TrueJournals

Humans vs. Zombies: A Social Experience

by on Jan.27, 2010, under life, thoughts

Last semester, some students from my university worked with university officials to get a game of Humans vs. Zombies going.  After hearing about the game, I decided I wanted to join up to play the game.  It was going to be a two-day game: starting Friday at 5 PM, and ending Sunday at 5 PM, as a trial for the university.  Unfortunately, I was going to be off campus that weekend, so I wasn’t able to sign up.  However, as soon as I heard they were doing another round, I knew I had to do my best to be on campus for the game.

So, working with the university some more, these students organized a three day game: starting Thursday at 5 PM, and ending Sunday at 5 PM.  The students wanted to have a week-long game, but the university wanted to see how the game would work with people travelling between classes before they allowed that.  I got a Nerf gun for Christmas, and was eager for the game to get started.    I attended the necessary meeting to sign up for the game, and just had to wait until Thursday to start playing.

Now, after the game is over, I have this to say: I can’t wait for the week-long game which is planned for some time in April.  Humans vs. Zombies is not only a great excuse to run around campus with a Nerf gun, shooting people for the fun of it, but also a great way to be social and meet new people.  The teamwork and strategy involved is amazing, and I definitely met some great people I would have otherwise never said hi to.  Needless to say, I’ve been disappointed to find out that some college campuses refuse to allow the game to happen. (continue reading…)

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A Brief Overview of 3D Technologies

by on Jan.15, 2010, under life, thoughts

Last semester, I was informed of a class at my university called “Virtual Reality Programming”, and I took immediate interest in it.  My university has a visbox 3D projection room in our engineering building, and I’ve been interested in that room ever since I found out about it.  After seeing Avatar, I became even more interested in that class, and in how 3D projection works.

I’m not going to try and say 3D projection is simple.  Quite frankly, it requires precise timing, and the technology behind it is amazing.  However, I’ll try to explain everything as simply as possible, so the information can be accessed by all.  Let’s start out with old school: those red and blue glasses. (continue reading…)

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New Hosting

by on Jan.10, 2010, under website

Well, I finally did it.  I finally broke down and actually bought web hosting for my blog.  I was able to find some cheap hosting through magmahost, and so far… so good!  The nameservers of truejournals.com have been updated to point to the new hosting, and everything’s good if you’re reading this.  The old site currently displays a “moving servers” message.

While this is pretty cheap hosting, I’d never complain about help with the costs!  There’s a little donate link in the right sidebar.  If you enjoy reading my blog, please donate!  It helps encourage me!

My goal for 2010 is to blog more often.  I’m taking some interesting classes at my university this semester, so hopefully that’ll lead to some topics to blog about.  I’d like to remind everyone that blogging is quite difficult if you have no ideas to write about.  So, if you have something you think I should write about, let me know!

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Why You MUST See Avatar

by on Jan.09, 2010, under life, thoughts

By the time of this writing, I have seen Avatar three times: twice in IMAX, and once in RealD 3D.  The first time was for the midnight premier in IMAX.  Then, I decided I wanted to see it again, so got a bunch of people to go see it in IMAX.  The third time, a couple people I knew were going, and I wanted to see the movie a third time.  I’m contemplating going to see it a fourth time.

Now, after reading this article and seeing the movie, you may feel the movie isn’t good enough to see it three or four times, and that’s fine.  But if you go see the movie and think it was bad, then I think you’re just looking for something to complain about, so you found something.  The only people I’ve heard of not liking this movie are comments I’ve read online.  Every person I actually know that saw it thought it was a fantastic movie.

But, really… Why should you go see Avatar?

1. The plot line

This is the complaint I see most often, so I’m going to address it before anything else.  I’m also fairly certain that this complaint comes mostly from people who haven’t seen the movie.  I’m not going to argue that the plot isn’t cliché, because… well, it really is.  But, that’s a terrible reason to not see a movie.  First off, if the only complaint you can find about a movie is that the plot line/story has been done before, then I’d say it’s a pretty damn good movie. Overall, the basic plot line has little to do with whether a movie is good or not.  Let’s face it: almost all movies have a clichéd basic plot line.  The reason you like a movie is how the plot line plays out: character development, how the end is reached, tests that characters have to go through, etc.  Most people would rather see a story they already know because it’s less confusing, and less to follow.  You know what’s going on, you just have to sit there and go along for the ride. (continue reading…)

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cca-bypass 0.5

by on Dec.04, 2009, under realbasic

Now this is what I call rapid development!  One day of coding, and I have a new and much improved version of cca-bypass.  This version still has two binaries, but it has my own sec_cloak_apply, instead of sec_cloak.  Basically, sec_cloak_apply allows me to do some additional things with the code, backing up the registry values, and allowing you to restore them later.  This could come in handy.

