A change is coming...to Command & Conquer

As many of you know (or maybe you don't), I write for the Full Circle Magazine. FCM is a free community e-magazine for Ubuntu and its' derivatives. I started writing for them in January, 2009 (21 issues ago!), filling in for Command & Conquer original author, Robert Clipsham. He felt he could no longer continue it for personal reasons and I sent him an email (as he suggested anyone interested should in C&C), and lo-and-behold, here I am. Last month (Issue #41) included a link to a survey. Based on said survey results, a large percentage of our readers are more inclined to use the GUI (no real surprise there), but a large number of readers expressed a liking to my article series (some even suggested we have more like it). In an attempt to appeal to a wider audience, I will henceforth (as of Issue #43) be including both GUI and CLI applications, tips, tricks, and general know-how in Command & Conquer (and may result in a name change if I think of something catchy). This fulfils a request by readers for a larger "tips and tricks" section, while possibly giving everyone something to read in C&C.

For those of you who love the CLI as much as I do - fret not! (musical pun unintended). I will be including CLI alternatives within any GUI article I write (as long as there is an alternative), and not every article will necessarily be GUI-based. I am mainly just removing the restriction on topic choice.

On a slightly different note, I'd like to take a moment to thank everyone who reads C&C, and who posted positive comments in the survey! It really means a lot to me to know that there are plenty of people out there who find my articles useful. And to those readers who point out any mistakes I make within a few hours of the magazine being online, I thank you, it's always nice to face-palm just after you lose the ability to fix any mistakes! (I jest - I always figure I have a mistake or two). I'd also like to take a moment to suggest that a few of you may want to contact Ronnie about becoming proof-readers? That way your suggestions will result in correct articles, instead of "oops" sections in the following article. I'm not sure how many of my readers are actually aware of this blog, but to those who know, here you go.

For those of you who aren't readers but enjoy reading Linux-oriented magazines, check out FCM here: www.fullcirclemagazine.org

And to my regular blog readers: I apologize for the lack of updates. I'm not going to make any excuses, I'm just going to say this: I have ideas for more blogposts (a review of Ubuntu 10.10 - either the LiveCD or the actual installed version, an article on LaTeX, a "how to google efficiently" article that may or may not be useful to you, and a few others that haven't been fully developed). I'm starting university and as such I can't promise regular updates, but I felt you should be made aware of the fact that I have things in the works, and they will arrive sooner rather than later.

Also, for those musically inclined readers of mine, I have updated my Guitar post from May with my new electric guitar (no pictures of the other acoustic, sorry!).

Doing my part...advertising!

A friend of mine asked me to share this video, and so here I am!

It's a video for the Samsung Galaxy Tab, titled "For You". Let me know what you guys think.




Description (English):
2 crew members.2 actors. 2 days. 1 Samsung Galaxy Tab.
'For You' can probably be considered one of those spontaneous projects. The new Samsung Galaxy Tab is supposed to transform your life on the go - and that's what happens to our main character.
http://galaxytab.samsungmobile.com/
Producer - Sang-Yoon Song
Director - Ina Fischer
Camera - Ina Fischer
Editing - Sang-Yoon Song & Ina Fischer
Animation - Sang-Yoon Song
Music - Luís Chaves
Actors - Oliwia Smolen & Lukas N.P. Egger

Description (German):
Film-Crew: 2
Schauspieler: 2
Tage: 2
Samsung Galaxy Tab: 1
http://galaxytab.samsungmobile.com/
'For You' ist aus einer einfachen Idee enstanden und soll, durch eine kleine Liebesgeschichte, die Einfachheit und Anwendbarkeit des Samsung Galaxy Tabs darstellen.
Producer - Sang-Yoon Song
Regisseur - Ina Fischer
Kamera - Ina Fischer
Schnitt (Film) - Ina Fischer
Bearbeitung - Sang-Yoon Song & Ina Fischer
Animation - Sang-Yoon Song
Musik - Luís Chaves
Schauspieler - Oliwia Smolen & Lukas N.P. Egger

Theme Overhaul & Update!

