Sadly

Unfortunately I am not updating this blog anymore, I’m afraid I have ran out of idea, If anyone have ideas or would like to be a contributor I’d be more than happy to start another blog with that someone or find a new subject on which to write on. On that note, good bye and maybe: see y’all later.

[Geek]This month in gaming.[/geek]

Computers made for winter !

This month is gaming is sure promising, as we’re approaching the holidays games seem to rain on our heads. Just by looking at what the end of october got us: Far Cry2, Fallout3, Dead Space and such. Now November seems to be just as lush with new releashes like: CoD: World at War, World of Warcraft: WOTLK, Mirror’s Edge, Sacred2, NFS: Undercover, Left4Dead, TR: Underworld, NWN2: Storm of Zehir and so on. Note than these are releashes for PC, I am not a fan of consoles and I have no plan on covering them on a micro-management basis. I am sure that all of these are going to be good games based on the fact that so much hype CANNOT possibly exist on bad games. Ok, I know. There ARE exeptions like Daikatana, DX2, Age Of Conan and many others (unfortunatly). But with the quantity of gameplay demo’s and trailers and interviews and previews they can’t turn bad, I refuse to beleive it.

As I side matter, I wanted to talk about the Left4Dead demo that was turned loose some time ago. Well, you can’t download the demo unless you pre-ordered the game right? Well don’t worry, when asked to include your serial or whatever they ask. Just write anything and chances are that you might be able to get a valid one. A good friend of mine told me that he entered some random number and he got to download the demo, how luck is that you say? Very lucky I answer, but still possible.

As a personal matter, I bought FarCry2 lately and I just love it. I would like to try my hands at making a game review, il check up on that later. But I figuered it’d be fun to do my best to convert more people into meaningless minions of FarCry2. And as my first review I’d like some feedback. Il have to make articles for all the time I was away, what a job… what a job.

The Blog is back !

Yes it is true, this blog is going to be updated. And its going to be soon, I’m having another of these writing fits so I guess that I’ll be publishing some more stuff, might even get a contributor or two. Once again I’ll be talking about pretty much anything that passes around my head for some reason. So, on that happy note I’l leave it at that. Im off to write the next article for this blog, which will hopefully get some more people to read it.

Music of the week.

For this week’s MOTW entry, I choose the popular but loved “A horse with no name”, from the group America.

“A horse with no name” is a song from the album America (with a group also called America). They started to do their music in the early 70′. Gerry Beckley, Dewey Bunnell, and Dan Peek are the original members of the group and it expanded a few years afterward. Their popularity started to peak in the 80′. Their best song are “A Horse with No Name,” “Sister Golden Hair”, “Ventura Highway,” and “Tin Man”. Thus, I invite you to look at this site to know more about them: Ventura Highway

Better be a smartass than a dumbass: RAM

If you open your computer case you will find little sticks standing out of your motherboard, those are called RAM. RAM stands for Random Access Memory, that is to say you can access its information on any cell as long as you know its address. But first let us dissect a stick of RAM.

Dynamic RAM Biology 101: Basically RAM is an integrated circuit made of millions of transistors and capacitors. The two of them makes a “Cell” which is to say a place that can store a single bit in his 1 or 0 form. The capacitors makes all the memory work while the transistor makes the switching work. The problem with capacitors are that they are very dumb and have a bad memory. Every few millisecond you have to re-tell him that he is 1 or 0. To alleviate the task of the cpu, a memory controller reads every cell each several millisecond and re-writes back the information that was written on it, refreshing the capacitor’s memory. It happens thousands of times in a single second.

That was Dynamic RAM, static RAM also exist but it is used mainly used for CPU caching. And I will not talk about it in today’s lesson. Feel free to Google it. There is lots of RAM types. SRAM (Static RAM) and DRAM (Dynamic RAM) are two of them but there are other kinds of RAM, you might have an outdated kind of RAM but most computers will use newer versions of static RAM when memory sticks are concerned.

Now RAM is the kind of memory that is “Volatile”. Meaning that all its content are flushed when the computer is powered down because the memory controller cannot re-write the information back on the chip. This takes us to the next section of RAM knowledge. What does it do?

Theoretical RAM 101: In your computer, the CPU is there to handle all the data that is flowing in and out of your computer. To your monitor, or printer, or USB key. All of the data have to pass throught the CPU to get proccessed and put back in place in its new state. But when you are playing a game, or running an application like photoshop, what happen when you make changes to your drawing but you are not saving it? The problem with CPU-Harddrive relation is that the channels between the two is very slow. Your harddrive cannot memorise data as quick as your CPU can process it. So this gigantic bulk of 1’s ans 0’s have to go somewhere in the meantime. This is where RAM comes in. As soon as your CPU have finished something, it sends it to the RAM modules because the channels between both are extremely fast. So lets say you open an old picture of your friend in photoshop. First the data is tranferred from the harddrive into the RAM and it stays there for as long as the application is open. When you make changes the CPU takes the information from RAM, processes it and turns it back into the RAM again. When you save your picture is empties your RAM of photoshop data and sends it into the harddrive at a relaxed pace. All the while the CPU can continue its actions.

