Monthly Archives: July 2011

TF2: Meet the ….

The “meet the ” videos for Team Fortress 2 are legendary. So much so that I had heard of them but nobody ever linked to them. The first one I saw was the recently released “Meet the Medic” (check out the out takes from that video, hilarious!)

So, here they are for your viewing pleasure. All the TF2 character videos so far produced! Go visit the TeamFortress Youtube channel for these and more!


Meet the Medic


Meet the Sniper


Meet the Spy


Meet the Soldier


Meet the Engineer


Meet the Demoman


Meet the Scout


Meet the Heavy

Harry Potter: the story so far

Well, of course if you’ve read the books you’ll know exactly how it’s going to end and how they got there for that matter. I read 2 or 3 of them about 8 years ago so I may have forgotten a detail or two. Who was the big beardy guy who …. ?

It seems to me that Harry Potter is as much the films as it is the books. More so in fact because of the wider audience. Hell, I never bought any of the books (got a lend of ’em at the time), but I do have a box set of the first 5 or 6 films. Yes, haven’t watched them either.

The whole thing is rather baffling, a bit like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles craze back in the early nineties, but this has gone on way longer … (too long if you ask me!)

So, has anyone made a “cam” version of the film yet? Come on Internet, it’s been out a day or two. Surely the “zero day” pirates already have it? I wonder how many kids will come across this post looking for “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2 (CAM).avi”. Just go buy the books, and while you’re at it buy other books too and expand your mind.


But first, go watch this great chat between Richard Dawkins and Neil deGrasse on the Poetry of Science. That will blow your mind, a hell of a lot more than Harry Potter will do. There’s real magic in science. (Thanks Alex!)

Hours of fun with Sanctum

That’s what an hour and a half of playing Sanctum looks like! Great games with the guys last night but in casual mode it’s just a little too easy. The damage to our core happened when enemy flew over us and we were so busy shooting the ground based guys!

I think Tye and Duck both recorded a few rounds so there might be a commentary coming from them in the next few days.

Live “commentary” thanks to Duck. 🙂

Terraria I bought the game a while back…

Terraria. I bought the game a while back and I’m still struggling to get it. Yes, it’s like Minecraft, but only in the same way Bad Company 2 is a shooter like Black Ops is a shooter. They’re very different games.

I think perhaps my lack of interest is due to a lack of time to invest in the game mining for minerals and learning what to make. 99% of my gaming is done after 9pm, by which time I’m generally exhausted. How’s about you? Has Terraria grabbed you by the proverbial goolies and won’t let go or did you just walk on by?

Regardless, here’s some reading for you: the getting started page on the Terraria wiki and a beginners guide from PC Gamer.

Get a sneak preview of WP Super Cache before 1.0!

WP Super Cache 1.0 will be out soon(ish) but I need testers to bang on the development version available on the download page.

This version should be significantly faster if you have a lot of mobile visitors, plus it adds support for https secure pages. The speed came about by saving those files as static files in the supercache directories rather than the old “legacy caching” of WP Cache. You’ll see files like index-mobile.html(.gz) and index-https.html(.gz) in those directories. Be aware that if you use a flat permalink structure the plugin opens the root supercache directory for reading to find the index* files. This may or may not be an issue with directories containing a very large number of directories (10,000+ for example).

HTTPS support is built into the mod_rewrite rules so those files are served by the web server directly, but PHP serves the mobile clients. Only now you’ll be able to cache many times more mobile pages than before. There’s negligible speed difference between PHP and mod_rewrite modes anyway in normal operation.

There’s also a handy little “donotcachepage” GET parameter now. Add that, giving it the value of a secret key from the Advanced settings page and the current page will not be cached in any way.

There is lots of new code in the plugin. It’s running fine here, and a few other people have had no problems but I need more feedback. If you have a development server please give this a go, and if it works ok I believe it’s good enough to go live, under supervision. Don’t go install it on a Friday afternoon…

With the upgrade to WordPress 3.2 I moved this site and my photoblog to a Multisite install so I’ve been looking at making Supercache work better in that environment too.

I also installed Varnish as a front end cache and woah, I’m impressed. Setup was fairly easy though it’s still not 100% right. When I make posts the following page is a blank page except for the blog title, and when I (as a logged in user) leave a comment I get a 500 error and wp-comments-post.php doesn’t redirect. I’m still trying to debug those issues. I mentioned this on Google Plus a few days ago but expect a follow up post on Varnish with docs in the near future.

Now all I need is traffic. I should blog more!

I bought a 4 pack of Sanctum I…

I bought a 4 pack of Sanctum. I already have an idea of who I’ll give the extra 3 copies to, but if anyone that I play with regularly is really interested in the game please leave a comment here.

Not tweeting this post, only for those few of you who actually read this blog! 🙂

Edit: 2 copies gone (David and Duck), one left. RPS blogged about the sale, here’s their wot i think review and here’s TotalBiscuit’s review:

My Favourite Android Apps

I’ve used a Samsung Galaxy S since August last year and in that time I’ve downloaded and played with lots of apps and games. Here are a few of my favourites.

  1. Tweetdeck
  2. Dolphin Browser HD
  3. Kindle and FBReader
  4. Amazon Appstore and Android Market
  5. Reddit is Fun
  6. GO Contacts/Dialer/Launcher EX/SMS Pro
  7. CardioTrainer
  8. WordPress
  9. aCar
  10. Juice Defender
And some games
  1. Galaxy Domination (not on the market any more, now here!)
  2. Cut the Rope
  3. Guns ‘n’ Glory

Besides those, there are so many apps on my phone now that it’s ridiculous. I recently started using the Google+ app, and the Amazon Appstore gives away a free paid app every day so that’s my first port of call shortly after 8am every morning. There’s also getjar.com who have a free ad-supported version of Cut the Rope, as well as many other apps and games.

I used to play a lot more games, I’d dive into Galaxy Domination any chance I’d get but now I’d rather read a book in the Kindle app or FBReader, or check out the latest Reddit posts on “Reddit is Fun”.

If you have a phone with a fairly big screen (the Galaxy S has a 4 inch screen) then reading on them is a rare pleasure. No more fiddling with bookmarks or holding the spine of a thick volume open. Go on, head over to Amazon now and pick up a cheap ebook. You might just like it!

You might wonder how much has this all cost me? I’ve bought quite a few books on the Kindle store (I still think it’s wonderful that I can visit Amazon from my phone and buy a book), but I’ve only bought 2 apps. Those would be aCar (purchased through the author’s website) and just last night I bought Juice Defender Plus. As I mentioned in a previous post on battery saving tips that app shuts off the various radios in your phone when not in use, switching them on momentarily for syncing on a regular basis. The free version turns off the 3G connection when the screen is locked, but not wifi. The paid for version  does that and it’s well worth it. Battery life sky rockets after using this app!

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