OT: I'm not actually complaining - it is interesting that you got modded up and I conversely got modded down though (given too that they are only a handful of posts apart).
I've changed my usual behavior and started marking people who are jerks in discussions I read "Foe's" - so I've now got a fair few more Foe's than I used to. While this is making my reading experience much more enjoyable I have had some geninuely good posts modded curiously recently... *raises eyebrow*
You joke, but you can actually download the ISO of RC1 freely from Microsoft (without having to jump through lots of hoops - assuming you have a Passport [MSN/Hotmail/X-Box Live] account already, or don't mind creating one). You need to give your details to get a licence key (which is immediately presented, and emailed to you for good measure), and you can use it on up to 10 PC's.
You must apply for a licence before November 30th to get a serial number though! If you do purchase it you can upgrade to the full release (i.e. you won't have to wipe your existing install). I actually think that's pretty cool. It makes me wonder why - as far as I can tell - you can't just 'unlock it' on line by paying for it with a credit card (the way I buy most of my Windows games now - e.g. through Stream or from similar systems like EA Downloader). I would expect that to cut down casual piracy amoung lazy people who can't be bothered to work out how to get round the 'activation/validation' that's increasingly required.
True, it is possible to write great apps in Perl. It's also great for simple small quick apps. But it's difficult to impossible to keep code clean as the app grows to a larger scale (think above the 100,000 LOC mark). It also has a very poor object model for encapsulation.
I definately have problems with Perl's object model but I don't think 100,000 + line Perl software is especially difficult. I've found a system with lots of modules and at least that many lines of code (I would estimate it at at least twice as many, but I don't have access to it at the moment) is quite easily maintainable. It's not as elegant as something like Java or PHP5's Class model but it still allows for a good level of discipline to be enforced.
As with any language, it does assume you don't abuse it, which is just as true of something like Ruby - purely anecdotally I would say that outside obfuscation challenges I've seen some worse Ruby than even the worst Perl I've come across from a maintainability point of view (and I've writ^W seen lots of nasty Perl!:). (The Ruby code in question is actually fairly infamous here it's that bad.)
I strongly suggest thinking about going for positions based around PHP (perferably somewhere doing OO based PHP5) - as these days PHP is much more commonly sought after as far as web site design goes and it's similar enough that's it's easy to learn and you can maintain your Perl skills at the same time (and I imagine most places that would welcome both). I'm sure there are certainly people who are going to advocate you go for positions with something like Ruby, but I would say it's not mainstream enough yet and it's safer to stick with something more common if you're looking for reliable work.
If your looking for steady employment you could also learn Java - demand for Java developers of all levels of ability is still very strong, though it is more of a departure from something like Perl (it's actually pretty close to doing good OO PHP5 though). Java development can be a bit dull though (based on the sort of environments it tends to get used in) and because it's so verbose you need an army of people to write reasonably complex applications with it (not that I don't like it). JSP development is another option, but seems to be less popular than PHP these days (something I think is for the best if I'm honest).
There is a lot to like about.NET itself, but I would have some trepidation about it on the grounds that a lot of Microsoft technology shops have some really awful developers and working in an environment with a bunch of numpti's can really drive you insane (something I would say that is also true for some Java shops - more so than most Perl/PHP/Unix houses, but obviously they are not guaranteed to bad developers either, I've just found them to be not quite as bad overall). If the guys seem like the stand up sort who have decent experience then I'd certainly consider it though!
As far as what not to look for, I would advise staying clear of anywhere that runs PHP on Windows or does much in the way of ASP (especially if they are using Vistual Studio to create ASP sites - you'll go mad inside a fortnight with that). Those two things are defiantly bad mojo in my experience, YMMV.:-) Oh and I'd pay attention to any bad vibes you get in an interview! If you are a bit suspect or slightly irritated by something in the interview I'd move on (it may be better to wait a few weeks for a job you reall want).
Call me sometime next year when there's a good shooter on the Wii, the only viable console to play a shooter on.
Millions of of people that do play first person shooters may disagree with you. It's all about the control mechanism and game mechanics, as long as you build them with the target platform in mind, it's perfectly viable.
Compare, GRAW on the 360 vrs GRAW for Windows. Despite the PC version having more interactive environments and allowing for more fine grained controller of your squad members it's not nearly as much fun to play as the 360, which has a different control system and mechanics specifically geared for the platform (much like has been done for Gears of War).
I agree that Goldeneye was vastly overrated (I wasn't a big fan of it's control mechanism), and Halo was a little too (though it's got it's the best control mechanism and mechanics of any console FPS I'd played prior to GRAW) but so was Half Life 2. Personally I didn't enjoy Half Life 2 nearly as much as the origional.
Throughout most of the game I felt the visbily elderly graphics engine compared poorly to other games like ones using the Unreal engine or in the BF series (let alone something like PlanetSide) as the outdoor maps ended up feeling cramped and artificial. I also felt the game left much less room for tactical gameplay than was present in the origional.
This is because so much that happend in HL2 was heavily scripted meaning you couldn't really 'attack objectives as you want to' but rather you were placed in situations where very specific things happened when you triggered them (doors closing behind you, gangways falling down blocking your path), forcing the same tactics on everyone.
I'd much rather have an open map (like a large BF2 map - which are very detailed) where it's more of a sandbox, but where I'm guided to objectives and targets. Scripted events and triggers are good things, but people generally don't prefer "on rails" gameplay.
I would note that the best levels in the origional Halo were the ones where you had an outdoor enviornment that you could tackle in a number of ways, achieving objectives in any order (and conversely the worst were the levels in The Library (IIRC) where you are walking down a narrow corridor having enemies thrown at you for about 30 minutes or more).
I felt the same was true of Halo 2 - you can complete the tunnel section in under 5 minutes if you go back to get a Warthog and then put you foot down and race all the way to the other side (great fun too, with all the jumps, obstacles and enemy fire to dodge), or you can get in the abandoned Ghost that is left waiting for you by the entrance and spend a good 45 minutes slogging it out killing everything between you and the exit. Of course Halo 2, while interesting in some of the story being told - much more of a story than was present in HL2 I would note - was not so dynamic.
