Tuesday, December 23, 2003 Friday, December 19, 2003
An earthquake of magnitude between six and seven takes California by surprise. Time on the news: One day. US soldiers capture Saddam Hussein alive. Time on the news: Two days. Michael Jackson is a strange man. Time on the news: Two months. Either I'm a complete idiot or there's something wrong with this.
I heart the weekend. The only exciting news I have is that Ben (the real one, not Konrad posting with Ben's name like on the chatterbox) made the high score list for the game Doom Funnel Chasers. Way to go, Ben. And way to be odd, Konrad.
If you'd care to enlighten yourself with computer/hacking knowledge, be sure to observe the following sites. The challenges they contain are quite addictive.
Hackits
Hackquest
Tuesday, December 16, 2003 Monday, December 15, 2003 Need to get in the holiday spirit? Click here to download my Christmas wallpaper. Coming soon: Hanukkah wallpaper.
Friday, December 12, 2003 Wednesday, December 10, 2003 Tuesday, December 9, 2003 Monday, December 8, 2003 Thursday, December 4, 2003 Wednesday, December 3, 2003 Tuesday, December 2, 2003 Sunday, November 30, 2003 Saturday, November 29, 2003 Friday, November 28, 2003 Wednesday, November 26, 2003 Sunday, November 23, 2003 Thursday, November 20, 2003 Wednesday, November 19, 2003 Tuesday, November 18, 2003 Monday, November 17, 2003 Sunday, November 16, 2003 Tuesday, November 11, 2003 Monday, November 10, 2003 Sunday, November 9, 2003 Thursday, November 6, 2003 Tuesday, November 4, 2003 Friday, October 31, 2003 Thursday, October 30, 2003
I've noticed something. Centuries ago it was a struggle to make a journey that would be relatively short by today's standards. Then after developments in technology, these journeys became shorter and humans could travel farther. Now we're able to travel these far distances in a matter of hours. So maybe, decades or centuries into the future, the trips that take hours today will be small errands. China, Singapore, Hawaii, and so on would all be neighbors to little old New Jersey. In which case it's likely that the "far journey" could become one between planets, stars, or other distant objects.
Anyway, I'm in desperate need of a new look for the blog. Anyone with any slight idea get back to me. In other words, read this and ignore it.
I've started to wish I wasn't addicted to computers.
I haven't much to say. I should be spending more time doing more important things.
Inspiration:
...And some others. But I'll stop there.
What makes nature so beautiful? Is it the fact that it's not made by man? Is it the subtle imperfections embodied in it? Nothing in nature is perfect (there are no perfect spheres, no completely straight or infinitely extending lines, nothing that has existed and will exist for all time), so it's rather odd we as humans attempt to make our creations as such. Edifices are constructed using perfect angles and support, products are considered incompetent if the result isn't of the highest quality, and students obtain the best score for work that's perfect. But sometimes imperfection proves to be more important, influential, or at the very least, thought-provoking. After all, the same nature that allows us to exist is imperfect.
I hope that jostled your brain a bit. I know you're not reading this in school (unless you're Ben or Konrad), but it's good to get your mind running.
Speaking of school, a unique coincidence occured yesterday. Upon discussing philosophy in Modern European History, the question "What is truth?" was asked. I had no prior intuition this inquiry would be brought to any attention, and yet I had been bearing it in mind the week before. Go right ahead and answer the question yourself on the chatterbox, if you wish.
Actually, another strange event happened just after I wrote the above paragraphs. Within a few minutes of writing "nothing that has existed and will exist for all time", a song came on that boasted the lyrics "Nothing is here to stay, everything has to begin and end".
People aren't intelligent enough to make school an institution of learning. So what's my only reason to not enjoy school? I'd like to learn more instead of wasting time.
Anyway, I realized that almost everything we as a society do revolves around truth. Think about it.
Congratulations to pcp01862871pcs.mtlrel01.nj.comcast.net (68.32.148.194). You were the blog's 500th hit.
