Michael Jackson

As an atheist I never really did believe in the afterlife, but in the case of MJ he really will live on forever, after all he is non-biodegradable!

We will remember him always for how he changed our perceptions on race. He showed us there where no boundaries like black or white, only greys.. from years 10 to 50.

It seems he was preparing his whole life for this moment, his final curtain, as even the mortician had nothing extra to do other than the usual weekly reconstruction of his nose.

I know that Michael touched many.. quite literally.. and it is my great honour to announce publicly the wishes of the Jackson family in regards what will happen to MJ’s body. He will be recycled and made into Lego so children can play with him for once,  and not the other way around.

Turn up the music

For those of you with volume control on your keyboards that seem to respond but dont actually change the vol I have a solution..

Go System >> Preferences >> Sound and change the Device under the Default Mixer Tracks to Playback: Your Soundcard and in the below list select Master.

This one took me awhile..

Zoom zoom..

I remember when I first started learning to program I still used gui text editors and I preferred to run a program from an icon off my desktop. Most beginners start off this way.  I recall every time I ran a script I had just written having followed some tutorial the thing up and finished at the speed of light, and I always missed the fucking output of the program.. which kind of defeated the point of the whole exercise!

Anyway I was asked how to pause a script so that you could see the stdout and it brought back memories of the beginning.. So I solved his problem and the funny thing was 5 other people in the chat room thanked me?

So here is how to make your script wait for user input or a predefined time in seconds;

bash 

read -p "Press ENTER to continue.."

sleep 5

python

raw_input("Press ENTER to continue..")

import time
time.sleep(5)

Dont forget to append the appropriate code to the end of your script.. otherwise it will wait but before anything has been printed to the terminal.

The best OS ever?

I have had a problem with jaunty’s net-manager-applet from the get go. I started up from a fresh install and it didn’t automatically connect to my DHCP server and get its ip and other info. I then tried to add a static connection via the applet with no luck.. Finally I manually edited /etc/network/interfaces and got my connection up and running. The only problem I could see was that the applet could not be used at all to configure the network. No biggy..

It came to pass one day that I had nothing to do and the applet was teasing me.. with its unused wireless meter (even though I only use wired..) poking at my firm statement that jaunty has to be so far the best OS ever.. I got down, used my windows admin skills inherited from my father combined with my linux guru magic, and fixed the bug in my otherwise perfect install.

Turning green!

Just as the next generation of bullshitters are coming onto the political arena, playing the green card under the false pretence that they are going to change the way we are doing things in a bid to prevent us turning the world into a larger version of Easter Island, it seems there has been a move to restrict your computer while it is idle to save that 1watt of electricity.

Program: Hey PC! It seems the user wants to show off the coolness that is a compiz enable linux!
Computer: Cool..
Program: I need some power to do something cool like 1 minutes ago.
Computer: OK. Here you go.
Program: Shit.. I am rendering as if I where running on a pentium 3!
Computer: Really? Well.. err.. I guess we can put foot to pedal, remove restrictions, and go the way my manufacturer intended?
Program: Its OK.. I am done giving my terrible demonstration.
Computer: Well just incase the user wants to show his friend what compiz can do given a second chance I will stay powered up for the next 1 second..
Program: …

Bounce!

I used to be addicted to gamemaker when I was younger so I thought I should try get the same experience but in python, hence pygame! On the site are a few simple tutorials to get you introduced. I just glossed over it so I could get onto the real stuff, writing an actual game. Not that punching a primate is not a game! I mean I know a few people that would spend hours whacking away at that chimp.

You will need pygame installed… There are installation instructions on their site. While you are there skim over their tutorials to get you greased up for what you are about to receive.

To get a quick intro to pygame I am going to make a very simple game. All it will consist of is a ball, that bounces… add some sort of user input, maybe some box shaped monsters with a fetish for killing round things and we have ourselves something!

Basic Intro

Firstly I would like to welcome you all to my blog!

Included in this verbal diarrhoea will be python, bash, C, linux and other related tutorials that I have written myself. I find that I cant learn unless I teach and I cant remember unless I record, motivation revealed.

There will be other drivel that you could filter through that I post as a matter of interest or to express various opinions and thoughts on what I see fit.

note: I am dyslexic, so if you see any misspelled words or incorrect English I have an excuse already lined up. Preparation makes perfect.

Welcome everyone!

In the beginning there was a boy, and his trusty pet computer named Dent. They played many games together and shared happy memories, until one fateful day when Dent got sick. He had contracted a virus!

He consequently lost all his memory and therefore all recall of his caring owner and the games we played.
I swore revenge for the damage that had been done…

1. Move to linux – complete
2. Learn python, bash, C and what ever else is needed for the next step – in progress
3. Write the singularity and name him ‘Dent’ – queued

note2self: don’t forget to buy flowers for Dents grave..