|
The Electric God of Technology
|
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Mar. 18th, 2009|01:35 am] |
Dear Diary
My teen angst bullshit has a body count.
Anyone getting that quote earns a cookie, and no, I haven't killed anyone. |
|
|
| C++ Help Needed |
[Feb. 26th, 2009|02:46 pm] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | Lab 3 | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  frustrated | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Keyboard Clatter | ] |
There are times I find C++ to be a deeply annoying language.
I have a class, lets call it A, and within that class definition I have the following:
private:
static QPainterPath *path;
Which is to say, I'm declaring a static (class-wide) pointer to a path object; all instances of this class will now have the same shared data member. The path object itself has to be instantiated in a most weird way, with the line:
QPainterPath *A::path = new QPainterPath();
placed OUTSIDE of any function call, just at the top of the corresponding cpp file.
This all works fine so far. When I try to subclass A however, I get in trouble. My subclass which we'll call F, should also have a static (class-wide) path, but it should be different from the base classes path. Obviously cannot access the private path object initially, since that's private to the base class, so I repeat the definition of it, and the weird instantiation of it, and then it correctly has a static member and everything I write in class F that uses path will correctly use the F::path object.
However, the whole point of building these classes as a hierarchy is so I can have things such as the drawing routines and bounding box calculations written only once, in the base class A, and then just inherited into the other classes. So you can imagine my annoyance that calling paint() on an instance of F paints a copy of A::path instead of F::path.
Can anyone tell me what I'm doing wrong here, because I'm rather at a loss to figure it out. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Sep. 20th, 2008|12:17 am] |
----------
/ \
/ REST \
/ IN \
/ PEACE \
/ \
| Tyr |
| 305 Au |
| killed by a |
| kitten, while |
| helpless |
| |
| 2008 |
*| * * * | *
_________)/\\_//(\/(/\)/\//\/|_)_______
Goodbye Tyr the Wizard...
|
|
|
| STOP VIRGIN MEDIA! |
[Apr. 18th, 2008|11:57 am] |
STOP VIRGIN MEDIA!
The new CEO of Virgin Media, Neil Berkett, has openly stated in an interview that they think net neutrality is “a load of bollocks" and claimed they're already doing deals to deliver some people's content faster than others. They would then put websites and services that don't pay Virgin in the "slow lane", meaning those sites would load slowly and cause most users to give up using them, feeling forced to use whatever Virgin wants to push through their network.
This is not the first time an internet provider infringes upon net neutrality, but it is the first time that an ISP so brutally states that they simply plan to limit internet access to a television-like system in which the access provider completely regulates the content you have access to.
Virgin Media has over 3.5 million customers in the UK and the real danger is that when they start applying this system to their network, all major internet providers around the globe will soon follow the trend. Because this is exactly what major ISP's have been wanting to do for years.
But we can stop it.
If the masses of the internet react against this, we will set an example of what happens when one provider tries to take away our freedom. We will make it very clear that any ISP who tries to infringe upon net neutrality will see its popularity go down the drain because the users don't accept it. And we'll see to it that only the providers who care about safeguarding our internet freedom have our support.
Yes, this is copypasta, no, I am not apologising for the huge font, this is too important, yes, important to you too, even if you're not a geek, this is important to ALL of you. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jan. 31st, 2008|05:19 pm] |
As an update to my earlier post here, it seems I may have over-reacted. We spoke to the landlord, who seems willing to accept whatever quote british gas give us for a new boiler. He's also going to drop round a couple of portable radiators on saturday, and has said that if we go and buy one now (up to £30 value), he'll happily refund the cost of it.
I'm still half tempted to try making a fuss, since we have been living here for many months with a potential carbon monoxide leak, which could have killed us at any time, but if he actually agrees to get everything sorted, as quickly as he says he will, then it'll make it hard to do so. Damnit, I was all geared up for him making us fight for it. |
|
|
| Legal advice needed |
[Jan. 31st, 2008|02:25 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  infuriated | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Vernian Process - Beetlejuice Theme | ] |
Hiya all, we need to sue the living shit out of our landlord, any advice would be greatly appreciated.
