I personally love Warsow (www.warsow.net), a Q2-based free (GPL?) FPS, and also World of Padman (www.worldofpadman.com) is quite fun at times, and I think both still have relatively active communities and some servers up at times. Other options include FEAR Combat (projectorigin.warnerbros.com/fearcombat/main), the free multi-player part of F.E.A.R., or free online-only games such as WarRock (www.warrock.net), though both options would require a relatively beefy graphics card. A game I also love personally is Iron Grip: Warlord (http://igwarlord.isotx.com/), which isn't free but they have a demo which allows you to go on-line, it's an FPS tower defense style game, and a lot of fun to play...
Yes, this sounds nice, but it's a large pitfall too. It's very tempting to start extending 'basic datatypes' with all kinds of stuff, which can result in awful clashes with other libraries that do the same. Ruby on Rails' 'Prototype' library is a good example of how _not_ to use this.
Horrible indeed. The idea of allowing to call a method with a different 'this' is already scary, and useful only for nasty hacks, but I think actually using this feature in very commonly used functionality* was a big mistake (perhaps not so obvious when 'object oriented' programming (yes, the prototype stuff, i know it's not strictly oo) wasn't very common, but nowadays it's one of the first walls JS developers bump into).
Nothing new here I think... There's more (intepreted) languages that can do this. And most other languages actually _do_ implement push() (or something similar) on all platforms.;)
> someObject.onclick = myFunction
Nothing new here either. Try Python for instance, which is a lot more dynamic than JavaScript...:)
Yes, I understand that JS has certain very nice features when you're used to more static ones like C or Java or whatnot, but I think compared to certain others (note that most of JS' features are in some way stolen from other languages) its awful implementation, lack of basic functionality (no String.strip() while there is a String.blink()?!?), sheer unintuitiveness (it's for instance not at all clear what notation to use for 'OO', there's a billion ways to define objects and prototypes and such, and the differences are subtle) and strange quirks (like the nested scopes example you mention, but there's plenty more examples) are reason enough to still see it as 'necessary evil' rather than 'an enlightening experience'...;)
(Do note that I'm a bit biased, as I'm (not deeply, but a bit) involved in the PyPy project, which works on (among a lot of other things) a Python to JavaScript compiler...;)
* most notably event handlers: when registering an event handler in certain ways 'this' points to the event, or the element on which the event is defined, or something, and not to the object, making that you need to use closures to actually have a reference to the object the method is defined on, from the method:|
Being able to slice out even half of the nights that I currently use for sleeping would be a tremendous assistance.
Sure it is... for a while. But eventually you'll pay the price, which may range from fatigue and mental instability, to addiction and even death.
A friend of mine took a tiny little bit of amphetamine each morning before going to work. He didn't make 25, turned out his heart was a bit flawed, couldn't handle the uppers.
Don't forget that you're dealing with drugs here, and drugs should be used with care. Even though I'm not sure about side-effects of the uppers you mention, basically you're doing things your body wasn't build to do: your limitations, both physical and mental, are there for a reason.
Occasional usage of most of amphetamines and amphetamine-like substances is usually harmless, but long-term usage can be very dangerous for most of them because you're wearing out your body and mind.
Actually, PyPy sprints can last more than a day or two, iirc the longest was 6 or 7 days. Same for Zope and other Python projects: week-long sprints are uncommon, but they do happen. Also, I wonder whether this has anything to do with significance... I think hackathons and sprints are basically the same thing, just different words for similar gatherings in different communities.
Yeah, I don't understand the fuss either. Demon delivers me 8 Mb down, 1 up, without asking a setup fee or charging for the modem. I don't have any limits either (well, there's a FUP, but never heard anyone actually get notified about that) and, in contrast to you, am allowed to run any kind of server and an unlimited sized network.
The speed is not guaranteed, but it's very steady since the provider makes sure the hardware is good and the network is never overloaded, and the helpdesk actually knows what Linux is...
On top of that we're allowed to smoke our joint while using our connection... Ain't Holland the best!;)
Indeed Python would be a good choice, it's a nice, compact, readable language and the interactive interpreter is really nice to get feedback fast, for instance it's really cool to see a Tkinter window popping up after typing 'from Tkinter import *\nroot = Tk()'.
I've just built a nice box for my 4-year old son, and I'm pretty sure I'll teach him Python too, as soon as he starts understanding what hacking is and that he wants to learn it too (not a matter of if, I reckon;).
Which brings me to a question I have myself: I have built a Gnome setup, made it a bit more child-friendly, large icons, no system tools available from the desktop anymore, installed gdm to allow booting into Gnome without logging in, installed lots of games (childsplay, gcompris, tuxpaint, etc.) and it's currently quite a nice environment for kids, but I'm not entirely happy about Gnome as a wm: some things just can not be customized. Icons on the desktop can not be locked, and neither can the taskbar. The trashcan and computer icons on the desktop can not be removed, the minimize and close buttons on application bars are small, etc. Does anyone know whether there's a window manager available that does allow customizing those points? Even better: is there a wm for kids? Or would it be possible to easily hack one up using some package?
Indeed. First they know where you are, now they're trying to find out what you have been doing, and if the project would succeed they would even know what you *will be* doing later on...
