28 March 2007
Frickin laser beams!
Another reason not to go to Vegas. Admittedly, it's still only on the drawing board, but the world had reached its saturation point of Micheal Jackson robots in 1998.
21 March 2007
Scientific analysis!
Is Hiren writing up? Let's answer the question with some scientific analysis!
Here is a unquestionably thorough look at the question, performed by carefully selecting five sample points and extrapolating a trendline in Excel. I can see you screwing up your face in disgust, but you cannot question my study, I have a PhD!
As you can see from the above graph, by the time we reach June, if Hiren is still writing, he'll be making at least 12 blog posts a day. This is a clear sign that procrastination has kicked in and the PhD has been kicked out. Can you imagine the horror?
Firefox users, you want this extension. Frames and tabs are FTW!
Here is a unquestionably thorough look at the question, performed by carefully selecting five sample points and extrapolating a trendline in Excel. I can see you screwing up your face in disgust, but you cannot question my study, I have a PhD!
As you can see from the above graph, by the time we reach June, if Hiren is still writing, he'll be making at least 12 blog posts a day. This is a clear sign that procrastination has kicked in and the PhD has been kicked out. Can you imagine the horror?
Firefox users, you want this extension. Frames and tabs are FTW!
20 March 2007
No, I don't want to restart my computer now.
I'm primarily living in windows XP again, and it didn't take me long to remember how the user interface used to drive me totally beserk. The back-end is reasonably stable - I do plenty of nasty stuff with C++, and I haven't had that cause a single BSOD. But the front-end - well, it's hideous.
Example: installation of an update causes constant, persistent nagging about needing to reboot the computer. While you're running a big job, it leads to one of those WTF moments and makes you wonder what kind of illicit substance the UI designers were smoking. There are a few workarounds, the majority of which involve ugly registry hacks.
I realise that KDE or gnome aren't hilariously easy to use, but once you get used to them, their crash and burn rates are at least consistent, with most errors not totally fatal. Plus there are a few mature and indispensable features that simply don't exist in other operating systems.
Rant over. This is well worth a look. It's the Chaser lads again - the video from India is worth a look on it's own.
Example: installation of an update causes constant, persistent nagging about needing to reboot the computer. While you're running a big job, it leads to one of those WTF moments and makes you wonder what kind of illicit substance the UI designers were smoking. There are a few workarounds, the majority of which involve ugly registry hacks.
I realise that KDE or gnome aren't hilariously easy to use, but once you get used to them, their crash and burn rates are at least consistent, with most errors not totally fatal. Plus there are a few mature and indispensable features that simply don't exist in other operating systems.
Rant over. This is well worth a look. It's the Chaser lads again - the video from India is worth a look on it's own.
14 March 2007
The epoc-alypse
Last week, Emotiv systems (where I'm at) went very public with what they've been working on at GDC 2007. Suffice to say, it got a little busy, what with the slashdotting and all.
It's been very weird, watching the widespread exposure and excitement from the inside out. Of course, I can't go into a heap of specifics, but suffice to say, the work is based on some solid science, and yes, it does work, and it works well (having tried it myself).
The project has had it's share of controversy, but, well, so far, it's coming out on top. Aspiring Jedi's are encouraged to contact Deborah, who'll enthusiastically examine your head while you get to try out the state-of-the-art headset :)
It's been very weird, watching the widespread exposure and excitement from the inside out. Of course, I can't go into a heap of specifics, but suffice to say, the work is based on some solid science, and yes, it does work, and it works well (having tried it myself).
The project has had it's share of controversy, but, well, so far, it's coming out on top. Aspiring Jedi's are encouraged to contact Deborah, who'll enthusiastically examine your head while you get to try out the state-of-the-art headset :)