thegfaults

Things are going well here in Chez Al. Work on the new site progresses – though slowly, and work in general is going well. In a couple of weeks, however, everything will be packed up for an indeterminate amount of time while I move everything to a new abode. Details to follow.

As for the more interesting things going on, I recently discovered The Void, a creepy game about a world between this one and the other, where lost souls go to try to save themselves. It’s excellently written, beautifully eerie, and the score is so well chosen to create the atmosphere the player experiences that one finds oneself on edge just from hearing it. I highly recommend giving the game a shot, although I managed to get it cheap in the Steam Summer Sale.

On the subject of games, I have to thank PC Gamer for their great article 50 games to play at work, which while showing me a terrific browser game in the style of Evil Genius, amongst other great games, also got me back into Evil Genius. It’s still just as difficult as I remember, though!

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Hi All,

Following the reimagining of hungrybugger, which is coming to the stage where it will be usable again, Mark and I have decided to start a new project. This one will take the form of a new blog, on which you will be able to read news and, hopefully, reviews of various tech-related (and possibly non-tech-related in future) subjects.

With this and my attempts to get back to blogging here, I intend to be much more present on the web over the coming weeks. In case you didn’t notice, I’m even posting here more than once-a-month now!

Alton Towers was great fun, and another trip with more friends is in the works. Seems my car can nearly double it’s average fuel consumption when I’m going down the M6, as opposed to Leith Walk.

Keep your eyes open.

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More than 20 days after resolving to post more often, I return again.

Primarily, this is to do with having been away or otherwise occupied every weekend since then, and it will be again this weekend, hence my decision to post on a Thursday evening.

However, I can exclusively reveal that there are several new ideas in the works, and you can expect to hear more about them as time goes by. Since last time, I have undertaken a long trip in the car, down to Stockport to see family, and I am overjoyed with how the car handled. Admittedly I had to splash out on 2 new tyres first, but that’s only to be expected. The other 2 will need replaced soon too. I’ve had rather an expensive month, in that I’ve spent most (read: all) of my money, but pay day is tomorrow, and at least all the major expenses are out of the way.

I also have a rather nice new gadget, the Jawbone ICON, an excellent bluetoth headset which seems to have struck the perfect balance between size, comfort and quality. After some more use, I’m considering a review, so we shall see whether my initial impressions hold up.

Until next time, farewell.

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In the time since I started this blog, I have not been remotely political in my writing. Neither, in case you’re worried, am I planning to suddenly ask you to support a certain party or agree with me on certain policies. However, I feel I need to ensure that you, the readers are aware of the importance of considering the Digital Economy Act (formerly Bill) in placing your vote this May 6th.

The Digital Economy Bill (DEB), sponsored through the Houses of Parliament by Lord Mandelson, was a bill designed to tackle the technological issues concerning our lives today. It attempted to address such issues as orphaned copyright works, online piracy, and video-game age ratings.

The DEB gained Royal Assent on April 12th, becoming the Digital Economy Act (DEA), following discussion in the house of commons.

Now I will happily acknowledge that the issues tackled in the DEA are important, and that they must indeed be discussed, preferably at length. However, the problem with the DEA is the lack of interest shown to it during its progress through the houses.

Photographers campaigned to have the clauses on orphaned works changed, and were successful in their endeavours to have Clause 43 removed. The Open Rights Group campaigned against the web-blocking and forced disconnection parts of the bill, designed to stop online piracy, and failed, bringing these measures into law, a law which comes into force on the 12th of June.

I may disagree with many of the measures proposed within the DEA. I may even think there was a certain amount of bias between Lord Mandelson, the bill’s sponsor, and big business. However, I am not writing about this to encourage you to agree with me, am writing about it to make sure you think for yourself.

The DEA was passed through the House of Commons during parliamentary “wash-up”, a period during the dying days of an out-going parliament, defined by Wikipedia as “last few days while a Parliament of the United Kingdom continues to sit after the Prime Minister has announced the date when Parliament will be dissolved” where “the Government attempts to pass unfinished business which has sufficient all-party support”. It is during this period that governments may pass non-contentious laws which they feel would be better in law before the election, and which have the support to succeed. Clearly, with the measures proposed in the DEA, it should be given more scrutiny than this, especially given how many MPs were actually present during the reading. As you will see here, there were 184 Conservative MPs absent, 45 Liberal Democrats, and 139 Labour MPs, not to mention the smaller parties. I believe laws such as the DEA should be given a full discussion in the commons, a view voiced by most of the MPs who voted against the bill during wash-up.

The Open Rights Group has been running a campaign to encourage voters to email their parliamentary candidates, asking for their views on the way the DEA was passed and whether they would seek further action should they be elected. I, for my part, set up a small blog on my server to bring together some of these replies. You can find it at http://debill.alitheg.co.uk

As I have stated previously, I do not ask that you support the same party as me. Neither do I ask that you agree with my political views. Instead, I ask that you do 3 things before you place your ‘X’ on a piece of paper on Thursday, May 6th:

• Inform yourself, get the facts.
• Make your own decisions. The only wasted vote is a vote not placed.
• Think.

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Well, it’s been a wee while…*checks calendar*

*ahem*

Well, it’s been two months since I last had a chance to post anything to this wonderful online world of musings, and I felt that an update was required. When you left me, I was awaiting a credit card arrival so that I could pay for the shipping of my new motherboard. In parallel to this, I was job hunting and wondering if my old company, CAS, would take me back.

