Category: Uncategorized

Well, Now I’ve done it. I decided to update my web site. So then I ended up adjusting style sheets and updating all the html files (including some I missed a few months ago) to use the new scheme. Things should be mostly standards compliant now. Wild, huh?

Part of this process involved rewriting the code for my blog and switching the backend database from Postgres to MySQL. Some of you may be screaming, "No! Why!" Well, I already have to deal with MySQL at the office and having to maintain only one particular software package is less time consuming. It also allows me to tinker with the more recent so called beta releases in a relatively safe environment.

Anyway, now I have the code in a state that will allow me to add nifty features to the blog. It’s down to the question of whether I actually get around to doing it. Only time will tell.

For those of you who care what is going on in my life, here’s an update on the various random things I’ve been up to.

With AugMUD, I am currently in the middle of a complete rewrite. That means there will be no code that is original to DikuMUD or CircleMUD or any of the other MUD codebases I’ve looked at over the years. As a matter of fact, the underlying architecture will be quite a bit different. I have, to date, got the core networking support working along with room file loading, mob file loading, a zone reset framework, and a somewhat functional scripting language. I have also created a subprocess handling scheme, player creation, and a few other boring things like AVL trees. The current ETA for this mammoth project is Novemberish.

I have also recently acquired a DVD burner. It reads things without issue. I have not, however, taken the time to work out how to get it to create a DVD yet. I suppose I should do that at some point.

This weekend (well, Thursday through Sunday), I’m heading off to the Mountain View County Fair. Anyone who enjoys this sort of thing should check it out. If you do stop by, you absolutely must stop by the Hot Chihuahua mexican food stand if they are there. (They usually are). Tell them "The Chile Guy" sent you. (No, that won’t get me anything. No, it won’t get you a discount. It might be amusing though.)

In other news, the finale of Joe Schmo 2 is on tonight. Anyone who hasn’t heard of Joe Schmo should check it out. Basically, they take some unsuspecting schmo and make like they’re on a reality show. But the show is all fake. I suppose it really is a reality show but it’s certainly not what the schmo thinks.

Some folks may have heard of LostMUD. Well, believe it or not, some progress can be considered to have been made. I should be able to use a bunch of the stuff I am manufacturing for the AugMUD rewrite to form the basis of LostMUD. This should be really cool. Of course, this could all be delusions on my part too.

And now for something completely different…

In the future some time, I am planning to add the ability to post comments here. Of course, that requires work.

I am also planning to come up with some sort of scheme to organize my bedroom so that all the stuff currently in cardboard boxes can be arranged in a more efficient manner. Yeah, I know, you’ll all believe it when you see it.

Then there’s the ambition project to invent a keyboard. Hey, I like reinventing the wheel. It’s fun. After all, I’m rewriting AugMUD.

Of course, I might also put up photos from my trip to Maine at some point, too.

Then there’s the genealogical project I’ve almost started working on. Maybe someday I’ll make some progress with it.

And, to tie all of this together, there’s the knowledge management system that’s going to revolutionize the world. Well, probably not.

Think I’m maybe a bit delusional about how much time I have?

So now you know more than you ever wanted to know about what I’m up to. Have fun.

Well, I finally got broadband internet back. It was a bit of a rough road once there was a port available in my neighborhood. Gotta love when the infrastructure can’t quite keep up with the demand. Anyway, it’s kinda sweet having 2.5M downstream and 1M upstream.

Of course, with the broadband came all the things that you can do with it. And I recently discovered Bit Torrent. Those of you that recognize the name need no further explanation. So, of course, I needed a shiny new 200G hard drive. And to store all the stuff on the 200G drive, I needed a DVD burner. So now I have these shiny new toys to play with. This ought to be fun. Good thing I have a motherboard with four IDE channels so everything can coexist with what I already have.

Of course, I could always get rid of some of the stuff I have. I have a CD-ROM drive, a CD burner, a DVD burner, and three hard drives. And they all work. A bit of overkill, eh?

That ought to be enough toys for a while. At least, it’s probably all I can actually afford. Now it’s time to get the finances back on track. But that’s a topic for another time.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled boredom.

