Eurogamer writes:

The community has also pointed out that SecuROM does nothing to stop piracy, as Spore was cracked before public release. Instead, they argue, the real target is the pre-owned, trade-in market.

#games

If you use both VisualSvn + Trac (or another flavour of Subversion and Trac), and tried to integrate them with Fogbugz , you will have tried the TracFogbugzPlugin.

Trying to get this to work isn’t straightforward as it’s not compatible with Trac 0.11. You will come across the following error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "C:\Python25\Lib\site-packages\trac\web\api.py", line 339, in
send_error
'text/html')
File "C:\Python25\Lib\site-packages\trac\web\chrome.py", line 684, in
render_template
data = self.populate_data(req, data)
File "C:\Python25\Lib\site-packages\trac\web\chrome.py", line 592, in
populate_data
d['chrome'].update(req.chrome)
File "C:\Python25\Lib\site-packages\trac\web\api.py", line 168, in
__getattr__
value = self.callbacks[name](self)
File "C:\Python25\Lib\site-packages\trac\web\chrome.py", line 460, in
prepare_request
for category, name, text in contributor.get_navigation_items(req):
File
"c:\Python25\lib\site-packages\tracfogbugzplugin-0.9u-py2.5.egg\fogbugz\fogb
ugz.py", line 22, in get_navigation_items
yield 'mainnav', 'fogbugz', Markup('<a href="%s">FogBuz</a>',
self.baseurl)
LookupError: unknown encoding: >/">https://<<myurl>>/

To fix this line 22 needs changed, to read:

yield 'mainnav', 'fogbugz', Markup('<a href="%s">FogBuz</a>'%self.baseurl)

Or download the file below and use it as part of the installation instructions (if this is your first Python Egg you want to read about installing Trac plugins. ;)

Now it is loading but the plugin doesn't seem to work, haha.

Download: Patched tracfogbugzplugin-09u-py25

#subversion

Maintaining code can be a real pain in backside. Especially when you’re using shared code, almost always at a later date you will want to make the code more versatile to accommodate a scenario you hadn’t thought of before.

I’ve had experience this in an ASP / VbScript environment, and therefore I’m going to use the terminology of page and functions as opposed to files and classes:

1. Rework the code and update all pages. This is obviously a bad idea.
2. To extend inflexible code: Rename the function and create a wrapper in its place to access the function using default parameters that are compatible with your existing codebase.
3. Create functions that are extendable.

To use optional parameters, pass them in an Array or dictionary object. This way you can add additional ones. The benefit that Arrays have over Dictionary objects is that they use less resources. This can be important if you are developing for a popular website.

Another advantage of using Arrays is that you’ll use less code calling the function. Using a dictionary object you’ll have to add each parameter separately, then pass the dictionary object as the parameter of the function.

On the other hand, code will be more legible using dictionary objects. Dictionary objects use  key value pairs to tell you that key A has a value B. You’ll not have to bother about the order of parameters, but you’ll have to know the keys of each function. It results in verbose, legible, resource intensive code.

#uncategorised

Just been reading Gizmo's article on disabling Google's text advertisements. I'm realizing it has come this far: people have been increasingly annoyed by advertising on their favourite websites. N now even Google's textads are targeted because a small percentage puts the ads on the page people have become annoyed. So they disable the ads. That's their right.

However that leaves millions of bloggers without a possible revenue stream to support their writing so I am thinking what it can be replaced with. I've no idea. Personally I wouldn't donate to a website because I liked a certain article, donationware works best for 'tools'. I don't think I can get paid for putting legitimate search results underneath a post, which would be a benefit to readers, which is a shame. Subscription services go against the nature of the web (hiding content from public). I wouldn't buy a mug just because i read a website. Maybe that means that it's just too hard for an individual to recoup their costs?

That said, the majority of people will not have Adsense blocked. And I think the majority of bloggers don't blog for money, but because they like to discuss.

Credit: Photo by mwagner01

#technology

Acquiring feedback on web projects can be harder than you'd think, especially when you're working on internal projects that don't get discussed on outside your organization. By making feedback a fun, easy and rewarding thing to do more people might be encouraged to help us and put in the effort.