Multiple ways to meet an objective (while not really something GRAW had that much of, and was admittedly fun never the less) is definately something I think more games should aim to allow for.
I think it was back in July Apple acknowledged this. As others have said it is, I am led to believe, usually not the fan (although it sounds like it is) but related to the motherboard, with possibly more than one specific cause - it was reported here, in case you missed it. Manufacturing problems might account for the overheating too, they seem to have had more than one issue with the first batch (I remember having a few problems with my first PowerBook G4).
What doesn't seem to have been mentioned yet is that you can get it repaired by Apple for free if you get in touch with them via Apple Care (even if you haven't explicitly purchased extended Apple Care). I would really recommend getting Apple Care, I've found them to be superb at fixing problems (including ones that were at least partly caused by user behaviour) very quickly with no fuss at all. I would definately get it sorted it out sooner rather than later, soemthing like the thermal paste issue could be effecting your performance (and potentially application stability) too.
I'll probably get Ridge Racer 7 on the way home tonight.
Or 6, or twelvtey, or whatever it's up to now, I should say.
I liked the origional TOCA game, until it stopped being about racing touring cars and started forcing you to play through all the stages with eveything from karts to grand prix cars to old muscle cars (which all handle widly differently, and you can't just pick and choose which style to play a series of races in, you have to play them all in order).
Oh and PGR3 is way too stingy on the cars now, again previously in the series it was easy to unlock cars and the progression is slow and natural. Now, you have to do some races on 'Easy' mode at first, then when you get a car that is fast enough to be able to meet the time restrictions to do it at Normal and Hard you have do them again. Oh yes, and the tracks are *much* smaller than in previous versions, less than half the size in fact.
I'm wonder if it was just too time consuming to do all the artwork for the size of area covered in the origional games, and that's why the latest version has the new less favourable career progression mode that's padded with all the more abstract speed/cone/timed lap challange stuff (because the wide range of courses possible in previous versions simply can't be done when you are racing over a much smaller map area).
Test Drive, despite it's not always completely smooth frame rate (which seems to be mostly due to all the flora it's rendering), seems to cope with loading scenery on the fly very well though. It's just occured to me I've never noticed it in fact.
You obviously haven't played PGR3. Oblivion's got nothing on the load screen bonanza that is PGR3.
I completely agree, PGR is a bit of a mess. When you try and restart a race on the same course it still takes ages to 'reload' it, and there isn't even any dynamic movable scenery to re-position (other than maybe the odd scripted plane that flys overhead)! It's much worse than the origional MSR on the Dreamcast or PGR on the X-Box, as much as I like the Live stuff the progression system is not as good either, in fact I've hardly played the game despite prefering it's handling to any other 360 racing title. I'll probably get Ridge Racer 7 on the way home tonight.
Microsoft definitely dropped the ball by not including an HD on every system, it was one of the outstanding features of the origional console. I can't see many developers bothering to optimise for Hard Disk loading if they think they might have to come up with another loading system for those that don't have a Hard Disk (certainly, no one seems to have bothered so far).
Microsoft's main interest is in that if everyone used Internet Explorer then it would make them easier to get hooked on Internet Explorer exclusive functionality - that is, other Microsoft technologies (so they can sell development tools and servers off the back of that). Early on Microsoft eschewed the web in favour of their own system, codenamed Blackbird (which they abandoned in 94/95 when it was clear it wasn't going to fly, if you'll pardon the pun) because they were hoping to have tighter control over the platform as a whole (from content creation tools to the delivery mechanism and also the client).
By publishing their own browser (leveraging an open source rendering engine) vendors like Apple can help stop that from happening which secures their own position (even though they have no plans to take over the desktop browser market, just having a significant number of users using something other than IE is enough). Though in reality, Apple pretty much had to bundle their own browser in some form as Microsoft didn't seem to be that commited to IE on the Mac any more (l would put that predominately down to the existance of Mozilla/Firefox). A shame, as IE on Mac OS (Classic) was for years the best browser on any platform, and even endorsed as such by the W3C!
I think Microsoft are much less focused on browser dominance now though (as there is enough competition to make to prevent them being able to dominate the market), which is why the pace of IE development has slowed to a crawl in the last few years (this update being many years over due, for a company with Microsoft's vast development reasources). Basically IE7, odd new interface aside, is comparatively minor update (even though it does address a small number of important issues, something that is very much welcomed by content creators) and is really just them having the project 'ticking over'. Microsoft could easly have done the fixes in it years ago if they'd actually had any motivation to assign developers to the project and get it done (but as you've said, there has been no real motification for them to do so).
There is virtually no incentive for other companies to develop a browser beyond preventing someone else (i.e. Microsoft) from dominating with their own solution. They are getting increasingly hard to develop too (especially if your aiming for complete CSS and XSLT compliance). Basically at this stage, I don't think anyone really cares who's winning (other than people who care on technical or political grounds), as long as someone else in the market doesn't have complete dominance. Projects like Firefox and the KHTML rendering engine (at the core of Safari) are pretty hard to squash too, because it's harder to crush an open source project than it is a product from another company.
The Wii is capable of 480p in a 16:9 aspect ratio. It will not look "weird" on HD sets, just not as detailed. You'll note that the videos Nintendo has of people playing the Wii are on smaller HDTV sets.
Even many X-Box titles look bad on a larger HDTV set, they don't just look 'not as detailed', they actually look a mess and some are unplayable.
Halo 2, for example, while fine on my 32" CRT set was so messy it was unplayable on my 50" Plasma (and the Pinoneer does very good scaling). It was very difficult working out what was going on onscreen with everthing so scaled up, everything kind of blurs together (unless your ridiculously far away from the set). I think the problem was made worse by the very uniform gray/purple colour palette. I was very happy when I got the update from Live which allowed it to run at a higher resolution on the 360, I could finally get round to playing it and make out the enemies and plasma grenades on screen!
It's not a problem unique to videogames either - before I got my HDTV box the low quality of the MPEG encoding on some non HD channels was very noticeable on my Plasma - watching some channels was a bit like watching a YouTube video, they had gone from being looking really good (on my older CRT) to looking noticeable block.
