he wont be punished, his contract just wont be renewed. or they wont hire him next time they need someone. id say its their perogative, but he should leave.
RoboCode is one of many of this genre of games, including C++ Robots, Robot Battle, C Robots, and a number of other games using more or less common programming languages to control robots in an arena, including some sold commercially. You could even include Robot Odyssey in this genre in some ways, although the robots didnt fight and you "programmed" them with electronic circuits.
well, since the 10Gs were only at touchdown, id say thats at least one bump. sure, it could be a very gradual bump, but I doubt it. and anyways, any maneuver that produces 10Gs in the atmosphere is gonna be bumpy due to turbulence and air density.
This has been done. A guy was doing an experiment in interpreted reality, where he uses a headset that has 2 video cameras in front of his eyes, then a computer that processes the image, then display them on little LCDs in front of his eyes. He used it to process bar codes on signs and stuff so he could "see" what the barcodes meant. But he also used it to replace with condom ad poster over a urinal with a waterfall. So, not so fictional as you think...
I think the best part is that MS cant get the design without agreeing to the license! Or they can spend a few million dollars to convince a judge that click through licenses arent binding and we are all happy!
You are totally ignoring braking power and vehicle mass. I dont know the math involved, but if it is safe for a 40-ton semi truck to be driving at 70MPH then it is sure as hell just as safe for me to be driving my 1-ton car 90MPH, if not much faster. And skidding cars are not the norm, anti lock brakes are the norm and have been for years.
Including the following choice selection, which I am sure we have all thought of before but never written down rules for:
CEILING FAN BASEBALL
For 2 or more players
Equipment:
One (1) piece of paper
One (1) ceiling fan
Some furniture
A basic understanding of the rules of baseball (without the complicated parts like the ground rule double and when to spit your tobacco)
Setup:
1) Wad up the paper into a ball.
2) Divide the players up into two teams.
3) Turn on the ceiling fan to maximum speed.
4) If you like to make this kind of thing official before starting (i.e., you don't trust your friends), determine exactly which pieces of furniture constitute which kinds of hits. (see below)
The Rules:
The team throwing the "ball" at the fan is on Offense. The specific person throwing is The Batter. A given at-bat goes like this:
The batter throws the ball at, or over and into, the ceiling fan...
* If the ball passes through the fan without being hit by the blades, the attempt is a strike.
* If the ball is nicked by the blades (i.e., you can hear it), but otherwise just drops through, it is a foul.
* If the ball is hit by the fan... it's a hit! The result depends on where the ball lands:
* If it lands on the floor, the batter is out. Pop fly, grounder to the shortstop, something like that.
* If it lands -- and stays on top of -- on a piece of furniture, then the result depends on the height and size of the surface, as per the following section (or whatever works for your players).
Scoring a hit:
Single -- Furniture which is about knee-high or lower with a sizable surface. Coffee table, sofa, easy chair, etc.
Double -- Doubles are scored on taller (waist-high) or smaller surfaces, often places like the top of the sofa's backrest or the top of the TV.
Triple -- High and/or slim surfaces such as the mantle of the fireplace, enclosed areas like one level of a bookshelf, or maybe a large-ish container like the trashcan.
Home Run! -- All those places that make people incredulous that the ball just landed there. Tops of lamps, inside hanging plant pots, the tippy-top of the tallest bookshelf. The kitchen sink. The floor two rooms away. That sort of thing.
The Rest:
Pretty much, it works like standard baseball from here on out. Each team has three outs before the next is up. Someone needs to keep track of where runners are located. Assume that runners advance the same number of bases as the batter when there's a hit (i.e., a runner on second advances home when the batter gets a double). Nine innings may or may not be the proper amount of innings -- I've found that outs tend to be common enough that games are quick and low-scoring, but I also only have one ceiling fan/room configuration worth of playtesting. Hey, what do you expect? It's a dumb game! I should have better things to do with my time!
One point to note is that the price of the games does NOT reflect the level of fun youll have. I have spent more time playing Change! in the car with friends on road trips than I will ever spend playing most other games. The higher priced games generally are distinguished by having multi-colored cards with real artwork. If youre a real Cheapass you can get a dozen games for less than $50, including Chief Herman's Holiday Fun Pack which is actually about 30 different games, ranging from using just dice to just a deck of cards to small boards and other bits.
I own most of the Cheapass titles, and would seriously suggest the following (a * denotes a must have:) ): Deadwood (with all 4 expansions) Freeloader *Kill Doctor Lucky Spree!
