01.30.06
Posted in ALPHA, Animation at 10:17 pm by Nick
Time: 2 hours
Total: 2 hours
——————
I spent some time refamiliarizing myself with trueSpace 5.2. It’s so complex it makes me want to weep. I watched the 18 minute quick introduction to the interface, and decided to reinstall the program to fix a few errors that I (seemingly) could not undo.
Alas I found my backup disk was actually blank and that my burner on this computer does in fact happen to be completely dead. ::sigh:: I sometime later, after fiddling around with the program and trying to follow a tutorial (unsuccessfully due to the previously mentioned problems, like somehow deleting of misplacing my rendering tool bar) I decided to leave it be.
I think this will actually be my In-Depth project. I don’t really have the patience to mess with this kind of thing for hours and hour straight, so 30-35 might be a more accurate range (that I will probably still pass). I will make a few little animations, mainly playing with moving cameras and lighting techniques, though I may try making a 3D still.
This concludes my first post of my never ending 3D animation frustration. Maybe it will grow on me…
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01.25.06
Posted in Programming, MUD related, ALPHA, KaladeaMUD at 8:10 pm by Nick
Time: 15 hours
Total: 20 hours
———————–
This is an accumulation of effort that I never felt like blogging about. Most of it was done over our 4 day weekend.
I decided to switch the codebase to an interesting base called Scratch. It is designed to be the “socketmud of the C++ world”. All this means is you can connect and use some basic commands, but nothing else. This leaves most of the development up to the programmer/design team.
I’ve pretty much fallen in love with this code. I’ve been using C for so long I think like a C programmer instead of C++. This fellow knows his C++, though it took some serious tinkering to get it to compile. It runs on windows so I can test it on my local machine without too much trouble.
I’ve made so many enhancements, many of them minor, that I don’t remember them all. Most notably the base loads rooms. Oh, and since I didn’t mention it, the entire base run’s off ot MySQL as opposed to basic file saving. This promotes many things. First would be speed. Seaching a DB with MySQL is -fast-. Fast is good. Second is security. Anyone wishing to tamper with their player file would first have to log into my shell (not an easy task), and then log into the MySQL command line interface. This also makes additions, deletions, and modifications relatively easy. MySQL is also free.
You can now move around in the world. There are only a few rooms, but it works for now. I need to flesh out building, but there are more important things.
A small todo list (in no particular order):
- Create help file, help file editing system, and related code
- Store room’s in a balanced binary tree using the AVL algorithm described earlier. Possibly create an Abstract Data Template (ADT) so it will be easy to make tree’s of the type.
- Work on an editor interface. Straight up strings arent going to cut it for room descriptions or help files.
- Change say output format. It looks dumb.
- Create system wide data configuration and log key spots.
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01.24.06
Posted in General at 7:16 pm by Nick
(mirrored from Xanaga)
Turns out I’m going to attempt to use trueSpace 5 and the facial animator to turn out a short but semi-decent animation for ALPHA Auto. For In-Depth I plan to continue work on Kaladea.
Today was alright by my standards. Despite the fact that it was really -REALLY- damn windy on the UNI campus (and elsewhere I guess…), early class, feeling like an idiot in CO because of my assignment, not having taken the AAT quiz, my truck not starting, it being gloomy (and the “most depressing” day of the year), and missing the appointment at Tuffy because we didn’t have two drivers available and I had no idea what time to go down there (I need the truck now), I still ate breakfast and didn’t have any major homework undone. Oh, the light they fixed on my truck is not fixed, and dan’s car has bit the bullet for the moment it seems. And, to top it all off, I have 1/8th a tank of gas left in the truck. ::sigh::
If you really care about my troubles (or you wonder where I was yesterday), though why I’m not sure, you can go ahead and keep reading. It isn’t pretty.
—
Dan woke me up at 7:15am yesterday to tell me our mom was sick -again- and that I needed to get up. This was definitely not a good way to start the morning, week, year, and had this happened today it would have made more sense (today supposedly == most depressing day of the year).