I took out the last post because it was taking up way too much space. If you'd like to read it let me know.
It's funny how the brain works. One might be able to convert a twenty digit number in base sixteen to base ten in a matter of seconds but have trouble stringing together a complete sentence. Oddly enough, every thought that passes through my head is pondered twice. The first time I think it too quickly for words to be made out, it just speeds through my mind. The second time I explain it at the speed of normal talking, as if talking to myself without using my voice. If I could find a way to cease the subconcious reverberation of every idea I could have availability for more thoughts, more ideas, more dreams. The only problem is that without the elaboration of the previous thought, I would sit there thinking nothing until something else popped into my head. I find it near impossible to think of nothing. I'm sure my explanation wasn't very clear. Do any of you have the same thing happen?
Well Russian had a large number of characters so I decided to go with Greek. Of course, I love ancient Greece so it could be kind of cool. The alphabet wasn't hard to memorize and soon I can start learning the actual language.
Not much to say today, although I would like feedback on one particular topic: I'm thinking of learning a new language in my spare time and can't decide between Russian and Greek. Any suggestions, anyone?
It seems that java applets on Angelfire don't work so well due to Angelfire's strange way of encorporating the use of quotes around a file name. I can use "main.html" to link to the file main.html as long as it's in the same directory. But with images and other multimedia, including Java classes, "main.class" or "main.jpg" would instead look for the specified file in the directory of lycos.com. Of course "/images/main.jpg" wouldn't put you back in the directory blog/dwalshland/images/ like it normally would. It'd instead send you to lycos.com/images.
What I'm trying to get at is that if I want to make any of my Java programs (i.e. binary converter) available for all to use via my blog I'll have to rewrite the programs in Javascript. It's not really hard. In fact, Javascript is more simple than Java itself. So whenever I get some free time I'll take care of that.
Oh yeah, and I finally realized where the name C++ came from about a week ago. Maybe in the future they'll make C+=2.
I like relaxing, physics, math, billiards, Blue Man Group, history, hacking/hacking simulators, photography, programming, helping people, Whose Line is it Anyway?, learning, my neighborhood, nVidia, rain, when people help me at Outwar, documentaries, mashed potatos, graphic design, ancient Greek philosophy, happiness, cool weather, wisdom, time travel, Smuggler's Run, talking about old video games, and many other things.
I don't like when people are mean, dictators, the death sentence, meat, when someone doesn't talk to you unless they need help on homework or want to complain, malicious code, waking up early, lack of self reliance, greed, cheating/lying, cursing, ignorance, neurological disorders, and a few other things.
Posts like this happen when there's not much else to say. Oh yeah, and I added another picture to the photo album.
I just put up a photo album with some pictures of mine in it. Notice on the side of the page the number 20 next to the link to the photo album. Just a note to show how many pictures are in the album at this point. Check out the album.
If you want to do Evan a favor, click here once a day. If not once a day, at least do it now. It'd be nice of you.
I hope you all had an pleasant, fattening Thanksgiving. It's a strange holiday, but still enjoyable.
I'm still attempting to dream up a new look for the blog. If you have any ideas let me know. As of right now I'm drawing a complete blank.
I'm also trying to find either a game in my collection to play or a program of my own to write. Neither of which I have any good ideas for. It seems all the games in my library are boring or uninspiring to play. Sure, it'd be easy to go out and buy a new game - especially with all the new releases from the approaching holidays. I'd just rather not spend money on a game this close to Christmas.
I'm prepared to wholeheartedly embrace the long weekend. Unfortunately I fear I'll spend the entire weekend in a regretful state while using all my time to think about how much I don't look forward to going back to school on Monday.
Fortunately, I have brain food. HackMe hacking challenges have been keeping me pretty occupied. They're not overly difficuilt -- especially the beginning ones. In about an hour and a half or two hours of work I've progressed up to level fourteen. I'll see you there. If you do decide to check this thing out, ignore all the Star Trek starfleet waste. Just skip on down to where it talks about the hacking challenges, and let the fun commence.
