Thursday, 24th November 2005

Chip

Work.

Shit's going down at work. My fulltimer is leaving, I'm getting a new one on monday though! Should be good. He's a good mate and he's worked here before. Shit, he *even* reads this blog... LOL! Should make for a fun and entertaining work environment. I'm going to miss my old full timer though, he's a champion. Very funny too. Ah well. He's going to "a better place" where pay is abundant and hours are slightly fewer. FSKING JB HIFI! Grrrrrrrrrrrr...

Tuesday, 22nd November 2005

Chip
A descent storm and I haven't got my bloody lightning release made yet. I haven't decided wether to use solar panels or a PhotoDarlington Pair. Both seem plausable but I think the solar panel may be a bit slow. hissyfit

Saturday, 19th November 2005

Chip

Not much happening today. I probably should be catching up on sleep.

I added some more smilies:

santahatstockingxmastreeangryviolentstirthepotsoapboxhissyfitgloomydrunkboggled

7:40 PM Update.

Short down-time. I have built the server up now to it's final arrangement. It has a cover now and the Hard Drive is screwed in =) It's now in 'hopefully don't have to touch again' mode  now. Mail is still broken, although permissions and stuff are right the mail isn't being delivered where it needs to be. Gallery is now working agian. I can upload images. I also added 5 more DVDs to the DVD section.

I removed the original 6.5 gig drive from the server. It was a really early 7200 RPM drive. Pretty fast for it's time. A Seagate Medalist Pro 6530. Gold goes to this drive thisevening for HEAT! I nearly dropped it, it was THAT hot. 

Friday, 18th November 2005

Chip

Jees! No updates since the 6th! I'm getting slack. First with laziness then with technical failure. Damn, 2 weeks.

Well it's almost the weekend now! I had a hectic day. Very tired, I tried to keep myself busy so I would stay awake. I managed to work my butt off and to stay awake, I got  a lot done at work. Tidied the stock room and it looks bloody terrific now. The last 3 days have been nastily late nights - I decided to install Ubuntu Linux. That part was easy. Installing and configuring the various services seems to be the very tricky part. At least as of now, WWW, FTP, SQL, DNS all work how they are supposed to, POP3 is up but doesn't work properly. Bugger it, it's not that important right now!

The port of the website was incredibly easy. I was very surprised. Since MySQL uses data files for it's database, I just FTP'd them up and restarted MySQL - BAM! all good. As for the website, that was a bit trickier. I had to upload the whole lot then adjust all the config files for Geeklog and Gallery so they didn't use the "C:directorydirectory" structure and used the "/var/asd/directory" structure. That was easy. The site looked pretty shit, no CSS - why? DNS was broken, there was a direct link with a FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) for the CSS file in the config, so it was looking for "HTTP://www.zagadka.org/cssfile.css" but it couldn't work out where www.zagadka.org was. DNS is fine as of about 4PM today, so now it works.

FTP had a little tiff with me, I forgot to add my username to the group that was allowed to access the FTP server - dropped me as soon as I connected and entered my username... I ended up uninstalling it and reinstalling it.

That's one thing I am really impressed with Ubuntu/Debian. You can get a package down off  the net and 9/10 it will work straight up - it's awesome. All you need to do is "apt-get install <package>". It will get the package off the net and install it. If you have it installed already it will download the newer version if there is one. Awesome. This is very, very stream-lined. It's been so long since I have had only a console to communicate with a box. I didn't install the GUI at all - yes, I'm hardcore Tongue2

Tomorrow's Project: Fix the fscking mail server! 

Teething Problems... Sorted

Chip

Teething Problems... are pretty much sorted now. I have the Website and Database up as well as Gallery. The Mail daemon is up but it's putting mail in a different place to where it's looking when I try to retrieve it. It's gotta be somewhere! Oh well. I will fix that later. At least DNS is online now! I fixed that this afternoon. Only one warning on www.dnsreport.com. It took some tweaking and a number of reloads of www.dnsreport.com, but I have it set nicely now. Only thing that is wrong, serving my own DNS - not such a boggle but I have two Nameservers, both on the same connection so I get a warning on the 'name servers on separate class C networks' part.

Linuxariffic

Chip

Massive downtime. Windows update single headedly killed my server system. I tried to repair it in the morning and again in the afternoon, but it was fair Borked. Tonight, I tried to fix it. Still dead. At least the website data survived.

Big Upgrade! I have now moved to a distribution of Linux to see how it goes. I’m sure it will work great, as that’s primarily what Linux is designed for - being a server...

