Glitch Walker

Redemption: The Bizarre Changes In My Political Views The Morning After

2019-12-13T15:01:00.000+00:00

Had I planned this blog post last night, it would have been a rant post about how everyone was wrong and I was right. That’s an exaggeration, but I think you get the feeling I’m talking about.

However, I woke up this morning with a re-aligning of my political views.

Firstly- and one of the most drastic for me- is that I finally accepted Tony Blair as a good Prime Minister, maybe one of the best. This doesn’t forgive his war, it doesn’t forgive the privatisation of various public services that started under his watch, or enjoying the poisoned apple of the Murdoch press. But, on a continuum, if we returned to a Blair administration today, it would be a far more progressive government than the one we are staring at now. It would certainly help more of our most vulnerable in society. It wouldn’t be as radical as I would have liked… But it would be much more of a positive force for good. And, on top of that, have the mandate of the British people.

The second for me was finally accepting the EU referendum result. I think it will make life harder for us in the long run, and think it will be a sad day for internationalist politics as a whole when it happens. But I am at the point I would rather be under a Labour government- whether Blair or Corbyn- whilst leaving the EU than the Tories.

I found more subtle things changing within me as well. If I were to re-join the Labour Party, I would much more likely vote for a moderate candidate than when I voted for Corbyn a few years ago. I agree with Corbyn much more- but would rather a Labour government actually in power, able to enact at least some of these beneficial policies.

This isn’t where I lay the blame on Corbyn, unlike most on the centre-left. At the end of the day, he was voted as leader by members of the party. He was elected- twice- on a platform that was clear to members, and that he delivered. Sadly, that platform turned out not to be one that would have won this election.

Now isn’t the time to ostracise movements such as Momentum. Instead, invite them to the table, to return the party to the coalition of varied views that make up the centre-to-left spectrum; along with New Labour, Progress, Compass, The Fabian Society, The Co-operative Party and of course the trade unions.

This is the Labour party I would like to return to. We are far, far stronger united and with the common goal of Social Democratic values; improving the Welfare State; improving the lives of the most vulnerable in society than apart.

Exasperation.

2019-12-13T14:57:00.000+00:00

Exasperation. That is the only word I have about the state of political play at the moment. Now, more than ever, it seems impossible for anyone to have a balanced view: whether "Brexiteer" or "Remoaner", alt-right or "Social Justice Warrior"... Every point of view has a box, or a label, that it belongs to: and every point of view has an ulterior motive. "You would think that" being the natural response.

At this point, I believe it only fair to state my own views. I am a passionate believer in the EU. Some of that is because it melds with my values: that we can be greater as a whole than the sum of our parts. And, that with political as well as an economic union, we are much less likely to go to war. That could be labelled as a rather extreme position, but that position extends internationally. I also strongly support our membership of the UN. And the politics of compromise across nations set a gold standard for the rest of the world. I believe leaving the EU will be one of the biggest mistakes of our generation.

Despite having what some would describe as an "extremist remain" point of view, my personality also very strongly veers me to the solution with the most compromise between groups. Was I an MP, I would have voted for Brexit 4 times by now. This has certain caveats: if I were elected in my constituency specifically on a "stop Brexit" message, I would not have done (i.e. as a Lib Dem or Green Party MP). But, were I a Labour or Conservative backbencher, I would have very likely voted for each of these "deals" (which, let's face it, are nothing of the sort: they are merely the withdrawal agreement... Or rather, the agreement about how we will start to negotiate a deal).

I would do this because we had an election just a year AFTER the 2016 referendum. More than that, one of the strongest messages of the 2011 Alternative Vote referendum was how important the link between a constituent and their MP is. The excuse that the MPs party campaigned on a "leave" manifesto isn't good enough for me. Under our current voting system, the burden is on the voter to find out where their MP lies. Put simply: in 2017, the people had ample opportunity to vote in a Brexit MP if they so desired. (Ironically, I would have far more sympathy if an MEP didn't vote along with their party in the EU Parliament!! As you vote for a party, rather than an individual).

