it would be easier to fine tune and have less recognition issues. Since the device is specifically designed for this use, it uses a “dot” (either sticker or in the latest version a clip that you attach to your head) to track then I would imagine the recognition would be easier. I believe it also comes with software that is easier to get your “profile” to know how to recognize your movements. So, Cam2Pan is the poor man’s TrackIR and I think TrackIR would bring better quality that is worth the price.

The question for me now is $10 Cam2Pan or $180 TrackIR 4: Pro.

Jan

22

It’s old news now but Steve Jobs said “No one uses Java” (or something like that). There has been a lot of discussion about this. I’m not a Steve Jobs disciple or a huge Mac fan but I have a healthy respect for both of them. But his statement and the discussion around it has threatened my “world view” (from a Java perspective).

Early in my career I decided to hang my hat on Java. It appeared to be a great up and comer. A language that could solve world hunger and cure cancer. Although it’s not quite done that yet, it had always appeared to me to be rather healthy. I also specialized in J2EE and even though I haven’t created an EJB in years I’ve been pumping out servlets and started using open source frameworks to my advantage (a la Spring/Ibatis).

After Steve’s comments I’ve started to question whether I’ve “maxed out” on Java. I’m not an expert by any means on Spring/Ibatis nor any other popular Java frameworks. But the difference between one who knows a subject and one who is an expert on a subject is experience. Not the “I’ve coded 50 million of my own applications in my spare time that no one uses” kind of experience because in that context you can always change the parameters of your project. I’m talking the experience where you have to conform to a customer’s requirements. In that context I can pretty much pick up any framework I need to and the only experience I lack to become an expert is completing projects for customers that REQUIRE those frameworks (or where I chose those frameworks).

To be fair the context of Steve’s comments appear to be directed to Java as a client language. I’ve never coded client side Java in my professional life. I’ve even lost the opportunities for jobs I really wanted due to my lack of experience with Java UI. The Java I’m experienced with and have “hung my hat on” is the server side Java. This has always been my direction. I view Java as the 21st century COBOL. That’s not meant to be degrading, it’s simply where Java has thrived. Where COBOL (or FORTRAN) programs on mainframes were once used as tools for business now Java on small servers are used.

I’ve always had the attitude that I will pickup whatever technology I need to keep myself marketable. Since all I’m hearing about lately is how Ruby can solve world hunger and cure cancer I guess I need to start picking that up. But I’m getting older and the older the dog the harder the new tricks come.

Jan

11

It has begun for Bonds

January 11, 2007 | 2 Comments

The beginning of the end has begun for Barry Bonds.

Earlier in the week the infamous Erik Weibust voice the opinion that the writers were “idiots” for not voting in Mark McGwire into the Baseball Hall of Fame. With all due respect to Erik, he’s wrong. But possibly only slightly. I agree with him that if McGwire isn’t let in that it’s insane to let Barry Bonds in.

Mark McGwire is one of the nicest guys ever to play baseball. There is no question that he used Androstenedione. When he was caught by a reporter with it, the substance was banned in the Olypics and the NFL. The substance was not illegal by federal standards and was sold at GNC. After people started to question his use of it he stopped. Just before his last season of playing baseball he signed a lucrative contract with St. Louis while having doubts in how well he would play. When he determined that he would not be able to play up to his personal standard he retired WITHOUT SIGNING THE CONTRACT. He had every legal right to that money. How many baseball players take their payout when they retire (I honestly don’t know the answer)? It was very upstanding of him not to sign the contract and eventually walk away from that money when he had doubts about his ability to play.

Barry Bonds is a jerk. His complaints about being hounded by steroid accusations while McGwire wasn’t due to racism are completely off the mark. He wasn’t hounded due to his race. He was hounded because he is a jerk. As pointed out: McGwire isn’t. From USAToday:

The most famous block of lockers in baseball might belong to San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds. He has a row to himself, complete with a vibrating lounge chair and TV set.

I don’t know how many other players have this luxury (maybe more after Bonds got it) but that’s pretty demanding to have that. Bonds has said inappropriate things to the media and fans and others players on his team. No amount of last ditch effort on his part to change the perception of his personality will change that.

My opinion has been, I can understand if McGwire is not voted into the Hall of Fame due the questions surrounding his andro use. However, to let Barry Bonds into the Hall of Fame with even greater questions would be an injustice no matter what or how many records he breaks.

A very possible endgame may be in sight now. If it is found before Bonds retires or is eligible for the Hall of Fame that he has definitely used performance enhancing drugs (and it has to be worse than greenies) then baseball’s problem is taken care of. The recent revelation about failing a test is only a hint at what the strategy of “the people who run baseball” might be. Catch him before you have to deal with the question: should Barry Bonds be in the Hall of Fame?