So, we moved in waaay back in august/september, and took up full time occupancy a week before october. Some five months prior to that, when we signed the contract (which unfortunately we seem to have misplaced), the landlord informed us that one of the things he planned to do over the summer was get a new gas safety certificate, since the one he claimed he had, would run out before we moved in. When we moved in, he said he had yet to do that, and would be getting onto it shortly. A man came, and left before finishing the job, he returned a month or two later, again failed to do the safety check. Two weeks ago we threatened that if the landlord didn't get it done by this monday just gone, we would do so and take the cost out of future rent payments. Last week he called me up to explain that a british gas man would be round on thursday (today).
The man from british gas did come, and did a full inspection. He found one of the main seals had worn away and been replaced with a filler-like substance, the entire boiler was covered in rust, the main burner had a crack, and the entire thing was twenty-eight years old. Needless to say, it failed the safety check on multiple counts, and now has a cute little red warning label hanging from the radiator.
We're now without gas, without heating (there is an immersion heater, but they cost a fortune in electricity), and without hot water, and there's forecasts of snow showers and blizzards to come in the coming days. We are all united in our common desire to take the landlord to court at the earliest opportunity, and press for the absolute maximum penalties possible. We're also looking into the possibility of getting him to pay for a hotel for the three of us until the new boiler (which will probably cost him £3,000+ is installed).
I'm about to call citizens advice, and then some of the more reputable no-win no-fee law firms. I'd love to get advice from anyone on here as well however (pokes ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) shiny_and_new).
Wish us luck. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jan. 13th, 2008|01:42 pm] |
A request for help and opinions.
I am in need of new networking gear, and this little device seems to tick all the boxes I could ask for (not least being QoS). However, I've been unable to locate a manufacturer's page for it, and thus have not been able to find support or manuals for it, which I'd ideally want to do before buying.
Anyone have any opinions about it? Does it look too good to be true, or just a nice machine at a low price? |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jan. 2nd, 2008|03:44 pm] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | Limehouse, London | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  impressed | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Random thumpy beats all night, no recognisable tune to any of it. | ] |
Well I suppose I should write a post about my new years eve, which was utterly fantastic. I attended Seductive Alchemy, a steampunk masked ball, filled with weird and wonderful people and events. Everyone was dressed fantastically, there were mad scientists, high victorian fashions, sky pirates, fire dancers, industrialists, aliens, rabble-rousers (rousing us against the alien menace), airships, ray-guns, and an inflatable penguin.
( Some images )
More piccies are up here.
There were really fantastic things going on all night, like the girls firespinning in the courtyard, a live band with robotic dancing girls (not actual robots, unfortunately), and a zeppelin battle over the main dance floor, with two 4 foot long skyships suspended from poles held by two guys on stilts. There are pictures, but they don't do the spectacle justice, it was amazing. They were lit from inside, and the baskets under them held sweets, which people helped themselves to as the zeppelins were lowered.
The final thing before we left was an alien invasion and battle with the sky pirates, for which a group of about 20 of us got talked into swapping masks and joining the alien menace. We were armed with rayguns, and sent into the smaller room to do battle with what appeared to be sky pirates, also armed with rayguns, and having the advantage of high ground. Nobody was quite sure which side won, but it doesn't really matter too much, and we did get to keep the alien-masks and rayguns, so everyone felt pretty good about it all.
I'll close this post with another link to the rest of the photos, and a ( caption competetion ) |
|
|
| Quote of the week. |
[Dec. 28th, 2007|04:56 pm] |
Damien: So, what is a lolcat, and what's it got to do with a me-me? |
|
|
| One for the ubergeeks. |
[Nov. 24th, 2007|02:06 am] |
I've had a nice relaxing day today, nothing to do except sit on the sofa and write code, fun code, code in befunge.