I'm sure some of you are in a similar situation: you launch a project and silence follows. Trivial problems might emerge but a there's no general response to the long hours you put in. That makes it much harder to evaluate the project and set a schedule for future developments.

To help with this we've created a UserVoice page. Let's describe it as a digg-like FAQ. People are encouraged to leave a message, can vote on feedback they find important, and always have the full picture of what the development is focused on. Developers act on the consensus and theoretically will work on solving the most urgent issues.

Of course this model will work best when both users and developers care enough to communicate. So Uservoice is engineered to make it trivial to leave a message. It can be easily integrated into an existing site. Some functionality requires a user account, which is a stumbling block. But you can leave feedback without it, which is a bonus. Oh and it doesn't integrate with any bug trackers which is a shame.

Will it work and will there be enough participation? Ask me again in 6 months time. I'm not sure how to make it any easier though.

#technology

James Houston, a Glasgow School of Art's graphic design graduate created a  live performance of Radiohead - Nude on a bunch of pc components. Very impressive.

Sinclair ZX Spectrum - Guitars (rhythm & lead)
Epson LX-81 Dot Matrix Printer - Drums
HP Scanjet 3c - Bass Guitar
Hard Drive array - Act as a collection of bad speakers - Vocals & FX

#web

It's good practice to make code easy to maintain, so sometimes you'll want to use less code using recursive functions. In order to find out how to this works in Second Life I created this small recusive example:

integer i = 0;
integer top = 0;
integer Monkeys()
{
    llOwnerSay("monkeys");
    i++;
    if (i <= top)
        return Monkeys();
    else
        return i;
}
default
{
    state_entry()
    {
        llSay(0, "Hello, Avatar!");
    }
    touch_start(integer total_number)
    {
        i = 0;
        top = Monkeys();
        llOwnerSay((string)top);
    }
}

This script says monkeys an increasing amount of times every time you touch it by calling itself if and keeping track of the total amount of times the function is called. First time there will be 1 monkey, next time 2 monkeys etc. Find more products at our shop in Badmoon.

#uncategorised

I had to create a simple script to turn a neon sign on and off. I decided to have both versions of the sign in a single texture and changing the offset with a script. Instead of using a timer and using llSetTimeout() instead I opted to pause the script for a small amount of time. The script does not respond when it's sleeping which should be less laggy then the timeout. All i do then at the start of a state is offsetting the texture to show the on/off alternatively.

default
{
    state_entry()
    {
        llOffsetTexture(0.0,0.25,ALL_SIDES);
        llSleep(1.37);
        state off;
    }
}

state off
{
    state_entry()
    {
        llOffsetTexture(0.0,0.75,ALL_SIDES);
        llSleep(.723);
        state default;
    }
}

Hope this is of use to you. See the result in our Higher / Lower game at Badmoon.

#uncategorised

Brian Wood presents an excellent Dreamweaver tips video on Youtube. Many people just use DW as a text-editor but it's capable of a lot more even in code view. The following video might open your eyes:

Very nice.

#development

I'd like to start recommending webservices  and software that I use frequently. Any product recommended has been evaluated for at least several weeks. In today's recommended we feature Instapaper. (Recommendation articles are personal opinions with no benefit for the author)

What does Instapaper do? Instapaper facilitates easy reading of long text content.

We discover web content throughout the day, and sometimes, we don’t have time to read long articles right when we find them.

Instapaper allows you to easily save them for later, when you do have time, so you don’t just forget about them or skim through them.

http://www.instapaper.com/

#technology #web

Interesting article regarding piracy and pc gaming:

Recently there has been a lot of talk about how piracy affects PC gaming. And if you listen to game developers, it apparently is a foregone conclusion - if a high quality PC game doesn't sell as many copies as it should, it must be because of piracy.

Now, I don't like piracy at all. It really bugs me when I see my game up on some torrent site just on the principle of the matter. And piracy certainly does cost sales.  But arguing that piracy is the primary factor in lower sales of well made games? I don't think so. People who never buy software aren't lost sales.

Is it about business or glory: http://draginol.joeuser.com/article/303512/Piracy_PC_Gaming

#games

Should simple software be free:

During the chat, the entire MacBreak Weekly crew discussed the danger to the music industry that comes from younger listeners having a built-in expectation that music should be free.