Meanwhile, we have a newly formed Liberal Party... Which basically are the eurosceptic Lib Dems who were kicked out or left their old party. To me, before the EU referendum, the whole selling point of the Lib Dems were that they were a democratic party... That individual opinons are taken into account and voted on... "Democratic" is literally in its name! The stereotypical Lib Dem was portrayed as wearing shorts and sandals at conferences; something I have heard some Lib Dems are "thankful" is dying out. Personally, this makes me sad! To me this suggested, when it came to policy-making, you didn't have to be a stereotypical suit. It spoke of a party that contained a wide range of views. The Lib Dems were a party that were able to go into coalition even with the "evil Tories"... something that, to me, is a very open-minded thing to do. I will always think the Lib Dems were sincere in that coalition; whether the Tories were is debateable. The betrayal for me was the University Fee fiasco; simply because that was a pledge individual MPs made, rather than purely being a party policy... It comes back to the MP-Constituency link. Personally, I believe the Lib Dems acted as a buffer in that coalition... Just think, if the coalition still existed, there probably wouldn't even have been an EU Referendum in the firstplace!!

The final part of this essay/long-form ramble was about "truth". This was the thing that started me off writing in the first place: how will Brexit directly benefit or harm me as an individual? Versus: How will remaining in the EU benefit or harm me as an individual?... However I might do this tomorrow. I might never do it.

Ubuntu Studio Review: My Favourite DM, Compositor, Workflow, Latency… Part 1

2019-10-12T18:34:00.000+01:00

So recently I have been using Ubuntu Studio as my primary OS, mostly to benefit from its support for creating MIDI music, and also its support for the myriad of devices I own, some of which not even Windows easily supports anymore.

Now, back when Ubuntu Studio first came onto the scene, it used Xubuntu (or the XFCE desktop environment) as its base. This made sense; it offered virtually everything that Gnome did, just a bit flashier. So that hardware power could be devoted to music making. Or photo-editing. Or whatever floats your boat. It was also seen as the “lightweight” desktop environment at the time.

Since then, however, things have changed. The “lightweight” monicker has now been taken by Lubuntu/LXDE… which has in turn moved over to QT, now being called LXQT. This also makes sense; I have always found QT very lightweight when I have used it on Windows. Meanwhile, there have been constant wars over the direction of Gnome and KDE for the last 5 or 6 years, with Gnome fragmenting more it appears… With Mate, Cinnamon, Gnome-Shell and now Gnome-Flashback on the scene.

Just to complicate matters… I personally loved the Gnome-Shell environment. I loved swiping to the top left corner to find my apps and windows; I loved the removal of the minimise button; I loved the translation of the mobile metaphor to a desktop environment. I acknowledge not everyone liked this… And admit I used Cinnamon rather than the official Gnome-Shell in the past, only because it was the first to receive extensions and meant I could customise it just that little bit more. In this environment, XFCE feels a bit homeless.

So, I decided today: I would install, and try out every sensible combination I can think of, in order to decide which one works the best. There won’t be any scientific basis to my conclusions, so please accept them merely as a hobbyist music maker. I don’t intend on doing clean installs or going the whole way. Just go with the combination that feels right.

Despite not being scientific, I aim to evaluate each interface/environment combination based on these headers:

Performance: How does it run? Are there many slowdowns? Am I still able to do what I need from the software?
Ease-of-Use: This will be rated based on how much setup is required after booting up. Potentially, I may include how hard it was to get the system into the state I wanted to as well.
Graphics: This overlaps with the previous two a little bit. Does the interface look nice and consistent, across GTK and QT/KDE apps? Even if it requires some extra initial setup. Also, does it just look… nice? Here, I compare with MacOS… Or at least, how people describe it. I have only owned one Mac in my life, and I’ve never liked the Apple fetishism. Really, here, I want to be able to show that Linux/Ubuntu can be a decent alternative to a Mac.