I agree that most users are going to have a smaller HDTV set in the immediate term, and so it's not going to be a huge issue. I think is enough to deter gamers with a larger set (which, with HDTV content picking up, are becoming increasingly popular), because low resolution games really will look terrible when they are blurry and scaled up. The danger in that is it may discourage those people from recommending to people who are liable ask them for advice that they get a Wii.
Where are you getting cable internet that isn't from the cable company?
You can get broadband (which is I assume what you mean) from sources other than a cable company (cable internet is just one form, and not actually the most common form of broadband).
o) Cable broadband providers most commonly provide CPE's (Customer Premises Equipment) with a single RJ45 interface, and often USB. Additionally, most cable providers do not encourage use of 3rd party cable modems. If you want to connect other devices, it's usually better to buy your own switch in this case, as you seem to have done with the WRT54G (which is both a wireless router and a switch). Cable providers have also different in that historically they been more picky about how many machines they 'allow' you to connect - typically because they are used to making money from 'multi room' subscriptions with cable boxes and have being trying to aply the same model to internet access (most seem to have given up on that now though, thankfully).
o) DSL broadband providers most commonly provide generic (sometimes rebadged) ADSL CPE's with more than one RJ45 interface (with ADSL2+ increasingly so, as pretty much all ADSL2+ capable modems have multiple interfaces). Some (from vendors like Actiontec) also have USB interfaces, but it's less common (built in wireless is more common in DSL modems though). DSL providers also rarely enforce limits on how many machines you can use (e.g. by checking to see how many unique MAC addresses it can see on your line, as some cable providers have done), because they are coming from a different background (one where vendors sell bandwith, rather than devices).
Most DSL providers are quite happy for their customers to buy a 'wires only' service (aka BYOM - Bring Your Own Modem), but some do prefer that you use one they have supplied as although ADSL is a standard, some CPE's are more compatible with the chipsets in specific brands of DSLAM's (the provder equipment that DSL routers connect to) and makes for less support calls.
Most interestingly, enforcing the use of specific provided equipment allows DSL providers to guarentee quality of service - allowing to compete with cable companies with VOD (Video On Demand) services. This is the direction a lot of satillete and DSL/telcoms companies are moving in and why they are providing their own CPE's for DSL lines now (even though they are not quite ready to deliver VOD just yet, next year it's set to explode in popularity - especially in regions where cable is not already dominant).
(Was about to go on about that, but must get back to work:-)
I can tell you for damn sure my modem only has 1 RJ45. The router has 4 out though. Shouldn't mix up hardware components like that.
I'm not mixing up hardware, but you are. Units like the Netgear DG834 (with comparible systems from Zyxel, Actiontec, etc) are all DSL modems with 4 Ethernet ports and in the US, Europe and Australia providers are shipping the same gear. They are typically switches not hubs though.
It's almost exclusively cable providers that provide systems with only one RJ45 port (and typically those systems also have an optional USB port - which is on some, but not most DSL modems).
Pretty much all ISP's and cable providers are using the same gear, all over the world. The same is true for cable and satellite set top boxes - it's just differently badged, with different software, but the hardware is stock equipment for one of a handful of vendors.
Actually, the vast majority of people in WA (which, for it's size, has bugger all people in it to begin with) have access to broadband in the form of DSL or Cable.
...and once again the US assumes everyone else in the world has DSL and 4 port modems.
I'm not from the US, and FYI all the other countries in the developed world do pretty much all have broadband, with 4 port DSL modems (from the likes of Negear, Zyxcel, etc.) being very much the norm.
Hello, a lot of people still use 56K modems to connect to the net.
Indeed, but those are not usually people with more than one computer - because people with more than one computer are the sort of people that will just get cable or DSL (unless they are in the sticks, and most bumpkins don't own more than one computer so that's a very small percentage).
The biggest ISP's in Australia supply a USB only DSL modem when you sign up. These people rely on ICS.
Not true. Bigpond/Telstra, Internode, OptusNet, Netspace, Westnet and the rest all supply DSL modems with an Ethernet interface or no modem at all. Providers everwhere - not just in Austrialia - have the option of a USB modem for customers who want the cheap and nasty option, but the people who have chosen to go for the USB-only modem option (where it's still avalible, and it's avaliblity is rapidly declining) are almost certainly not "relying on ICS" because they almost certainly have only one personal computer in the house.
It's freeware. As soon as the principle author tires it will stagnate, die and be forgotten.
Freeware is not distinct in that regard, plenty of half decent FOSS projects are abandoned and die too (despite interest in the software from the userbase).
Anyone using NAT under Linux, for one. Families connecting multiple computers onto a single network, for another. Not to mention people who share the same printer or who have a central file server set up to share mp3s or whatever.
None of those things require Internet Connection Sharing, and I would argue it's not even the easiest or most common way to achive them. Virtually anyone with a consumer DSL offering can just plug their computers (or printers, or network storage devices) right into one of the RJ45 ports on their DSL modem and be served a DHCP IP from the modem - even most cable modems these days even have standard RJ45 interfaces you can plug in to a cheap switch (allowing you to use several machines on the network, even if they have a policy that you are only supposed to use one machine).
It was useful on Windows 98 when so many people were limited to using modems for internet access, but Ethernet is so ubiquitous these days it's a bit of an anachronism. Even in Windows 2000 the ability to configure the routing policy is limited to renaming the connections so that the prefered routes occur first in alphabetical order (I kid you not), that is unless you upgrade to something like Advanced Server which comes with administration tools to enable routing tables to be modified.
They ARE talking openly about what the intend to offer
No they arn't.
If you disagree, I'd be interested to hear a rebuttle with a detailed description of what both Sony and Nintendo have confirmed about their online gaming platforms. For example, I would love to know more about the friends system, the match paring system, if it has different 'zones' for different types of players, if there will be different subscription levels, and what the abuse mechanism is like (especially if there is no charge for the service - that is how they intend to deter abusive players who've been banned from just creating yet another free account on the spot).