After a long day of waiting around to see what was going on my mom was transfered to Iowa City just as my aunt got here from Iowa City. Somewhat bad timing, but it was still good in the sense we needed to talk to her. My dad is now down with my grandparents again (in IC) and last I heard my mom is in the ICU. To top this off, the last few times my brother CJ has come up from college my mom has been in the hospital, and he comes home Friday/Saturday. What a ball buster… ::sigh::
To top this off, Dan and I have to do the sleep shift schedule to avoid being late and what not, which leaves us quite drained. In fact, the only reason I’m still up and writing this is so the dogs can be outside a bit longer.
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01.22.06
Posted in School, High School, College, ALPHA, Computer Science at 3:06 pm by Nick
Time: 2 hours
Total: 5 hours
——————-
I spent some time verifying the balance of the tree’s and everything looks pretty good. However, I have one node in -every- tree I create with a balance of 2 (which is bad). The code leads me to believe that this node used to be a root node that was later rotated out of the root spot.
I will attempt later (if my professor can give me a lead) to fix the problem, but overall the effects are extremely positive. I ran the program on a 338 meg text file named osu.medline, which contains various informations on effects of drugs, diseases, disorders, their causes, and things like that.
This is a sample output (I won’t paste all 7.2 million words it read) with the number of nodes/unique words capped at 200,000 (Note: words of length 3 or less are discareded):
Nodes w/ 0 bal: 136003
Nodes w/ 1 bal: 32057
Nodes w/-1 bal: 31939
Nodes w/ other: 1
Overal balance: 120
Number of words: 7201810
Number of nodes: 200000
Time: 32 seconds*
–
It took just over 32 seconds to read 7.2 million words and inset them into the tree (and balance the tree accordingly). This is very impressive. The fact that 136,000 of the 200,000 nodes are balanced perfectly (balance == 0) means the tree is in very good working order, and the only problem is the “other” node, which has a balance of two. The others, -1 and 1, are local fluxuations that exist and will exist until the tree need’s rebalancing at that particular spot.
In closing (for now), the method outlined works. It is fast (7.2 million searches and additions! in 32 seconds!) and provides a very good tree.
*This time is a little off. Sadly the timer is not very resolute, and it in no way accounts for the hundreds of thousands of small words (length < = 3) that were read, translated to lowercase (with smashed punctuation), and then discarded. Also, this test was run on a Sidhe (http://sidhe.cs.uni.edu), a very fast machine.
-- edit --
I added two lines of code to avoid even smashing/converting strings of length less than 4 already. This decreased the overall time by one second:
Nodes w/ 0 bal: 136003
Nodes w/ 1 bal: 32057
Nodes w/-1 bal: 31939
Nodes w/ other: 1
Overal balance: 120
Number of words: 7201810
Number of nodes: 200000
Time: 31 seconds
-edit-
Code has been updated. The original is main.cpp, the recent additions are under main_mod.cpp.
http://ew.xidus.net/download/cs2/1
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01.20.06
Posted in General, School, High School, College at 11:28 pm by Nick
I’m setting two year long goals for myself right now (these are not like New Year’s Resolutions, as I plan to keep mine this year and I don’t mind if I break these:
1) Produce a semi-decent 2-3 minute animation using trueSpace 5 and its facial animator. I already have an idea in mind, which should be good I think. I just need to find the time to work on this. Tomorrow will hopefully produce a 30 second animation (perhaps a recreation of the spinning blue-red ring with fancy camera tricks). I should use a few of the tutorials…
2) Have a workable alpha version of Kaladea by the end of the year. This means I need a building system and a few other things (such as combat). Luckily I have room’s set up right now, and all seems well. Fleshing them out shouldn’t be difficult.
Pretty average day today. High school was boring as ever, but thats nothing new. I must say Demoss is fantastic and I think I’m really going to like Eastern Civ. The only downside to it all is I have oodles of reading to do just for those two classes.
Highlight of my day today was definitely CS II. O’Kane got done explaining a bunch of code, but no one understood it (and we have three or four Physics majors)! I told him he could do it much easier and he went and looked at my code (explained in the two previous posts) and then all was clear. So, in short, my code was more concise and understandable (but used slightly more overhead) and enabled the Physics majors to have a clue!