So, that is my basis. I think to begin with I will be using SDDM + KDE as my starting point. Additionally, I am using the kxstudio repository, as I prefer using Cadence for managing my JACK/ALSA audio.

Finally, I wish to repeat, there is nothing scientific about this. It is likely you may be more technically minded than myself, or alternatively more audiophile than myself. This is an experiment for me as much as you, the reader! Enjoy!

Energy Drinks, Cigarettes and Health and Safety

2019-08-13T12:25:00.001+01:00

There appears to be a bizarre trend with the British, of which I’m a member of. It seems to be the flow of logic that is best summarised as “actively pointing out the splinter in other people’s eyes, whilst having a log in their own”.

And what better example to think of than energy drinks. Personally, I drink energy drinks as an alternative to coffee. I don’t generally like hot drinks, as I don’t deal well with heat or warm weather full stop. As an energy drink is the equivalent of a few cups of coffee, it seems a sensible drink to have in moderation.

And yet, people go to great lengths to tell you they are bad for you, that they can kill you, that they can cause all manner of side effects. I kid you not, I have even had smokers tell me these drinks are bad for me. To which I feel like saying, statistically, they are far more likely to die of a whole range of illnesses than I am. Even with non-smokers, people are quite happy to get paralytic every weekend without people raising as much as an eyelid. Indeed, alcohol intake is generally seen as probably not good for you, but a social norm, so worth it.

And yet, as a country, we regularly like to moan about “health and safety gone mad”, despite this being an accurate description of my fellow Brit. “Those are bad for you, you know”, “your shoelaces are undone, you will trip” (for the record, in my 30-odd years on this earth, I have never once tripped on the incredibly rare occasion my shoelaces have been untied).

This really does become madness when you consider most of the “EU health and safety madness” comes from laws originally drawn up by us Brits; British lawmakers, politicians and civil servants.

Or, in plain English, its OK to point out other people’s flaws, but not our own.

It all seems a little narcissistic, don’t you think?

Moving Forward; EdX; TypingClub dislikes British Keyboards

2018-01-03T01:33:00.000+00:00

So it has been a fair few months, and I'm at the point I'd usually not bother with blogging anymore. Or create a new blog. My plans foiled once again by my own lack of self-determination and laziness. To be fair, however, I have moved back into Lincoln at last and living on my own again rather than holed up at my parents' place (not to mean any disrespect to them, however, as they have helped get me through this last year).

So now I am finished with the move. And it seemed appropriate to start typing a post again.

I do have some ideas for apps in the works, with lots of diagrams and labels to show how I want them to look. My aim is, having a precise specification of what I want to create, I will then be able to abstract from that the skills and tools I need to (finally!!) start feeling like I can develop something (as opposed to wasting oxygen).

I am also enrolled on an edX.org course. This was always my aim once I had moved. The course in particular is the Introduction To Computer Science And Programming Using Python Course, and I'm really hoping I can keep up with it. So far I have watched the first video and read through the first set of materials. Maybe with an App in mind, I'll actually be able to see it through to the end!

I have also gone back to using TypingClub to improve my touch-typing ability now I finally have an actual desk with full-size keyboard again. I have hit a stumbling block, however... In the fact it doesn't support British Keyboards. Meaning, from a particular point, I will never be able to progress further as it will always be expecting a hash key (rather than the £ sign, which takes its place on the British Keyboard). This seems a bit odd to not have fixed, as all it would have taken is to swap the keys around on their end. I'm not bothered about the US spellings, as I'm not using the site to learn how to spell but rather I am there to learn how to type. But oh well... I shall try to contact them to see when/if they will fix it, and in the meantime keep following the previous exercises until I can't improve anymore. The previous exercises included many actual typing experiences anyway, so it should keep me entertained for a while!!

