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But you just made Scott Adams piss himself.

BlackBolt

Right you are - wrong Python. I have no excuse, the book is sitting on a shelf behind me!

...and it was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying "Beware of The Leopard". (Apologies to DNA).

If we shut our mouths, our brains would start working.. (RIP DNA)

> start using giant round rocks with holes in the middle.

I favour adopting Ningis, thus:" In fact there are three convertable currencies in the Galaxy, but none of them count. The Altarian Dollar has recently collapsed, the Flainian Pobble Bead is only exchangeable for other Flainian Pobble Beads, and the Triganuc Pu has its own very special problems. Its exchange rate of eight Ningis to one Pu is simple enough, but since a Ningi is a triangular rubber coin six thousand eight hundred miles along each side, no one has ever collected enough to own one Pu. Ningis are not negoitable currency, because the Galacticbanks refuse to deal in fiddling small change. From this basic premise it is very simple to prove that the Galacticbanks are also the product of a deranged imagination. "

-- Hitchikers Guide To The Galaxy, the late Douglas Adams (still mourned)

PS What was this story doing on Slashdot to start with?

The late, lamented DNA.

I rather expected Douglas Adams last writings was a non-issue on Slashdot, because I wrote up nice posts with links and everything and they kept getting send to file 86. From the rather lukewarm addition by Michael, I'd assume it's so. Too bad he didn't have an Anime version, but maybe there's hope.

"What??"

"Big yellow ship hang over MegaTokyo in exactly way that brick do not!!"

"What say!!"

"Arthur Dent, where my satchel!?! We go on Vogon ship, listen to Poetry!!"

"What??"

There's to be a VHS tape documentary, too, this from DNA's site, one year to the date after his death.

http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/infocomjava. html

Requires java. Minimize window if the boss comes.

I wouldn't expect a Hugo for it, and it would probably be a sad irony for anyone to even nominate, for next year's awards, but stranger things happen.

Also, having a digital watch doesn't make a difference, you'd still be unhappy. (from HHGTG , rest in peace.)

A Java version of the Infocom HHG is available here (douglasadams.com):

http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/infocomjava. html

Save and restore don't work in this version, though.

Raymond

Well I've got a theory that we're all living inside a giant cosmic nostril. I could get someone to print that in a journal without getting decent peer review, get publicity and call it 'science' but I doubt it's very helpful.

Well, I think this guy beat you to it.

Speaking of small games, does anyone remember the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy adventure by Infocom. A shareware version was due apparently but never released. A java applet version is available at douglasadams.com

So all ye HHGG fans, enjoy. :)

Arpit.

...and you shall call it 'The Earth'

Sure, but after a thorough analysis, it will always produce a liquid that is almost, but not entirely unlike tea. :)

RIP, DNA

These old Infocom games may be the best reply to all the whiners asking "What good are Java Applets, anyway?"

The Z-code file for the Hitchhiker's Guide is available off Douglas Adams' web site. Download this, and buy the Activision reissue of "Classic text adventure masterpieces" and you'll have pretty much everything Infocom ever did. If you have a Pilot, put a copy of Frotz on it and you can play on the move. Some of the games have mildly annoying copy protection which means you have to look something up in the PDF manual, but by and large it's fantastic. I paid about £25 or so I think -- unfortunately I can't remember the URL, but I do remember the page was a sort of pepperminty green. Oh, and check out if-archive.
--

I think Douglas Adams (May he rest in peace. No, how about 'may he suddenly rise from dead and get back to writing those insanely hilarious books again!') said it best:

"There we British sat, poor grey sodden creatures, huddling under our grey northern sky that seeped like a rancid dish cloth, busy sending those we wished to punish most severely to sit in bright sunlight on the coast of the Tasman sea at the southern tip of the Great Barrier Reef and maybe do some surfing too. No wonder the Australians have a particular kind of smile that they reserve exclusively for use on the British."