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I personally love Warsow (www.warsow.net), a Q2-based free (GPL?) FPS, and also World of Padman (www.worldofpadman.com) is quite fun at times, and I think both still have relatively active communities and some servers up at times. Other options include FEAR Combat (projectorigin.warnerbros.com/fearcombat/main), the free multi-player part of F.E.A.R., or free online-only games such as WarRock (www.warrock.net), though both options would require a relatively beefy graphics card. A game I also love personally is Iron Grip: Warlord (http://igwarlord.isotx.com/), which isn't free but they have a demo which allows you to go on-line, it's an FPS tower defense style game, and a lot of fun to play...
> if( !Array.push ) ... }
;)
:)
;)
;)
:|
> Array.prototype.push = function( item ){
Yes, this sounds nice, but it's a large pitfall too. It's very tempting to start extending 'basic datatypes' with all kinds of stuff, which can result in awful clashes with other libraries that do the same. Ruby on Rails' 'Prototype' library is a good example of how _not_ to use this.
> someObject.onclick = function(){ myFunction( this.someAttribute ) }
Horrible indeed. The idea of allowing to call a method with a different 'this' is already scary, and useful only for nasty hacks, but I think actually using this feature in very commonly used functionality* was a big mistake (perhaps not so obvious when 'object oriented' programming (yes, the prototype stuff, i know it's not strictly oo) wasn't very common, but nowadays it's one of the first walls JS developers bump into).
> function array_push( arr , item )
> arr[arr.length] = item;
Nothing new here I think... There's more (intepreted) languages that can do this. And most other languages actually _do_ implement push() (or something similar) on all platforms.
> someObject.onclick = myFunction
Nothing new here either. Try Python for instance, which is a lot more dynamic than JavaScript...
Yes, I understand that JS has certain very nice features when you're used to more static ones like C or Java or whatnot, but I think compared to certain others (note that most of JS' features are in some way stolen from other languages) its awful implementation, lack of basic functionality (no String.strip() while there is a String.blink()?!?), sheer unintuitiveness (it's for instance not at all clear what notation to use for 'OO', there's a billion ways to define objects and prototypes and such, and the differences are subtle) and strange quirks (like the nested scopes example you mention, but there's plenty more examples) are reason enough to still see it as 'necessary evil' rather than 'an enlightening experience'...
(Do note that I'm a bit biased, as I'm (not deeply, but a bit) involved in the PyPy project, which works on (among a lot of other things) a Python to JavaScript compiler...
* most notably event handlers: when registering an event handler in certain ways 'this' points to the event, or the element on which the event is defined, or something, and not to the object, making that you need to use closures to actually have a reference to the object the method is defined on, from the method
Being able to slice out even half of the nights that I currently use for sleeping would be a tremendous assistance.
Sure it is... for a while. But eventually you'll pay the price, which may range from fatigue and mental instability, to addiction and even death.
A friend of mine took a tiny little bit of amphetamine each morning before going to work. He didn't make 25, turned out his heart was a bit flawed, couldn't handle the uppers.
Don't forget that you're dealing with drugs here, and drugs should be used with care. Even though I'm not sure about side-effects of the uppers you mention, basically you're doing things your body wasn't build to do: your limitations, both physical and mental, are there for a reason.
Occasional usage of most of amphetamines and amphetamine-like substances is usually harmless, but long-term usage can be very dangerous for most of them because you're wearing out your body and mind.
Actually, PyPy sprints can last more than a day or two, iirc the longest was 6 or 7 days. Same for Zope and other Python projects: week-long sprints are uncommon, but they do happen. Also, I wonder whether this has anything to do with significance... I think hackathons and sprints are basically the same thing, just different words for similar gatherings in different communities.
Oh, ehrm, of course this 'trying to make you envious' doesn't really work without mentioning I pay only 65 euros... ;)
Yeah, I don't understand the fuss either. Demon delivers me 8 Mb down, 1 up, without asking a setup fee or charging for the modem. I don't have any limits either (well, there's a FUP, but never heard anyone actually get notified about that) and, in contrast to you, am allowed to run any kind of server and an unlimited sized network.
;)
The speed is not guaranteed, but it's very steady since the provider makes sure the hardware is good and the network is never overloaded, and the helpdesk actually knows what Linux is...
On top of that we're allowed to smoke our joint while using our connection... Ain't Holland the best!
Indeed Python would be a good choice, it's a nice, compact, readable language and the interactive interpreter is really nice to get feedback fast, for instance it's really cool to see a Tkinter window popping up after typing 'from Tkinter import *\nroot = Tk()'.
;).
I've just built a nice box for my 4-year old son, and I'm pretty sure I'll teach him Python too, as soon as he starts understanding what hacking is and that he wants to learn it too (not a matter of if, I reckon
Which brings me to a question I have myself: I have built a Gnome setup, made it a bit more child-friendly, large icons, no system tools available from the desktop anymore, installed gdm to allow booting into Gnome without logging in, installed lots of games (childsplay, gcompris, tuxpaint, etc.) and it's currently quite a nice environment for kids, but I'm not entirely happy about Gnome as a wm: some things just can not be customized. Icons on the desktop can not be locked, and neither can the taskbar. The trashcan and computer icons on the desktop can not be removed, the minimize and close buttons on application bars are small, etc. Does anyone know whether there's a window manager available that does allow customizing those points? Even better: is there a wm for kids? Or would it be possible to easily hack one up using some package?
Indeed. First they know where you are, now they're trying to find out what you have been doing, and if the project would succeed they would even know what you *will be* doing later on...