* Lack of each browser tab running as a separate process. One "hung" tab and it freezes all the other ones./sarcasm That's real bright in this day and age. * Lack of a tab overview to see how much EACH tab is using CPU-wise, Memory-Wise, and FPS. Google Chrome: Tools - Task Manager. Enough said. * Leaks memory like a sieve. The running joke is that FF is a memory hog. The bigger problem is closing tabs doesn't restore memory! WTF? The ONLY way to "fix" the memory hog is to close & restart the browser. Dev's don't give a fuck to fix.
Been using Firefox before 1.0. Hated Chrome when it came out but jumped to Chrome around FF v6 - v9. Google's V8 engine dynamically compiles Javascript to x86. Along with superior WebGL support there is nothing FF has at this point.:-(
* Instead of sitting on their ass throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks like changing the UI in Vista and again in Windows 8 for now good reason, they should of taken a cue from Apple who built and _expanded_ upon a good foundation -- every OS X release from 10.0 to 10.7 (for the most part) just got better, more polished, faster (!), added neat features, and kept it consistent and simple.
Microsoft had 10 years to TRULY advance the state of the UI by removing the stupid close button being placed next to the maximized button, by recognizing people want to have TWO (or more) spatial groups in the task bar for the SAME program, by removing the screen-wide title bar that just wastes screen vertical real estate, by providing an API so users can skin the UI, by allowing users to choose an option LESS then "smaller" 100% UI scaling in Control Panel Display, by polishing the UI, allow people to pick a ZERO pixel window border to maximize screen usage, by getting feedback from UI & UX experts along with power users for how they could make the computer EASIER _and_ more FASTER, etc.. i.e. It only took Microsoft how many years to allow people to add custom favorite folders in the Explorer view ??
People want 1) consistency, 2) features, 3) simplicity. In that order.
The fact that Microsoft constantly has to re-arrange & re-name almost every element in the control panel every other version of Windows tells me they don't know what they hell they are doing with UI - namely respecting and building a positive Out-of-theBox User Experience. That is why the majority no one gives a shit about Microsoft & their products anymore. They don't understand hardware, they don't understand software, they don't understand user experience. Apple is by no means perfect but at least they seem to (or used to) understand the basics extremely well. Microsoft has NEVER understood UI.
Microsoft: Just another me-too company with Apple envy. No one gives a crap about your physical Store. LOL.
For Microsoft to change they need to:
a) learn to be humble
b) acknowledge that they don't understand UI / UX. (proof: Clippy)
c) communicate with people
d) get off their arrogant attitude & stop pushing things down people's throats that people don't want: Zune, WinCE, Windows Phone, Surface, a dozen different versions of Windows, refusing to sell Windows XP for $20, etc.
e) treat customers with respect
Sadly, that will never happen. Microsoft will die a slow death of becoming irrelevant all the while wondering where the fuck they went wrong.
Apple: Likes to take risks - "We can grow into new markets and augment our OS strategy." Microsoft: We live in fear - "We can't grow into new markets because that will cannibalize our existing Windows+Office sales!"
It isn't Computer Science - it is basic business planning & execution with the focus on User Experience. Something Microsoft has been terrible at for the past 10 years.
Agreed 100% about CUDA and OpenMP! Already invented a new multi-core string searching algorithm and having a load of fun playing around with my GTX Titan combing CUDA + OpenMP. You can even do printf() from the GPU.:-)
On Linux, at the command line fire up 'nsight' open the CUDA SDK samples and start exploring! And by exploring I mean single-stepping through the code. The NSight IDE is pretty darn good considering it is free.
Oh and don't pay attention to the Intel Propaganda - there are numerous inaccuracies: Debunking the 100X GPU vs CPU Myth: An Evaluation of Throughput Computing on CPU and GPU http://pcl.intel-research.net/publications/isca319-lee.pdf
> 1: We already know it's down > Then put it on the freaking dashboard for the network service outages so we know not to bother you. If you really don't want to be bothered, put up an "Estimated time to resolution, given past history"/"Estimated time to resolution for [characterized as problem X]", or you're going to get the "we know you know it's down; when will the f---ing thing be back up?" calls anyway.
THIS. 100% !!!
_Communication_ from Sysadmins / DevOps to the rest of the team is PARAMOUNT.
It helps tear down barricades and builds bridges.
Sysadmins are like the janitors -- the most important people in a building because they provide the foundation. We understand Sysadmins have to deal with all the crap from everybody else. However, if they don't want to be seen as distributing all the crap to everyone else they need to learn to communicate humbly Why, When, How, etc. They are the unspoken hero's & backbone of the company.
> STTNG is priced at $125 a season because there are people who want it that are willing to pay that much for it. That they might sell more copies by lowering their price is immaterial to this point.
You haven't been paying attention to what Valve has been doing and how sensitive the digital market is to pricing.
Valve co-founder Gabe Newell announced during a DICE keynote today that last weekend's half-price sale of Left 4 Dead resulted in a 3000% increase in sales of the game, posting overall sales that beat the title's original launch performance.