Not sure, but there is always this classic little java gem for hours of fun...

Although I can do something similar, thanks to a friend - look at this message, where Douglas asks who wrote it, and then this message where the author explains that he wrote it, DNA didn't, and it was in part inspired by "The Lost Continent" by TP. He also mentions how it became attributed to DNA.

Tim

Although I can do something similar, thanks to a friend - look at this message, where Douglas asks who wrote it, and then this message where the author explains that he wrote it, DNA didn't, and it was in part inspired by "The Lost Continent" by TP. He also mentions how it became attributed to DNA.

Tim

Does anyone else remember this game or should I just check myself into a "home" (as my wife has threatened to do to me recently)?

It did exist, we all loved it (that damned babel fish!), and you can play a java version of it here.

The java port of the HHGG Infocom game is also available here, on the Douglas Adams home page. It's fully functional except that you can't save your game.

The URL is http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/infocomjava. html.

Play the Java game here
http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/infocom.html

There is a page on his personal site where you can pay tribute: http://www.douglasadams.com/

Watch out though, I think it's running fairly slow with the load right now.

Sometimes, though, it was a bit of a love/hate relationship, see this page.

other articles, for those who want to catch up, can be found here.

Thanks for everything, Douglas.
Raymond

Sometimes, though, it was a bit of a love/hate relationship, see this page.

other articles, for those who want to catch up, can be found here.

Thanks for everything, Douglas.
Raymond

Here's the URL to grab the Game File which can then be played on any emulator.

(In text form: http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/hhgg.z5 )

It's really sad he had to pass on already being only 49. I don't know how many hundreds references to THGTTG were putting some fun in everyones daily lives, up to a point where it'd seemed necessary to post a "No more 42 jokes, please" on the office door.

Apart from his all-time master piece, a trilogy in five parts, I think it's worth pointing out his other works, about strange Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, the Starship Titanic picking up travellers on Earth and my favourite piece of non-fiction, Last Chance To See . I'd really love to have seen more like this from his quill and meet him live on one of his public readings, even if he'd be talking to me in a foreign language...

We all will surely miss you, even the most stubborned Terry Prattchet fans. Farewell.

He helped create the first "hit" computer game based on a novel, helped ignite the whole "books on tape" trend, brought his stories to radio and television, helped create the rich, computerized environment of "Starship Titanic" and the concept of a "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"--a massive collection of obscure hyperlinked information (before the www existed) displayed on a small handheld computer (before PDAs existed). He also created the idea of the babel fish--a universal translator, essentially. Just by writing a good yarn, he helped spur change in the world around him that has benefited all of us. We all owe a lot to the guy and to the kind of changes that one "good read" can bring. Thanks, Doug.

...that Douglas Adams' official website doesn't have a word on his death. IMHO it quite well demonstrates the problem with 90% of all websites, they don't keep them up-to-date. Altough sad incident, the webmasters should realize that this kind of event will automatically create a busy day for the author's official website, and if the website is out-of-date, it kind of destroys any kind of credibility. But on the topic itself, sad. just sad.

Seems to me (and also to Douglas Adams - Author of Hitchhikers Guide etc [see here]) that it would be much better to wire houses with extra sockets on the powerpoints - thus the point will have (for example) a 250vac, a 5vdc and a 12vdc socket. Then every manufacturer creates their products to work using these sockets and thus you dont have to own 1000 'dongly things' .

There will be some equipment (your PC may be one of them) that would need to do its own conversions - maybe for getting a 0vdc or some such - I'm no expert. But for the most part there would be no need for damned power supplies for everything!

I won't come up with a transscript, though, I just died and it takes about a hundred steps to get to this damned door (the door next to it is even harder, btw)

Oh, and you can play HHGG as a Java Game on Douglas Adams website

so long, Michael

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy says that if you hold a lungful of air you can survive in the total vacuum of space for about thirty seconds. However, it does go on to say that what with space being the mind-boggling size it is the chances of getting picked up by another ship within those thirty seconds are 2**276709 to 1 against.

