2006-04-30

Wiki Library

Filed under: Programming — Tags: — D. Moonfire @ 21:41

I modify or run a couple of wiki sites, specifically MediaWiki. I found a program, mvs, that seemed to do great, but I kept wanting it to do more. Not to mention, the long lines mode for Emacs kind of sucks. So, I decided to throw together a little library and mvs-like took, written in C#, C5, and my own libraries that allows for the download and upload of wiki pages, complete with CVS/SVN-like conflicts.

At the moment, it can download pages, upload content. The program also handles checking for conflicts and those related functions. The only major feature left is a Gtk# front end that makes it easy to edit and control the entire process.

Tellico DVD Covers

Filed under: Programming,Technology — Tags: , — D. Moonfire @ 21:35

I have a lot of DVD’s. Okay, a lot isn’t really the best way of saying it. I have just over 800 of them. A lot of that came when Suncoast Video shut down and I decided to take advantage of it to pick up a bunch of cheap DVD’s.

Now, the problem with 800+ DVD’s is that it takes up way too much room. At one point, I had two-meter bookshelves across the entire teleivision room. I was looking at it one day and decided that it was rather… egoistical of me to present them that way, so I tried to find a different approach.

A friend of mine used those 200+ CD booklets, which I tried for a while. However, I lost a couple DVD’s because I watch so many of them so often that they were getting scratched with the constant in and out. So, the next approach was the slim-line CD cases. They were tiny, you can get about 300 of them in about a meter of space, no more than 1.1 dm in height. Most importantly, they had held the DVD away from the edges so they didn’t get scratched.

Of course, the major drawback of transplanting 800+ DVD is that you have to either ignore the covers, cut up the DVD covers (which is kind of one way), or find another way of showing information. Now, many DVD’s have useful covers but just as many are bright and shiny, and almost impossible to identify unless you read the 6 point font along the inner ring.

I decided that I needed to keep track of my collection anyways. Mainly to make it easier to find the DVD I’m looking for. I’m using Tellico for that, which leads back to my prior comment that even though I’m mostly Gnome, this KDE application is probably one of the best ones I’ve ever used. Tellico has an XML export which I created a XSL-FO stylesheet that formats it quite nicely into the exact (mostly exact) shape for a consistent display of information.

ss-011.png ss-021.png

Now, there is a fair amount of white space in these, but the size of the descriptions is pretty varied and it covers basically the information I need. The most important part of the cover is the upper right. The four letters (and numbers underneath) are to make it easier to sort them. I’ve never been really good at sorting letters, but the numbers work out very well for trying to arrange all of them quickly.

2006-04-28

Measurements and Variables

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — D. Moonfire @ 21:05

Significant progress on the measurements for the Complete Clothier. We have all 380+ measurements in and the variables are connecting properly. The next step is to make sure everything generates sane values and that part is done before we can first show it out. The pattern editor is going to get a little more cleanup, then all next week I’m going to be working on getting it working with Windows.

2006-04-25

Working on Measurements

Filed under: Programming — Tags: , , — D. Moonfire @ 20:56

Worked a bit on pattern view, removed the rulers for now until I can figure out what math concept I’m missing.

ss-01.png

Had to back track a little bit on measurements. Got the master list and working on parsing it, which takes time. I found a way of handling the large number of variables, I hope it works out the way I think it is going to.

ss-02.png

From the next three screenshots, you’ll see how I’m planning on handling the 300+ measurements. There needs to be some organization, but the dial in the upper right corner lets you increase how much information you see or don’t see, letting you focus on just what you want to work with.

ss-03.png ss-04.png ss-05.png

I’m planning on showing the variables the user enters always (or giving them a checkbox), that way if you enter something specifically, you’ll see it even if you “dial down” the details. The checkbox, if you are curious, says to use a formula if possible.

Balance Actions and Hits

Filed under: Games — Tags: — D. Moonfire @ 13:35

With the new workflow system, I actually started filling in the gaps again in Balance. Hopefully, version 0.50.0 will be the last one and there won’t be any more rewrites. Last night, I wrote a pretty good draft of how hits work, including healing, damage, and resisting. I ended up renaming “Toughness” to “Resist Physical,” “Ground” to “Resist Mental,” and “Dignity” to “Resist Social.”

I also expanded out the actions system, including ticks. I decided to stick with deciseconds (ds) because I thought taking 5 seconds to attack was a little too long. 5 ds sounds like a much better time for a basic action.