* 10% sale = 35% increase in sales (real dollars, not units shipped) * 25% sale = 245% increase in sales * 50% sale = 320% increase in sales * 75% sale = 1470% increase in sales
Netflix and iTunes seem to be the only ones successful with "disruptive technology" because tthey are clued in with what customers really want -- cheap digital content -- and are capitalizing on the opportunity instead of living in fear and doing next to nothing about it !
Actually it is worse then that. Sometimes I can't even _legally_ BUY the media because it is
a) not available for sale due to bullshit "Region" locking aka PRICE-FIXING, b) no longer available for sale, c) outrageously, ridiculously expensive as you mentioned.
Case in point: ST:TNG (Star Trek: The Next Generation) was $125 per SEASON when it came out. For something that I'm _maybe_ going to watch more then once that price is a total rip off. When a season is $20 THEN it is worth "owning." Until then the MPAA can fuck off. Their content isn't THAT valuable so I don't bother but I can certainly see some folks pirating "disposable media."
The MPAA doesn't understand "The Long Tail" at all. Just because old content has little value to the majority it doesn't imply it has no value to the minority! Good luck trying to buy old 80's sitcoms that weren't AS popular. The master tapes have long been lost, the duplicates deteriorated and society suffers because we "lost" a generation of [popular] culture. That alone is almost a "crime" against history.
Why is it against the law to "pirate" software when the original company is no longer offering it for sale, or worse, no longer even in business? i.e. * Windows XP -- can't buy it from Microsoft because they refuse to sell it. * Vivacity - can't buy it because Topaz Labs refuses to sell it. http://www.topazlabs.com/vivacity/
Yup. Meh. Only the immature junior programmers flame each arguing over which editor is better instead of channeling their energy into _writing_ code./flame They ALL suck. Some just suck less then others.
> and you have not even touched on the argument between vector and quaternions yet and whether gimbal lock is a difficult or trivial problem.
I intentional did not discuss Quaternions nor Euler angles. Discussing singularities would be a natural progression for the discussion and one I hope that the student would next purse. i.e.
"Is matrix form the only way we can represent an orientation?"
IMO bringing them up at this stage would just be too confusing as people are still coming to terms with the bigger picture and the implementation details. Once they get a handle on that they we can introduce special edge cases and how we can "solve" them.
I'm quite well aware of Diana Gruber from the old rec.games.programmer days and the (almost endless) arguments whether "quats" were equivalent to half-angle-axis representation (they are.) For the more advanced student a good paper is written by the modern "father" of quaternions:
> Saying the "same principle is used for 3D" is hand waving in the context of the subject of "is math hard"
Somewhat. I agree higher dimensions quickly becomes verbose and cumbersome, However that is a perceptual belief. Whether you are doing an inner product (dot) or exterior product (wedge) in 2, 3, 4,... 7, 11, etc. dimensions is (largely) irrelevant if one understands the basics. IMHO it is more important for the "stigma" of 3D+ math to be removed so people will feel more comfortable working in higher dimensions. i.e. Use their confidence from 2D to slowly understand 3D and then grok 4D. The higher dimensions of 5+ are "not intuitive" so anything we can do to help them avoid the false stigma "math is hard" is a good thing. (Aside: one can visualize a 3x3 matrix or quat if one learns a different way of thinking, or in this case, "seeing".)
> but MSE has a light effect on my Windows partition
Another vote that MSE is good enough - not bloated, doesn't bog the machine down like Norton / McAffe. However you really need a multi-pronged solution for security:
> use XP with NO virus protection for a month, visit the same websites these people visit, use a modern web browser (not IE 8), and see at the end of that period if you are actually infected.
A good hosts file (such as the one above) will block 99% of that crap.
And as another professional game programmer I disagree: Good Luck tracking down memory fragmentation.
Real game programmers never call malloc / new from inside the main game loop. They should be allocating from memory pools / heaps. What do you mean you don't have a memory budget for ALL objects, effects, and events ??
That is THE fundamental problem with junior / immature programmers. They don't know how to THINK about the problem: its boundary and edge cases, the run-time memory usage, knowing if they are CPU bound, knowing if they IO bound, etc.
> Talks usually end up in most of them dismissing scripting languages, higher level APIs (such as OpenGL),
A few years back I've implemented OpenGL on the Wii and did maintenance work on our OpenGL version running on the PS2. Hell, even shipped a couple of games with it. OpenGL 1.x _can_ be implemented efficiently on a console if you apply some discipline. People who dismiss a rendering pipelineprobably have never implemented one.HOWEVER, their point is that memory manage CAN be an issue if one isn't careful. ( NOTE please don't confuse the misapplication with the theory: Broadcom has a garbage implementation of OpenGL ES 1.x & 2.x across there devices from the ones I've worked with, but there is no reason it needs to be that bad. Apple has a very nice OpenGL ES implementation.)
> I'm probably going to get downvoted as troll, but my experiences with most console developers were often strange (as a developer myself). > Any attempt to raising a point about how you don't need to optimize everything but only few critical zones of your code (what matters),
No, the reason you should get down modded is BECAUSE your mindsetis part of the problem not the solution,
1. You don't understand the first rule of computing:
TINSTAAFL: There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.