For those who don't know what befunge is, it is an EsoLang (esoteric language), which means it's the kind of language us geeks muck about with for shits and giggles. It is not the kind of language one writes serious things in. None the less, I've been playing about with concurrency and resource locking, which are normally issues found only in large software apps and databases.
My eventual goal is something far more complex, but for now, I present to the world a working spinlock in befunge:
>v ;Note: requires concurrent befuge support.;
v]t55+".sgnirts fo rebmun a tuo tnirp lliw margorp sihT"
v]t55+".daerht tnereffid a yb detnirp si gnirts hcaE"
v]t55+".emit hcae redro modnar a ni detnirp era sgnirts ehT"
v]t55+".kcolnips a yb detaluger si neercs eht ot sseccA"
v]t55+".siht ekil smetsys tnerrucnoc rof lativ era skcolnipS"
v]t55+".emitnur ta edoc smargorp eht gniyfidom yb skrow kcolnips sihT"
v]t55+".7002 ni renruT.N yb nettirw saw margorp sihT"
v]>55+".egnuQeB gnisu detset dna ni nettirw saw margorp sihT"
>>v<
^???<
v<<^
v<}}<<<<<
>0{{'^40p}}>:#,_0{'p055+-0p}@
|
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Nov. 11th, 2007|07:14 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | amused | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Portishead - Cowboys | ] |
It occurs to me that while this may well be a cult phenomenon on my course, it might not have reached the wider audience of my friendlist, so without further ado, I present to you all DOOM: Repercussions of Evil. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Nov. 1st, 2007|01:25 am] |
Ok, so today has not had that much in the way of mechanical failure, only three incidents, which seems low for a visit to thorpe park. However, those three were annoying. Firstly there was the aforementioned breakdown of colossus, as I reached it's gates. Then there was the fact that once again, stealth was shut due to a failure of something or other. To top it off, at gone 1am, I'm stuck on a train, trying to go home, but instead going nowhere because of some broken points in front of us. Engineers are apparently on the way, but we're expecting to be here for the duration. At this point it would probably be quicker to get of and walk to colchester. Oh... We're moving, it seems.I wonder how far we'll get.
Update: its now 3.15am, I'm back in wivenhoe, I'm in bed, and all would be good, but for the fact that I've got a 10am lecture, followed by an 11am-1pm lecture, followed by a 1pm-3pm lab session. by my maths that gives me about 5 and a quarter hours of sleep. I got slightly less than that last night. Fortunately I expected something like this, and bought some pro plus earlier. I hope they do the job.
A further update: its now 10.50am, and I'm in bed with a hot semi-naked redhead. Suffice it to say, I'm probably going to miss all my lectures =P |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Oct. 31st, 2007|04:46 pm] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | Colossus at Thorpe Park | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | angry | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | an endlessly repeating 15 second gingle, for an hour and 20 mins. | ] |
Well folks, I'm currently sat at the absolute head of the queue for my first ride today at thorpe park, which I would be next onto, if it hadn't been broken for the last half hour. I do love the reliability of this place. The real pisstake this time is that they still haven't offered free fast-track passes to us, which should be automatic with long mechanical delays like this. Ah well, we're running again now, apparently. Next stop: guest services to complain. Ho hum, at least it's beginning to get a little dark and gloomy now. This place will be awesome in the dark.
Update: one complaint and two fasttrack passes later, I'm almost on nemesis, having skipped 80% or more of the queue. The system works, and this place *IS* awesome in the dark, so pretty.
You all should have come. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Oct. 29th, 2007|08:40 am] |
I have wednesday free, and plan on spending it at Thorpe Park. Any and all who wish to join me are more than welcome to do so (shiny_and_new that means you!). We'll hopefully have a cyrus_ii but more than likely not, for his knee is still giving him trouble. If we do, it means a maximum group size of 4 people total, if not, any multiple of two is good.