It was just over 7 days ago that Sony even started to give tangible information about the actual online gaming experience (ie. beyond pure speculation from marketing), and even then they have shared it only to selected parties, like the folks at 1UP (who, it's clear from their latest video podcast, still arn't sure what it's going to be like). So far, the browser and that it will have an online store is all we've heard. It turns out we now know Sony's store lists the price of items in straight forward monetary amounts, rather than hiding behind a points system, and that it will interact with your PSP. That's pretty much all we know (and none of that tells us how the online gaming service will actually function).
Nindendo have been conspicuously quiet about the details their offering too, no one knows exactly what they have planned. While are all excited about itwe don't know what it's going to be like yet.
I would add in closing that playing on line *is* a privillage (no quotes needed), it's not a basic human right or anything - it's a service on offer that is charged for. The hosted service that make Live possible is not free to run (even in the case of peer hosted games, Live still matches you with people you know and like, avoids recommending servers where there is someone who you don't want to play with on them, and provides different 'zones' for different types of players). Sure non MMO multiplayer gaming on Windows and the Mac is free once you've bought the game, but they don't offer any of those features (though frankly I'd really like to see zones and a player rating system on all platforms, especially in teamplay games like Battlefield).
It's pretty hard to paint Microsoft in a bad light for charging a small fee for a service that no other vendor is even offering yet. The other vendors have now had 6 years to play catch up to the Dreamcast and despite much hope the PS2 and GB would support online gaming, they didn't (and it's not unreasonable to think that if Microsoft hadn't launched Live 4 years ago - at a time where both Sony and Nindendo were saying, incredibly, they didn't think online gaming was that big a deal - that the incumbants would not have been pushed into coming up with similar offerings).
Sony got people to hold off on buying a Dreamcast based on lies (e.g. faked demos at E3, of games that look better than any PS2 game ever produced) and hype about how awesome it would be. In the end the PS2 did not compare favourably with the DC (bearing it mind it was released two years later yet, unlike the DC, had no online games platform and almost identical graphics - in some cases, like DOA, PS2 ports were actually graphically inferior to the DC versions).
This hurt the brand a little, but the impact of the origional PlayStation still meant it had a loyal following (and Sega's bad timing with the Saturn and previously lack luster 32X and comparitively expensive MegaCD systems had left meany consumers hesistant of new Sega consoles). It's clear many in the press and in the general public have bought into the PS3 hype and - thanks once again to the likes of faked E3 demo's and outrageous exaggeration of the systems power - but I would say the PlayStation brand is significantly damaged from Sony's previous antics and Sony itself has lossed a lot of the brand loyalty it enjoyed in the 80's and 90's.
I think it will do fairly well still. As with the PS2 roll out a lot of people have held off waiting for it because they've heard it will be the best thing since sliced bread and are determined to get it almost regardless of what you say to them about it, but I think it will show 'you can't fool all the people, all of the time' and that the brand image will be further eroded, and that rediculous cost will contribute to that. I think that will be the case because those of us that are happy to spend such a large amount on a console are also those of us who are least likely to be convinced by hype alone (because if we are that serious about gaming we problably know quite a bit more about it than your average guy) while the average man in the street (who is, understandably, going with the flow in thinking "PS3 is the best console to get, right?") isn't going to want to spend that much on a games console - I suspect he's going to be paying more attention to each one and trying to work out why he should spend that much more on a PS3, and I further suspect a lot of people are going to determine their isn't enough of a compelling reason at all.
It's probably too late for Microsoft to make much more money out of this (I expect most people who want a 360 have got one by now, and that they've probably already profited as much from the shinanagins surrounding the PS3 as they are going to), but I think Nindendo will do very well - especially if they can get enough Wii's out on sale in Dec-Feb. Oddly, I find myself content at the thought that Microsoft are attempting to sabotage the PS3's launch through well timed product releases (with titles like Gears of War coming out and with it looking better than any PS3 launch title - and Halo 3 waiting in the wings to try and steal thunder at some future point), given Sony's behaviour with regard to PS2 and PS3 I can't help thinking they soundly deserve to have some wind taken out of their sails.
Sony and Nintendo do not have an online service for their consoles, while Microsoft launched their service 4 years ago. I'm not sure how you can reasonably interperate that as 'Sony and Nindendo have a free online service', it's only free in the sense they don't exist yet.
When the other vendors eventually launch online gaming on their consoles (like Sega did with the Dreamcast over 6 years ago, but that Sony and Nintendo both dismissed as irrelevant) or at least talk openly about what they intend to offer, then it's worth discussing. Until then, it's the same old tired mantra of "Yeah, well when OUR console comes out it will be TWICE as good!" vendors playing catchup have induldged in for about two decades. In reality, most vendors are knowingly deceptive about what they intend to offer, and it's invariably a huge over hyped disappointment. While it's certain all vendors will have an online offering of some sort, it remains to be seen how it will compare against Live.
Coming from a PC gaming background too, I think it's marginally annoying to be charged for the services offered by X-Box live as I'm used to them for free on the PC, but the amount they are charging is peanuts and they are offering some reasonable service with decent content - like demos, previews and community content, the IM service, gamer profiles. The quality of the service is entirely inline with the small annual fee (about 45 UKP a year), it's not as if they are charging 10 UKP a month.
That said, the pricing structure falls down with MMO's though. I think PSO on the 360 will fail by attempting to charge an additional monthly fee as users perceive they are paying twice for the same service. They'd do better to have a Live subscription of a higher level (e.g. more like a 10-15 UKP a month value) that gave you an entitlement to play all MMO games on the 360, and have some way of doing revenue sharing with the publishers based on what services were getting the most use. I think MMO games on all consoles will suffer until a better pricing mechanism is implimented, which is a shame as a lot of console gamers have never played an MMO and are missing out on the experience.
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, that's my joke from about 15 minutes ago! I demand royalties! ;-)
OT: I'm not actually complaining - it is interesting that you got modded up and I conversely got modded down though (given too that they are only a handful of posts apart).
