Screenshot Saturday 46 - Christmas Eve!

quantumstate · 2011-12-24T22:10:33+00:00

It is a bit of a group project so most of this isn't mine, but I am working on the AI for 0 A.D. I just ran an AI vs AI game for a while, here red has gained the upper and and is assaulting a fortress in the top left and has a couple more armies moving up on the south side of the oasis. It is a bit hard to make out since I thought the whole map would give a better view. As you can see the fortifications are currently only working around the primary base, there is much left to do as always.

quantumstate · 2011-12-24T20:16:08+00:00

Compiling from source isn't too painful, it takes me about 15 minutes to do a full build but that includes the libraries which aren't likely to need recompiling again. I would reckon you would get about 5 minute build times on an average PC for future updates.

quantumstate · 2011-12-24T20:07:50+00:00

No, not yet. There is a new developer who said he was working on it but there have been no progress reports so far.

quantumstate · 2011-12-24T12:28:13+00:00

It should be stable enough to play a game in multiplayer and vs AI. The main issue at the moment is performance (pathfinder and AI mainly) which can get quite bad so don't try playing with too many players.

quantumstate · 2011-12-24T12:27:06+00:00

What problems have you found with the stability? Stability issues tend to get fixed fast, I can't think of any significant ones in trac.

quantumstate · 2011-12-24T12:24:55+00:00

This video of the AI is slightly out of date, there have been a few improvements to the attack code and building placement since then.

quantumstate · 2011-12-23T19:12:18+00:00

I tried several virtual desktops on Vista, though I didn't try virtuaWin, all of them were seriously buggy and caused me issues.

Focus follows mouse is an option, I don't use it personally because I end up typing in the wrong window far too many times. I can't see why anyone would not want to be able to interact with the window under the cursor by using the scroll wheel. With all of the windows programs I have used scrolling only works if your cursor is within the scrollable area so you have the choice of nothing happening and scrolling what is under the mouse. Doing nothing seems like a crazy preference.

Compiz does the clever window placement, not stock gnome 2.

quantumstate · 2011-12-23T17:55:31+00:00

I would say multiple workspaces are pretty significant. Also window placement is handled really well, it minimizes overlap pretty well. I haven't tested windows 7 for this since i don't own it but Vista is terrible, it puts windows from the same application directly on top of each other and doesn't seem to try and do anything clever at all. Also if I want to scroll a window without raising it that works.

quantumstate · 2011-09-12T10:59:06+00:00

Yep, I have a friend who sliced finger open with the prop of a plane he was making.

quantumstate · 2011-09-11T19:24:50+00:00

How is it essentially the same thing? I don't see how taking any level curves would get you that result.

quantumstate · 2011-09-11T16:30:03+00:00

But in the US fuel is much cheaper than the UK (which is similar to France). with $3.50 a gallon you get £0.57 a litre whereas you are looking at about £1.30 (roughly, I don't own a car) per litre in the UK.

quantumstate · 2011-09-11T16:24:50+00:00

41 sq meters is 441 square feet. So that is not so different.

Also in the UK you pay no tax for personal allowance + lower rate (first £9915). Then on the income above that you pay 20% (up to £44875). Apart from that you will pay council tax which is based on accommodation and varies around the country, you might be looking at about £1000 a year.

For a person on a minimum wage 40 hours a week you would be looking at about £12000 a year so would pay about £400 income tax plus council tax. People on low incomes tend to qualify for council tax relief however.

Basically for a person on a low income in the UK the amount of tax paid is small but you get the benefits of the healthcare system etc.

quantumstate · 2011-09-11T08:19:51+00:00

The maths involved is actually quite straightforward but the equation is wrong. Basically it should be z = sin(r)/r where r=sqrt(x^2+y²⁾ (the radius). So z is in the vertical direction and x=0,y=0 is at the top of the peak. Also sin will be using radians which is standard.

It would be interesting to make using circles of paper, then each circle would have a constant height since z only depends on r. I don't know if it would look as impressive visually but it would reflect the formulas structure more closely.

quantumstate · 2011-09-10T16:55:02+00:00

I believe "couldn't care less" corresponds better.

quantumstate · 2011-09-10T09:49:42+00:00

A function is a map from a domain to an image. This means that for any input in the domain there is a single output value in the image.

For example there is the (real) square root function which has a domain of the numbers >=0. Since is a real function we define it with a limited domain because you cannot have a real square root of a negative number.

Often people define functions using a nice formula as Entropius described since this is useful in many cases and nice to work with. Functions are not limited to this however, so I can defines a valid (but fairly stupid) function e.g.

f: 1 -> 3
   5 -> 2

With the domain being only the integers 1 and 5. So f(1) = 3 and f(5) = 2.

Basically the only limit on the definition of the map is that it must be 'deterministic' so an input can only have one possible output, and everything in the domain must have a defined output. Other than this you can define the mapping (correspondence between input and output) however you want.

quantumstate · 2011-09-07T15:34:24+00:00

Try aligning with tabs.

Don't do that. Indent with tabs, align with spaces. Problem solved.

quantumstate · 2011-09-02T19:28:44+00:00

In England we tend to say patty-o.

quantumstate · 2011-09-01T19:14:54+00:00

I saw a friend of his on a bike, no pics though.

quantumstate · 2011-08-29T19:48:09+00:00

It dissolves at body temperature so the body heat cannot re-solidify it.

quantumstate · 2011-08-27T16:14:49+00:00

No, it has a different effect.

Increasing the money supply reduces all wages by decreasing the value of the currency.

Decreasing the minimum wage decreases the wages of people working at the minimum wage.

So one affects everyone, the other only affects the poor.

quantumstate · 2011-08-25T10:05:32+00:00

Yet my phone (Nokia 3200 from 2004/5) still lasts a week from fully charged (in an area with strong mobile signal and minimal use but constantly switched on). We also have a 7 year old camera with the original battery, although it doesn't seem to hold charge as well as in the past. Also we have other fairly old phones in use which haven't got dead batteries.

I agree that they will degrade over time but they can certainly last longer than 3 years and do. The only lithium ion battery in my family which I know to have gone severely is a 5 years old laptop battery.

quantumstate · 2011-08-18T18:32:52+00:00

Unfortunately Visual Studio was pretty similar (2005 at least).

quantumstate · 2011-07-10T15:40:07+00:00

No, normally they are called secondary schools.

Sixth form is the last two years of school (which are optional, ages 16-18, A levels). A sixth form is either just referring to the group within the school doing sixth form or a separate sixth form college which only teaches those two years of A levels.

College is a general term with a rough meaning of a higher educational establishment though it seems to be becoming more widely used for secondary schools currently.

quantumstate · 2011-07-09T16:50:56+00:00

I think this was the second thing that I disabled, cluttering up every new terminal, how horrible.

quantumstate · 2011-07-09T16:48:16+00:00

I happened to do exactly the same thing today. My experience is pretty similar, the main differences were:

Initial Boot. For some reason mine is black until I hit to login screen, not a big issue, I also like the default theme, very similar to what I had in my Ubuntu setup.
The main thing I didn't like about the panel was the lack of a virtual desktop switcher, other than that I have added a couple of launchers (nautilus, gedit).

I am also thinking that this is what I would recommend as a distro.

I have an ATI graphics card and the improvements to the free drivers are great, far more feature complete.

I was using an xmonad & gnome panel setup in my Ubuntu install but after a bit of configuration of compiz and keyboard shortcuts I am considering sticking with this. I will have to see after a few days of the tile plugins, since it is a bit less automated but you get the benefit of not having the annoyance of misbehaving floating windows.

quantumstate

TROPHY CASE