I haven't been updating because frankly I haven't done anything worth mentioning. Eventually I'll concoct a more visually appealing design for the blog and hope it'll inspire me to update more. Maybe I'll even keep it for more than a few weeks.
Over the weekend I've been toying with Mozilla Firebird to see if I like it more than Avant browser. And I feel it's a huge improvement over Avant. It has a much sleeker design because it's more simplistic and customizable at the same time. Plus, there are decent skins to download, unlike those of Avant Browser. I definitely like the ability to use extensions, or plugins, with Mozilla. I already have a mouse gesture extension that allows me to perform tasks with the browser simply by moving the mouse in certain ways. Plus, the skin I use is really eye candy.
Yesterday I bought a book entitled Time Travel in Einstein's Universe by J. Richard Gott. From the first page I was completely engrossed in the book and since then I have felt a dire need to continue reading. I would suggest this book to everyone and anyone interested in time travel, sci-fi, physics, or science in the very least bit. While I'm on the subject, I might as well also recommend The Time Machine by H.G. Wells. I read it a few years ago and still find the concepts in it interesting to this day. What may be more fascinating is the fact that although it was written in the late 1800s, many ideas discussed in The Time Machine are being considered by physicists today.
I'm tired of doing homework from the time school ends to the time I go to bed.
I'm gravely disappointed. I was about to install RedHat on the extra-old computer when I realized it only had two hundred megs of HDD space. That's right, two hundred. Two zero zero. 200. And a lightning speed sixty-six megahertz to push it along. Seeing as RedHat is about three gigs, I'm way off. I'm not going to even ask my parents if they'll let me dual boot this computer. That conversation would never end well.
On the plus side, I did find the original version of Wolfenstein 3D on the computer. It works, too. It's quite an amazing experience playing a game that archaic and still feeling like it's fresh out of the box.
Updating from Spanish class. More to come later, I guess, because the period is going to end in two minutes. Thankfully it's finally thirteenth period. That makes me merry.
So my dad agreed to let me put the uber-old computer in my room with RedHat on it. Jolly good show. More to come this evening.
Finally got the long-awaited report cards today. What's funny is that I couldn't wait to get my hands on mine despite the fact that I've known my grades for a few weeks. Yeah, I kept my 4.0 GPA. I'm proud.
I really wish I had my own computer. I mean, I don't mind sharing a desktop or settings or files with the rest of my family. At this point I mind sharing an OS. That's right, I want to finally make the leap onto Linux. I downloaded RedHat last night so I can make the boot disk. I might put it on my old computer just for fun. You know, my computer that's old enough to have a 5 1/2 inch floppy drive and Windows 98. Maybe if I'm lucky I'll talk my parents into letting me dual boot this computer. But I doubt it.
So I went to Rutgers' FTP location for the download. Apparently they have a bunch of "*NIX" OS's available for download. Unfortunately Windows, being its normal old self, gave a "you do not have permission to move these files" error after the download was complete. My parents saw this before I could handle it and immediately assumed I was doing something illegal and morally wrong. As if (1) Red Hat isn't free to begin with and has to be pirated and (2) Rutgers left its FTP wide open accidentally.
I say "you know" too much.
Wow, I didn't realize how long it had been since I last posted. Well, here I am to waste more time posting.
I'd like to start of by saying ha Ben I can use JOptionPane too now. That was fun. And apparently JOptionPane is pretty cool after all. Can't wait till Cal starts making us use it in programs.
Unfortunately, my Game of Life program is on the fritz. I did a poor job coding so far so I plan to simply delete everything I have inside the do loop that handles the execution of the game. Sometimes it's better to start fresh.
I plan to get a new digital camera for Christmas. It'll have to be somewhere around the two hundred dollar or less price range. Since there's such a huge selection now I'd be more than thankful if anyone has any suggestions on good cameras, companies, etc.
PS: Yeah, so I completed the aforementioned Game of Life program. What a lovely little device.
