Something Odd!

Justice League: Gods and Monsters Chronicles

Wonder Woman

Batman

Superman

This is an alternate universe where the Justice League use lethal force to maintain order on Earth. Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman are not who you are familiar with. An animated movie is expected at the end of the month and will shine an altogether darker light on these super heroes.

In an alternate universe, the Justice League is a brutal force that maintains order on Earth. Superman is named Hernan Guerra and is the son of General Zod, who was rocketed to Earth as a child and raised by a family of Mexican immigrants. Batman is Kirk Langstrom, a scientist who has inadvertently transformed himself into a vampire in an attempt to cure his cancer, feeding on criminals to satisfy his hunger. Wonder Woman is Bekka, who is the wife of the New God Orion.[2][3] The Justice League’s unaccountability is ultimately challenged by the world’s governments following the suspicious deaths of renowned scientists. (Wikipedia)

There’s a series of comic books too. Here’s a sneak peek at the first Superman one. Looks great!

Justice League Superman

Sounds of the Irish Smoking Ban

The Irish Smoking Ban

It’s hard to believe that smoking was banned in the workplace in Ireland in 2004. It was a huge change but very welcome (by most) and the best thing a Fianna Fail government ever did.

Listen to this Witness podcast on the subject here to be brought back eleven years.

Since the ban it became clear that a bunch of dancing sweaty people consuming alcohol are a smelly lot but the increased ventilation that some nightclubs have installed has helped. 🙂

Learn to program with Minecraft

ComputerCraftEdu Turtle

I’ve long been interested in messing around with Javascript in Minecraft courtesy of ScriptCraft but I never got around to it, partly because it required using an external program to edit code but something always stopped the code running. I gotta go bug Walter about it! 🙂

Anyway, I recently discovered ComputerCraftEdu which is a mod for Minecraft that has both a drag and drop and text mode code editor to program turtles that do anything the player can do. It’s a different beast to ScriptCraft and necessarily more limited but I think it’ll make it easier to teach the basics of programming to my eight year old son. Loops, conditions and functions are all possible here and will hopefully give him a taste for what’s possible. He’s already hooked on command blocks but that single line interface is awful!

ComputerCraftEdu drag and drop editor

ComputerCraftEdu code editor

Installing ComputerCraftEdu is fairly easy, but we experienced some odd problems:

Minecraft would crash as soon as we started a map saying it was “shutting down internal server”. The problem was the draw distance. Set that to 16 blocks and it fixes it.
One of our machines had weird graphical glitches. Blocks were see through, or corrupted, the icons of the drag and drop editor disappeared but showed the text hint when the mouse hovered over them. Setting Mip Mapping to 2 (from 4) fixed that.

There are a whole series of tutorial videos and a programming section on their wiki to explain the commands available. There are example maps, guidance for parents and tools for teachers available so it’s definitely worth looking into.

Thanks Alex for telling me about this mod. Here’s what r/FTB had to say about it. They’re enthusiastic too! 🙂

Kick Off World

kickoffworld

I’m not a huge fan of football or spectator sports but there’s a certain charm about Kick Off World or “The Player Manager 2016” (I can’t decide what it’s called). It’s a remake of the Kickoff/Player Manager games of the 90’s on the Amiga. Graphics are simplified of course. The view of the playing field is overhead like in Kickoff or Microprose Soccer but still manages to be interesting, at least for the first few matches. You can also skip the game and go straight to the results if all you’re interested in is the managerial side of the game.

There’s loads to see in the game, lots of players and teams as well as options to set tactics. Go get it on Windows, Mac, Linux or even Android. They’re all linked from their homepage including a (slightly out of date) Flash version you can play in your browser! Watch out for updates on their Facebook page.

set -o vi FTW

The Bash command line can be edited using the cursor keys but for the real power user you need to enable Vi mode:

$ set -o vi

Or add it to one of your Bash startup files.

Now, instead of the slow interactive editing you’ll get the command and insert mode of Vi! Users of Vi or Vim will feel right at home. You start in insert mode by default so it feels the same as before. You can type new text, move left and right with the cursor keys and delete text but press ESC and you can do all the things Vi command mode allows you to do.

Check out this extensive cheat sheet with examples or jump directly to the ascii version here!

Ten Years at Automattic

Working

I still remember the day in 2005 when Matt asked me to come work for him. I still remember the exact spot I was standing where I took that call. It was only a couple of metres from where I sit typing this now.

Ten years, time has flown. I work for an absolutely amazing company with great people. It’s hard to believe there’s well over three hundred people there now. Remember when you needed an invite? It’s a far cry from WordPress.com today.

I wish I could provide an insightful comment on the challenges and rewards of working remotely but it’s late and I just wanted to get this post out there to mark the day. If you want to experience the remote work lifestyle for yourself, come work with us!

A Commodore 64 in Police Academy 3

I honestly don’t remember this at all. The C64 was just a prop, but it’s still nice to see the breadbox there! It’s a pity they used the arcade version of Paperboy and not the C64 conversion however.

Say Fine to the Shirt

When shopping get in there and out as quickly as possible. (Thanks Conor O’Neill for the link!)

My first time seeing anything by Amy Schumer. Funny stuff! 🙂

1c and 2c coins to go (in Ireland)

Finally! These tiny coins will be on the way out if all goes to plan.

I guess I should add those coins above to my small stockpile of Irish coins.

Government sources have told the Irish Independent that the matter is to be brought to Cabinet tomorrow.

It is understood Finance Minister Michael Noonan will bring the memo recommending the withdrawal of the coins, which cost more to mint than they are worth.

Denali – a tribute to a friend

I’ve said goodbye to two dogs in my life, and neither time was easy. If you’re a dog owner watch this only somewhere where you won’t mind being seen bawling your eyes out. It’s a beautiful tribute to a dog called Denali and his owner.