I've entered a mode that I can't explain. I used to enjoy games more than this. Now; they all feel like a series of chores to distract from actual chores. The fun seems to have seeped out of them, slowly but surely. The entertainment value is there, but its pull isn't so great.
Then I wonder, why should I do this chore with no tangible benefits compared to that other chore?
This year I've "invested" far fewer hours playing video-games than any previous year. And I don't miss them at all - it's as though I've been addicted to games, went to rehab, and wondered why I play them in the first place...
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Modern Treasure
Sitting at 1220 Montreal Road was a beautiful house within which, rumors told, the family hid a great treasure. Secured by multiple security systems, each as difficult to bypass as the previous. Security so tight that only a team of professionals could get through it safely.
Jane believed her team could pull it off. She had watched the family for days on end as she moved in next doors, to 1218 Montreal Road. She befriended the family, and managed to discover the ideal time to strike. The 25th of June, the day they leave for a long vacation in the Caribbean for over 2 weeks.
On the morning of the 25th, Jane put a small bag filled with flyers on the porch of her victims. The bag looked identical to the one she distributed to all of the neighbors. Each neighbor, took the bag into their home. Her victim threw the bag into their home not caring about it as they were too busy rushing out towards the airport to make their flight. They wanted to focus on ensuring everything was in order - not a petty bag.
However that bag was no ordinary bag filled with papers and advertisements. The catalog was hollow, and it contained this small robot in the shape of a fly. The robot could fly, but fed upon the sun's rays. Using short-range radio and a miniature camera to maintain communication and visual contact, Jane settled it in the sun on a windowsill, where it's batteries would stay full.
During the nights of absence of her victims, Jane would fly the robot through the house until she felt intimately familiar with it. She found the entrance to the treasure - obviously blocked off - and obviously too difficult for her little robot to enter as the entrance was sealed off and the little robot couldn't produce enough pressure on the buttons on the control panel beside the entrance to push any button.
However, all of this was part of Jane's plans. Upon the family's return, she had her fly keep an eye on the individuals. She noticed the mother go to the entrance of the secret area where the treasure should be kept. The mother entered a code - <1 2 3 1 0 1> - on the numeric keypad. She gripped the entrance and slid it aside, the and fly followed her in.
Obstacle after obstacle the mother unlocked, and the fly followed her, and Jane noted each movement and each solution to the ever-more complicated security systems. The details being irrelevant.
On the last door, the room filled with treasure, was actually quite empty. It was a barren room, with white walls, white ceilings, and a carpeted floor. In the middle of the cylindrical room was a small pedestal, upon which there was an urn. Two lawn chairs faced the urn. On the pedestal it was written "in memory of Jack". The pedestal was made of glass, transparent and hiding nothing. The urn was of clay, but not worth the effort of Jane to break into the house to get.
Shocked, Jane let her fly rest in peace at the foot of the pedestal. Months of planning, massive sums spent, all to discover that the treasure wasn't there. That it seemed to have moved.
The next day, Jane asked about the rumors of the treasure to her neighbors. Openly, they replied: "In this mass-produced world - everything exists in infinite multitudes which drives down value. The unique objects - the objects that identify us from the sea of duplicates - are what we believe to be of utmost value. Hiding money would only attract thieves therefore we use the bank, expensive objects are mass produced - we can buy one again as we have the means. Thoughts can be expressed and transferred into a digital form - duplicated and spread effortlessly. People are unique."
Saddened and guilt-ridden - Jane moved away. Her victims continued living, attracting the curiosity of thieves. None managed to get the treasure, but who would want to go through the effort to get it?
This story is simply a few ideas mixed in together. It's not really fleshed out - but it describes what I'm thinking about; namely how 'value' is being twisted and can be relevant to specific individuals, not everyone.
Jane believed her team could pull it off. She had watched the family for days on end as she moved in next doors, to 1218 Montreal Road. She befriended the family, and managed to discover the ideal time to strike. The 25th of June, the day they leave for a long vacation in the Caribbean for over 2 weeks.
On the morning of the 25th, Jane put a small bag filled with flyers on the porch of her victims. The bag looked identical to the one she distributed to all of the neighbors. Each neighbor, took the bag into their home. Her victim threw the bag into their home not caring about it as they were too busy rushing out towards the airport to make their flight. They wanted to focus on ensuring everything was in order - not a petty bag.