Other than that, the big improvement is the addition of a progress bar, and making the login process asynchronous.  This means that there’ll be a nice little progress bar to show you how far along in the login process the task is.  Note that it takes a second after you click “Login” for the task to start running.

Finally, there is a LOT more error checking in the Login process, so all errors should now be in plain English.  If you DO encounter an error, and you think you shouldn’t have, please let me know, and I’ll do my best to fix it.  I can’t test every situation!  Anyway, on to the download links for version 0.5:

Pre-compiled binary: cca-bypass-0.5-binary.zip (2.39 MB)

Source: cca-bypass-0.5-os.zip (38 KB)

Note: I’m still considering this beta because I haven’t been able to thoroughly test it.  It should be pretty, stable, though, so don’t be afraid of the “beta”!

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cca-bypass beta1

by on Dec.04, 2009, under realbasic

For a while, Cisco Clean Access on Windows has bothered the heck out of me.  The client for CCA on windows is just plain buggy.  It takes forever to open, prompts me to let it run as admin every time I boot into Windows, doesn’t let me use the Internet until I update Windows (which sometimes requires a reboot first), and sometimes just doesn’t work.  However, I’ve only recently decided to investigate more, and figure out how to get past it.

The idea is simple: on a machine running Linux, everything is done through a web interface.  This makes it simple to create a script to get through Clean Access.  However, on Windows, while this web interface is presented, it simply tells you to download the client.  The obvious method of bypassing this, changing the User Agent of your browser, doesn’t work: Clean Access has other methods of detecting that you’re running Windows, using TCP fingerprinting.  Basically, Cisco has figured out certain commands they can send over the network, and exactly how a Windows machine will respond.  So, the answer becomes to change these responses. (continue reading…)

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Suspend vs. Hibernate

by on Oct.13, 2009, under thoughts

Two often unused options on computers are the suspend and hibernate options. When used in the correct situations, these can be extremely useful. However, one first must understand what each each does, and their uses.  This can help you save time, battery life, and a bit of effort on your part.  So… let’s get this started.

First, let’s discuss what suspend and hibernate each do, specifically, with relationship to your computer.  We’ll start with suspend, because hibernation is built on top of the idea of suspending the computer.  When you suspend your computer (this is sometimes referred to as “sleep mode”), the computer disconnects from any networks, tells everything to pause, and removes power from everything except RAM.  So, you put your computer into a state where the memory of what was going on in every program is still present, but the computer is, essentially, off.  However, because RAM still needs to be powered, there is a little power drain, even when your computer is suspended.  Of course, this is almost negligible.  Let’s say you have a laptop whose battery would last 2.5 hours when its on and doing things.   In suspend mode, the same battery could probably last a couple days (Note: this is purely my estimation).

Suspend is quite useful and laptop users use it all the time.  The default for most operating systems is to suspend when it’s not connected to a power source, and the lid is closed.  This means your hard-drive will stop spinning, your fans will turn off, and you will be able to move your laptop around, and put it in closed places without damaging anything.  When you need to use it again, simply open it up, press the power button, and the computer will be ready to use almost instantly.  Obviously better than shutting down.

Suspend is really most useful for laptop users.  Imagine you have to travel a short distance with your laptop, but want to keep all your word documents, web browser windows, etc. open.  Simply suspend the laptop, carry it wherever, open and press the power button, and it’s ready to use again.

Let’s contrast this to hibernation.  When you put your computer into hibernation, it follows all the steps for suspending, but takes one additional step: it writes the RAM to the hard-drive.  This means it is able to power down everything, including RAM, and really turn off.  The downside to this, vs. suspend, is that it will take some time to boot back up again.  Ideally, this will be shorter than the time to power up from completely shut down, but longer than the time to resume from a suspended state.

Hibernation is useful to laptop users, but also has some more meaning to desktop users.  Let’s first look at the use for a desktop user.  Instead of shutting down your computer every night, you could simply put it into hibernation mode.  This will still save power, but will allow your computer to boot up quickly when you need it.  You could use suspension for the same reason, but this will still draw some power, and hibernation, ideally, won’t take too much longer than suspension.

For laptop users, we can look at a different scenario.  Let’s say you’re packing your laptop away in a bag for a couple hours.  Maybe for a long car drive, or a plane ride, etc.  Hibernation would be more ideal than suspension in this case, because it will save a lot of battery life, and prevent the danger of any electric field interference with RAM (as rare as that may be).  Because all your data is written to the hard-drive, there is no fear of RAM failing.  Additionally, hibernation uses no battery life, so a laptop could be in hibernation for a long time without the worry of be battery dying.