Right, so over the course of two hours we built up two inches of snow and I had to clean off my previously clear truck. The trip home took ten minutes longer than it should have, as I got stuck through an entire light and repeatedly slipped past turns I planned on taking. I do believe driving that one time was worse than all of the winter. Oh, to top it off, they made the turn-in to my housing area smaller when they rebuilt it and I nearly smashed into two cars (though going 6 miles an hour i doubt anyone would be hurt and the damage would not have been more than scratch). Wouldn’t that have been oh so great? Luckily I was able to turn away, but in doing so I nearly went off the road (because of the damn fish-tailing nature of trucks).
On another note, it is the most beautiful snow I have -EVER- seen in my life. Slow, thick, heavy and nicely spaced. It was amazing. It is also the best packing snow I’ve seen (I threw a few snowballs at my house).
-edit-
I reread this post and fixed a bunch of dumb errors. Should make more sense now.
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01.19.06
Posted in ALPHA, Computer Science at 12:50 am by Nick
Time: 3 hours
Total: 3 hours
——————
I spent all of this time on my first assignment for Comp. Sci. II. He hasn’t even finished explaining it all yet, but I have it all done. I checked the overall balance and it seems a little wacky, I must talk to O’Kane about this. Each tree seems to have one element with a balance of 2, which is forbidden!
Despite this, I have used binary tree’s successfully to accomplish the task. It is quite a nifty program really.
One of the interesting things about this code is that I was able to IM conversation and count the number of words (and unique words). Granted everything looked a little strange as it was all without puncuation and in lower case, but it still did it. Now it will give the overall balance level and the number of nodes at each balance level (-1, 0, 1, other).
There may be more on this a bit later.
Source: http://ew.xidus.net/download/cs2/1/
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01.17.06
Posted in General, High School, College at 9:08 pm by Nick
Yeah, so while all you little kiddies were sleeping in this morning (ok, not all of you) I had to get up at 7:30am and go to class. I know what you are thinking, yeah yeah, bitch bitch. And yes, thats exactly what I’m doing!
The title is partly inspired (if you didn’t somehow realize) by Benjamin Franlkin’s famous quote. I just finished listening to the hour long review of his life they did on him (this is the second or third time i’ve heard parts of it). He was such an amazing fellow, I really would have liked to meet him. But alas, I am not that old nor can I got back in time (too bad I sold that machine to NASA….).
Right, so, tomorrow is the first day of high school classes, second semester. Finally. My second semester college classes are pretty damn good, so I’m looking forward to Eastern Civ. (with Logan, Mandy, David, Ben, Tommy and probably tons of people i’m forgetting) and Great Books. I need to work much harder this semester. Maybe my mom won’t make it so much harder by staying out of the hospital for more than three weeks at a time…
In any event, I must shower, feed dogs, and sleep. Yup, I’m starting the wind down process now because I’m really really tired (up for almost 14 hours straight, I think I should be!). I feel bad for you poor fellows who have to get up and go to school at the normal time. Wednesday is my late day! I don’t have to be there till 3rd hour. However, I REALLY need to establish a sleep cycle so it isnt a shocker to have to wake up at 7:30am two days a week. If I could make a habit of waking up that early that would be pretty damn spiffy.
In other news, I’m going to get some help seeking employment at UNI in the ITS department from a fellow student (O’kane would probably give me a recommendation if I need one as well). Hopefully that turns out well.
Good night world. I’ll post something -real- tomorrow hopefully.
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01.10.06
Posted in General at 8:24 pm by Nick
Yeah, so today was pretty much terrible. Granted I really didn’t do as much as I could have, but seriously, it was bad. I don’t feel the need to elaborate as I have better things I should be doing, but I think it is probably worth noting that I, like everyone else, am having a terrible finals week (though I’m sure mine is much worse).
Motherly update: she definitely got worse from yesterday. ::sigh::
Better go finish up all of the work I can, tomorrow is the last “normal” day of this semester, which is good, because if I have ANY more entrepreneurship I’ll snap. I will miss creative writing though.
Final days shouldn’t be too bad themselves. Thursday (1,2,6,7) I have my entrepreneurship final (2nd hour) and class at UNI, but that is all (I took my 6/7 hour finals already). Friday will be Math and Creative Writing, so this will be the tough day (becuase of math). Also we get a long weekend (4 days), though I have 8am class on the Tuesday we have off. Probably for the best actually, as I need to find a sleep schedule and USE IT.