You may have noticed two things upon looking at the blog since I last updated. The first being I removed the links from the site of the page that go to the webcam and desktop cam. The second being I put thumbnail pictures of both cams that, when clicked, will take you to the same destination as the links would. I feel it'll potentially bring more use and/or attention to the cameras, provided I turn them on once in a while.
I just found out Dark Signs Online has been out for a long enough period of time that a sequel or expansion or something will be out soon. I'm eager to find a way to get my hands on a copy of Dark Signs Online. Or at least find a version of Dark Signs that has the e-mail interception mission working. Pardon my drooling.
Damn. I spent all that time wondering why my program wasn't functioning correctly and it turned out to be simply because I had a semicolon at the end of the statement initializing my for loop. And now when Ben reads this he's going to laugh at me. Konrad will laugh too, but only because he'll be busy putting my mouse in my CD-ROM drive and pretending to punch me in the face.
I don't feel like writing much more; I'd rather get back to coding. I'll leave the link I promised, though. Enjoy playing NationStates. It's an online-based game that requires no downloads or high tech equipment. If you do sign up, be sure to find me. I'm known as The Empire of The goddess Minerva. Enjoy.
Today's post is here
New music today. Whatever.
So today was extremely uneventful. I went out to lunch with my parents and then stopped over at Barnes & Noble. I was greatly disappointed at Barnes & Noble because of their crappy selection of computer and physics books. In computers they pretty much only have networking, security, and web-based programming books. In physics their selection is mainly just either too expensive or boring. Oh well.
Tomorrow I'm being forced to spend the day touring the USS New Jersey. Okay, usually I like this kind of thing. But I was honestly planning on using tomorrow to get some homework done. I don't understand why my grandparents and parents spend so much time saying how proud they are when I get straight A's but then minimize my homework time for other, unrelated things. I always figured they'd force me to do my homework while I begged to go on tours of battleships.
It's been a few days since I posted here, I know. It's all good. I've been kind of bitter towards Angelfire within the past few days, seeing as I updated Saturday but it didn't save. In addition to that I was working on another site today trying to add frames and it just wasn't cooperating. I know it wasn't my fault because I've been using frames for years.
I'm happy that Cherokee will have off from school on Thursday and Friday. It's time for some "much needed" relaxation. In other words, it's time to lie around, playing chess and failing miserably in Deadly Dozen.
I think Mikey Lembo is trying to convert me into a Something Corporate fan. That's ... interesting.
&nbps; My poetry generating program is well underway and might even be done soon. It's among the easiest programs I've ever written -- it's just time-consuming. I guess I'll put that up on the blog for all to enjoy when I'm done.
Halloween is probably the dumbest widely celebrated holiday in the US. There, I said it. Other stupid holidays, in my humble opinion, include (but are not limited to) Valentine's Day, Arbor Day, and whatever Box Day is. The logic is as follows: any holiday involving a naked baby shooting arrows to induce love spells is silly, people should be environmentally friendly every day, and I have no idea what Box Day is. But as for Halloween I won't even start. You can figure it out.
I plan on putting some music on the blog, but it may not last for lack of substantial bandwidth. Maybe the song will change depending on the hour of the day and maybe you'll get a choice as to which song you want to hear. It's possible I'll just put one song on and you won't have a choice. Before any of this can be considered I have to find a freeware MP3 to WMA converter.
It turns out that black holes spew out infrared emissions as they suck matter down their bottomless throats. What does this mean? Astronomers can now calculate the rate at which the black hole spins.
P.S.:So yeah. I added the music already. The song as for now is "Photograph" by Weezer. Enjoy.
The little icon at the bottom of the last post that I was too lazy to explain before is known as the new "hacker logo". It's really a shape known as the glider from the "game of life"which is an interesting game that I'm in the process of writing a java applet for.
So I got banned from a Medal of Honor server tonight. That was pretty hilarious. I was guilty only of asking why a member of my clan was banned. The console claimed I was ejected for "rudeness"; then again, if they knew how to play in the first place they wouldn't be beaten so badly that they'd accuse honest players of cheating. And that's that. Click the image at the end of this post for some entertainment.