However that bag was no ordinary bag filled with papers and advertisements. The catalog was hollow, and it contained this small robot in the shape of a fly. The robot could fly, but fed upon the sun's rays. Using short-range radio and a miniature camera to maintain communication and visual contact, Jane settled it in the sun on a windowsill, where it's batteries would stay full.
During the nights of absence of her victims, Jane would fly the robot through the house until she felt intimately familiar with it. She found the entrance to the treasure - obviously blocked off - and obviously too difficult for her little robot to enter as the entrance was sealed off and the little robot couldn't produce enough pressure on the buttons on the control panel beside the entrance to push any button.
However, all of this was part of Jane's plans. Upon the family's return, she had her fly keep an eye on the individuals. She noticed the mother go to the entrance of the secret area where the treasure should be kept. The mother entered a code - <1 2 3 1 0 1> - on the numeric keypad. She gripped the entrance and slid it aside, the and fly followed her in.
Obstacle after obstacle the mother unlocked, and the fly followed her, and Jane noted each movement and each solution to the ever-more complicated security systems. The details being irrelevant.
On the last door, the room filled with treasure, was actually quite empty. It was a barren room, with white walls, white ceilings, and a carpeted floor. In the middle of the cylindrical room was a small pedestal, upon which there was an urn. Two lawn chairs faced the urn. On the pedestal it was written "in memory of Jack". The pedestal was made of glass, transparent and hiding nothing. The urn was of clay, but not worth the effort of Jane to break into the house to get.
Shocked, Jane let her fly rest in peace at the foot of the pedestal. Months of planning, massive sums spent, all to discover that the treasure wasn't there. That it seemed to have moved.
The next day, Jane asked about the rumors of the treasure to her neighbors. Openly, they replied: "In this mass-produced world - everything exists in infinite multitudes which drives down value. The unique objects - the objects that identify us from the sea of duplicates - are what we believe to be of utmost value. Hiding money would only attract thieves therefore we use the bank, expensive objects are mass produced - we can buy one again as we have the means. Thoughts can be expressed and transferred into a digital form - duplicated and spread effortlessly. People are unique."
Saddened and guilt-ridden - Jane moved away. Her victims continued living, attracting the curiosity of thieves. None managed to get the treasure, but who would want to go through the effort to get it?
This story is simply a few ideas mixed in together. It's not really fleshed out - but it describes what I'm thinking about; namely how 'value' is being twisted and can be relevant to specific individuals, not everyone.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Information on the Internet
Once upon a time there was this small tidbit of information. A datum. Pronounced useful and thrown onto the disarray that is known as the world wide web. The datum, lonely, remained stationary - lonely - disconnected.
The datum wanted friends, so it tweeted to everyone. Messages of it's loneliness. It got a few followers. They were bots.
The datum remained in obscurity. It knew it's self worth, but it felt like the web didn't want to mesh to it. That the spiders never got to it as no-one extended a filament for the spider to traverse.
The datum, lonely, gained a group on Face Book. No-one joined it's group - who would want to be fans of this small morsel of useful information? It was as though the datum was banned from the web. But how could useful information be banned thought the datum.
Until it linked to related datum. Extending itself for a solitary, useful, datum to an interconnected set of data whose combination is infinitely more useful as the datum now relates itself historically to previously related datum, and to similar datum discussing the same subject at the same time but from different point of views.
The datum, now part of the data that makes up the web, became accepted and linked to. No longer solitary.
As information - out of context - without any means to learn of the context, is useless to the user, even if it applies to the current situation.
The datum wanted friends, so it tweeted to everyone. Messages of it's loneliness. It got a few followers. They were bots.
The datum remained in obscurity. It knew it's self worth, but it felt like the web didn't want to mesh to it. That the spiders never got to it as no-one extended a filament for the spider to traverse.
The datum, lonely, gained a group on Face Book. No-one joined it's group - who would want to be fans of this small morsel of useful information? It was as though the datum was banned from the web. But how could useful information be banned thought the datum.