As I noted previously I spent three weeks on vacation. This is, of course, a good thing. Even the experts agree that vacations are a good thing. (I heard the on the radio (CBC I think) while I was driving. It must be true.) In any event, I have survived my vacation and have even survived three days of work.

As vacations go, it was largely uneventful. This is a good thing. I drove from Calgary to Farmington without significant issues. I took a few wrong turns in Chicago and Cleaveland and almost missed a few turns along the way. I made it in just under 4 days. Then I hung out for 4 days visiting with friends. (Hi, Lynne & Darrell!) Then I got turned around in Augusta and evenutally got to the atlantic coast of Maine and travelled into New Brunswick. I took a wrong turn or three in Saint John but I eventually arrived in Prince Edward Island where I drove around a bit and saw a few sights.

Then, I started working my way back to Calgary. I made it across Quebec without having to stop for gas. I got tangled up in a traffic jam (due to construction) in Montreal and then another traffic jam in Ottawa. I found road construction on the 401 in Toronto and was amused by some of the traffic coming through Sault Ste Marie. I was harrassed by the US customs people at Rainy River but ultimately I was let through. I nearly froze in Winnipeg while getting gasoline.

All in all, I made it safely back to Calgary. More detail will eventually appear in the adventures section of my web site, possibly coupled with some photographs.

As a side note, Harry Potter on the IMAX was most excellent.

The trip itself only took two weeks. Then I watched Garfield and Around the World in 80 Days. Both films are hilarious. I also surprised Dad at the annual ham radio picnic (at Pine Lake this year). Then I enjoyed basically doing nothing for a whole week. That was most excellent.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled boredom.

In just a few hours, my vacation starts. That’s 23 days without having to go to work. Sweet.

I’ll be spending most of that three weeks on the road. For some reason, I enjoy road trips. But before I leave, I get to see the Harry Potter film on the IMAX screen. This ought to be really cool. Of course, the thing is completely sold out which could make things a trifle uncomfortable but, hey, it’s on the IMAX.

Of course, I had to come down with a cold of some sort just before my vacation but it should be mostly cleared up by time I get to my destination. I’ve got between 5 and 7 days of driving ahead of me to get there. Look for some pictures on my web site (eventually) after the trip.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled procastination.

It is amazing how fast time disappears when you get busy doing things. In particular if the things you are doing are related to something you will be doing in the future. Of course, you never notice this until after the time is basically gone.

This morning I was chatting with a coworker and realized that it is only four days before my vacation starts. And I’ve only got about five hundred things to do before then. Well, maybe not five hundred, but still quite a few things. Essentially, I have to fit the following into my schedule:

• Work
• CLUG
• Harry Potter
• Laundry
• Sort out my camera
• Acquire sufficient quantities of the appropriate currency
• …

This ought to be exciting.

Of course, once the vacation starts, time will continue to disappear except this time it will be bacause I will be having fun. Or at least that’s the theory.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled procrastination.

Okay, this is yet another rant about unimportant things. But hey, it’s my site and I’ll say what I want. 🙂

I take the bus to work every morning and then home again every evening. As a result, I get to see a great deal of what goes on on the bus on a daily basis. For example, in the past few days, I have encountered the following things:

• Characters who insist on standing in the middle of the aisle about half way between the front and the back, directly adjacent to the rear door of the bus.[1] Now this is relatively minor when the bus is not full. But when the dorks just stand there and refuse to move to the back of the bus, or even take a seat when one is vacated right beside them, it really causes problems for the rest of the crowd of shlubs who are simply trying to get from point B to point A.
• Then there is the person who asks, "Is anyone here from <insert name of city where the bus is operating>?" Ummm, yeah, it would be a pretty good bet that at least someone on a transit bus is from the locality. But come on, do you really expect people who are crammed into a crowded bus to respond to such a query? Esepcially those who are standing and may end up having to move further back at any moment? Now you might have a better chance of getting a response if the bus is not crowded and people are not simply trying to tune out the entire world in order to cope with not having any personal space. (You can see the same effect in elevators.)
• Here’s a really good one. Take a couple (boyfriend-girlfriend perhaps, but not necessarily) and put them on a somewhat crowded bus so they cannot sit together. Now have them make cryptic gestures, expressions, and so on, with the odd loud yell back and forth, for a quarter of an hour. Then when a seat clears up and they can sit together, have them behave like two-year-olds and refuse to sit together but complain about it. Don’t you just love how childish people can be?
• And now we come to that annoyingly excessively cheerful extroverted personality that occasionally seems to get on a bus. And then insists on regaling you and anyone else within earshot (which often turns out to be the next county) about this and that and the other inane thing, or worse, why their day went so well. Don’t you just love having someone in an excessively good mood inflicting that mood on you in an enclosed space from which you really can’t escape? Even worse is that these people simply cannot read the cues and realize that nobody actually cares. Of course, it’s compounded when they do insist on going on at length about their good day when you haven’t had a particularly good one

That is just some of the things I’ve encountered. Isn’t life just grand when you’re taking transit?

I daresay my life is not all that interesting and that most folks on the internet couldn’t care less if they tried. That said, I’m going to ramble on anyway.

Why exactly do people complain about the weather continually? I mean, we all complain when it snows or rains or what have you. Then we complain when it doesn’t. Why can’t people make up their minds? (Big question, I know.)

Have you ever noticed how mass transit is a great way to turn an otherwise great day into a lousy one? Invariably, by the time I get home in the eventing, I have a splitting headache and feel vaguely motion sick after my 25 minute bus ride. It’s marginally better in the morning. Perhaps it has something to do with the (hyperbole alert) 850,000 people who take the same bus every day?

And what’s with drivers, anyway? Why do people weave in and out of traffic simply to arrive at the next stop light three seconds before someone else? And then they repeat the procedure on the next leg of their trip. I mean, that’s got to be more aggravating than just moving along calmly.

Now here’s the kicker. Why do people write in blogs when basically nobody really cares what they have to say?

I now return you to the rest of your regularly scheduled inanity.

As some of you may have noticed, I’ve made a few updates (discussed here). I have now managed to convert my blog code to also use the same basic formatting and style sheet. The upshot to all of this is that the entire site should have approximately the same look and feel.

Of course, like all good tinkerers, I just had to adjust other things while I was in the code. You might notice now that the date and time for the blog entries is somewhat more readable. You may also have noticed that they are now displaying using Coordinated Universal Time. This does not change the link via which each entry can be reached. It does, however, remove all possible ambiguities due to time zones and daylight savings time and other confusing things.

This should be the last major bit of tinkering with my site for a while.

I first started using the "joe" text editor some time around 1996. I discovered it when a friend of mine was using it on his system. Up to that point, I had been using "pico" on account of it just happening to be barely adequate for my needs. After poking through the online help for joe for a while, I realized it was a very powerful text editor. It also worked well over the 2400 baud modem connection I was often using.

I have been using joe as my editor of choice since then. Sure, I learned the bare minimum of vi so I could deal with systems where it wasn’t installed. I also dealt with the frustration of joe not supporting UTF8 on a few occasions. I occasionally wished for syntax highlighting but found it to be a lunxury I wasn’t willing to switch editors for.

So, after the better part of a decade using joe, and watching almost no development over that time, I tune into the internet and find out that there’s a new version that does syntax highlighting and has support for some level of UTF8. Of course, I nearly immediately downloaeded it to check it out. After adding the usual tweaks to the config (setting the tab stops to 4 characters for .c, .php, .pl, etc. files), I set off using the new version.

Unsurprisingly, it works exactly like the previous versions. And the syntax highlighting is somewhat useful. Someone spent a great deal of time working through the definitions for a number of languages and also updating the default configuration file to indicate how to use it. This is really cool.

To those of you out there who like the joe editor and, for some reason, haven’t heard about version 3.0, I encourage you to run out and get it. Also, for those of you looking for a good text editor that groks the Wordstar key commands, you should check it out too. You can obtain joe by travelling past frestmeat and searching for joe. Sourceforge is home to the joe editor project currently so you could just go directly there, too.

Long live joe!