I do not know to the extent you are but lazy developers are spoiled by their excessive Virtual Memory, slow high level languages, and including every bloated 3rd party library under the sun and the kitchen sink that OVERALL add to a SLOW machine. Great developers _constantly_ keep optimizations a low priority THROUGHOUT the writing process in the background so they don't have go and clean up all the crap later. Your mentality of "we will fix it later" is the sign of an immature and inexperienced programmer.
2. Your boss / peers are trying to teach you an important lesson:
Do It Right The First Time!
and
Keep is Simple, silly!
THAT is the point -- not your uneducated rant about "Who cares about memory usage, memory fragmentation, garbage collection, memory leaks, cpu cycles, etc." -- well your USER does EVEN if they don't understand the technical terms. ONCE you say the user experience is no longer important you have FAILED as a programmer. People are the SOLE reason software even exists in the first place. Please stop this shitty attitude that "performance doesn't matter -- we'll just throw more hardware at it." No! NO! NO! How about doing the best* with what you have instead?? ALL your code should be (relatively) clean, simple, fast, efficient. This has the side-effect that it is EASY to maintain to boot! Who wouldn't want. And you are going to make excuses that you can't be bothered???
* Apply the 80/20 rule for time-management in case it wasn't obvious.
To bring this back on topic, Javascript is a badly designed & implemented language because of
a) lack of memory control which leads to memory fragmentation and bloat, and b) lack of types and which forces the run-time to do extra unnecessary work if they had designed the language properly in the first place.
There is a time and place for everything. Just never forgot to keep asking the questions: Can we do this better?
-- "Necessity is the Mother of Invention, but Curiosity is the Father." -- Michaelangelo
> a) Writing a matrix as a composition of sub-matrices is not familiar to people who don't grok matrix math. They need to think about it and can't follow the rest.
At this stage they don't need to understand all the technical details only the concept: namely we representing both a orientation and position within a 4x4 matrix. As we drill down into the details we will put together all the constituent parts.
> The decomposition was also wrong. No it isn't. If are you going to make claims then you need to provide evidence of the correct answer so it can be determined what _precisely_ is "wrong."
> b) The explanation of the rotation matrix uses trigonometric identities that are not familiar to most people. Much easier to explain it with triangles.
i) ALL matrix students should _already_ have a basic background in trigonometry. If they don't then it is worth going over the basics until they understand them. ii) It is much easier to see the equations when there is a diagram.
> c) Magic parameter. Where did the one and the zeros come from?
i) That is intentional to provoke the students into thinking: "Where the hell did those come from? And why do we need them?" ii) IF you read the 2nd part that is explained.
> I am still not sure I understand using 4x4 matrices to do transforms in three space. I can write the code though (slowly).
Part 2 since/. ecode formatting is still so gey I am including a bunch of whitespace filler text '.' to align things up in columns.
Now, expressing the Rotation equation in Matrix form. Remember we ended up with these two equations:
x' = x * cos(B) - y * sin(B)
y' = x * sin(B) + y*cos(B)
We can literally "transcode" them from algebraic form into matrix form without too much difficulty. We end up with this:
. [ x' ] = [ sx 0 ] * [ x ]
[ y' ] . [ 0 sy ] [ y ]
Likewise expressing the Translation in Matrix form:
x' = x + dx y' = y + dy x' = (x*m + y*p) + dx*1 y' = (x*n + y*q) + dy*1
The problem is that a 2x2 matrix form won't do! We need to extend the problem from 2D to 3D !
[ x' ] = [ m p dx ] * [ x ] [ y' ] . [ n q dy ] . [ y ] [ 0. ] . [ 0 0 1. ] . [ 1 ]
The exact same _principle_ is used for 3D. We extend a 3x3 matrix (orientation) to a 4x4 matrix so that it expresses BOTH a orientation AND translation.
> I am still not sure I understand using 4x4 matrices to do transforms in three space. I can write the code though (slowly).
That's just proof that you had a bad/crappy teacher.:-( Here is one explanation:
In 3D computer graphics we use a 4x4 matrix to conveniently and compactly represent _two_ things:
a) orientation, and
b) location (or position) within a single variable.
M = [ R 0 ]
[ T 1 ]
Where:
R = 3x3 orientation matrix, and
T = 3-dimensional position vector.
To understand how this comes about let us start with something a little more basic: 2D Affine Transformations. Namely: Rotations, Translations, Scaling.
Given a point P = we can write it in matrix form as either [ x y ], or [ x ] [ y ]
How would we write the equation for a point that is rotated around the origin (or z-axis.)? We will eventually want to write a matrix equation where the matrix represents a change in orientation. That is by definition:
x = R * cos(A), and
y = R * sin(A) x' = R * cos(A+B), and y' = R * cos(A+B)
Where:
R = radius of the angle,
A = initial angle,
B = the relative change in the angle,
A+B = the absolute final angle
We don't always know R, so let us rewriting these in terms without R: x' = R * cos(A+B)
= R * {cos(A)*cos(B) - sin(A)*sin(B)}
= {R*cos(A)} * cos(B) - {R*sin(A)} * sin(B)
= x * cos(B) - y * sin(B)
Similarly we do the same for y.