Until it linked to related datum. Extending itself for a solitary, useful, datum to an interconnected set of data whose combination is infinitely more useful as the datum now relates itself historically to previously related datum, and to similar datum discussing the same subject at the same time but from different point of views.
The datum, now part of the data that makes up the web, became accepted and linked to. No longer solitary.
As information - out of context - without any means to learn of the context, is useless to the user, even if it applies to the current situation.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Introducing Topics
Each word, carefuly chosen, concisely reflects the material of the main matter without burderning the reader with details while providing a miniature conclusion based on a fraction of the information. That is the type of introduction I strive to write, however selecting words is a much more laborious process than my imagination would allow me to believe possible.
These missing introductions are the plague of the posts within this blog -- immediate ideas are written ignoring the final structure of the document. Ignoring the road map that is the introduction.
Once finalized, the introduction will scope the text, keeping it in order and coherent. Ensuring that minute details are presented in order as defined by the macroscopic view of the topic presented in the introduction.
I need to finalize the introduction to my thesis.
These missing introductions are the plague of the posts within this blog -- immediate ideas are written ignoring the final structure of the document. Ignoring the road map that is the introduction.
Once finalized, the introduction will scope the text, keeping it in order and coherent. Ensuring that minute details are presented in order as defined by the macroscopic view of the topic presented in the introduction.
I need to finalize the introduction to my thesis.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Opinion of `Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince' Movie
To be honest, I didn't expect much when I went to see the movie. From what I heard here and there, however there are many glowing reviews of the movie online. However, I didn't expect what came out of the movie - as such the following impression could as well be due to missed expectations (which I believed to have kept low) and not to a movie that missed it's mark.
I've read, and enjoyed, all of the Harry Potter books - the first being my favorite. Each book sets out a puzzle. May it be finding out who the evil teacher is, discovering who a given person is, finding a specific person, etc. And once the puzzle is solved -- at the last minute of course -- does the story come to an end, usually through some battle. As well, the puzzle has plenty of tracks to send the three protagonists off course, and the school-year keeps them occupied.
Upon watching the movie, something didn't feel right. The characters were there, however there was this 'puzzle' component that was missing. Of course there was a search for who the `Half Blood Prince' was, and what Malfoy was doing, and the final memory from Slughorn. There were no false roads - everything was straight-forward and clear.
I understand this movie is supposed to serve as a bridge to the other two, albeit it feels like they simplified it for the sake of making the last two better. Every major component is there, but not fleshed out. There are puzzles, but no false paths that can be deciphered until the next movie.
The movie finished off as a bridge to the next, whereas the book went out with a bang aided by a battle at Hogwarts castle between students+teachers versus death eaters with Malfoy and Dumbledore discussing amidst the chaos while Harry is stuck underneath his invisibility cloak immobilized by Dumbledore; this one had Dumbledore die and death eaters proudly running off and only killing Dumbledore. Maybe my favorite scene in the book - absent in the movie.
The other scene in the book that I can clearly recall - was that of Moaning Myrtle screaming "murder" after Harry hits Draco with the spell 'sectumsempra'. In the book - there is consequence for Harry - and Snape clearly goes for the book. In the movie, in practically the next scene Harry resolves to get rid of the book - and he just walks away from a bloodied Draco letting Snape tend to Draco's wounds.
In the end, it wasn't a bad movie, neither was it as good as it's predecessors in my opinion. My opinion has nothing to do with the quality of the movie's visuals or audio (which are superb - I wouldn't expect anything less from a big budget movie) but the chosen content. This seems to be because two scenes that I associated as memorable from the book were missing from the movie.
I've read, and enjoyed, all of the Harry Potter books - the first being my favorite. Each book sets out a puzzle. May it be finding out who the evil teacher is, discovering who a given person is, finding a specific person, etc. And once the puzzle is solved -- at the last minute of course -- does the story come to an end, usually through some battle. As well, the puzzle has plenty of tracks to send the three protagonists off course, and the school-year keeps them occupied.
Upon watching the movie, something didn't feel right. The characters were there, however there was this 'puzzle' component that was missing. Of course there was a search for who the `Half Blood Prince' was, and what Malfoy was doing, and the final memory from Slughorn. There were no false roads - everything was straight-forward and clear.