Any X BRAWL decks, X being at least 1 more than the number of gamers in your group *Change! *Falling Any X FightBall deck pairs, X being at least 2 Fight City *Girl Genius: The Works Give Me The Brain Starbase Jeff
*Cube Farm *Nexus The Very Clever Pipe Game Any X Button Men, X being as with BRAWL *Diceland: Deep White Sea The other 3 Diceland sets
Assuming X is 3 in all cases, this full list will set you back about $230, plus $25 for the bits pack. If you go for just the *s then for a mere $60 (plus bits) you will have a collection of 7 (or more, Change! is really 3 games) games that will last you through any trip or boring delay, and be more portable than a single Monopoly box.
Many sites have tried to copy the Cheapass business plan, some well and some poorly. One of the other good ones is Alien Menace who have a growing selection of games of above average quality. I particularly like Sucking Vacuum and Election Day, but would suggest against Danger Guy.
a 3d model generator is nothing like a 3d image generator. what he has done here is very cool. if you want to generate models, do this same experiment but instead of a scanner use an array of a few dozen IR rangefinders arranged in a line. rotate the object, fire, record depths, repeat. Map the resulting heightmap onto the inside of a cylinder in your program of choice. Instant 3d mesh.
Cookie and Cream for sure! I am a hard core gamer and I loved it, and so did my parents and little sister. The ability (but not neccessity) to share one controller (right?) was also kind of interesting. I guess they realized that some people buy a console with only one controller and this is a great way to introduce them to multiplayer gaming.
proof that you have a legitimate right to have the said movies
welcome to the real world, where theres no law against possessing copyrighted materials no matter what. no, they are not stolen goods, even if you did pirate them. there is never a law against HAVING copies, just making and distributing them.
Where the hell is that coming from? By signing up as a claimant all you said was that you bought a CD. Nothing else. And the judge ruled against them, ergo there WAS price fixing.
www.lanrental.com is great if they are in range of you. they do lanwar (600-1000 person LAN every 3 months) and asylumlan (200 person LAN every 3 months) and probably a few more I havent attended. you should really get on irc.gamesnet.net and join #lanwar and #asylumlan for pointers, there are people in there who have run dozens of multi-hundred-attendee events.
"Bomb-shelter" has become law What is UCITA "bomb-shelter" legislation? UCITA "bomb-shelter" legislation is defensive legislation needed to protect a state's residents from being subject to unfair and overreaching provisions in UCITA even if the act has never passed in their state. As of 2002, West Virginia, Iowa and North Carolina have passed this kind of legislation. "Bomb-shelter" legislation narrowly protect software licensees from choice of law provisions that make UCITA the governing law of the contract or from choice of forum provisions that might select another state unrelated to either the vendor or the licensee as the forum for settling a legal dispute over the contract. One proposed version (New York) stipulates that only the laws of the licensee's state (i.e. the state with the "bomb-shelter" law) will apply in determining whether the license's terms are enforceable.
See AFFECT's "bomb-shelter" section:
North Carolina
West Virginia
States to WATCH This state is one to watch closely because some UCITA activity has been reported. This could mean that important pre-legislative activity has begun.
Things you can do:
Contact your state library association to find out how you can help them. Educate yourself about UCITA's effect on libraries by visiting the Impact section.
Arizona
Delaware
Pennsylvania
Texas
Utah
Wisconsin
No legislative activity reported Things you can do:
Contact your state library association to find out how you can help.
Educate yourself about UCITA's effect on libraries.
Review the ALA Washington Office Online UCITA Tutorial.
Keep your eyes open for workshops in your area at ALA mid-winter and annual conferences.
Request a workshop if you don't see one listed in upcoming conferences.
I had to add this somewhere, and here seemed fine... Not a cursive problem, but a complete standardization problem. Not only do different people's cursive vary so much as to make some impossible to read, some people's printing is just as bad. About 10% of the people I know write their number seven as follows:
.____. ..../. ..-/-. ../...
Whic h I find rather annoying. But what makes it even more so is that I am now working in a public service industry where I encounter the handwriting of a hundred people a day, and have met a few dozen people (out of perhaps the 10000 I have encountered) who write the capital letter F as follows:
.____. /.../. ..-/-. ../...
Anyo ne see the problem here? This isnt just a personality quirk, someone is TEACHING these people to write like this. Who? Where? WHY?
If a dozen companies are willing to pay a million bucks for your schlong then yeah, its worth a million bucks. The Unreal Engine really does sell (license) for $350k.
However, if there were manned Mars missions planned, we wouldn't have any money left for all this neat science.
Apparently someone hasnt kept up with Mars Direct which includes proposales that outline a viable real world plan for putting men on mars within a decade for a cost of less than $6B.
Slashdot Mirror
he wont be punished, his contract just wont be renewed. or they wont hire him next time they need someone. id say its their perogative, but he should leave.