At The End Of Basic Front-End Dev Projects: My Current Issues w/FreeCodeCamp

2017-10-28T19:00:00.001+01:00

Up until last week, FreeCodeCamp had been like a dream come true. It had brilliant small, measurable and achievable goals in order to help keep momentum in programming learning, even if you only had the energy for the smallest commitment in the day. It reminded me of the feeling I got when I very first coded with Codecademy: how simple it was to begin, as well as continue, straight from the homepage.

However, I have come to the end of the "Basic Front-End Development" block... And I've reached a sudden roadblock. Technically, yes, we should know everything we have been taught up to that point. I have a reasonable idea of how to use <div>'s and <div class>'s in order to group elements together. I even figured out, through my own research, the one thing I had always wondered... How to create a neat menu along the top, that also follows you as you scroll the page (it turns out it's just an unordered list, with some extra CSS!).

However, the biggest stumbling block was creating my own portfolio page. The "Tribute" project was much easier, as it was easy enough to create an "Ironic" page that incorporated the lyrics of Tenacious D's tribute. I found I completed a rudimentary page pretty quickly on my first attempt, without looking anything up.

Then I got to the Portfolio project. And, I put my hands up (as I increasingly regularly do): the biggest obstacle to my learning is that I am a top-tier perfectionist. If I know exactly what I want, I'll end up creating ridiculous amounts of work for myself to incorporate even the smallest, unimportant element... Even if it means I make no progress with the actual page.

This can be a helpful and important skill; as I mentioned, I have now learned something about creating navigation bars which, even weeks after first learning it, hasn't left me. The problem came when I really wanted that bar to contain a "now playing" section, displaying my currently playing Last.FM track.

In a nutshell, the biggest problem in creating a portfolio for myself is my own ridiculous set of standards. The task was significantly easier when I forced myself into the easier task of emulating my brother's stylish website... But even then, I came up with problems like trying to get a navigation bar centred, and the problems that developed with page colouring when I attempted that.

More than that, I feel as if FreeCodeCamp went from being a course that was very easy to follow, with gamification seemingly ingrained into its soul, to a task where I was suddenly thrown at the deep end. Again, technically this is stuff I have just been taught. But I feel the course could have benefited from another guided example for creating an entire web page within its learning environment (maybe with fewer hints and cues) before asking us to create our own site.

The thing is... I do have a rudimentary Portfolio page created from this as well. And I have made the decision just to submit it; as I know doing so will get me out of this rut, and looking at the continuing course, it goes back to the format of small, achievable tasks. I intend to go back and improve it as I become more knowledgeable, as well as e-mail/submit this in some way to help improve the course (hell, I would even be willing to help create the learning materials for it).

Anyway, here I present https://glitchwalker.github.io (oh, yeah, I used GitHub instead of the site they suggested; as I already have it set up to update game mod projects, and I preferred the workflow of having the entire site working and editable on my own computer already).

Free Code Camp is free to use and is available at https://www.freecodecamp.org. The learning materials are also open source, and free to use within any setting.

Thank you for being my voice. #RIPCHESTER

2017-10-27T15:54:00.000+01:00

The thing that hits me as I grow older is that people keep dying. When you're a kid, it's maybe the famous people you faintly know on TV, or a great-grandparent you are too young to really remember (my heart goes out to anyone who had a traumatic loss as a child). The older I get, the more I find it's the celebrities that I listened to and grew up with... The deaths in our own communities become people we had closer relationships, closer members of our family and friends.

In terms of celebrity, no death has hit me quite as hard as that of Chester Bennington. For so many reasons... some of which I will try to get down here.

It is such an odd feeling, as I haven't really followed them for a long time... More than that, they are so deeply ingrained in the 00s nu-metal scene... I can't be the only person that loved them as a teen, then "grew out" of them... Thinking they were the heaviest metal I ever heard in my youth, whilst thinking of those songs more like pop music really as an adult. This isn't me trying to slate the band, I'm trying to explain my honest thoughts before Chester's death... And what I would probably think still were he still with us.