Now, we would also like to write the equation for the Translation of a 2D point:
x' = x + dx
y' = y + dy
Likewise Scaling is pretty straightforward:
x' = x * sx
y' = y * sy
These 3 different operations require 3 different functions and order of operations! This sucks. It sure would be nice if we could unify these operations into one equation! We actually have two choices for how we could write/calculate this:
a) Pre-multiply the column vector (ignore the '.' it is whitespace due to/. being lame.)
[ x' ] = [ m p ] * [ x ] [ y' ] . [ n q ] * [ y ]
b) Post-multiply the row vector
[ x' y' ] = [ x y ] * [ m p ]
[ n q ]
At the end of the day it doesn't matter which convention you pick just as long as you are consistent.
Since/. is lame and doesn't like an _informative_ MATH post I'm breaking it into two parts...
Disagree. You can only have -one- NSA security clearance as it implies you are cleared for it AND everything below it.
Examples:
"Want an security clearance?" is incorrect. "Want the security clearance?" is OK. "Want a security clearance?" is CORRECT. "Want security clearance?" is CORRECT. Agreed this is best.
Substituting 'NSA' for 'security' doesn't change anything as both words are nouns that start with consonants.
-- In ~10 years (2024) humans will finally be allowed to know the truth that we are not alone, and never have been.
> It's not like Valve doesn't have a release cycle that's about 5 times as long as that of other studios and whilst their games are good they're not any better than those of many others to justify the absurdly long development times.
Valve, Blizzard, etc have already explained their thought process...
* If a good game is shipped late no one will remember it was late. * If a bad game ships on time no one will remember it was on time.
You gotta love these self proclaimed armchair "experts" complaining about Company X to make Product Y because obviously these "experts" have mastered the process of game development and how hard it is to a) ship something b) good.
-- In ~ 10 years Humans will finally be allowed to know first hand that they are not alone
Hear Yea, Hear Yea! Some Arrogant Cunt on/. makes a baseless claim with ZERO evidence and this stupid shit gets modded up?? It is on the Internet so it must be true!! Riiiight. *face palm*
How about looking at NASA's own evidence of the STS missions before going off half-cocked and looking like an total idiot.
> Here's the truth. No aliens have visited the earth, and they never will. Not ever. [[citation required]] from the self claimed armchair expert.
> If Stephen Hawking is right, So he is an expert in Xenology now?? Based on what _experience_ ??
Here's a news flash. He's a BRILLIANT physicists HOWEVER he's a total idiot about Xenology. He has ZERO knowledge, only beliefs. That's like going to the Doctor and asking the best way to understand "The Source." An Expert in the WRONG frield.
> Maybe they want to trade with us. Yeah, right. You must be the life of the party. Apparently you don't understand the value of humor: Namely the gift of being able to create it, give it, and receive it. It is so sad to see "you don't get it.":-( Here's a joke for you: Boy, are you ever in for a rude surprise in ~ 10 years.
> The question of why aliens might "want to come here" is fundamentally flawed because we are forming that question from our current (tiny) viewpoint. You are absolutely correct on one thing: Your own myopic view is completely unable to see the bigger picture:
NAMELY: Do you even understand the concept of being able to visit how your great^N--grandchildren are doing?
FOR THE RECORD: Earth is the ONLY planet with Free Will. Aliens* have as much as to learn from us as we from them.
Specifically: How we are [slowly] working on transformering ourselves from being extreme negativity & limitations to one of positiveness and abundance. The Earth (and all the many life forms it hosts) is much more an experiment in the evolution of Consciousness. We celebrated passing the "marker" back in 2012 that "Yes, Humans are able to spiritually grow up and not be total idiots like we used to be in the past by over-developing our Male Science mind and completely ignore our Female Spiritual Side and destroying ourselves in the process."
* NOTE: Technically there is no such thing as aliens when we share the same DNA - both physically and spiritually.
> We're just not as advanced or as important as we like to think. In the end, there's no compelling reason to think they'd be interested in meeting us. The perfect example of the average human: No self-worth, places artificial limitations on themselves, unable to grok the bigger picture. Sad.;-( I hear they have this thing called self-esteem now a days. You may want to check it out.
Humans are one of the greatest experiments ever designed. You want to try embracing your heritage sometime. When you meet an alien ask him who his/her "parents are", and who their "children" are, and "your importance." You might be shocked at the self respect they give you.
-- Before you can learn, you must first unlearn. That is, stop your ego from being delusional in that "you think you already know when you don't."
Slashdot Mirror
Ah, the old days where the mods shoot the messenger instead of listening to the message.
Glad "about:memory" reclaims all memory when there are no tabs open. Oh Wait, it doesn't.
What is the equivalent of "Chrome's Tool - Task Manager" in FF again? .. Oh wait, there isn't one.
> What is it that bothers people about Firefox?
* Lack of each browser tab running as a separate process. One "hung" tab and it freezes all the other ones. /sarcasm That's real bright in this day and age.
* Lack of a tab overview to see how much EACH tab is using CPU-wise, Memory-Wise, and FPS. Google Chrome: Tools - Task Manager. Enough said.