I had a couple of distributions on DVD from a PC User Mag and decided to take the plunge. I also took advantage of the down-time to upgrade the hard drive from its impressive 6 GBs of epic power to 40 GB! OMG! =P

I chose Ubuntu Linux, it seems to have the most updates + support... I just need to get all the stuff that I require on there and configured! FTP Server, HTTP Server, SSH Server, Mail Server etc etc etc…

Sunday, 06th November 2005

Chip

Ah! The weekend at last!

Breaky with bacon and eggs twice! Awesome! Bacon, Scrambled Eggs and Toast mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Also trying to get this crap to work...: Here

Tuesday, 01st November 2005

Chip
Work. An exciting 8 hour meeting at Head Office today. <sarcasm> yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! </sarcasm>

Sunday, 30th October 2005

Chip
Sunday. Rain. Excellent. It means today will be of a descent temperature below 25 degC... Mmmmmmmm. I wish it would rain all day.

Friday, 28th October 2005

Chip
Work.
Not much blogging is happening... Re-Arranging the whole store front to back!

Tuesday, 25th October 2005

Chip

Work. The day of the idiot it seems...

I can almost guarantee my offsider here will be convulsing on the floor in the fetal position before the day is through. He's been dealing with a heap of stupid requests...

Customer starts their query with only:"What kind of memory card does my camera take?"

and

A discontinued line was reduced to $20 to clear it. It has no box or accessories. It is marked $20 'as is'. This normally retails for $89, even at this price it is below cost. A customer puts the unit on hold. Calls later. "Is there any chance of a further discount?"

Sunday, 23rd October 2005

Chip

Sunday.

Off to Mum and Dad's to fix the car.

Saturday, 22nd October 2005

Chip
Saturday! Off to see Serenity!@

Friday, 21st October 2005

Chip

Work...

Friday at last!

Serenity on saturday! 

Wednesday, 19th October 2005

Chip
Some moron broke into the electrical cupboard and switched off all the breakers... A nice big F - U to that person. No hot water, no internet and no website all day. What kind of an idiot breaks into an electrical cupboard anyway? Jesus, it's got a board with breakers, lots of pretty looking cables and ducts, a hot water heater and a bloody MDF in it. Grrrrrr.... Sounds like this/these person/people have the brain/s of Terrance and Phillip from southpark.

"Come Terrance! Lets Search For Tweasure!"

image
Terrance and Phillip

Yeah, because there's going to be gold and diamonds in the fucking electrical cupboard! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

http://www.doctronics.co.uk/4511.htm

Yay for down time... ...not

Chip
Some moron broke into the electrical cupboard and switched off all the breakers...

Sunday, 16th October 2005

Chip
Finally saw Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy! Rented it. The movie is awesome!

Saturday, 15th October 2005

Chip

Work.

Breaky. A Chicken Souvlaki Skewer and a Spring Roll. Life on the edge! Ah the TAFE days. Spring Rolls made up about 50% of my diet! Healthy! Mmmmmm. I like to keep my stomach strong by eating some Salmonella infested food on occasion. Oh! and there's only one way to eat the spring roll. Bite off the ends. Squeeze out the insides into your mouth then eat the yummy hollow pastry stuff!! Just don't tell my mum that I do that! I'm sure she would not be impressed l33t!

Friday, 14th October 2005

Chip

Work. Friday at last! Well, sorta. I have to work Saturday! MAD!

12:10 PM:

DAMN EXCEL!!!! Why does such a small bug mess up my spreadsheet so badly!!!! I'm talking about TRUNC() - a function that slices the fraction off without rounding the number.

TRUNC(1.25) = 1

Now the boggle:

I have $211.25 worth of money to take from the til in takings leaving the float... I have already taken from the til $211.20 in notes and coins starting from the largest denomination, now I need to calculate how many 5c pieces to take out. By the time the formulars have cascaded down from $100 notes to coins down to the 5cs that's the last one you will take out. So to check this we have a formula. I have $1.25 in 5c coins is the $1.25 of 5c less than what I have removed already? Nay, there is only 0.05. Cool. Divide the remainder by the money denominator ($0.05). To see how many will fit (1 in this case) we divide the remainder by the coin value and we get 1. So we need 1 5c piece. No probs. Answer x Denomination = Coin to remove. Swar. ONLY fscking TRUNC(1,0) seems to return 0.0000999998 == 0. SHIT!

Thursday, 13th October 2005

Chip

Work.