Finally, there is a more advanced use for hibernation.  Lets say you boot both Linux and Windows, in separate partitions.  The boot-loader will show up when the computer wakes from hibernation, so one can switch between Linux and Windows while hibernating.  This is awesome.  You could boot into Windows, do some work with Windows-specific applications, hibernate, boot into Linux, do some work, hibernate (or shut down), boot again, and come back to Windows right where you left off.  This may seem a strange situation, but it can often come up in real life.

So, now that you know what suspend and hibernate are, feel free to use them instead of shutting your laptop down all the time.  It can save the time of having to boot up from a cold start, while using minimal power.  Running low on battery, but don’t want to lose work?  Hibernate, find a power source, and boot back up when you’re plugged in.

But, remember, it’s still good to shut computers down every now and then.  They like their rest.

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Re: Re: Zune or iPod Touch?

by on Aug.07, 2009, under thoughts

Brian (@jotkeybrian) has responded to my post, and I have a couple comments after reading his response… This seems like a good place to do it!

Actually, Microsoft has been pretty cool lately with formats.  Take a look at the Xbox 360, before you could only play wmv, wma, mp3, and wav.  Now you can play xvid, divx, wmv, mp4 (h.264/mpeg), mp3, and mp4/m4a (unprotected aac).

That’s very interesting, actually!  I don’t own a 360 personally, so this is the kind of thing I’m not personally aware of.  I made some assumptions for the sake of my argument.  That’s good to hear, and you’re right, it sounds like Microsoft’s being pretty good about this.  I’ll talk more about Microsoft codecs vs. Apple codecs later.

You also have to realize no-one-uses FLAC from Microsoft’s perspective.

And why is this?  Because nothing supports it!  Why would I use FLAC instead of WMA lossless if nothing I want to play my media files on supports FLAC?

Now Apple on the other hand… They are fucking bastards, they don’t support SHIT. No divx, no xvid – the only formats/codecs they really support are AAC and mp3 for audio and H.264 for video.

You’re absolutely right.  After going over my post again, and thinking about it more, Microsoft is much better with codecs and library organization for letting you keep your music.  Media players that support Microsoft’s “Plays for Sure” often support quite a few codecs.  (Note: I don’t have Windows running currently, so I can’t double-check this!)  When you import music into Media Player, it can move it to the My Music folder, and keep it organized, or leave it where it is.  Apple on the other hand… supports very few codecs on its media players.  When you import music into iTunes, it can move it to My Music/iTunes Library/iTunes Music, and keep it organized there (a strange path for people who want their music files), or leave it where it is. (continue reading…)

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Zune or iPod Touch?

by on Aug.06, 2009, under thoughts

There’s been a bit of news about Microsoft’s newest addition to it’s Zune PMP line, the Zune HD lately.  It’s a device created to directly compete with the iPod touch, carrying a capacitive touch screen, and giving the ability to play HD video, listen to HD radio, and browse the web.  Oh, yeah, it plays music, too.  A recent review on CNET makes the device sound quite enticing.  This review was posted on digg, where I saw it, and proceeded to read the comments.

I noticed a couple people requesting a feature that I immediately knew wouldn’t be in the Zune HD: the ability to play FLAC.  To me, this seemed kind of silly.  Why would a product made by a big-name company like Microsoft or Apple, be able to play a free and open audio format, when they’ve already invented their own?  As I started to think about it, that should be precisely the reason a device SHOULD be able to play FLAC: it’s free and open, and therefore, easy to implement.  But, this is a move Microsoft and Apple will never make, because they’re fighting for more than your pocket.

They’re fighting for your audio format.  (continue reading…)

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Changing Caps Lock to Shift in Linux

by on Jul.20, 2009, under thoughts

After a lot of figuring out how xmodmap works, I’ve finally been able to get my caps lock to work as a shift key, instead a locking key.  There are actually two steps to this, the second one being the tricky part.  Just create a file called .Xmodmap in your home directory with the following contents:

remove Lock = Caps_Lock
add Shift = Caps_Lock

This removes the lock from caps lock (so it’s a press-and-hold, not a toggle), and makes it a shift key, even though the computer still recognizes it as the caps lock key.  If you wanted to get fancier, you could make the computer recognize it as the left shift key with the following:

remove Lock = Caps_Lock
keysym Caps_Lock = Shift_L
add Shift = Shift_L

The tricky part here is realizing that after you tell the computer that Caps Lock is actually left shift, you need to add this key to the “shift” list, even though it’s already there.  I don’t quite understand this, but I know that it’s necessary.

Have fun getting rid of that annoying caps lock key!

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