* Leaks memory like a sieve. The running joke is that FF is a memory hog. The bigger problem is closing tabs doesn't restore memory! WTF? The ONLY way to "fix" the memory hog is to close & restart the browser. Dev's don't give a fuck to fix.
Been using Firefox before 1.0. Hated Chrome when it came out but jumped to Chrome around FF v6 - v9. Google's V8 engine dynamically compiles Javascript to x86. Along with superior WebGL support there is nothing FF has at this point. :-(
There is one other thing they could of done.
* Instead of sitting on their ass throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks like changing the UI in Vista and again in Windows 8 for now good reason, they should of taken a cue from Apple who built and _expanded_ upon a good foundation -- every OS X release from 10.0 to 10.7 (for the most part) just got better, more polished, faster (!), added neat features, and kept it consistent and simple.
Microsoft had 10 years to TRULY advance the state of the UI by removing the stupid close button being placed next to the maximized button, by recognizing people want to have TWO (or more) spatial groups in the task bar for the SAME program, by removing the screen-wide title bar that just wastes screen vertical real estate, by providing an API so users can skin the UI, by allowing users to choose an option LESS then "smaller" 100% UI scaling in Control Panel Display, by polishing the UI, allow people to pick a ZERO pixel window border to maximize screen usage, by getting feedback from UI & UX experts along with power users for how they could make the computer EASIER _and_ more FASTER, etc.. i.e. It only took Microsoft how many years to allow people to add custom favorite folders in the Explorer view ??
People want 1) consistency, 2) features, 3) simplicity. In that order.
The fact that Microsoft constantly has to re-arrange & re-name almost every element in the control panel every other version of Windows tells me they don't know what they hell they are doing with UI - namely respecting and building a positive Out-of-theBox User Experience. That is why the majority no one gives a shit about Microsoft & their products anymore. They don't understand hardware, they don't understand software, they don't understand user experience. Apple is by no means perfect but at least they seem to (or used to) understand the basics extremely well. Microsoft has NEVER understood UI.
Microsoft: Just another me-too company with Apple envy. No one gives a crap about your physical Store. LOL.
For Microsoft to change they need to:
a) learn to be humble
b) acknowledge that they don't understand UI / UX. (proof: Clippy)
c) communicate with people
d) get off their arrogant attitude & stop pushing things down people's throats that people don't want: Zune, WinCE, Windows Phone, Surface, a dozen different versions of Windows, refusing to sell Windows XP for $20, etc.
e) treat customers with respect
Sadly, that will never happen. Microsoft will die a slow death of becoming irrelevant all the while wondering where the fuck they went wrong.
The key difference is in attitudes:
Apple: Likes to take risks - "We can grow into new markets and augment our OS strategy."
Microsoft: We live in fear - "We can't grow into new markets because that will cannibalize our existing Windows+Office sales!"
It isn't Computer Science - it is basic business planning & execution with the focus on User Experience. Something Microsoft has been terrible at for the past 10 years.
Agreed 100% about CUDA and OpenMP! Already invented a new multi-core string searching algorithm and having a load of fun playing around with my GTX Titan combing CUDA + OpenMP. You can even do printf() from the GPU. :-)
The most _painless_ way to learn CUDA is to install CUDA on a Linux (Ubuntu) box or Windows box.
https://developer.nvidia.com/cuda-downloads
On Linux, at the command line fire up 'nsight' open the CUDA SDK samples and start exploring! And by exploring I mean single-stepping through the code. The NSight IDE is pretty darn good considering it is free.
Another really good doc is the CUDA C Programming Guide.
http://docs.nvidia.com/cuda/cuda-c-programming-guide/
Oh and don't pay attention to the Intel Propaganda - there are numerous inaccuracies:
Debunking the 100X GPU vs CPU Myth: An Evaluation of Throughput Computing on CPU and GPU
http://pcl.intel-research.net/publications/isca319-lee.pdf
> 1: We already know it's down
> Then put it on the freaking dashboard for the network service outages so we know not to bother you. If you really don't want to be bothered, put up an "Estimated time to resolution, given past history"/"Estimated time to resolution for [characterized as problem X]", or you're going to get the "we know you know it's down; when will the f---ing thing be back up?" calls anyway.
THIS. 100% !!!
_Communication_ from Sysadmins / DevOps to the rest of the team is PARAMOUNT.
It helps tear down barricades and builds bridges.
Sysadmins are like the janitors -- the most important people in a building because they provide the foundation. We understand Sysadmins have to deal with all the crap from everybody else. However, if they don't want to be seen as distributing all the crap to everyone else they need to learn to communicate humbly Why, When, How, etc. They are the unspoken hero's & backbone of the company.
> STTNG is priced at $125 a season because there are people who want it that are willing to pay that much for it. That they might sell more copies by lowering their price is immaterial to this point.
You haven't been paying attention to what Valve has been doing and how sensitive the digital market is to pricing.
Valve co-founder Gabe Newell announced during a DICE keynote today that last weekend's half-price sale of Left 4 Dead resulted in a 3000% increase in sales of the game, posting overall sales that beat the title's original launch performance.