Well, now that there's the ability to customize templates, I've made the entire blog a little wider (lets you guys read my code snippets fully). Also, I've gone with a layout and colour/background combo that appeals to me. If you guys have any complaints about any elements of the blog, leave me a comment and I'll take it into consideration (I can't promise every complaint will be acted upon, but the major issues should be resolved). Consequently...if you like the blog like this, let me know!

I'll be updating the guitars post in a few days once I get to my third guitar, for anyone interested. I am also currently learning Japanese and have learned a few things (SCIM, anyone?), which I'll be posting up here soon (I can also post up a link to my vocab list for anyone who's interested - just leave a comment).

Looking forward to getting some feedback,
Lswest

Guitars

Well, I've been playing guitar a lot lately, and I just got a new steel-string, so I thought I'd share them with anyone who's interested.



















Above is my newest steel-string acoustic electric guitar. It's a special edition DynaSun Burst 4 channel equalizer. Sounds great, is extremely light (has a plastic back instead of a wooden back), and is louder than I expected with the off-set sound holes. Definitely a good guitar (at a very affordable price) for those, like me, who are mainly hobbyists and not looking to spend 1,799USD on a Cole Clarks FL2AC like Jack Johnson uses.

























The above is actually my first guitar. It's a nylon-string Granada (no idea what model, sorry). It sounds great, and is really easy on the fingers. The neck is a bit wider than would be ideal for songs involving capos, but that's hardly a problem. Quite a bit more expensive than the one above, but it's lasted well (only replaced the strings once, and rather recently at that).







Newest addition (as of September 2010). A Squier Made By Fender SE Special Strat (part of the strat pack). I bought this guitar because I was interested in getting started with an electric and had very little in the way of a budget. This pack (199€) is pretty good for anyone who's starting off. If you plan to play gigs with this, I recommend instead to buy a bullet strat by Squier and a better amp. The guitar itself is pretty decent, but I did have to adjust everything intonation-wise to arrive at a "pretty decent" sound. If you're looking for a really good beginner guitar and don't have much in the way of free cash, go for a Squier bullet pack or this pack.


If, however, you've got a bigger budget, check out a Fender Mexican Strat and a Spider Line-6 amp, for example. Plenty more expensive, but I've heard plenty of good things about both.

I also have a fourth guitar (a Tradition TG550 steel-string), but I have no pictures of it handy (it's in another country). I may update this post with stock photos if I find some good ones. Also, I have to apologize for any issues with the pictures, I used my Milestone to take the shots.

If there are any specific questions you've got, feel free to leave me a comment!

C++

Lately I've been moving my programming focus from Python to C++, simply because I wanted to experience a compiled language, and compare it with the "slower" scripting languages I often use (perl, bash, python, etc.). Slower insofar as they require libraries to be loaded at runtime. My first step was to create a recursive directory traversal function, since I planned on re-writing a "music catalogue" program I wrote in Python (basically a program that compiles a list of songs) in C++. I also want to add functionality, like specifying if you only want a list of artists, albums, etc. And also specify how it is printed out (i.e. comma-separated for "About Me" type forms, or a normal list).

I ran into a bit of a snag getting the recursion working properly at first, but asking in the ArchLinux Forums gave me the advice I needed, and the method works now without a problem. During that time though, another forum member mentioned that recursion is best avoided (with which I wholeheartedly agree), and who has prompted me now to look into re-writing my method as an iterative method instead of a recursive one. However, I'm still trying to wrap my head around the changes I'd need to create an iterative directory traversal function from the method I've already written. If anyone feels like taking a shot at explaining the differences I'd need to make in my recursive function to make it iterative to me, feel free to leave me a comment. Or, if you'd like to see the code I've written, I've paste-binned it here. If you re-write it into an iterative function, I'd be grateful if you posted a link to it here, in order to spur my thinking processes along.

Besides that, I haven't been up to all too much. Mainly organizing my life. Once I finish the music catalogue program, I'll probably post it up here. Also, I plan to update my blog more regularly once things have settled down here a bit.