Otherwise my life is good, busy, loads of uni crap, plus setting-up-house crap, so very little time, I never seem to get much done, but the living room is beginning to look like a room, and I've mostly unpacked my games. Two of the three assignments look easy, and the other one only mildly taxing, but they'll still take time to do. I never have enough time any more, I miss being a lazy bum with nothing to do but persue my every whim. Oh, and I have a macbook. It is shiny. |
|
|
| phones |
[Sep. 28th, 2007|07:50 am] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | bed | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | pissed off | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | none | ] |
I have a problem. I have a new phone, and that is the problem. It's an N95, which I've wanted since they came out, and it's on 3, who offer some really cool things for cheap/free. The problem is reception.
All the way back on the bus yesterday there was great signal. As we went past the uni, there was great signal. As I got off, outside the flag, there were 7 bars of signal. Three streets away, in the house, there is almost no signal at all. Putting the phone by a window gets it a weak (1-3 bars, out of 7) signal, but other places, or moving about, it gets none. For calls, it will happily drop down to using orange 2G, which gets a pretty good signal.
I'm left wondering if it is worth putting up with it, for the sake of the awesomeness of the contract, or trying to get something close from someone else. I doubt any other network would give me unlimited net access for a fiver a month however =(
Opinions, what should I do? Anyone want to recommend their network of choice? What makes said network so great?
The signal isn't all that terrible though, I was able to post this entry from my new bed, which I spent last night building. |
|
|
| Rain. |
[Sep. 26th, 2007|02:30 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  apathetic | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | None | ] |
Well, I'm here, and I'm currently stuck in a lab because there's a monsoon going on outside. I was on my way to B&Q, on my bike, but it started raining so I darted onto campus to sit it out, thinking it would only be a shower (there was a large patch of blue sky above me when it started).
They've demolished Lab 3, and Lab 4, and half of Lab2 has become someone's office. Fortunately we've inherited the ESE labs, but its a poor show for having our old labs reduced to an empty shell. Not even a shell, really, there are only 3 walls remaining, with the long wall onto square 2 having been totally removed.
The new house is still something of a state. The bathroom is a disgrace, the re-grouting he promised to do when we first looked at the house, 5 months ago, has not been done. There is no water in the taps, the door doesn't lock, and the loo roll holder is falling off. delkaetre_ni's room has a blind, but no fittings to hang it from. The house is still over-full with random furniture of such low quality that charity shops might not take it, there is still no fridge or freezer, and to top it all off, we've got very loud squirrels in the eves, and I suspect, the attic.
All in all, not the best start to things. But it's all fixable.
Right, the rain seems to have mostly passed, I'll head off and continue my quest to B&Q now. |
|
|
| Wireless is back |
[Sep. 17th, 2007|05:50 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | jubilant | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | None | ] |
After having it sat in a box for 4 months, waiting for me to fix it, I've finally fixed my wireless router. It's a Netgear MR814v2, and it is, quite frankly, a pile of poo. But it was cheap, and it does the basic job of unencrypted wifi perfectly well, so its enough for me. My problems began when I realised that someone in my flat at uni was packet-sniffing me. Not a huge problem, I don't really have anything to hide, but I thought I'd set the Netgear pos to use wep and keep him out. Now I'm not sure if I set it up right, but got the key wrong, or set it up wrong, or if it just didn't like the idea of running wep at all and crashed. I suspect the latter, since it became unresponsive even to wired access.
Netgear handily provide a little factory reset switch on the back. You're meant to be able to hold this for 10 seconds, and have it reset everything and greet you with the setup wizard. I tried this, many, many times. It appears that my switch is broken. I finally managed to reset to factory defaults by opening it up, and grounding the leg of the reset button. It would have been so much nicer if they'd put a jumper on the inside, the way most pc bios's get reset. Ah well, live and learn. I don't think I'll try wep-locking it again. |
|
|
| navigation |
| [ |
viewing |
| |
most recent entries |
] |
| [ |
go |
| |
earlier |
] |
| |
|
|
tired