The honest truth is, despite these thoughts... I fucking love Linkin Park. It's so easy, with hindsight, to see them as that poppy, teeny band with baggy trousers pretending to be rockers. But the reality is they were a huge influence... There is no one quite like them. And I'd argue, without Linkin Park, there would be fewer fans of rock music in the world.

Up to the moment that they came onto the scene, even nu-metal had that feeling of sweary, screaming, sex-obsessed rocky stoners. Linkin Park crossed that divide with more melodic vocals, more personal emotions and a unique innocence that is incredibly rare in any form of popular music these days (highlighted by the fact their first two albums, as far as I'm aware, had no swearing). Few of those listening would even realise these lyrics were written by a guy who suffered child abuse; they spoke to anyone and everyone going through school and feeling their voice wasn't being. They spoke to anyone that ever felt they weren't being listened to (which, really, at some points is all of us). And they literally crossed genres, between hip-hop and metal, between rapping, screaming and singing. I remember the "Numb/Encore" mash-up being on the charts forever, and it's easy to see why... It could appeal to such a massive audience.

The band used this to grow into other genres... To a certain extent, trying to disown their previous work. I can understand why. There are some that could describe Hybrid Theory and Meteora as a smear on their career... There are others that probably felt like me, feeling a bit too old to enjoy their older work, but not really being a huge fan of their newer work. The reality is every album they released had sales most artists could only dream of. And, arguably, they had earned the right to put out whatever they wanted to create.

Despite some reports to the contrary, I had never, ever, gotten the impression they were "sell-outs", or that they were just trying to gain sales. In fact, the only time I had ever considered this was when Meteora was released (sounding like a continuation of Hybrid Theory). I still loved that album, however.

I'm realising I'm actually spending very little time on the man himself, but rather the band he was the lead singer of. All of my emotions seem tied to the work of the band itself... It was through this band that Chester spoke to me in tracks like In The End and Numb when I was suicidal, depressed, lonely. Part of me feels it's an exaggeration to put them on par with The Beetles, Michael Jackson, or David Bowie. But My honest opinion is that they had the same worldwide impact all these other artists had. And as a listener, you felt a certain, anonymous, intimacy with Chester. Without knowing his situation, you felt and empathised with the fact he was drowning in his skin... That, in the end, it didn't even matter.

This isn't more obvious than the recent music video to the track One More Light. It's a song I may never have listened to were it not for recent events. As the video went on, it was like watching a montage of my youth. With one event, that song now has such a powerful meaning for me... Like the band's own epitaph. You listen and, along with its music video, feel like maybe he is talking about himself, or suicide in general... when in actuality it was written in memory of a friend who died of cancer.

The reality is he seemed to have a tortured youth, which led to substance misuse, self-loathing. Despite that (maybe because of his experience?) he became the lead singer of one of the biggest bands in the world. He always felt like a beacon of hope; an example of how you can't choose the hand you are dealt, but you can still follow your dreams. To hear of his death breaks down that construct in my head. I had the same experience with one of my closest friends... Another person who had been through the worst of life and seemed to pull through and find success/happiness... But ended up ending his own life. The meaning of their songs feels, in some ways, forever changed... Maybe even more intimate, and sincere, than we had ever imagined cranking up the volume after a day at school.

Free Code Camp Is Like The Codacademy I Used To Remember

2017-10-20T18:29:00.001+01:00

I have no idea why I didn't use this sooner; I had been subscribed to the FreeCodeCamp Blog for a few months now, as it had lots of little bits of coding news and things like that. I honestly thought it was solely a blog with new ideas on, and maybe a little side community!

However, the main FreeCodeCamp itself is made up of it's free main web design "certification" course, alongside local communities and a scheme in which you can contribute coding to non-profits later on in said course. I nags you once for a donation, near the beginning of the course itself, and that's it.