This site can now exclusively reveal that both of the above have been a success.

Yes, I am now a practising software developer. With a working desktop computer at home.

I’ve been in the job for a few weeks now, but it’s all going very well and I hope that a Mono-Fri, 9-5 job may give me the chance I need to start doing several things which I have not done properly in ages. The first of these is to get back to reading again, the second to recommence (semi-)regular blogging. I have of course acheived the latter of these to some extent by writing this post in the first place, and you’ll have to take my word for it that the former is under way as well.

The more astute among you (ie. those who have been following my Twitter feed or Facebook) will also know that I m now the proud owner of a used Volkswagen Golf. With an 02 plate, a 1.9 TDI engine, and 150bhp, I find the commute to work all the more bearable than it was in the bus, and I am now able to travel to the lands of my birth¹ (as I am doing later today) without being tied to the train times.

Well, that should be you up-to-date with my goings on², I certainly hope to see you again very soon. Sooner than last time, that is…

1. well, Bathgate [↩]
2. unless you got bored and skipped to this part [↩]

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Over the last month, I have finally managed to convince EVGA to accept a return on my probably-faulty motherboard. Unfortunately, I have to pay shipping in both directions as the board was imported from the US, and the credit cards I have tried have been declined. I must now wait for my new card to arrive so that I can give it another shot.

To pass the time, I have started watching Futurama from the beginning, having found an excellent deal in HMV last month (all 4 seasons reduced from £90 to £60, and bought with the 2 gift cards I had). Watching crustacean-aliens mate makes an excellent way to pass the time if I’m ever bored on a day off (!)

The job hunt continues, although it seems the company I worked with temporarily may have a new position coming up, so I am looking forward to hearing from them in among my other hunting.

The minor issues that have cropped up in the flat are being fixed one-by-one, and although I have to keep cleaning up (well I’ve had enough days off that it’s only fair), it’s all going well.

I’ll let you know how the job hunt goes, and hopefully I might start having some more computer and gaming related news once the desktop is fixed.

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He’s finally back! Having settled in to the new flat, and finally (after much consternation) got the internet, network and server up and running, I am returning to my blog.

My new-year’s resolution this year is “to get a ‘proper’ job” i.e. to leave retail and find a job that I enjoy, rather than one I enjoy purely because of the people I work with. This is a challenge which I approach with a mixture of enthusiasm and dread, mostly depending on the day on which I’m asked. I have realised that, since graduating, my interests as a paid job have shifted away from purely programming, as retail has taught me how much I enjoy working with people, something which software engineering seems to give less opportunity for than other fields. Part of the reasoning behind this shift of interest is that I realise I enjoy programming in my own time, when I can work on something I enjoy seeing come together and where I can have as much input as I would like.

In the mean time, I can get back to sorting the final touches to the flat and probably sleep, as the last few weeks have left me physically and mentally exhausted.

Cau

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As those of you who follow me on Facebook or Twitter will know, I am currently surrounded by boxes.

In many other situations, this would be a condition most concerning, however the reason behind my boxes is that, on Monday, I finally move to my new flat.

If I was moving and not working, or working and not moving, I would perhaps have had time to post about the progress of each. However, attempting to do both at the same time is enough of a tightrope, without having to think up engaging ways to keep the lovely readers interested! In any case, the next time I post will be from my new flat on Leith Walk, most likely surrounded by boxes, although it depends how long it takes to get new phone and internet set up.

On a related note, the site will go down on Monday morning, and likely remain down for at least the remainder of the week, probably longer, depending again on said internet-enabling timespan.

I look forward to being able to post from a comfortable new flat, with suitably decent internet.

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As many of you will know already, I finally have a flat!

We put the deposit down on Wednesday and are moving in on the 14th of December (as long as we hurry up and hand in these damn forms!).

There is now much to be done before then, including making sure I budget correctly, deciding on providers for internet, power, etc. and finding my parents another router, since I’ll be taking mine away! It’s great that the long process of finding flats and arraning viewings is over, and knowing we’ll be in in less than a month is even better.

In other, almost-equally-important news, my long-anticipated PC upgrade/repair is finally finished, and I am writing this post from a Windows 7 PC containing a brand new Core i7, 6GB RAM and a Solid State Drive. It’s mind-bogglingly fast. In fact, in the time it’s taken you to read this, it’s could probably have solved crime. Forever. And made me a cup of tea.

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It’s taking a little getting used to, having days off. I’ve spent these last two doing so little I’m almost disappointed. Yesterday I was in Edinburgh briefly but accomplished nothing except a cookie delivery, and writing this, I sit with the TV on watching Star Trek on Virgin 1.

However, I have accomplished something with these days. For starters, I now have my new motherboard and RAM. Tomorrow should bring my processor and a shiny new SSD (I know, needlessly unnecessary, but fun and cool!), and hopefully by Sunday (my next day off) I will have the CPU cooler which I had to buy on eBay as no one else seemed to have it.

This time round, I’m determined to keep the inside of my PC nice and tidy. Using the rather handy full-size picture which comes with the motherboard I have already begun working out where best to run and tie cables inside the case, and things are looking quite good.

I also discovered that it’s possible to lubricate sleeve-bearing fans. My hope is that this might quieten things down a bit.

With any luck, my next post will not be about how annoying slow the postal system is, but rather about how fast my new computer is and my own first impressions of Windows 7.

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