So whenever you find yourself locked out of a spaceship by some paranoid AI...grab your towel and Don't Panic!

Get yer Peril-sensitive sunglasses out and play it now!!!

disk images of the original are all over the place too.

And download it from here.
Richy C.

If you want you can play it online! here

You wake up. The room is spinning very gently round your head. Or at least it would be if you could see it which you can't.

>Turn on light
>Get up
>get gown

Play online Infocom HHGG.

This article was mostly using "If we look at human work and the factories the work is done in as a whole, then we have self replicating factories!" And the latest nanotechnology I've seen, was mostly nano-scale tools, and one motor that was driven by heat. Any nano-robot thingies that live in your trunk until you pull over. . . just might be a little too small to change a tire, or to repair a busted hose. As for replicating materials that we don't have. . . well, as far as I know, if we don't have something, we can't make something out of it. Too much "Jetsons" based thinking here. I think I'd rather have spent that 5 or so minutes that I read this article playing the old Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy game.

Here is a direct link to the Zcode on no less than the author (and HHGTTG copyright holder) Douglas Adams' website. (If this is of dubious legality, sorry - but there IS a java zcode interpreter there on the site so that you can play the game if it is :) )

Haven't you ever read Dirk Gently? Remember the bit about the sofa in the stairwell...

Or aliens might accidentally upset our planet or solar system while carrying out some grandiose interstellar construction project.

Golly, where have I heard this before?! ;-)

fwiw the original hitch-hiker's radio series is available on CD and tape.

fwiw the original hitch-hiker's radio series is available on CD and tape.

Hitchhiker's is here

You have: No Tea

On a related note, the games are still around, Activision (not so recently) released the first 3 zorks as freeware, Douglas Adam's web site has Hitchhiker's running (a java version, you may have to do some searching for it, I can't remember where it is) and the IF (interactive fiction) archive at ftp.gmd.de has plenty of new ones written by people who love the genre... Ahhh... ain't nostalgia great? No, seriously, ain't it great?

-GreenHell

The Zork Trilogy is available on Activision's web site.

You can play Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy on Douglas Adams' official page.

None of the other Infocom classics are currently free, that I know of.

It's certainly a pleasure to take advantage of those publishers that have decided to relinquish their right to not distribute.

Thank you Activision and Douglas Adams.

For a thorough understanding read "The Hitchhikers guide to the Galaxy" by Douglas Adams who did a /. interview recently.

I posted this in a subthread, but it's pretty deep so I'm not sure anyone's gonna find it...

You can find the old Douglas Adams text adventure here. You'll need a Z-code interpreter to play it, do a search on Freshmeat or your favorite software repository for either "text adventure", "infocom" or "Z-machine". You can also play it online right here, but you can't save on this page.

For those of you who might be curious, the online play page is just a Java applet interpreting the Z-machine code file, and the URL to it is embedded in the HTML file as a PARAM to the Java applet. Pretty basic, I know, but it comes in handy a lot... :-)

I posted this in a subthread, but it's pretty deep so I'm not sure anyone's gonna find it...

You can find the old Douglas Adams text adventure here. You'll need a Z-code interpreter to play it, do a search on Freshmeat or your favorite software repository for either "text adventure", "infocom" or "Z-machine". You can also play it online right here, but you can't save on this page.

For those of you who might be curious, the online play page is just a Java applet interpreting the Z-machine code file, and the URL to it is embedded in the HTML file as a PARAM to the Java applet. Pretty basic, I know, but it comes in handy a lot... :-)

...but you can download HHGG for free here.

In case anyone's wondering where the link is on his site, it's not there. But there's an online version that you can play. This online version is simply a Java applet interpreting the Z-code stored on the server, so if you dissect the HTML you'll find a PARAM tag with the link.

Wonderful thing, Java applets...