–
Today was the first day of Computer Organization. There are quite a few people in the class, most of them were in my Discrete Structures class. The man who sat at my table-section thing was actually much older and looked like a seasoned engineer. Between the two of us, Deandre and the other kid behind me (James? John?.. J…something) we should have a pretty good discussion group.
Right, off to work now. ::sigh:: Better turn up my System of a Down.
—
Edit: I found this worth saving, feel free to not read it.
ProgrammerX: OMG NO! It’s GOING TO EAT HER!
WhiteKnight8103: nah, i checked him out, he doesnt even breathe
ProgrammerX: Zombies don’t breathe, and they eat people…
WhiteKnight8103: yes, but the bear is not a zombie (it is made of fluff)
WhiteKnight8103: he is quite soft (the bear)
WhiteKnight8103: she has yet to name him
ProgrammerX: I hope she names him soon, unnamed bears are unlucky… or was that boats?
WhiteKnight8103: i think its both
WhiteKnight8103: zombies apply too (which makes life complicated)
WhiteKnight8103: unnamed zombies = bad luck
WhiteKnight8103: which is why in Dawn of the Dead most of the zombies are PRICKS
WhiteKnight8103: i mean, they are all bent of devouring live flesh….but if you name them, keep them as pets, cherish them, love them, then they gradually learn not to eat you alive
WhiteKnight8103: though you may not live long enough to experience that phenomenom
WhiteKnight8103: unless its Shaun of the Dead, in which you keep the zombie on a chain in your toolshed to play video games with
WhiteKnight8103: they suck at games though…such slow reaction times (which is why gaming consoles on the moon are pretty much wasted)
ProgrammerX: hehe, I see
ProgrammerX: lol I mentioned our conversation with someone else and he said this…:
ProgrammerX: You know, I’ve been talkign with Skttzo’s tonight, and that’s the strangest thing I’ve heard thus far. 
WhiteKnight8103: which part did ye give him?
ProgrammerX: me and my friend are discussing the sociological impact of unnamed zombies, one of the most unfortunate problems facing society. Seeing as, going unnamed, they can devour at will and go unpunished.
: Plus, unnamed zombies are also bad luck, and really really sad.
: Kinda like unnamed teddy bears and boats.
WhiteKnight8103: its because he != sane
WhiteKnight8103: he doesnt have the extensive knowledge of zombie society like you and i do
WhiteKnight8103: not to mention he doesnt have the moon to house his zombie legions (which are non existant for him!)
WhiteKnight8103: which, btw, doesnt actually have a “cycle”
WhiteKnight8103: they devour it
ProgrammerX: indeed
WhiteKnight8103: and it regenerates every so often
WhiteKnight8103: who doesnt have a regenerating spacerock to house zombies?
ProgrammerX: I can’t think of anybody off hand?
WhiteKnight8103: well, only sane people have them. I dont really “know” any non-sane people. I’m afraid i’m a bit…oh, sane-ist
ProgrammerX: 
WhiteKnight8103: i only fiddle with their kind, i do not allow them to penetrate the inner workings of the sane
ProgrammerX: yeah, that’s a pretty good idea.
ProgrammerX: The non-sane are strange ones indeed.
—-
WhiteKnight8103: i enjoy being sane
ProgrammerX: Same here
WhiteKnight8103: tis one of many feelings the world has yet to experience!
WhiteKnight8103: some day sanity will run rampant and spread faster than its predecessor (bird flu), and kill just as many!
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01.07.06
Posted in General at 7:03 pm by Nick
My mom kind of got me into a cleaning mood and now my room is in much better shape, but still has a ways to go. I actually cleaned out my nightstand’s….wow, lots of memories in there. Some bad, a lot good, and a few very suprising.
I also found a lot of things I’ve been looking for for a while (my first house key, glasses fixing kit, a few CDs and random trinkets). I also cleaned the other side of my bed (the side that is not visible via the door and standing). No more random papers. It is walkable now (though shelves still prevent that from being easy).
The area near the closet still needs an overhaul, as well as the computer desk. But it all looks much better and it makes me somewhat happy. But for now I think I’ll go to a private post and remind myself of the memories I’ve once again uncovered.
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