7:24 PM:

Brenny Linked me an article about the upcoming doom movie. It's worth a read. So here it is: Original Link

   

FEATURE: LIGHTS, CAMERA, DOOM ACTION!

Silver screen screams and horrors! We hit the Doom movie set - full report inside!

15:24 It's been on-again, off-again more times than Pammy, Tommy and the Iranian nuclear program all put together - but finally, after ten years, the ultimate game-movie is coming to a screen near you. As ever, the big question on every gamer's lips is, "Have they f***ed it up?", or more likely, "Just how badly have they f***ed it up?"

It's a fair enough question. History pretty much dictates that films based on games are going to stink, pissing right in the eyes of the gamers that made the film possible in the first place and leaving the source material unconscious in a ditch. But there's always that faint hope that this will be the one to break the mould, the one that finally does justice to our memories, hopes and dreams. If you've seen the Doom trailer, that crack of hope will have opened just a little, because it looks - not too loud now - pretty good.

To be honest though, we've been expecting this, as we've had a bit of an inside track on the film's development all year. In fact, PC ZONE visited the set of Doom in Prague during principal photography and had a chat with many of the key players, including Karl Urban, Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson, Rosamund Pike and visual FX supervisor Jon Farhat. We've been itching to tell you all about it, but a pesky international embargo has kept us gagged (until now). Finally, we can make like a bloated zombie and spill our guts (though not too much of the plot hopefully), and reveal why we think Doom could break every precedent there is for game-based movies.

IF IT'S WORTH DOING...
Admittedly, we haven't seen the finished product yet, so we could be horribly wrong here. But what we can assert with confidence is that everyone involved went into the project with the right frame of mind and the right level of respect for the wants of the fans. The script, for a start, went through at least seven major revisions before filming got under way, starting with an ultragritty first draft by first-timer David Callaham, then through the hands of producer John Wells and eventually to Wesley Strick, a big-time Hollywood script doctor who came aboard to polish the dialogue. At every step, id Software had broad approval.

"The story is very similar," says id's Todd Hollenshead. "It isn't based exactly on the Doom 3 story, but there are a lot of similarities between who the good guys are, who the bad guys are and how that all works out." Suffice it to say, the plot will be instantly recognisable, despite a few inevitable tweaks for the sake of storytelling.

MARS ATTACKS
The action takes place at a scientific research base on Mars, where a meddling scientist (called Dr Carmack, ho ho) has unwittingly opened a wormhole to 'somewhere bad'. It's not necessarily the gates of hell, but it may as well be, as the accident has unleashed a legion of imps and demons into the facility. To make matters worse, people are turning into hideous zombie mutants left and right, and nobody knows why. Answering a distress call from the stricken base, an elite Rapid Response Tactical Squad is sent in to seal off the facility and kill whatever they find inside - unless it eats them first.

Apart from the games, the inspiration here is clearly Aliens, as well as a little bit of Predator (no bad thing either way). The squad of space marines even have nicknames that could be from either of those films - Duke, Goat, Destroyer, not to forget John 'Reaper' Grimm, better known to you and me as DoomGuy.

LEADING MAN
One of the big questions throughout the development of Doom was: who would play DoomGuy? Names such as Arnie and Vin Diesel were tossed around early on, but when the project was finally green-lit it looked like the part would fall to The Rock, former People's Champion now turned serious actor. As it turns out, the brawny grappler preferred the 'Sarge' role, leaving the door open for a personable Kiwi called Karl Urban. Best known for his taciturn performance as Eomer in The Lord Of The Rings trilogy, he's also played villains in Riddick and The Bourne Supremacy, but cites Doom as the most challenging, exhausting film he's ever done. Luckily for us, he also understands the gravity of his position.

"I've got to admit I had concerns," admits the star in his thick Kiwi twang. "I was a massive, massive game fan in my college years, and I thought, I don't want to be involved with something if they're not going to do it justice. But after looking at the script and seeing the attention to character, I was convinced. Because you can't just hang this off corridors and killing zombies - there has to be more to it than that. If you don't have the story and the characters right, people are going to get bored pretty quickly. There have been examples of videogame films in the recent past that haven't got that right; we're aware of that, and we're doing everything to inject as much three-dimensionality into these characters as we can."

Urban describes John Grimm as a "thinking man's soldier". He's good at his job and gets the job done with ruthless efficiency, but is a little more introspective and cerebral than your average grunt. "I'm hoping he's going to appeal to the gamers who are not these guys who are built like brick shithouses," says Urban. "They're normal guys like you and me."