* 10% sale = 35% increase in sales (real dollars, not units shipped)
* 25% sale = 245% increase in sales
* 50% sale = 320% increase in sales
* 75% sale = 1470% increase in sales
IMDB doesn't tell me jack where I can buy / rent the interesting indy film:
Wheat (2009)
a 2009 Chinese historical drama film, that opened at the Shanghai International Film Festival.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1388901/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat_(film)
And that movie is only 4 years old !
Yup agreed 100%!
Netflix and iTunes seem to be the only ones successful with "disruptive technology" because tthey are clued in with what customers really want -- cheap digital content -- and are capitalizing on the opportunity instead of living in fear and doing next to nothing about it !
Actually it is worse then that. Sometimes I can't even _legally_ BUY the media because it is
a) not available for sale due to bullshit "Region" locking aka PRICE-FIXING,
b) no longer available for sale,
c) outrageously, ridiculously expensive as you mentioned.
Case in point: ST:TNG (Star Trek: The Next Generation) was $125 per SEASON when it came out. For something that I'm _maybe_ going to watch more then once that price is a total rip off. When a season is $20 THEN it is worth "owning." Until then the MPAA can fuck off. Their content isn't THAT valuable so I don't bother but I can certainly see some folks pirating "disposable media."
The MPAA doesn't understand "The Long Tail" at all. Just because old content has little value to the majority it doesn't imply it has no value to the minority! Good luck trying to buy old 80's sitcoms that weren't AS popular. The master tapes have long been lost, the duplicates deteriorated and society suffers because we "lost" a generation of [popular] culture. That alone is almost a "crime" against history.
Why is it against the law to "pirate" software when the original company is no longer offering it for sale, or worse, no longer even in business?
i.e.
* Windows XP -- can't buy it from Microsoft because they refuse to sell it.
* Vivacity - can't buy it because Topaz Labs refuses to sell it. http://www.topazlabs.com/vivacity/
I was thinking more along the lines.
fuck.developers.over
> vi or emacs debates anyone?
Yup. Meh. Only the immature junior programmers flame each arguing over which editor is better instead of channeling their energy into _writing_ code. /flame They ALL suck. Some just suck less then others.
> and you have not even touched on the argument between vector and quaternions yet and whether gimbal lock is a difficult or trivial problem.
I intentional did not discuss Quaternions nor Euler angles. Discussing singularities would be a natural progression for the discussion and one I hope that the student would next purse.
i.e.
"Is matrix form the only way we can represent an orientation?"
IMO bringing them up at this stage would just be too confusing as people are still coming to terms with the bigger picture and the implementation details. Once they get a handle on that they we can introduce special edge cases and how we can "solve" them.
I'm quite well aware of Diana Gruber from the old rec.games.programmer days and the (almost endless) arguments whether "quats" were equivalent to half-angle-axis representation (they are.) For the more advanced student a good paper is written by the modern "father" of quaternions:
* "Quaternions" by Ken Shoemake
http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs171/quatut.pdf
> Saying the "same principle is used for 3D" is hand waving in the context of the subject of "is math hard"
Somewhat. I agree higher dimensions quickly becomes verbose and cumbersome, However that is a perceptual belief. Whether you are doing an inner product (dot) or exterior product (wedge) in 2, 3, 4, ... 7, 11, etc. dimensions is (largely) irrelevant if one understands the basics. IMHO it is more important for the "stigma" of 3D+ math to be removed so people will feel more comfortable working in higher dimensions. i.e. Use their confidence from 2D to slowly understand 3D and then grok 4D. The higher dimensions of 5+ are "not intuitive" so anything we can do to help them avoid the false stigma "math is hard" is a good thing. (Aside: one can visualize a 3x3 matrix or quat if one learns a different way of thinking, or in this case, "seeing".)
> but MSE has a light effect on my Windows partition
Another vote that MSE is good enough - not bloated, doesn't bog the machine down like Norton / McAffe. However you really need a multi-pronged solution for security:
* Firewall - both Hardware & Software
* Hosts Blocking - http://winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.txt
* Anti-Virus (real-time) - MSE
* Anti-Cookies: Spybot Search N Destroy, Adaware
> use XP with NO virus protection for a month, visit the same websites these people visit, use a modern web browser (not IE 8), and see at the end of that period if you are actually infected.
A good hosts file (such as the one above) will block 99% of that crap.
And as another professional game programmer I disagree: Good Luck tracking down memory fragmentation.
Real game programmers never call malloc / new from inside the main game loop. They should be allocating from memory pools / heaps. What do you mean you don't have a memory budget for ALL objects, effects, and events ??
Agreed. The old trade-off between:
< -- fast & rigid - - - slow & features/flexibility -- >
Someone please mod this up!!!
That is THE fundamental problem with junior / immature programmers. They don't know how to THINK about the problem: its boundary and edge cases, the run-time memory usage, knowing if they are CPU bound, knowing if they IO bound, etc.
> Talks usually end up in most of them dismissing scripting languages, higher level APIs (such as OpenGL),
A few years back I've implemented OpenGL on the Wii and did maintenance work on our OpenGL version running on the PS2. Hell, even shipped a couple of games with it. OpenGL 1.x _can_ be implemented efficiently on a console if you apply some discipline. People who dismiss a rendering pipeline probably have never implemented one. HOWEVER, their point is that memory manage CAN be an issue if one isn't careful. ( NOTE please don't confuse the misapplication with the theory: Broadcom has a garbage implementation of OpenGL ES 1.x & 2.x across there devices from the ones I've worked with, but there is no reason it needs to be that bad. Apple has a very nice OpenGL ES implementation.)