RoboCode is one of many of this genre of games, including C++ Robots, Robot Battle, C Robots, and a number of other games using more or less common programming languages to control robots in an arena, including some sold commercially. You could even include Robot Odyssey in this genre in some ways, although the robots didnt fight and you "programmed" them with electronic circuits.
well, since the 10Gs were only at touchdown, id say thats at least one bump. sure, it could be a very gradual bump, but I doubt it. and anyways, any maneuver that produces 10Gs in the atmosphere is gonna be bumpy due to turbulence and air density.
This has been done. A guy was doing an experiment in interpreted reality, where he uses a headset that has 2 video cameras in front of his eyes, then a computer that processes the image, then display them on little LCDs in front of his eyes. He used it to process bar codes on signs and stuff so he could "see" what the barcodes meant. But he also used it to replace with condom ad poster over a urinal with a waterfall. So, not so fictional as you think...
Well, no... Theres also the whole 'free xbox mod chip design on the web' aspect to it as well, which I imagine would be the best part for most people.
I think the best part is that MS cant get the design without agreeing to the license! Or they can spend a few million dollars to convince a judge that click through licenses arent binding and we are all happy!
Ventrilo is definitely the LEAST dialup-friendly, offering no support for codecs at lower than 20kbps.
You are totally ignoring braking power and vehicle mass. I dont know the math involved, but if it is safe for a 40-ton semi truck to be driving at 70MPH then it is sure as hell just as safe for me to be driving my 1-ton car 90MPH, if not much faster. And skidding cars are not the norm, anti lock brakes are the norm and have been for years.
Including the following choice selection, which I am sure we have all thought of before but never written down rules for:
CEILING FAN BASEBALL
For 2 or more players
Equipment:
One (1) piece of paper
One (1) ceiling fan
Some furniture
A basic understanding of the rules of baseball (without the complicated parts like the ground rule double and when to spit your tobacco)
Setup:
1) Wad up the paper into a ball.
2) Divide the players up into two teams.
3) Turn on the ceiling fan to maximum speed.
4) If you like to make this kind of thing official before starting (i.e., you don't trust your friends), determine exactly which pieces of furniture constitute which kinds of hits. (see below)
The Rules:
The team throwing the "ball" at the fan is on Offense. The specific person throwing is The Batter. A given at-bat goes like this:
The batter throws the ball at, or over and into, the ceiling fan...
* If the ball passes through the fan without being hit by the blades, the attempt is a strike.
* If the ball is nicked by the blades (i.e., you can hear it), but otherwise just drops through, it is a foul.
* If the ball is hit by the fan... it's a hit! The result depends on where the ball lands:
* If it lands on the floor, the batter is out. Pop fly, grounder to the shortstop, something like that.
* If it lands -- and stays on top of -- on a piece of furniture, then the result depends on the height and size of the surface, as per the following section (or whatever works for your players).
Scoring a hit:
Single -- Furniture which is about knee-high or lower with a sizable surface. Coffee table, sofa, easy chair, etc.
Double -- Doubles are scored on taller (waist-high) or smaller surfaces, often places like the top of the sofa's backrest or the top of the TV.
Triple -- High and/or slim surfaces such as the mantle of the fireplace, enclosed areas like one level of a bookshelf, or maybe a large-ish container like the trashcan.
Home Run! -- All those places that make people incredulous that the ball just landed there. Tops of lamps, inside hanging plant pots, the tippy-top of the tallest bookshelf. The kitchen sink. The floor two rooms away. That sort of thing.
The Rest:
Pretty much, it works like standard baseball from here on out. Each team has three outs before the next is up. Someone needs to keep track of where runners are located. Assume that runners advance the same number of bases as the batter when there's a hit (i.e., a runner on second advances home when the batter gets a double). Nine innings may or may not be the proper amount of innings -- I've found that outs tend to be common enough that games are quick and low-scoring, but I also only have one ceiling fan/room configuration worth of playtesting. Hey, what do you expect? It's a dumb game! I should have better things to do with my time!
Chris Floyd
chrisf@vr1.com
One point to note is that the price of the games does NOT reflect the level of fun youll have. I have spent more time playing Change! in the car with friends on road trips than I will ever spend playing most other games. The higher priced games generally are distinguished by having multi-colored cards with real artwork. If youre a real Cheapass you can get a dozen games for less than $50, including Chief Herman's Holiday Fun Pack which is actually about 30 different games, ranging from using just dice to just a deck of cards to small boards and other bits.
I own most of the Cheapass titles, and would seriously suggest the following (a * denotes a must have :) ):
Deadwood (with all 4 expansions)
Freeloader
*Kill Doctor Lucky
Spree!
Any X BRAWL decks, X being at least 1 more than the number of gamers in your group
*Change!
