Rudolf Henning

I started playing with the idea again yesterday evening and started to draw up first a mindmap and then some simple ERD diagram for it.This is not gona be a short term project. The idea at this moment is to keep it small and simple - let the idea grow itself.

At the moment its a private project as it is located only on my own home pc (except for the blogging entries mentioning it here).

For now the concept basically covers only three aspects: (1) some document management i gona be needed, (2) a small'ish database to track things like events, locations, actors (will explain more later) and authors and (3) some static content like physics rules for the 'universe'.

The system will be part dynamic (database) and part manual - submitting stories and populating the database to reflect the story.

Explaining a bit more on entities(tables) in the database:
Authors: The writer of a story.
Stories: collection of 'events' that take place to make up the storyline.
Events: Define an 'event' that occurs linked to a location and some 'actors'. It will define a start and end time for the event.
Locations: As the name indicate will describe a location. It could be something as small as small room to 'a place' in empty space.
Actors: The term actor will include both characters and objects (like spaceships, craft, a home planet, a fleet of ships etc). Anything that can be written 'about' and could be an entity in itself.

As can be seen from the entities above it does have some hierachical structure. There is potentially another level that can be intruduced above 'Stories' : Universe. For now I'm keeping is simple and there is only one (story) universe and thus all stories submitted into it must mutually 'respect' each others story lines, events and locations... No planets can be blown up that someone else want to write a piece on later...

Initially there will be only one 'administrator' or master of the universe: me, that gets to decide what will/can be contributed. Initially I'll be the sole contributer anyway basically laying down the foundation rules and rules of the 'universe'.

At some stage I'll start making the content available publicly on a web site so others can share the experience and contribute themself.

Well, wish me luck. I'm about to create my own universe (actually I have already done it long ago and it just needs to be translated and cleaned up...)

I just finished Half life 2. Must say I did'nt like the end - really an ironic twist for an end. I can't help wondering why go through all the trouble of trying saving humanity... ok, dont let me not spoil the end for those that still has to play it.

Anyway, great game with so many aspects to it that makes it interesting. The only real bad thing about the whole game is the steam software that is so finicky about copy protection. They have gone to too much length to try to protect the game that it make the whole game play experience less enjoyable. Dare I say a cracked version will be much more fun!

I have added a statistics page on my 'bringbackscifichannel.za.net' web site. It seems that sci-fi is not limited to just joung or old people. There r ages from 12 to 64!

More than 3/4 of all those that signed r subscribers to DSTV. The remainder seems to be willing to subscribe if the sci-fi channel (or something of that genre) is brought back.

Please everyone, keep spreading the message!

Thanks

I came across the site of the new Battlestar Galactica 2003 movie/series.

http://www.galactica2003.net/

They have a lot of content on the site, lots of pictures and more. One bloke even tries to explain how folding works using relativity and string theories. I however don't believe in those theories which is based on false assumptions (check out www.metaresearch.org)

Great web site. This is why I love Sci-fi (actually Space-fi). Not those paranormal crap that some people believe is sci-fi.

I hope the DVD of this movie is available soon.

There is a review on Xbit labs about CPU performance under Half life 2.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/29cpu-hl2.html

It would appear that AMD has the edge over Intel on this game.

AnandTech has a review of the new Gigabyte K8NXP-9 motherboard featuring the NForce4 chipset. The AMD64 and PCI express support is what I'm looking for. The biggest issue is that it will take a while for it to become available here in the good 'ol R of SA. Why do we have to be so behind with these things - I wonder at times?

Like here: http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2273

Oh well, is there perhaps someone that want to buy me a Christmas pressie ? :p

Rudolf

I'm starting to enjoy this game a lot. The gameplay varies from action/shooting scenes to puzzles u have to solve using objects lying around. One scene in particular is breathtaking! U have to get across a HUGE bridge that is possibly hundreds of meters above the water by climbing the framework on the underside! U can look down and see how far the water is below u and u can actually hear the wind rushing past u while u hang on for dear life.

Then there is the next scene where I was trampled 3 times by a train rushing towards u while ur driving down the train tracks. All u can do is turn around and start driving at top speed away!