I've changed my usual behavior and started marking people who are jerks in discussions I read "Foe's" - so I've now got a fair few more Foe's than I used to. While this is making my reading experience much more enjoyable I have had some geninuely good posts modded curiously recently... *raises eyebrow*
You joke, but you can actually download the ISO of RC1 freely from Microsoft (without having to jump through lots of hoops - assuming you have a Passport [MSN/Hotmail/X-Box Live] account already, or don't mind creating one). You need to give your details to get a licence key (which is immediately presented, and emailed to you for good measure), and you can use it on up to 10 PC's.
You must apply for a licence before November 30th to get a serial number though! If you do purchase it you can upgrade to the full release (i.e. you won't have to wipe your existing install). I actually think that's pretty cool. It makes me wonder why - as far as I can tell - you can't just 'unlock it' on line by paying for it with a credit card (the way I buy most of my Windows games now - e.g. through Stream or from similar systems like EA Downloader). I would expect that to cut down casual piracy amoung lazy people who can't be bothered to work out how to get round the 'activation/validation' that's increasingly required.
Never mind the music, have you seen the guys name? "Mr Toyoda " indeed! He should be up for trademark infringement!
True, it is possible to write great apps in Perl. It's also great for simple small quick apps. But it's difficult to impossible to keep code clean as the app grows to a larger scale (think above the 100,000 LOC mark). It also has a very poor object model for encapsulation.
:). (The Ruby code in question is actually fairly infamous here it's that bad.)
I definately have problems with Perl's object model but I don't think 100,000 + line Perl software is especially difficult. I've found a system with lots of modules and at least that many lines of code (I would estimate it at at least twice as many, but I don't have access to it at the moment) is quite easily maintainable. It's not as elegant as something like Java or PHP5's Class model but it still allows for a good level of discipline to be enforced.
As with any language, it does assume you don't abuse it, which is just as true of something like Ruby - purely anecdotally I would say that outside obfuscation challenges I've seen some worse Ruby than even the worst Perl I've come across from a maintainability point of view (and I've writ^W seen lots of nasty Perl!
I strongly suggest thinking about going for positions based around PHP (perferably somewhere doing OO based PHP5) - as these days PHP is much more commonly sought after as far as web site design goes and it's similar enough that's it's easy to learn and you can maintain your Perl skills at the same time (and I imagine most places that would welcome both). I'm sure there are certainly people who are going to advocate you go for positions with something like Ruby, but I would say it's not mainstream enough yet and it's safer to stick with something more common if you're looking for reliable work.
.NET itself, but I would have some trepidation about it on the grounds that a lot of Microsoft technology shops have some really awful developers and working in an environment with a bunch of numpti's can really drive you insane (something I would say that is also true for some Java shops - more so than most Perl/PHP/Unix houses, but obviously they are not guaranteed to bad developers either, I've just found them to be not quite as bad overall). If the guys seem like the stand up sort who have decent experience then I'd certainly consider it though!
:-) Oh and I'd pay attention to any bad vibes you get in an interview! If you are a bit suspect or slightly irritated by something in the interview I'd move on (it may be better to wait a few weeks for a job you reall want).
If your looking for steady employment you could also learn Java - demand for Java developers of all levels of ability is still very strong, though it is more of a departure from something like Perl (it's actually pretty close to doing good OO PHP5 though). Java development can be a bit dull though (based on the sort of environments it tends to get used in) and because it's so verbose you need an army of people to write reasonably complex applications with it (not that I don't like it). JSP development is another option, but seems to be less popular than PHP these days (something I think is for the best if I'm honest).
There is a lot to like about
As far as what not to look for, I would advise staying clear of anywhere that runs PHP on Windows or does much in the way of ASP (especially if they are using Vistual Studio to create ASP sites - you'll go mad inside a fortnight with that). Those two things are defiantly bad mojo in my experience, YMMV.
Call me sometime next year when there's a good shooter on the Wii, the only viable console to play a shooter on.
Millions of of people that do play first person shooters may disagree with you. It's all about the control mechanism and game mechanics, as long as you build them with the target platform in mind, it's perfectly viable.
Compare, GRAW on the 360 vrs GRAW for Windows. Despite the PC version having more interactive environments and allowing for more fine grained controller of your squad members it's not nearly as much fun to play as the 360, which has a different control system and mechanics specifically geared for the platform (much like has been done for Gears of War).
I agree that Goldeneye was vastly overrated (I wasn't a big fan of it's control mechanism), and Halo was a little too (though it's got it's the best control mechanism and mechanics of any console FPS I'd played prior to GRAW) but so was Half Life 2. Personally I didn't enjoy Half Life 2 nearly as much as the origional.
Throughout most of the game I felt the visbily elderly graphics engine compared poorly to other games like ones using the Unreal engine or in the BF series (let alone something like PlanetSide) as the outdoor maps ended up feeling cramped and artificial. I also felt the game left much less room for tactical gameplay than was present in the origional.
This is because so much that happend in HL2 was heavily scripted meaning you couldn't really 'attack objectives as you want to' but rather you were placed in situations where very specific things happened when you triggered them (doors closing behind you, gangways falling down blocking your path), forcing the same tactics on everyone.
I'd much rather have an open map (like a large BF2 map - which are very detailed) where it's more of a sandbox, but where I'm guided to objectives and targets. Scripted events and triggers are good things, but people generally don't prefer "on rails" gameplay.
I would note that the best levels in the origional Halo were the ones where you had an outdoor enviornment that you could tackle in a number of ways, achieving objectives in any order (and conversely the worst were the levels in The Library (IIRC) where you are walking down a narrow corridor having enemies thrown at you for about 30 minutes or more).
I felt the same was true of Halo 2 - you can complete the tunnel section in under 5 minutes if you go back to get a Warthog and then put you foot down and race all the way to the other side (great fun too, with all the jumps, obstacles and enemy fire to dodge), or you can get in the abandoned Ghost that is left waiting for you by the entrance and spend a good 45 minutes slogging it out killing everything between you and the exit. Of course Halo 2, while interesting in some of the story being told - much more of a story than was present in HL2 I would note - was not so dynamic.
Multiple ways to meet an objective (while not really something GRAW had that much of, and was admittedly fun never the less) is definately something I think more games should aim to allow for.