On this episode I believe [Leo Laporte] has inadvertently helped to perpetuate the same kind of thinking about software that the panel had just finished expressing concern about with regard to music: the idea that the hard-earned fruits of somebody’s creative labor should be free.

http://www.red-sweater.com/blog/481/it-should-be-free

#technology

PowerShell is a complete replacement for any of Microsoft's DOS or Windows command line interpreters. It is a full fledged object oriented system administration scripting language. With PowerShell knowledge you would run circles around any sysadmin that works predominantly from through the GUI, as well as be able to get Windows to do things that you just can't do through a GUI alone.

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/topics/msh/cmdlets/index.mspx

#powershell

From Eurogamer: Unangst said Microsoft would "continue to invest" in Games for Windows, which apart from giving its games an Xbox Live-style service layer with friends lists, Achievements and the like, also insists that games be easy to install, support widescreen displays and include parental controls.

It all sounds promising. The one thing I was most impressed with on Xbox 360 is the whole integration and lack of configuration for games, if they can bring that to Windows Vista then a lot of people will be very happy.

Some ideas:
You can see how they could potentially take the experience index benchmarking framework and develop that into something that can adjust games visual quality, automatic updating and applying of patching without user intervention, matchmaking and the community features could all be very useful and add value to PC gaming. Even some sort of integrated anti piracy tool developed for Microsoft that doesn't rootkit your machine which would be less painful to consumers would also be an improvement over the current situation.

#games

Breaks Friday with Cloudseer @ the Drome! It's my new spot: 3pm-5pm PST! Start off your weekend with the best breaks mixed by live DJ Cloudseer Writer, with a little bit electro thrown in! Bring all your friends to the Drome :D

It was good, managed to cram in a lot of breaks in two hours!

#music #secondlife

Mike Davies works as a web developer for Yahoo Europe and has some insightful comments on the Internet Explorer rendering switch (see source).

When a user upgrades from IE7 to IE8, they will be upgrading from IE7 to IE7. When a user upgrades from IE8 to IE9, they will be upgrading from IE7 to IE7. Notice the trend. [...]
Effectively, with this meta tag proposal, Microsoft have either absolutely guaranteed that they will remain the dominant browser on the web, or it has sown the seeds for its ultimate destruction. If it's dominant IE7 will be the instrument to hold back all standards compliant progress, just like IE6 before it.

Source [isolani.co.uk]

I can only agree. It seems to me the switch will result in better fitting websites, but not by using more standards. But I noticed this at the whole Eolas patent debacle: the IE team doesn't take enough responsibility regarding standards. Even though the code was fine they wanted developers to implement a javascript workaround for their own workaround solution in all their pages with embedded content. They didn't want to (or couldn't) pay Eolas so people now have to click to start embedded media. Even though it's a browser issue.

And the same happens in this case: if the browser vendor took its responsibility and improved its implementation, the whole issue  wouldn't exist for webdevelopers' if their sites written to standards (and valid) don't display properly. So the whole "the users have to be protected from broken pages" card is a smoke screen in my opinion.

Just be frank then: corporate partners costcutting is more important to Microsoft than the freedom of the web.

#technology

The following sites might prove useful if you suffer from a games addiction:

• http://www.find-games.co.uk   price comparison for games
• http://www.cex.co.uk – high street swap shop but great secondhand prices

#games

Don't call your submit button 'submit' if you want to change the submit event with Javascript:

If you do, the browser (please read “Firefox 1.5 or IE 6? - that’s what I tested at the moment) will consider submit is an object. And an object is not a function (although you might enjoy later on the paradox that a function is an object).

Source [webprodevelopment.com]

#development

All you need now is a mirror to see your own shirt:

This Wi-Fi Detector Shirt will detect Wi-Fi hot spots around you and will show you a signal each time it detects a working Wi-Fi spot.The Wi-Fi shirt will even show you the signal strength of the Wi-Fi hot spot around you and will animate the signal dynamically.

Source: Sizelopedia via Cybernetnews

#technology

Apparently they have not processed my 200+ logs I sent to them:

• Windows Vista users generally experience 20 percent fewer application “hangs” than those running Windows XP.

Source (Microsoft)

#windows