Jan

8

Although he has come close, Weird Al has not created the perfect polka medley, yet.

Over the holiday when I couldn’t find anything good to watch on the “bird ate the worm” channels I flipped over to VH1Classics for some nostalgic videos. They were running a countdown of the top 100 videos as voted on by some 50,000 people who visited their website. The number one video, again as voted on, was Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer”.

That song makes me laugh. Unless I am actively listening to it I can’t think of how it goes. All I can think of is the way it is portrayed in Weird Al’s song “The Alternative Polka”. That reminded me of Weird Al’s polka medleys. So I had to go back and listen to them all. There is one, however, that I deemed better, if not the best, of Weird Al’s polka medleys. That got me thinking of seeing if it was just because of nostalgic remembrance of the songs or if it truely was the best one he did.

I decided to rate every one of his polka medleys. Here are my rules:

1) Only polka medleys of multiple artists are eligible. This means that “Hot Rocks” (which is Rolling Stones only) or “Bohemian Rhapsody” (which is a polka of a single song) did not qualify.

2) I would listen to each polka and for each song I heard I would rate a + or - for like or dislike. I would attempt to judge it objectively by not considering whether I knew the original song or whether I liked the original song. It impossible to rid myself of all biased but I tried to determined if the specific parody was a good application of polka to the modern song (from my zero knowledge of polka) and whether the polka application of the song was catchy (whether I liked it).

For each medley’s score I added all the +’s and divide that number by the total number of songs I judged. This works just like a score on a test at school. If the song had 20 parodies that I judged and I liked 10 then the score would be 50. This means that the more songs parodied makes the medley harder to score high because Weird Al has to do better on more songs. You get the idea.

3) Transition was ignored. I did not judge the transition between songs in the medleys. This means that any named polka songs used in the medleys were ignored. This also means that any parodies that did not use lyrics that formed words were ignored (for example “Bawitdaba” by Kid Rock that is found in the song “White Angry Polka”).

Here are the results from worse to best:

8) Polka Party: 25 (3/9)

7) Alternative Polka: 36 (4/11)

6) Polkas on 45: 46 (6/13)

5) Hooked on Polkas: 54 (6/11)

4) Angry White Boy Polka: 75 (9/12)

3) Polka Your Eyes Out: 76 (10/13)

2) Polkarama: 91 (11/12)

1) Polka Power: 92 (13/14)

Some interesting conclusions can be formed from this.

First, it is obvious that Weird Al has gotten better with his polkas over the years. Both Polkarama and Polka Power are more recent polkas. The only reason Polka Power scored better was that it had more songs to parody and therefore had a higher difficulty to be perfect. However, both of the songs only had one song that didn’t score.

Second, newer style songs are easier to make polkas out of than the style of songs that were out in the 1980s. I realize that may challenge my first point but that is a good question: Is Weird Al getting better at parody polka medleys or are modern songs easier to make polkas out of?

There is no question in my mind that some modern genres have polka influence. The new punk/alternative style that my younger sister calls “Sca” (like Blink42 or Smashmouth) has some polka influence in it. Neither my math nor my music is brushed up enough to do a mathmatically scientific examination of this so I’ll use more anecdotal examination to show this point. This “Sca” (as I will call it) has the same “uhm pah bah” rhythm found in polka. Both inspire dance moves that involved jumping vertically while moving the feet in the air. Polka dancing involves a shorter jump with much flailing of the feet while “Sca” involves a higher jump with less flailing of the feet. Some songs have less polka influence and may be more alternative or punk and many might disagree with me but when I first heard this newish style I immediately felt a polka influence. Maybe the artist were subconsciously influence by Weird Al polkas they heard when they were younger?

Finally, although Weird Al has come close he has not created the perfect polka medley. Madanna’s “Ray of Light” disqualified “Polka Power” and Coldplay’s “Speed of Sound” disqualified “Polkarama” as being polka medley perfection. Although I’m sure his ability is getting better since the “Sca” stylings is, I’m sure, having less influence in music then Weird Al may have missed his chance.

Jan

3

Code in Books

January 3, 2007 | 1 Comment

NOTE: My OCD may be a factor in the following post:

If there is one pet peeve I have about reading technical books it’s errors in the example code. For example, in the Spring: A Developer’s Notebook that I’m reading right now on page 45 the following line appears:

protected RentABIke getRentABike(){

As soon as I saw the line I recognized the error because I had done the same fat-finger several times during the first two chapters (the I in RentABIke should be lowercase). As far as code errors in books goes this is a very trivial error. But it does point to the fact that the person who wrote the example, in this case not the primary author, didn’t even enter the code in an IDE much less compiled or tested it.