> I'm probably going to get downvoted as troll, but my experiences with most console developers were often strange (as a developer myself).
> Any attempt to raising a point about how you don't need to optimize everything but only few critical zones of your code (what matters),
No, the reason you should get down modded is BECAUSE your mindset is part of the problem not the solution,
1. You don't understand the first rule of computing:
TINSTAAFL: There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.
I do not know to the extent you are but lazy developers are spoiled by their excessive Virtual Memory, slow high level languages, and including every bloated 3rd party library under the sun and the kitchen sink that OVERALL add to a SLOW machine. Great developers _constantly_ keep optimizations a low priority THROUGHOUT the writing process in the background so they don't have go and clean up all the crap later. Your mentality of "we will fix it later" is the sign of an immature and inexperienced programmer.
2. Your boss / peers are trying to teach you an important lesson:
Do It Right The First Time!
and
Keep is Simple, silly!
THAT is the point -- not your uneducated rant about "Who cares about memory usage, memory fragmentation, garbage collection, memory leaks, cpu cycles, etc." -- well your USER does EVEN if they don't understand the technical terms. ONCE you say the user experience is no longer important you have FAILED as a programmer. People are the SOLE reason software even exists in the first place. Please stop this shitty attitude that "performance doesn't matter -- we'll just throw more hardware at it." No! NO! NO! How about doing the best* with what you have instead?? ALL your code should be (relatively) clean, simple, fast, efficient. This has the side-effect that it is EASY to maintain to boot! Who wouldn't want. And you are going to make excuses that you can't be bothered???
* Apply the 80/20 rule for time-management in case it wasn't obvious.
To bring this back on topic, Javascript is a badly designed & implemented language because of
a) lack of memory control which leads to memory fragmentation and bloat, and
b) lack of types and which forces the run-time to do extra unnecessary work if they had designed the language properly in the first place.
There is a time and place for everything. Just never forgot to keep asking the questions: Can we do this better?
--
"Necessity is the Mother of Invention, but Curiosity is the Father." -- Michaelangelo
> a) Writing a matrix as a composition of sub-matrices is not familiar to people who don't grok matrix math. They need to think about it and can't follow the rest.
At this stage they don't need to understand all the technical details only the concept: namely we representing both a orientation and position within a 4x4 matrix. As we drill down into the details we will put together all the constituent parts.
> The decomposition was also wrong.
No it isn't. If are you going to make claims then you need to provide evidence of the correct answer so it can be determined what _precisely_ is "wrong."
> b) The explanation of the rotation matrix uses trigonometric identities that are not familiar to most people. Much easier to explain it with triangles.
i) ALL matrix students should _already_ have a basic background in trigonometry. If they don't then it is worth going over the basics until they understand them.
ii) It is much easier to see the equations when there is a diagram.
> c) Magic parameter. Where did the one and the zeros come from?
i) That is intentional to provoke the students into thinking: "Where the hell did those come from? And why do we need them?"
ii) IF you read the 2nd part that is explained.
Typo: y' = R * cos(A+B)
Should be: y' = R * sin(A+B)
> I am still not sure I understand using 4x4 matrices to do transforms in three space. I can write the code though (slowly).
Part 2 since /. ecode formatting is still so gey I am including a bunch of whitespace filler text '.' to align things up in columns.
Now, expressing the Rotation equation in Matrix form. Remember we ended up with these two equations:
x' = x * cos(B) - y * sin(B)
y' = x * sin(B) + y*cos(B)
We can literally "transcode" them from algebraic form into matrix form without too much difficulty. We end up with this:
And expressing the Scaling in Matrix form:
Likewise expressing the Translation in Matrix form:
The problem is that a 2x2 matrix form won't do! We need to extend the problem from 2D to 3D !
The exact same _principle_ is used for 3D. We extend a 3x3 matrix (orientation) to a 4x4 matrix so that it expresses BOTH a orientation AND translation.
Hope this helped!
> I am still not sure I understand using 4x4 matrices to do transforms in three space. I can write the code though (slowly).
That's just proof that you had a bad/crappy teacher. :-( Here is one explanation:
In 3D computer graphics we use a 4x4 matrix to conveniently and compactly represent _two_ things:
a) orientation, and
b) location (or position) within a single variable.
Where:
R = 3x3 orientation matrix, and
T = 3-dimensional position vector.
To understand how this comes about let us start with something a little more basic: 2D Affine Transformations. Namely: Rotations, Translations, Scaling.
Given a point P = we can write it in matrix form as either [ x y ], or
[ x ]
[ y ]
How would we write the equation for a point that is rotated around the origin (or z-axis.)? We will eventually want to write a matrix equation where the matrix represents a change in orientation. That is by definition:
x = R * cos(A), and
y = R * sin(A)
x' = R * cos(A+B), and
y' = R * cos(A+B)
Where:
R = radius of the angle,
A = initial angle,
B = the relative change in the angle,
A+B = the absolute final angle
We don't always know R, so let us rewriting these in terms without R:
x' = R * cos(A+B)
= R * {cos(A)*cos(B) - sin(A)*sin(B)}
= {R*cos(A)} * cos(B) - {R*sin(A)} * sin(B)
= x * cos(B) - y * sin(B)
Similarly we do the same for y.