Memory Swapping: This is why the more RAM you have, the more things you can execute faster in your computer. But what happen when you want to open an application that takes more memory that your RAM can support? Memory swapping happen. Lets say you have a total of 512 megabytes of RAM. And you open an application that needs 1014mb of RAM to fully operate. Theres a problem, now your computer will take 512mb’s of data at a time, sends it to the CPU, wait to get it back again, sends it back to the harddrive, retrieve the OTHER 512mb’s that have remained untouched, sends to the CPU, wait to get it back, and re-send it to the harddrive. He will make that again, and again, and again until your application has closed. Due to the harddrive read/write speed memory swapping will greatly slower your system. The solution? Get more ram. The advantage of having more RAM is that you can execute multiple applications before going into a memory swapping situation.

Now that you know that you need more RAM, how do you install it? Read on !

Practical RAM 101: This section will cover the basics (in other word, pretty much everything there is to know) about installing RAM. First the tools, you need absolutely nothing. There’s that, installing RAM is extremely easy and quick. First unplug your case completely, don’t just turn it off. When that is done, open your case and ground yourself by touching a metallic part of the computer (like the metal frame) and with your other hand touch the ground. Second, look inside your computer and locate the slots in which RAM is inserted. Look at the image right by, you can see the arrow pointing to the RAM, two sticks are in place and there are two free spots. Now stop here, be careful when buying RAM. As I said earlier, there are several types of RAM. Not just Static and Dynamic. Depending on the date your motherboard was build it might be compatible with just a single kind of RAM. Newer computers are compatible with DDR2 RAM type. Be sure to check which one you are compatible before buying your sticks, there is nothing more frustrating than buying a stick of ram that won’t fit. To get back on the subject, now that you have your stick of RAM in the hand and the location on where you are going to put it in, the only thing that is left to you is to push the little brackets on the side outward so that the stick will fit right it. Now apply a gentle but strong pressure on the stick forcing it in the slot. DONT PUSH TOO HARD, or you might break it. If it does not fit, try inserting it the other way around. If it still does not work you might not have the correct kind of RAM. Try looking the the slot to see if the crevisses on your RAM matches with the bumps on the slots. If not, you have an incorrect kind of RAM. If all goes well the brackets will closes themselves on your ram stick holding it securely in place. And there you go, no more messing around it needed. Your computer will automatically regognize the RAM and use its power therefore making your computer faster.

Firefox Weave 0.2

Today, Mozilla’s Labs put online their latest product called Weave. Weave is a synchronization add-on for firefox that allows you to access your cookies, bookmarks, history, favorites and so on from other computers. This is not their latest release from Weave although it is the most stable yet.

How does it work?: Weave works as such. When first installed and did the familiar restart of Firefox. Weave will prompt you to enter a username/password and an encryption key. After that you will be able to select a number of things you want the server to save. Bookmarks, themes, individual addons, saved password and more. Nearly all the heavy lifting is done client side so Mozilla’s server have very little to do exept accept registerations and save user settings. Here is a comprehensive schematic on how the information is handled.

As you can figure anyone with your encryption key, username and password can access your data on any computer in the world. Can you see the makings of a future “Cloud computer”¹ system? I do, just by looking over the single fact that you could put a whole computer in a remote server and access all of your documents just by having a monitor plugged to the server. More on that later. Weave is not finished yet so if you want to try it know that there are going to be bugs. So use it at your own risk.

Download weave here: http://labs.mozilla.com/projects/weave/

Further reading: http://labs.mozilla.com/2007/12/introducing-weave/

¹ I will soon make a big article on cloud computers and how they are going to work.

Beleive-it-or-don’t column.

Oddly enough but true a truck containing 12 million angry bees was overturned on a major highway in Canada near the town of St-Leonard. A couple thousand were set free before the vehicule could be sealed. As you might have figuered dealing with millions of bees is not exactly easy. Gaz has been poured in the truck to calm the bees and so officials said that there was no danger to the general public but “If there’s anyone in St Leonard who is allergic to bees, we’re recommending they leave town for a couple of hours,” Strong told the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. If you are like me, and hate bees. I’d suggest not going anywhere near St-Leonard anytime in the near future

Ice Ice baby.

Well, there is is. There was indeed ice on Mars. Or so we think. Phoenix, the robot that NASA sent to Mars several weeks ago, found evidences of Ice in form of bright spots that are beleived to have been Ice in a gazeous form couple millions years ago.

Well, these bright spots are what you could call Marsian Ice, do you see the little bright spots? These are traces of Ice that passed directly from a solid to gazeous state. They are visible in the lower right portion of that weird square. They are visible in one frame but not in the next, the perfect excuse to beleive its ice.  NASA think that the finding of Ice is not particullarly extravagant considered that traces Ice is beleived to be found in abundance in the area that Phoenix is in. The lander still have two months to explore the surface of Mars and find more traces of prehistoric water.

