I’ve been working on a reboot of Free Sky, codenamed “Shiny”, and things are coming along nicely. I’ve learned a lot about program structure in the last two years, and I’m finally beginning to understand the MVC (Model-View-Controller) way of making an app with a graphical interface. A lot of problems that seemed unapproachable two years ago now open themselves [...]
I recently mentioned that I had a nifty little dice library and parser sitting around, waiting to get cleaned up and released as open source. Well, thanks to the common cold, I spent a good portion of today sitting around the house.
When I wasn’t sleeping, I was learning how to package a python library for [...]
With my object system prototype, I wanted to explore the possibilities of tagging. An article in AI Game Programming Wisdom 2 (”A Flexible Tagging System for AI Resource Selection”, by Paul Tozor) spurred my imagination: the article poses the scenario of a first-person sneaker. The player sneaks up on two guards and overhears them complaining about the cold. The straightforward [...]
I haven’t posted since the election. I’m afraid that an imperfect storm of events have kept me away. For one, I burned myself out on the internet in the ramp-up to the election. For another, I decided that November would be National Change Your ISP Month (NaChYoIspMo). I’m now quite happy with WebFaction, and just [...]
As you might notice, I’m experimenting with placing ads on newstalk. I have this hazy idea that it would be nice for my sites to pay for their own hosting (~$15 a month, currently), with the idea of eventually upgrading to a more featureful account and making some improvements in the way I currently run [...]
So, there’s this computer game I’ve been working on for the past three years. The working title is Free Sky, and the concept is very ambitious. Too ambitious, in fact. I have had several aims with this project, with varying amounts of success:
Nearly three years ago, I wrote about focus. This is my update on all that, and my rationale for reviving a near-dead blog. If you don’t want to read this lengthy screed, I’ll sum it up here:
I have to start writing again. Regularly. Newstalk is my chosen venue. If I don’t write here several times a week, please harass [...]
These are notes on several forms of extended storytelling I’ve observed in episodic television. I’m fascinated by the techniques used to tell these stories. The essay may never materialize, but some day I’d like to use some of the latter techniques myself.
So everyone’s talking about a certain recent poll purporting that 51% of Americans reject the Theory of Evolution. To provide counterpoint to this little bubble of furor (the poll only had 808 respondents–hardly a useful sample, I should think), I have to wonder: to what percentage of Americans does it actually make a noticeable difference whether the theory of [...]
Well, I’m finally doing it. I’m upgrading to the new WordPress. The site may experience some technical difficulties over the next few hours, or weeks. :) Expect some design changes too. You have been warned.
Update 12-Oct – That went better than I expected. You’re now looking at the new [...]
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The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
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