I think it was back in July Apple acknowledged this. As others have said it is, I am led to believe, usually not the fan (although it sounds like it is) but related to the motherboard, with possibly more than one specific cause - it was reported here, in case you missed it. Manufacturing problems might account for the overheating too, they seem to have had more than one issue with the first batch (I remember having a few problems with my first PowerBook G4).
What doesn't seem to have been mentioned yet is that you can get it repaired by Apple for free if you get in touch with them via Apple Care (even if you haven't explicitly purchased extended Apple Care). I would really recommend getting Apple Care, I've found them to be superb at fixing problems (including ones that were at least partly caused by user behaviour) very quickly with no fuss at all. I would definately get it sorted it out sooner rather than later, soemthing like the thermal paste issue could be effecting your performance (and potentially application stability) too.
I'll probably get Ridge Racer 7 on the way home tonight.
Or 6, or twelvtey, or whatever it's up to now, I should say.
I liked the origional TOCA game, until it stopped being about racing touring cars and started forcing you to play through all the stages with eveything from karts to grand prix cars to old muscle cars (which all handle widly differently, and you can't just pick and choose which style to play a series of races in, you have to play them all in order).
Oh and PGR3 is way too stingy on the cars now, again previously in the series it was easy to unlock cars and the progression is slow and natural. Now, you have to do some races on 'Easy' mode at first, then when you get a car that is fast enough to be able to meet the time restrictions to do it at Normal and Hard you have do them again. Oh yes, and the tracks are *much* smaller than in previous versions, less than half the size in fact.
I'm wonder if it was just too time consuming to do all the artwork for the size of area covered in the origional games, and that's why the latest version has the new less favourable career progression mode that's padded with all the more abstract speed/cone/timed lap challange stuff (because the wide range of courses possible in previous versions simply can't be done when you are racing over a much smaller map area).
Test Drive, despite it's not always completely smooth frame rate (which seems to be mostly due to all the flora it's rendering), seems to cope with loading scenery on the fly very well though. It's just occured to me I've never noticed it in fact.
You obviously haven't played PGR3. Oblivion's got nothing on the load screen bonanza that is PGR3.
I completely agree, PGR is a bit of a mess. When you try and restart a race on the same course it still takes ages to 'reload' it, and there isn't even any dynamic movable scenery to re-position (other than maybe the odd scripted plane that flys overhead)! It's much worse than the origional MSR on the Dreamcast or PGR on the X-Box, as much as I like the Live stuff the progression system is not as good either, in fact I've hardly played the game despite prefering it's handling to any other 360 racing title. I'll probably get Ridge Racer 7 on the way home tonight.
Microsoft definitely dropped the ball by not including an HD on every system, it was one of the outstanding features of the origional console. I can't see many developers bothering to optimise for Hard Disk loading if they think they might have to come up with another loading system for those that don't have a Hard Disk (certainly, no one seems to have bothered so far).
Microsoft's main interest is in that if everyone used Internet Explorer then it would make them easier to get hooked on Internet Explorer exclusive functionality - that is, other Microsoft technologies (so they can sell development tools and servers off the back of that). Early on Microsoft eschewed the web in favour of their own system, codenamed Blackbird (which they abandoned in 94/95 when it was clear it wasn't going to fly, if you'll pardon the pun) because they were hoping to have tighter control over the platform as a whole (from content creation tools to the delivery mechanism and also the client).
By publishing their own browser (leveraging an open source rendering engine) vendors like Apple can help stop that from happening which secures their own position (even though they have no plans to take over the desktop browser market, just having a significant number of users using something other than IE is enough). Though in reality, Apple pretty much had to bundle their own browser in some form as Microsoft didn't seem to be that commited to IE on the Mac any more (l would put that predominately down to the existance of Mozilla/Firefox). A shame, as IE on Mac OS (Classic) was for years the best browser on any platform, and even endorsed as such by the W3C!
I think Microsoft are much less focused on browser dominance now though (as there is enough competition to make to prevent them being able to dominate the market), which is why the pace of IE development has slowed to a crawl in the last few years (this update being many years over due, for a company with Microsoft's vast development reasources). Basically IE7, odd new interface aside, is comparatively minor update (even though it does address a small number of important issues, something that is very much welcomed by content creators) and is really just them having the project 'ticking over'. Microsoft could easly have done the fixes in it years ago if they'd actually had any motivation to assign developers to the project and get it done (but as you've said, there has been no real motification for them to do so).
There is virtually no incentive for other companies to develop a browser beyond preventing someone else (i.e. Microsoft) from dominating with their own solution. They are getting increasingly hard to develop too (especially if your aiming for complete CSS and XSLT compliance). Basically at this stage, I don't think anyone really cares who's winning (other than people who care on technical or political grounds), as long as someone else in the market doesn't have complete dominance. Projects like Firefox and the KHTML rendering engine (at the core of Safari) are pretty hard to squash too, because it's harder to crush an open source project than it is a product from another company.
The Wii is capable of 480p in a 16:9 aspect ratio. It will not look "weird" on HD sets, just not as detailed. You'll note that the videos Nintendo has of people playing the Wii are on smaller HDTV sets.
Even many X-Box titles look bad on a larger HDTV set, they don't just look 'not as detailed', they actually look a mess and some are unplayable.
Halo 2, for example, while fine on my 32" CRT set was so messy it was unplayable on my 50" Plasma (and the Pinoneer does very good scaling). It was very difficult working out what was going on onscreen with everthing so scaled up, everything kind of blurs together (unless your ridiculously far away from the set). I think the problem was made worse by the very uniform gray/purple colour palette. I was very happy when I got the update from Live which allowed it to run at a higher resolution on the 360, I could finally get round to playing it and make out the enemies and plasma grenades on screen!
It's not a problem unique to videogames either - before I got my HDTV box the low quality of the MPEG encoding on some non HD channels was very noticeable on my Plasma - watching some channels was a bit like watching a YouTube video, they had gone from being looking really good (on my older CRT) to looking noticeable block.