I had a little trouble with initiative/order. I didn’t want everyone to start at once, since that keeps everyone in sync. Even though I started working on this before White Wolf came out with theirs, I didn’t have the “who starts” figured out before that book. Of course, I don’t like their approach at all. So, I went with 20 – 2d10 is how many ds it takes to enter combat. I’m probably not going to bother with an Initiative metric though.

I think it will work out.

OpenOffice and Balance

Filed under: Games,Programming — Tags: , — D. Moonfire @ 13:30

In the last couple of days, I was working on a slightly different format of Balance. I was taking fightertype’s suggestion of just making it a book instead of the three-ring binder that I happen to like. The reasons are varied, but it might be drifting a little too far from the “normal” to be anything other than “cool.” Not to mention, I could actually publish it on lulu.com instead of jumping through hoops myself.

So, I used my MfGames.OpenDocument library to createa concatanate and combine function, really smoothed out the command-style replacement feature, which I think is so neat, and built it all into a nice workflow. It takes each of the individual files, expands out the command styles to insert the metrics (and later characters and actions). Then it combines all of them in one directory with a part title (complete with title sheet). And finally, it throws all of them together into a single ODT file.

At the moment, there are a couple of “bummers.” One is that the MfGames.OpenDocument doesn’t quite handle indexes and tables yet. Once it does, I can automatically build up the table of contents and the indexes as part of the workflow.

I also couldn’t get the OOo templates to work, so I went with my class “restyle” Makefile rule. This just unzips a template file, grabs the style, and replaces all the other ODT’s style.xml file with that one. Fast and simple and works every single time.

DRM on a Dell D600

Filed under: Technology — Tags: — D. Moonfire @ 00:04

Using the radeon driver with Xorg, I finally got DRM working properly on the system. Apparently, I had to modprobe intel-agp instead of ati-agp. That little thing was all it took to get everything working properly. *cheer* So, now I can play with OpenGL stuff again.

2006-04-20

Complete Clothier Zooming

Filed under: Programming — Tags: , , — D. Moonfire @ 21:07

Worked on the rulers and zooming for CC today. Mainly, it now allows you to scale your image, to focus on specific areas. It also now can handle scrolling right and left, so you don’t have to make your window larger than your pattern. The area that has the most trouble at this point is the rulers. They aren’t quite in sync with the image, but that is tomorrow’s primary goal (though it may take into Monday since Friday is my half-day).

cc-100.jpg cc-101.jpg cc-102.jpg cc-103.jpg

2006-04-19

Complete Clothier Status

Filed under: Programming — Tags: , , — D. Moonfire @ 22:24

Spent a fun week working on the pattern stuff for the Complete Clothier. At the moment, a pattern draft is possible and you can save/load the data without a problem. This doesn’t show much at the moment, mainly because I don’t exactly have a complete measurement list in the system, nor anything that Tessa has worked on.

cc-001.jpg cc-003.jpg cc-004.jpg

This is the basic screen. Yeah, it has only one line and three points, but for the basics, that is the only thing needed. When you think about it, a pattern is just a bunch of lines. Of course, the complexity comes in when you actually do fancy things, like have the points based on measurements.

cc-002.jpg

These screens show how you can edit points and lines. At the moment, the interface is very simple and hard to break.

cc-005.jpg

This final screenshot is basically the revamp of the pattern library (used to be list). You can rename patterns and move them arround, plus it reads it from a local source, allowing us to have “pattern packs” or groups of patterns you can purchase then install.

Also spent part of the week working on getting VMWare installed so I can get this working on Windows properly. That will make it easier for someone else to see it, but also point out the details needed for the Mac migration. There is a chance I’ll end up switching this entire thing to System.Windows.Forms, but I’m keeping it Gtk# for now.

2006-04-18

xorg.conf, ATI drivers, Radeon M9

Filed under: Technology — Tags: , — D. Moonfire @ 02:10

Spent most of the day dealing with an annoying problem of dist-upgrade when half of xorg was in sid but the other half wasn’t. Of course, like the mono project, xorg split into a bunch of packages with naturally broke everything. And, I use(d) fglrx as my driver, so that broke. Naturally.

So, I took the chance and moved over to the ATI radeon driver instead of the fglrx. I don’t use a lot of 3D at the moment, so it probably won’t affect me, but I did spend the entire day trying to get it working.

Gave up trying to use “dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg” and just went with hand-editing the file. Still haven’t gotten DRI working properly, haven’t figure out how. I also have trouble with the laptop verses attached monitor setup that I use at home and at work. Right now, I just disable the laptop screen until I can figure out why it turns so stupid at 1280×1024. The laptop is fine, but the attached monitor is always about 90% of the laptop, despite the fact I want them all at the same setting (or the laptop smaller).

I got just about everything else working, so its at least usuable.

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