Supposedly the company that owns Gator is filing suits to sue organizations that call Gator spyware. This doesn't seem to make sense to me. A little message to Gator's programmers: the easiest way to make a program that isn't considered spyware is to make a program that ... isn't spyware. That is all.
Wednesday, October 29, 2003
Yes, I'm awesome. Finally got that English project with the line memorization out of the way. Hopefully now I can free up more time for some Medal of Honor and studying and such. Or just being lazy. Like today, when I celebrated my lack of work to do with an hour long nap. Ah, the finer things.
I've been reading up on some theoretical physics today, which is no surprise. My RSS feed entitled Physical Sciences has caused my theoretical physics interest to skyrocket once again. Today's specialty was entropy among black holes. I'm still fascinated by the fact that black holes aren't really black and their event horizon is always increasing.
Sunday, October 26, 2003 Friday, October 24, 2003 Wednesday, October 22, 2003
I'm pretty sure I've fallen in love with RSS. I use Feed Reader to get my RSS feeds. I suggest you check out RSS whether you plan to use FeedReader as your aggregator or not. I just wish I had my feeds on both computers. I'm too lazy to set them up.
As for now I'm about to go out to dinner. Maybe eventually I'll actually have something worth reading in my blog. It doesn't really matter.
Spending some blog time in Computer Prog. II r+ight now. I somehow managed to get my progra+++m done dur+ing class+++++++ even with Konrad si+tting next to me. It's a wonder anyone in the class can do +++++knaor+"with antelope stuff en cqnkagroo sauce'
You can see Konrad's work in action in the paragraph above. This is Konrad's version of "concatenating" my blog. Imagine how boring life would be without such a source of enlightenment.
I'm happy to say that as of now this lovely piece of machinery you know as a computer, my network knows as Gunther, and I know as a hobby is running smoothly with an active connection once again. Fortunately it had less than a full day of down time.
Anywho, I feel I should spread the word on the realphx worm. I've seen more than one person infected with it so it must be at least relatively common. It might be useful to read up on the worm by clicking the link above.
Here's a comic strip from over at User Friendly that pretty much sums up my attitude towards my computer.
Monday, October 20, 2003
Mondays aren't so bad. It's a shame that Mondays are given such a bad name. If anything they cushion the blow that Tuesday brings. I just hope to have as little homework for the next two weeks as I had today and over the weekend. That'd be greatly appreciated.
So today I payed a long-overdue visit to Something Awful. The only part of the site I've found interest in is Photoshop Phriday, so obviously that's what I went to first. Anyway, one of the more recent Phridays involved fake video games. Of course this inspired me to photoshop something of my own.
So, here I have something to feed those that are either Linux haters or Windows/Microsoft lovers. I'm actually impartial, myself, but this just seemed like such a fun project. Be sure to click on the thumbnail to see the full sized version.
Sunday, October 19, 2003 Saturday, October 18, 2003
The weekend went fast. Between lounging around all night Friday, writing a program yesterday, hanging out with Evan last night, and doing homework (aka lounging around) today everything went relatively quickly.
Found the W32.Swen.A worm on my system today, which explains a lot. It was successfully removed with no mess involved.
I'm too lazy to type any more so it'll once again have to wait until tomorrow.
So the blog is back once again with a layout that may actually appeal to the eye. It took about two hours to make, including making and refining the graphics from scratch, writing the HTML, and making those last minute tweaks so all the colors and shapes on the page could supplement one another. Overall it turned out satisfactory. Maybe it's not that exciting as of now, but that could be easily changed (and probably will be). Let me know what you think.
If you're interested in reading the old posts, check out the "archive" page. Something tells me the page will go unaccessed, but I'll just take the optimistic approach and take it to mean that everyone has already read those posts.
I guess that'll be it for this post. I'd love to continue and mention new 64-bit processors but, to be honest, I'm tired of typing in this HTML editor. Look forward to another update tomorrow.