I agree that most users are going to have a smaller HDTV set in the immediate term, and so it's not going to be a huge issue. I think is enough to deter gamers with a larger set (which, with HDTV content picking up, are becoming increasingly popular), because low resolution games really will look terrible when they are blurry and scaled up. The danger in that is it may discourage those people from recommending to people who are liable ask them for advice that they get a Wii.
"a point in six-dimensional space"
No rumble, requires more spatial dimentions than are known to exist. Lame.
You want me to pay extra for ancient games?
You are not being asked to pay extra, you are just being asked to pay.
I'll stick with my emulators, thanks
You mean "I'll stick with not paying because I can get them for free".
I'll try my best to clarify:
:-)
Where are you getting cable internet that isn't from the cable company?
You can get broadband (which is I assume what you mean) from sources other than a cable company (cable internet is just one form, and not actually the most common form of broadband).
o) Cable broadband providers most commonly provide CPE's (Customer Premises Equipment) with a single RJ45 interface, and often USB. Additionally, most cable providers do not encourage use of 3rd party cable modems. If you want to connect other devices, it's usually better to buy your own switch in this case, as you seem to have done with the WRT54G (which is both a wireless router and a switch). Cable providers have also different in that historically they been more picky about how many machines they 'allow' you to connect - typically because they are used to making money from 'multi room' subscriptions with cable boxes and have being trying to aply the same model to internet access (most seem to have given up on that now though, thankfully).
o) DSL broadband providers most commonly provide generic (sometimes rebadged) ADSL CPE's with more than one RJ45 interface (with ADSL2+ increasingly so, as pretty much all ADSL2+ capable modems have multiple interfaces). Some (from vendors like Actiontec) also have USB interfaces, but it's less common (built in wireless is more common in DSL modems though). DSL providers also rarely enforce limits on how many machines you can use (e.g. by checking to see how many unique MAC addresses it can see on your line, as some cable providers have done), because they are coming from a different background (one where vendors sell bandwith, rather than devices).
Most DSL providers are quite happy for their customers to buy a 'wires only' service (aka BYOM - Bring Your Own Modem), but some do prefer that you use one they have supplied as although ADSL is a standard, some CPE's are more compatible with the chipsets in specific brands of DSLAM's (the provder equipment that DSL routers connect to) and makes for less support calls.
Most interestingly, enforcing the use of specific provided equipment allows DSL providers to guarentee quality of service - allowing to compete with cable companies with VOD (Video On Demand) services. This is the direction a lot of satillete and DSL/telcoms companies are moving in and why they are providing their own CPE's for DSL lines now (even though they are not quite ready to deliver VOD just yet, next year it's set to explode in popularity - especially in regions where cable is not already dominant).
(Was about to go on about that, but must get back to work
I can tell you for damn sure my modem only has 1 RJ45. The router has 4 out though. Shouldn't mix up hardware components like that.
I'm not mixing up hardware, but you are. Units like the Netgear DG834 (with comparible systems from Zyxel, Actiontec, etc) are all DSL modems with 4 Ethernet ports and in the US, Europe and Australia providers are shipping the same gear. They are typically switches not hubs though.
It's almost exclusively cable providers that provide systems with only one RJ45 port (and typically those systems also have an optional USB port - which is on some, but not most DSL modems).
Pretty much all ISP's and cable providers are using the same gear, all over the world. The same is true for cable and satellite set top boxes - it's just differently badged, with different software, but the hardware is stock equipment for one of a handful of vendors.
Which is, of course, most of WA.
Actually, the vast majority of people in WA (which, for it's size, has bugger all people in it to begin with) have access to broadband in the form of DSL or Cable.
...and once again the US assumes everyone else in the world has DSL and 4 port modems.
I'm not from the US, and FYI all the other countries in the developed world do pretty much all have broadband, with 4 port DSL modems (from the likes of Negear, Zyxcel, etc.) being very much the norm.
Hello, a lot of people still use 56K modems to connect to the net.
Indeed, but those are not usually people with more than one computer - because people with more than one computer are the sort of people that will just get cable or DSL (unless they are in the sticks, and most bumpkins don't own more than one computer so that's a very small percentage).
The biggest ISP's in Australia supply a USB only DSL modem when you sign up. These people rely on ICS.
Not true. Bigpond/Telstra, Internode, OptusNet, Netspace, Westnet and the rest all supply DSL modems with an Ethernet interface or no modem at all. Providers everwhere - not just in Austrialia - have the option of a USB modem for customers who want the cheap and nasty option, but the people who have chosen to go for the USB-only modem option (where it's still avalible, and it's avaliblity is rapidly declining) are almost certainly not "relying on ICS" because they almost certainly have only one personal computer in the house.
It's freeware. As soon as the principle author tires it will stagnate, die and be forgotten.
Freeware is not distinct in that regard, plenty of half decent FOSS projects are abandoned and die too (despite interest in the software from the userbase).
Anyone using NAT under Linux, for one. Families connecting multiple computers onto a single network, for another. Not to mention people who share the same printer or who have a central file server set up to share mp3s or whatever.
None of those things require Internet Connection Sharing, and I would argue it's not even the easiest or most common way to achive them. Virtually anyone with a consumer DSL offering can just plug their computers (or printers, or network storage devices) right into one of the RJ45 ports on their DSL modem and be served a DHCP IP from the modem - even most cable modems these days even have standard RJ45 interfaces you can plug in to a cheap switch (allowing you to use several machines on the network, even if they have a policy that you are only supposed to use one machine).
It was useful on Windows 98 when so many people were limited to using modems for internet access, but Ethernet is so ubiquitous these days it's a bit of an anachronism. Even in Windows 2000 the ability to configure the routing policy is limited to renaming the connections so that the prefered routes occur first in alphabetical order (I kid you not), that is unless you upgrade to something like Advanced Server which comes with administration tools to enable routing tables to be modified.
They ARE talking openly about what the intend to offer
No they arn't.
If you disagree, I'd be interested to hear a rebuttle with a detailed description of what both Sony and Nintendo have confirmed about their online gaming platforms. For example, I would love to know more about the friends system, the match paring system, if it has different 'zones' for different types of players, if there will be different subscription levels, and what the abuse mechanism is like (especially if there is no charge for the service - that is how they intend to deter abusive players who've been banned from just creating yet another free account on the spot).