One of the other great things about the script is that it doesn't attempt to crowbar a romantic subplot into what is, essentially, a bloody and violent horror film. Perhaps to provide an equivalent emotional journey, John Grimm instead must come to terms with his estranged sister Sam - one of the scientists trapped on the base, played by former Bond-girl Rosamund Pike. The two haven't seen each other since their parents died in a scientific accident, after which John abandoned his budding scientific career and joined the space marines. When the Martian mission comes up, he volunteers to go back and, er, face his demons.

LA-DI-DA...
"Sam's the impostor, because she's not in the game," says Rosamund Pike, perhaps the poshest person ever to be associated with the name Doom. "She's the brains of the piece really. She's the insider, the person who has access to the computer files and the scientific knowledge to work out what's going on. People are turning into these creatures, but she's the one who works out why not everybody turns, and that's quite a crucial thing to the story."

For Pike, Samantha Grimm is a vital addition to the formula, balancing the overriding masculinity of the film and injecting the space marines with a bit of humanity. "She despises them and what they stand for at the beginning, but it's quite interesting how things work out."

AS BAD AS THEY WANNA BE
Another key decision made early on was to consciously go for an R-18 rating. Trying to reach a wider audience by pulling back to a PG-13 was one of the many things that ruined Aliens Vs Predator; here, luckily, the producers realised that without the right level of gibs and ultraviolence, it just wouldn't be Doom.

For Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson, this was practically a prerequisite to his involvement. "What I love about this film is it's very unapologetic," enthuses the big man. "We pull no punches - it's rated R-plus! When I first spoke to Andrzej (Bartowiak, the director), he asked me what's important. And I said it's important to me to deliver on the sci-fi front, on the videogame enthusiast front and on the horror front. All these genres are very, very loyal. And I said with an R-rating we have the ability to really scare the shit out of people, and I think we should. And he goes 'Well we're not going to do that.' There was this long pause, and I'm thinking, shit... Then he says: 'We're going to f***ing terrify them!' That was cool to hear."

The Rock plays the character of Sarge, loosely based on Master Sergeant Kelly from Doom 3. In preparing for the role, Rock sought out some classic asshole commanders from the Hollywood backcatalogue, especially Full Metal Jacket for Lee Ermey and The Rock (funnily enough) for Ed Harrison.

"It's great," says Johnson. "I get to play what I call the BMFOP - the baddest motherf***er on the planet. I'm excited about that. He's not a bad guy as such; he's just a guy who's extremely dedicated to the Marine Corps. He believes in seeing through the orders at all costs, and if he has to kill everybody, then that's what he has to do. I admire Sarge for that."

The Rock describes the experience of making the film as like reliving a childhood dream, playing soldiers and toting around ridiculous amounts of firepower. "At one time I've got a BFG, a rifle, a handgun and I've also got this chaingun that Destroyer uses. It's basically one of the guns that's mounted on top of a Humvee, duh-duh-duh-duh (makes machine-gun noise). It's awesome, because as soon as we get off that helicopter, it's balls to the wall. I would say the first eight to ten minutes of the movie is setting up everything, and then bang, we get into it."

ALL ACTION
Towards the end of the film, the action takes on another dimension, with a breathtaking four-minute action sequence shot in first-person perspective. At this point the film achieves the most literal possible interpretation of the game, as we enter John Grimm's head and battle the Baron and other familiar hellspawn.

We spoke to VFX supervisor Jon Farhat about the sequence. "Primarily, the purpose of it is to be true to the fans. We're hoping that by the time it comes around and you're into a POV, that the audience is like, 'Yeah! THIS is Doom!' So the FPS section is really paying tribute to that and trying to take everything we know about visual FX and special FX and just pile it in there to make something non-stop. I guarantee you it will be pretty intense. It's a combination of creature effects, make-up effects, CG environments, CG creatures, live characters - everything all in one."

Having seen part of the FPS sequence being filmed, we can assure you it looks fantastic - it's a surprisingly scary effect, especially when the Baron starts beating seven shades of shit out of you/John Grimm. Like any FPS, it proves an efficient way of immersing the viewer in the action, and we're just surprised the technique has never been used to much effect in the past.

This sequence alone should satisfy gamers looking for a slice of raw Doomstyle action on the silver screen. Whether the rest of the film lives up to the legacy is another question, but what we can say is, for perhaps the first time in a videogameinspired production, the hearts and minds of the key players were in the right place. This, for us, is sufficient reason to be in the queue on October 28. No doubt we'll see you there.

Anthony Holden

We have hope now! =)