Now, we would also like to write the equation for the Translation of a 2D point:
x' = x + dx
y' = y + dy
Likewise Scaling is pretty straightforward:
x' = x * sx
y' = y * sy
These 3 different operations require 3 different functions and order of operations! This sucks. It sure would be nice if we could unify these operations into one equation! We actually have two choices for how we could write/calculate this:
a) Pre-multiply the column vector (ignore the '.' it is whitespace due to /. being lame.)
b) Post-multiply the row vector
At the end of the day it doesn't matter which convention you pick just as long as you are consistent.
Since /. is lame and doesn't like an _informative_ MATH post I'm breaking it into two parts...
Disagree. You can only have -one- NSA security clearance as it implies you are cleared for it AND everything below it.
Examples:
"Want an security clearance?" is incorrect.
"Want the security clearance?" is OK.
"Want a security clearance?" is CORRECT.
"Want security clearance?" is CORRECT. Agreed this is best.
Substituting 'NSA' for 'security' doesn't change anything as both words are nouns that start with consonants.
--
In ~10 years (2024) humans will finally be allowed to know the truth that we are not alone, and never have been.
> It's not like Valve doesn't have a release cycle that's about 5 times as long as that of other studios and whilst their games are good they're not any better than those of many others to justify the absurdly long development times.
Valve, Blizzard, etc have already explained their thought process ...
* If a good game is shipped late no one will remember it was late.
* If a bad game ships on time no one will remember it was on time.
You gotta love these self proclaimed armchair "experts" complaining about Company X to make Product Y because obviously these "experts" have mastered the process of game development and how hard it is to a) ship something b) good.
--
In ~ 10 years Humans will finally be allowed to know first hand that they are not alone
Hear Yea, Hear Yea! Some Arrogant Cunt on /. makes a baseless claim with ZERO evidence and this stupid shit gets modded up?? It is on the Internet so it must be true!! Riiiight. *face palm*
How about looking at NASA's own evidence of the STS missions before going off half-cocked and looking like an total idiot.
* Evidence: The Case For NASA UFO's
http://www.disclose.tv/action/viewvideo/117264/Evidence_The_Case_For_NASA_UFOs__Full/
* The URZI UFO Case - The Full Story - Authentic & Complete
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_09AQClOIQ
Note: @54:12 - 54:28 has some great hi-res shots. The craft(s) definitely looks Pleiadian. e.g. http://aquariuschannelings.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/smogmeinichols.jpg
> Here's the truth. No aliens have visited the earth, and they never will. Not ever.
[[citation required]] from the self claimed armchair expert.
> If Stephen Hawking is right,
So he is an expert in Xenology now?? Based on what _experience_ ??
Here's a news flash. He's a BRILLIANT physicists HOWEVER he's a total idiot about Xenology. He has ZERO knowledge, only beliefs. That's like going to the Doctor and asking the best way to understand "The Source." An Expert in the WRONG frield.
> Maybe they want to trade with us. Yeah, right. :-( Here's a joke for you: Boy, are you ever in for a rude surprise in ~ 10 years.
You must be the life of the party. Apparently you don't understand the value of humor: Namely the gift of being able to create it, give it, and receive it. It is so sad to see "you don't get it."
> The question of why aliens might "want to come here" is fundamentally flawed because we are forming that question from our current (tiny) viewpoint.
You are absolutely correct on one thing: Your own myopic view is completely unable to see the bigger picture:
NAMELY: Do you even understand the concept of being able to visit how your great^N--grandchildren are doing?
FOR THE RECORD: Earth is the ONLY planet with Free Will. Aliens* have as much as to learn from us as we from them.
Specifically: How we are [slowly] working on transformering ourselves from being extreme negativity & limitations to one of positiveness and abundance. The Earth (and all the many life forms it hosts) is much more an experiment in the evolution of Consciousness. We celebrated passing the "marker" back in 2012 that "Yes, Humans are able to spiritually grow up and not be total idiots like we used to be in the past by over-developing our Male Science mind and completely ignore our Female Spiritual Side and destroying ourselves in the process."
* NOTE: Technically there is no such thing as aliens when we share the same DNA - both physically and spiritually.
> We're just not as advanced or as important as we like to think. In the end, there's no compelling reason to think they'd be interested in meeting us. ;-( I hear they have this thing called self-esteem now a days. You may want to check it out.
The perfect example of the average human: No self-worth, places artificial limitations on themselves, unable to grok the bigger picture. Sad.
Humans are one of the greatest experiments ever designed. You want to try embracing your heritage sometime. When you meet an alien ask him who his/her "parents are", and who their "children" are, and "your importance." You might be shocked at the self respect they give you.
--
Before you can learn, you must first unlearn. That is, stop your ego from being delusional in that "you think you already know when you don't."