It was just over 7 days ago that Sony even started to give tangible information about the actual online gaming experience (ie. beyond pure speculation from marketing), and even then they have shared it only to selected parties, like the folks at 1UP (who, it's clear from their latest video podcast, still arn't sure what it's going to be like). So far, the browser and that it will have an online store is all we've heard. It turns out we now know Sony's store lists the price of items in straight forward monetary amounts, rather than hiding behind a points system, and that it will interact with your PSP. That's pretty much all we know (and none of that tells us how the online gaming service will actually function).
Nindendo have been conspicuously quiet about the details their offering too, no one knows exactly what they have planned. While are all excited about itwe don't know what it's going to be like yet.
I would add in closing that playing on line *is* a privillage (no quotes needed), it's not a basic human right or anything - it's a service on offer that is charged for. The hosted service that make Live possible is not free to run (even in the case of peer hosted games, Live still matches you with people you know and like, avoids recommending servers where there is someone who you don't want to play with on them, and provides different 'zones' for different types of players). Sure non MMO multiplayer gaming on Windows and the Mac is free once you've bought the game, but they don't offer any of those features (though frankly I'd really like to see zones and a player rating system on all platforms, especially in teamplay games like Battlefield).
It's pretty hard to paint Microsoft in a bad light for charging a small fee for a service that no other vendor is even offering yet. The other vendors have now had 6 years to play catch up to the Dreamcast and despite much hope the PS2 and GB would support online gaming, they didn't (and it's not unreasonable to think that if Microsoft hadn't launched Live 4 years ago - at a time where both Sony and Nindendo were saying, incredibly, they didn't think online gaming was that big a deal - that the incumbants would not have been pushed into coming up with similar offerings).
Sony got people to hold off on buying a Dreamcast based on lies (e.g. faked demos at E3, of games that look better than any PS2 game ever produced) and hype about how awesome it would be. In the end the PS2 did not compare favourably with the DC (bearing it mind it was released two years later yet, unlike the DC, had no online games platform and almost identical graphics - in some cases, like DOA, PS2 ports were actually graphically inferior to the DC versions).
This hurt the brand a little, but the impact of the origional PlayStation still meant it had a loyal following (and Sega's bad timing with the Saturn and previously lack luster 32X and comparitively expensive MegaCD systems had left meany consumers hesistant of new Sega consoles). It's clear many in the press and in the general public have bought into the PS3 hype and - thanks once again to the likes of faked E3 demo's and outrageous exaggeration of the systems power - but I would say the PlayStation brand is significantly damaged from Sony's previous antics and Sony itself has lossed a lot of the brand loyalty it enjoyed in the 80's and 90's.
I think it will do fairly well still. As with the PS2 roll out a lot of people have held off waiting for it because they've heard it will be the best thing since sliced bread and are determined to get it almost regardless of what you say to them about it, but I think it will show 'you can't fool all the people, all of the time' and that the brand image will be further eroded, and that rediculous cost will contribute to that. I think that will be the case because those of us that are happy to spend such a large amount on a console are also those of us who are least likely to be convinced by hype alone (because if we are that serious about gaming we problably know quite a bit more about it than your average guy) while the average man in the street (who is, understandably, going with the flow in thinking "PS3 is the best console to get, right?") isn't going to want to spend that much on a games console - I suspect he's going to be paying more attention to each one and trying to work out why he should spend that much more on a PS3, and I further suspect a lot of people are going to determine their isn't enough of a compelling reason at all.
It's probably too late for Microsoft to make much more money out of this (I expect most people who want a 360 have got one by now, and that they've probably already profited as much from the shinanagins surrounding the PS3 as they are going to), but I think Nindendo will do very well - especially if they can get enough Wii's out on sale in Dec-Feb. Oddly, I find myself content at the thought that Microsoft are attempting to sabotage the PS3's launch through well timed product releases (with titles like Gears of War coming out and with it looking better than any PS3 launch title - and Halo 3 waiting in the wings to try and steal thunder at some future point), given Sony's behaviour with regard to PS2 and PS3 I can't help thinking they soundly deserve to have some wind taken out of their sails.
Sony and Nintendo do not have an online service for their consoles, while Microsoft launched their service 4 years ago. I'm not sure how you can reasonably interperate that as 'Sony and Nindendo have a free online service', it's only free in the sense they don't exist yet.
When the other vendors eventually launch online gaming on their consoles (like Sega did with the Dreamcast over 6 years ago, but that Sony and Nintendo both dismissed as irrelevant) or at least talk openly about what they intend to offer, then it's worth discussing. Until then, it's the same old tired mantra of "Yeah, well when OUR console comes out it will be TWICE as good!" vendors playing catchup have induldged in for about two decades. In reality, most vendors are knowingly deceptive about what they intend to offer, and it's invariably a huge over hyped disappointment. While it's certain all vendors will have an online offering of some sort, it remains to be seen how it will compare against Live.
Coming from a PC gaming background too, I think it's marginally annoying to be charged for the services offered by X-Box live as I'm used to them for free on the PC, but the amount they are charging is peanuts and they are offering some reasonable service with decent content - like demos, previews and community content, the IM service, gamer profiles. The quality of the service is entirely inline with the small annual fee (about 45 UKP a year), it's not as if they are charging 10 UKP a month.
That said, the pricing structure falls down with MMO's though. I think PSO on the 360 will fail by attempting to charge an additional monthly fee as users perceive they are paying twice for the same service. They'd do better to have a Live subscription of a higher level (e.g. more like a 10-15 UKP a month value) that gave you an entitlement to play all MMO games on the 360, and have some way of doing revenue sharing with the publishers based on what services were getting the most use. I think MMO games on all consoles will suffer until a better pricing mechanism is implimented, which is a shame as a lot of console gamers have never played an MMO and are missing out on the experience.
See you same time next week.
Another 3 part trilogy, inspired by the OP:
Naked Live gamers frag each other.
Bunny hopping makes host hopping mad.
X-Box unplugged, points dissipate into ether.
Good post! That's what I was thinking, but I couldn't think of a concise way to put it :-)