The most egregious of errors are when the example code not only does not work but the entire way in which the code is structured or framed doesn’t work. I’ve seen this where you have to basically re-write the example to get it to function. The re-write may demonstrate what you need to learn from the example but it takes so much time to do so you might as well teach yourself and forgo even reading the book. Most books at least forget to include some xml configuration entry or possibly a small method required somewhere. It can make it hard to learn the subject matter if your busy trying to figure out some small bit of configuration or code that has been left out.

I don’t learn from actually entering the example code and running it. I can do it with my mind completely shut down. The way I learn is to look at something that works and change it. The best case scenario for me to learn from examples in books is to enter the code, get it to run and the change it around. I want to look at it, think of some change I want to do (starting small and making larger changes until I feel I understand), make the change and test the results. For me it just takes too much time to do this if I am wasting my time fixing the example code.

I remember in my comp-sci 101 class the Pascal book we worked out of had the example code in the text but had an appendix in the back with full and complete code for the examples in the back. To me this is the best way to use example code in books. The code in the back should be fully tested by someone other than the author to make sure it compiles and functions the way the author desires. I guess not having this in the back saves a lot of money in printing. Why bother these days anyway when you can (usually!) download the code from the publishers site. BECAUSE THE BOOK IS INCOMPLETE IF YOU DON’T, THAT’S WHY!!!

I think I would be good at going through books and verifying the quality of the examples. I would enjoy doing it also. If any authors are interested, drop me a line, maybe we could work something out. I doubt it though. I just can’t see making the same amount of money I do now editing example code.

Jan

2

I saw a headline that “Japan TV apologizes for ‘topless’ New Year’s Eve shock… ” (video here).  They apologized for the appearance of topless dancers (I guess they had on body suits that had realistic outlines?).  What they should apologize for is the abomination of a show that was.  In the immortal words of the Emperor on “Amadeaus”  “well, look at them!”

What on earth is that?

Catchy tune?  Check.   Pretty girls in feather hats and skimpy outfits?  Check.  Crazy looking lead “singer”?  check.  Clown?  Wait….what the heck is the clown for?  And why on earth do you put body suits on women that mimic their breasts?  I mean…..I can’t tell a difference on the internet video.  The audience in the seats probably can’t tell a difference.  The T.V. audience probably can’t tell the difference.  If you were worried about nudity offending your viewers then it probably isn’t a good idea to use body suits that look, well, like nudity.

But finally. . . . .WHAT IS UP WITH THE CLOWN?!?!?!?

Jan

2

I might be done with EVE-Online. It’s not a bad game and if I am done with it then it is not EVE’s fault. I just haven’t been that interested in playing it lately. I think it might be a good game. It’s a sandbox game. There is no story line. The game is entirely player driven.

I don’t have the skills to fly a Battlecruiser to go out into low or zero security space by myself. I think my next step in playing it is to go out into less secure space and become part of a beginning or primer player corp. However, every time I log in all I can think of is the effort it will take to socially network to achieve this goal. After coming home from work at night, when I want to play a game I’m just not in the mood to put so much effort into the social networking. I bet this game scores high in the social area of the Bartle Test. This isn’t the game’s fault that I feel this way. I’m just not in the mood during my play-time.

I played a little bit of Rome: Total War over the holidays. I love the Total War series. I bought Shogun: Total War when it was fresh on the shelf just from seeing it (I am fascinated by medieval Japan). I liked the game a lot and it wasn’t until after I stopped playing it that it became popular with others due to little advertising of the game and the time it took the popularity of it to spread by word of mouth.

Halfway through the holiday I went back to playing Oblivion though. I don’t know what happened. I just got a desire to play some fantasy. Since, I already had Oblivion and it would be an easy single player game that I could walk away from to take care of other stuff I went ahead and started playing it again. I think I’ll probably play it for a while.

I can’t believe I’m going to say this but I might be done with MMOs. I just can’t find any that fit the strict parameters I’ve developed for a MMO. In fact I’m having trouble finding ANY games that fit the parameters I want. Primarily I want to play with my family in other cities across the country (and a good friend in another city; maybe some co-workers). I want to play co-operatively. I want to be able to play by myself if I want to and for the other people to be able to play by themselves if they want to (if no one else can play at the moment). The game can’t be too twitchy (most of us are older and our reflexes just can’t compete with the kids). Finally, I want some persistence. I want us to progress as we play over multiple sessions. I’ve been very surprised at the limited number of titles that even come close to these requirements.

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