Congratulations Kirill!

Just wrapping some eBay winnings and I thought I should check out the results from Games Day in the UK... You have to smile at Kirill's win. The man's a genius! I've been saying it for a while, it's great to see the folks at GW agree.

In other news, the Mailout came out today...

Good afternoon.

Luna went to the vet today. She is virtually unrecognizable from when I first discovered her. No longer just a pair of eyes and ears but a proper cat head. She has more than doubled her weight since her last visit and had the mixed experience of her first vaccination today.

Not a happy camper after she returned home. Lots of dry heaving turned into general lethargy and irritability.

It seems like months since my last log entry. My life has been consumed with selling things on eBay over the past few days, including the Studio army I wrote about so affectionately through November 2003. I have mixed feelings but a relatively high reserve. I came over the army by chance. If it doesn't reach the reserve, I continue to own it. If it makes the reserve, I'll have a nice chunk of change.

I'm writing a set of ApeScript help documents on my laptop. Included with the documentation is a file I am currently calling Xtreme ApeScript which looks at a number of hacks I have been working through that exploit the functionality of the language in some strange and unique ways.

Mailout halfway written too.

Good afternoon.

Folks who read the Log last year will remember the epic sales of Barbalet's clutter on eBay. Moving to the US, I promised to start these sales up again. We didn't really have space when we moved into our 700 sq foot apartment from our 2100+ sq foot home in the UK. I'm using this first set of listings to test the water in the US market. Whilst I had a number of US buyers, the local market always contributes the most to eBay sales.

In other news, I have been working through ApeScript in writing example ApeScript code. It's a great way to find bugs.

Good night.

Malek Unplugs

I got an email from Barbalet email regular Malek Qtaish this morning indicating he would be unplugging from the internet. I have long thought about unplugging from the internet. I would say probably about three quarters of the time I firmly believe that the internet adds nothing to my life. Since I've gotten stronger spam control, I get about ten emails a day intended for me and about ten emails from mailing lists.

The things that interest me currently relate to ApeScript and simplifying programming methodology to assist young folks learning to program. The internet seems to take away from writing, reading and programming time.

Trip to the Vet

I took Charlie and Luna to the vet today. It's wonderful to have a local vet. Charlie needed a series of annual shots and I wanted to see how Luna was doing. She's consuming vast quantities of food but I have noticed a few small insects on her. They turned out to be Vegan fleas. Nothing can be done for a four week old cat. I'm taking her back when she reaches the seniority of six weeks.

Good afternoon.

It turns out the cat who lives in the wall was actually a large family of cats. Walking Charlie a couple of days ago, we found this little one...

About twenty feet away from the hole and close to death. Very dehydrated, I wrapped her little bones in my shirt and carried her home.

Michele named her Luna. Two days of weight gain kitten formula later, she's in much better spirits.

Good morning.

Working through the ApeScript development it reminds me of the multiplicity of solutions. The issue that ApeScript was developed to address could have taken a number of different directions. Developing a programming language, thinking about the application of the language, the kind of users, the concepts that will be familiar to them and, in addition, also the memory/processor constraints for the language is central to creating a language like ApeScript. In recent days functions have been added to ApeScript. I'm not sure how functions will change the use of the language, but it provides a slightly higher level interface for developers.

Running ApeScript through the Simulation currently I am caught by a few factors;

(1) As it is an interpreted language, it appears slightly sluggish when compared to the executable simulation code. In case of error, the normal Simulation code kicks in. This is something I have thought about removing in the long run. Speeding up ApeScript has its challenges. There are a number of optimisation to the interpreted language that involve running multiple script instructions in solid code blocks rather than continuous functions. But this method really needs to be defined following some progressive - this is standard use cases.

(2) The lack of a solid user base is troubling. In developing a language in a ghost town, I reflect on the origins of the Noble Ape development. Through 2000-2003, prior to Mridul's additional development, working on Noble Ape was a completely solo effort. In that way, developing Noble Ape was a shadow boxing experience. Pedro has requested some additional features to ApeScript including access to the biological simulation. The biological simulation was based on ideas from quantum mechanics. As such, it just requires the addition of a single function. The species densities exist like photon fuzz through the Simulation.

(3) A language is very different to a file format. There needs to be substantial Learn to Use ApeScript documentation that can be written at any stage. There are good examples of how-to methods for teaching programming languages. In general the more examples, the more clarification. The current examples through the Manual documentation doesn't provide enough diversity for both the variable files and ApeScript. Both are going to be combined in the near future.

This entry was written to replace a set of depressing entries. Sometimes it's good to exercise self censorship on the Log.

Good night!

Last night's WeFunk featured the new Euphrates track, Commodore 64 (3.7Mb MP3) c/o CKUT archives. I'm assuming this comes from the new album that features the new Loes track too. C64 is a move in the right direction for Euphrates. Gotta love a cow bell solo and deep guitar riffs over a track about a classic computer.

Working through the ApeScript issues today. The first issue related to some of the platform implementations not zeroing the pointer from a plat_free. Good morning.

I have been working through changes to ApeScript over the past couple of days. Introducing functions and then sending a call out to the developer mailing list to render some assistance with the debugging etc of a string of ApeScript related bugs. My tolerance of debugging is lowered a little with the back injury. Life goes on.

The IGDA IPR SIG received an interesting case this week, Spark vs Activision (1Mb PDF). Curious the level of specialisation that these folks who make the WWII first person shooter's obtain. I'm a fan of the time period and, thus, the genre of games. Always good to read a filing that doesn't hold back

Over recent days I have made a conscious effort to watch less television but do productive things like add links to the American Red Cross on all the main traffic pages of the various sites I maintain. I suspect these links will need to be maintained for a month at least.

I'm looking forward to tonight's WeFunk Show. They are going to reach 400 in the very near future. Clearly some heady freestyling sessions to come. Good afternoon.