James Bond: Quantum Of Solace

The trailer of the new episode in the James Bond series have been released yesterday and here it is. Quantum Of Solace take up exactly when Casino Royale ended. That is to say, when James Bond was with Mr. White at his house. I can say that it is going to be grand (like every other James Bond movie), it looks like James will have to escape the foes of this mysterious “Organization” as well as the MI6 who does not seem to thrust him.

Heh? Isn’t it going to be grand? I think it will. It is due to appear in theaters November 7th (Yes, the seventh) and im sure no one can wait for that date. Until then contend yourselves by visiting the offficial site.

A tribute to Penny Arcade

First let me tell you about Penny Arcade. PA is a webcomic that has been going for 10 years now. It depicts the life of two young gamers while they joke their way to our hearth. Tycho Brahe and John Gabriel (just “Gabe”). The comic consist of a blog entry accompanied by a comic that usually express their thoughts on games, movies and internet stuff. Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik are the two behind our heroes.

What makes them great is the amazing relation that both characters have with each other. Gabe plays the PacMan addict(he is always seen with a PacMan shirt and sometime a watch) that keeps up with a passion for barbies and unicorns. He once found a cardboard tube on the street and has been using it has a samurai sword for several comics. He loves superheroes, especially Batman and Spiderman. He likes to brag about his “wang” and makes regular jokes with it, usually crude jokes but nonetheless appreciable (in a Penny Arcade context that is). He is usually rude to people but he can be gentle with closer characters. Like when he wanted to give RAM to his girlfriend for example.

Now to his counterpart Tycho Brahe. He is intelligent, cynical and sarcastic on several occasion. Tycho is always seen wearing a blue stripped jacket with matching pants. He is an adept of D&D and RPG’s in general. Thought he try to hide it, he’s having late night sessions with nerdy guys to play D&D. His childhood has been marked by his mother that physically abused him, the trips to Idaho’s Shitfarms. He also have “one of these aunts that send you homo-erotic material for Christmas”. He possess a very special D&D cookbook that allows him to cook wonderful sandwiches because “He roll twenties”.  Much of Tycho’s comics are marked by a presence of his faithful twenty sided dice in honor for his passion of D&D.

Penny Arcade comics are full of references of games that went out recently, both characters comment on these games very aggressively. The same goes for any company that makes big announcements or big blunders. One of them involves EA commenting on their SecuROM copy protection software (the one that had to make periodic checks to validate the game) but PA transformed it into a crazy announcement involving blood test and rectal exam as validation. Thought you must be up to date on the latest news to understand their jokes but there is no need to be a hardcore gamer to fully understand every joke. A popular strip is John Gabriel Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory as depicted here:

This shows how anyone can become a total jackass over some time by playing multiplayer games like UT2004 or other. I think this leads to the uncontroversial proof that Penny Arcade is the best webcomic ever. Not only because of their jokes but also because of their implication in society. They are the host of the annual Penny Arcade Exposition (PAX). A game convention that draws thousands of gamers to Seattle to the Washington State Convention & Trade Center. They also support Child’s Play, which is a charity organization that supplies hospitals with toys and games for child’s. They have a running total of $3,489,000 from 2003 to 2007. So don’t hesitate to donate, some kids are really sick and they need amusement. You wouldn’t want yours to be in such situation. Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins along with Scott Kurtz of PvP’s webcomic went together and played the new 4th edition of the D&D game along and a DM from Wizards of the Coast. And it is hilarious. They have 5 episodes of about 45 minutes released yet and you can download them from here (search google : DnD + penny arcade episode #   to get other episodes).

But Penny Arcade is not just about Tycho and Gabe. They also sometime include side-characters. Both Gabe and Tycho have wives that appears sometime in the strips. Kara O’Donnal Gabriel is the wife of Gabe(in the comic as well as in real life), she is a gamer and she understands Gabe’s obsession for gaming. Gabe actually discussed with Tycho the fact that she was playing the Sims online with other guys that pretends to be girls in-game. Which is a really good deal for 10$ a month says Gabe. Brenna Brahe is the wife of Tycho that shares the name of Jerry Holkin’s real wife. She does not understand why her husband  plays so much games but sometimes talks about it with Kara. Tycho actually killed her once when he was trying a Splinter Cell’s move. But she came back in the comics a year later. Another but far from the last would be the two talking appliances that Tycho and Gabe owns. One is a DIVx player that can talk and that is alcoholic as well as a sex maniac. The second is the Fruit Fucker 2000 a machine that makes juice by… ( … you know what I mean, read the name … ). A near complete list is available here.  So, for every laugh that Penny Arcade brought us I think they deserve a good thanks. I wave my hat to you guys ! Keep up the good comics, you’ve been working so hard for the past 10 years and I hope that you will excuse me from asking you to keep up the work for another ten years !