I understand this movie is supposed to serve as a bridge to the other two, albeit it feels like they simplified it for the sake of making the last two better. Every major component is there, but not fleshed out. There are puzzles, but no false paths that can be deciphered until the next movie.
The movie finished off as a bridge to the next, whereas the book went out with a bang aided by a battle at Hogwarts castle between students+teachers versus death eaters with Malfoy and Dumbledore discussing amidst the chaos while Harry is stuck underneath his invisibility cloak immobilized by Dumbledore; this one had Dumbledore die and death eaters proudly running off and only killing Dumbledore. Maybe my favorite scene in the book - absent in the movie.
The other scene in the book that I can clearly recall - was that of Moaning Myrtle screaming "murder" after Harry hits Draco with the spell 'sectumsempra'. In the book - there is consequence for Harry - and Snape clearly goes for the book. In the movie, in practically the next scene Harry resolves to get rid of the book - and he just walks away from a bloodied Draco letting Snape tend to Draco's wounds.
In the end, it wasn't a bad movie, neither was it as good as it's predecessors in my opinion. My opinion has nothing to do with the quality of the movie's visuals or audio (which are superb - I wouldn't expect anything less from a big budget movie) but the chosen content. This seems to be because two scenes that I associated as memorable from the book were missing from the movie.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Perceived Flaw with Java
There are several things that annoy me about Java. Same goes for C# and similar languages. Albeit - I do respect the "code-behind" feature of C#.
The flaw is not security, it's not performance, it's not syntax, it's the encouraged methodology. And I'm not complaining about the inner classes used to implement interfaces to receive events (although that could be a rant on it's own). It's a philosophy that developers must break out of.
Getters and setters - I'm looking at you!
Nothing wrong with getters and setters? Hmm - let's delve deeper into the perceived problem. A getter allows code to extract values from a class, and a setter allows us to set values into a class while performing a bit of error correction. Sounds good so far.
But there's an ominous problem here - and it appears to affect most OOP languages. The getters and setters - when used improperly (happens more often than not) - bypasses the elegant concept that a class' public methods are simply a gateway to get something to happen and that the underlying implementation can change at will.
Classes should perform a (limited) set of actions and the getters/setters should reflect not the underlying implementation but what the user of the class is expecting. So often I've seen getters/setters for questionable things that clearly indicate how the underlying implementation must function. Functions made public for the sake of having them accessible by any other class (since it was convenient).
And XML serialization is making this worse, using reflection to get at the class internals by assuming variables will each have a "getValue" and a "setValue". The holy-grail of OOP - modular components that can be changed independent as long as they retain the same behavior diminishes as the getters/setters imply an implementation.
I could argue for C-style header files. However, that wouldn't make a difference - it's a method that I feel Java makes worse.
For example - for most problems - if posed correctly - can be very simple and elegant. Composition of this simpler problems using classes that expose simple interfaces can keep the program as a whole simple. However, in reality at times, it's a free-for-all with overly complex function calls... (a big picture view is required to get anything done)
Maybe I'm ranting for nothing? Maybe things need to expose their complexity?
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Taming Time
Tick-tock the clock counted down. Tick-tock it sounded. Tick-tock it resonated down the hall.
Workers count the tick-tocks. Workers know there are a fixed number every day. Workers eagerly await their freedom.
Time is evil. Time slows down for people who do not enjoy themselves. Time lengthens the tick-tocks for the workers.
Supervisor counts the tick-tocks as well. Supervisor hopes a worker misses a tick-tock. Supervisor despises time for it's negative effect on people.
And throughout the day, supervisor tries to keep people productive, time attacks the bored workers, all of whom are listening in to the tick-tocks from the clock.
Workers count the tick-tocks. Workers know there are a fixed number every day. Workers eagerly await their freedom.
Time is evil. Time slows down for people who do not enjoy themselves. Time lengthens the tick-tocks for the workers.
Supervisor counts the tick-tocks as well. Supervisor hopes a worker misses a tick-tock. Supervisor despises time for it's negative effect on people.
And throughout the day, supervisor tries to keep people productive, time attacks the bored workers, all of whom are listening in to the tick-tocks from the clock.
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