*Falling
Any X FightBall deck pairs, X being at least 2
Fight City
*Girl Genius: The Works
Give Me The Brain
Starbase Jeff
*Cube Farm
*Nexus
The Very Clever Pipe Game
Any X Button Men, X being as with BRAWL
*Diceland: Deep White Sea
The other 3 Diceland sets
Assuming X is 3 in all cases, this full list will set you back about $230, plus $25 for the bits pack. If you go for just the *s then for a mere $60 (plus bits) you will have a collection of 7 (or more, Change! is really 3 games) games that will last you through any trip or boring delay, and be more portable than a single Monopoly box.
Many sites have tried to copy the Cheapass business plan, some well and some poorly. One of the other good ones is Alien Menace who have a growing selection of games of above average quality. I particularly like Sucking Vacuum and Election Day, but would suggest against Danger Guy.
Devil Bunny Hates The Earth is another neat puzzle game, think of it as 2D (as opposed to 1D) Mancala for 2 or more players.
Mom: You get grounded.
duh
a 3d model generator is nothing like a 3d image generator. what he has done here is very cool. if you want to generate models, do this same experiment but instead of a scanner use an array of a few dozen IR rangefinders arranged in a line. rotate the object, fire, record depths, repeat. Map the resulting heightmap onto the inside of a cylinder in your program of choice. Instant 3d mesh.
Cookie and Cream for sure! I am a hard core gamer and I loved it, and so did my parents and little sister. The ability (but not neccessity) to share one controller (right?) was also kind of interesting. I guess they realized that some people buy a console with only one controller and this is a great way to introduce them to multiplayer gaming.
proof that you have a legitimate right to have the said movies
welcome to the real world, where theres no law against possessing copyrighted materials no matter what. no, they are not stolen goods, even if you did pirate them. there is never a law against HAVING copies, just making and distributing them.
Where the hell is that coming from? By signing up as a claimant all you said was that you bought a CD. Nothing else. And the judge ruled against them, ergo there WAS price fixing.
I think he was looking for factual sites. If youre going for fiction with morals, id suggest Aesop's Fables.
The point here is that this is designed for situations where tens of thousands of people all want the same content at the same time.
www.lanrental.com is great if they are in range of you. they do lanwar (600-1000 person LAN every 3 months) and asylumlan (200 person LAN every 3 months) and probably a few more I havent attended. you should really get on irc.gamesnet.net and join #lanwar and #asylumlan for pointers, there are people in there who have run dozens of multi-hundred-attendee events.
UCITA has become law
"Bomb-shelter" has become law
What is UCITA "bomb-shelter" legislation? UCITA "bomb-shelter" legislation is defensive legislation needed to protect a state's residents from being subject to unfair and overreaching provisions in UCITA even if the act has never passed in their state. As of 2002, West Virginia, Iowa and North Carolina have passed this kind of legislation. "Bomb-shelter" legislation narrowly protect software licensees from choice of law provisions that make UCITA the governing law of the contract or from choice of forum provisions that might select another state unrelated to either the vendor or the licensee as the forum for settling a legal dispute over the contract. One proposed version (New York) stipulates that only the laws of the licensee's state (i.e. the state with the "bomb-shelter" law) will apply in determining whether the license's terms are enforceable.
See AFFECT's "bomb-shelter" section:
States to WATCH
This state is one to watch closely because some UCITA activity has been reported. This could mean that important pre-legislative activity has begun.
Things you can do:
Contact your state library association to find out how you can help them. Educate yourself about UCITA's effect on libraries by visiting the Impact section.
No legislative activity reported
Things you can do:
Contact your state library association to find out how you can help.
Educate yourself about UCITA's effect on libraries.
Review the ALA Washington Office Online UCITA Tutorial.
Keep your eyes open for workshops in your area at ALA mid-winter and annual conferences.
Request a workshop if you don't see one listed in upcoming conferences.
I had to add this somewhere, and here seemed fine... Not a cursive problem, but a complete standardization problem. Not only do different people's cursive vary so much as to make some impossible to read, some people's printing is just as bad. About 10% of the people I know write their number seven as follows:
.____.
..../.
..-/-.
../...
Whic h I find rather annoying. But what makes it even more so is that I am now working in a public service industry where I encounter the handwriting of a hundred people a day, and have met a few dozen people (out of perhaps the 10000 I have encountered) who write the capital letter F as follows:
.____.
/.../.
..-/-.
../...
Anyo ne see the problem here? This isnt just a personality quirk, someone is TEACHING these people to write like this. Who? Where? WHY?
If a dozen companies are willing to pay a million bucks for your schlong then yeah, its worth a million bucks. The Unreal Engine really does sell (license) for $350k.
However, if there were manned Mars missions planned, we wouldn't have any money left for all this neat science.
Apparently someone hasnt kept up with Mars Direct which includes proposales that outline a viable real world plan for putting men on mars within a decade for a cost of less than $6B.