One thing I find really irritating is the continues louding between levels while ur in some kind of action (moving). The game freezes for a minute of so and by then u have forgotton what u've been doing (driving at full speed towards a wall... then when the game starts reacting again there is some stuttering and u cannot control what ur doing for a few seconds. Yeh, perhaps I need a faster machine... :'(

Anyway, last night I stopped while invading some prison with the help of some insects that use to attack me in the previous level. That brings me to another very irritating point of the game. The total lack of instructions or objectives. If u happen to have missed what some character has said what u must do there is no way to find out what is suppose to happen next. In Doom3 u had the PDA to lookup previous instructions and refresh the memory (which is getting fuller of holes by the day). This is outside the fact that the game (half life) does not even start with some explanation why things r the way they r and what is suppose to happen. But like some other commentor said somewhere... If in doubt in this kind of game its a good bet that ur suppose to save the world (somehow). Only problem is it seems there is'nt much to save anymore as the aliens have basically wiped out mankind already and the planet is all but ruined.

Anyway (again) I'm having fun still with the game and lacking in giving attention to the wife and kid. I owe them again!

I got the game on Wednesday afternoon and only tried to install it that evening. The first part is a rant section:

Why the h3ll put a game on 5 CD's? I mean, have'nt they heard of DVD's yet??

The 'Registration' part really 'SUCKS'! Sorry, there is no other way to put it. Took over 3 hours!!!

To top it all once the registration part was done it first wanted to 'download' updates - another 45 minutes of download time. For f#$%  sake, I just bought the game and there is already updates to the game!!

These guys (Valve) really seems to be paranoid about copy protection - to the point it actually scares away 'legitimate' gamers that wants to pay for the game!!

There is virtually no manual in the box. Only a small'ish instructionsheet with control keys and a few other things. Considdering this is one of the most highly anticipated games of the year I would have expected something more.

On the positive side I'm glad to say the actuall game (one u can get to it...) is really nice. Even on my 'slightly' dated system it runs smooth and without any major interuptions. Loading levels really is slow but once its loaded it seems fine. One issue is the 'lack' of instructions on what to do. There does not appear to be an 'objective' list or something and its not always obvious what should happen next. This force you to wander around trying to figure out both what and how to do it next. In a way this makes the game more challenging.

At no stage so far did I had any real problems with framerate dropping below an acceptable level. There are a couple of places you can feel the system is taking a bit of strain but overall it seems ok.

The physics of the game is excelent! You can interact with objects and do 'stuff' with them. The AI does at times seems a bit basic (guards standing behind a wall waiting for you to move so they can shoot). The sound and effects seems adequate but the music gets a bit irritating after a while (short while)

This I think can be a good game if only they can solve or get rid of the registration parts.

Oh well, I like the game.

Thanks to a collegue of mine the petition site has been 'mentioned' on Jo'blog. Although in a twisted way ;) since he 'apparently' don't like sci-fi.

What kind of IT person does'nt like sci-fi or at least some parts of it? Anyway, any publicity is welcome.

Now, if only some of those radio stations can start mentioning it...

Found this interesting post on Channel 9.

http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=28972#28972 

 Makes u wonder. Perhaps not all points r 'fair' but a number of them is so true its scarry!

I'm by no means an expert on the subject now but I learned a whole lot about AD during the last couple of days. I got a small utility project to do for the 'support desk' to reset users password (u'll be amazed how often it happens....)

Anyway, most of the thanks for solving most of this development issues should go to Carlos one of our AD MVPs. He helped out a couple of times when I got stuck. The tricky part is now that the utility is a ASP.Net app and thus the security contex in which it runs is an issue. This is one we have to do some more researching on how to implement it properly.

At least from within a windows app I can get it working flawlessly to reset a user's password plus set the 'must change password on next logon'. In ASP.Net I can get it working if I set the impersonated user fixed in the web.config file but when the enduser's context is used it fails...

Our first mcsd training session was a success and we all had lots of fun (with more than just the training...)

Some pictures can be found here

Now we're getting starting.

The site went life and became selfaware on 14 November 2004 at 17:14 (South African time). From there it will grow and consume the space-time continuum of the know universe.

Please go and sign my petition site!

www.bringbackscifichannel.za.net 

Mercy will not be shown to those that disobey!

And remember, the sci-fi channel will be baaack!

I've started an action to petition the return of the Sci-fi channel on DSTV. So far I've managed to registered a domain bringbackscifichannel.za.net where I'll host two or 3 web pages where people can sign the petition. The idea is to reach at least 10000 names and then send the information to DSTV as proof that the 'community' wants to see this channel brought back.

Soon I'll be calling on all u geeks to help raise enough awareness for the cause!

I posted a couple of pictures of our planning and strategy session this morning: http://dotnet.org.za/rudolf/gallery/599.aspx

There was even an airshow for us :p !