And I have to say I am impressed. It reminds me of the old design of Codecademy, which would encourage you to start learning from the homepage itself. Although FCC isn't quite from the homepage (there are a couple of pages of logging in and introduction to the site itself), the barriers between the homepage and learning are very small, and you start earning challenge points from your first log in.

This challenge point thing is the one idea that keeps me coming back to FCC at the moment... Each goal is incredibly small, maybe change a piece of code here or there (based on a similar example in the learning materials)... So it's very quick to delve in and start learning, even if there has been some time between learning sessions. This has the effect of making it much more likely you will return to it, and means you're also likely to learn for much longer. This is the kind of concept I hadn't quite been able to find up to now... But FreeCodeCamp definitely ticks the boxes for accessibility and ease of use.

Stuck In A Rut (Again)

2017-10-17T18:40:00.000+01:00

I appear to have got myself stuck in a rut, going from lots of little successes each day through learning, to spending most of my evenings pigging out on the sofa watching Vinesauce and Ricky Gervais. It is quite understandable; my Wednesday's and Thursdays away from home involve pretty strenuous work. Also, I've had some downers related to situations out of my control over the past few years (and how they impacted on some shitty decisions which were within my control, and my own responsibility).

Licensed under the CC0 License. From Pexels.

I think it's worth pointing out, to everyone, it's absolutely fine to feel like shit. Don't listen to these people who say "...for every negative there is a positive", or to have a positive outlook rather than dwell on the negative. It implies that it is wrong to feel crap when nothing can be further from the truth. Feeling low is part of human emotions... And if you are depressed, feeling low is an inevitable outcome. Although there is research a positive frame of mind can make you feel more positive, there's also research that suggests a low mood and depression are likened to an inflammation of the brain... Feeling like shit because of depression is as natural as feeling in pain because someone punches you. This isn't about making light of depression and dismissing it as something casual, but rather about accepting there's no need to beat yourself up even further for feeling low and not doing anything to get out of that.

In a nutshell, you have every right to feel down. You have every right to do sod all when you get home from work (or, for those who sadly can't work, doing nothing while you're at home). Whether it's full-blown depression or even just feeling a little lazy, it's no-one else's business but your own. It seems linked with an obsession to always be doing or learning something new, to feel like you have something new to show off to others. But really, just focus on yourself. If you need another night chilling out watching TV, it could be just what you need in that moment.

Measure The Time You're Wasting In Your Worth Per Hour

2017-10-10T19:55:00.001+01:00

Having a brief flick through my Lifehacker feed, I came across this brilliant article introducing "Sloth Worth".

Image licensed under CC0 License

It is an extension, for both Chrome and Firefox, that measures the amount of time you are wasting based on how much you earn (or value yourself) per hour. It needs to be enabled for specific sites, but once enabled it shows your total for all measured sites in the top left corner of that site (right now, my total is at £27.41 since this afternoon at £8 per hour, although I also turned it on for Duolingo and Lingvist to experiment how much value I'm using on "positive" endeavors).

Even though the extension is pretty simplistic, it's an eye-opener to how much time you actually spend doing unimportant things or procrastinating. Not to say that relaxing in your preferred way is useless. On the contrary; it's vital for your mental health. However, it's certainly a brilliant way to spur you onto more productive work or learning, if that is something you keep putting off.

The extension has its limits; I'd prefer breakdown of how much value is spent on each site, along with maybe catagories such as "education" or "entertainment", and a breakdown of the time of the day usually spent doing either. It'd also be cool to have a separate "positive" value indicator for time spent on more positive sites, to encourage you to engage with those sites more.

However, as I said, it is an eye-opener.

You can install the extension from their site at https://qotoqot.com/sloth-worth/

The Orville: More Star Trek Than Star Trek (these days)

2017-10-08T01:41:00.001+01:00

Besides my hugely belated, final, review of Metal Gear Solid V (which, trust me, is still going through re-writes to this day), it may seem rare to see some kind of entertainment review on here. However, I just binge watched the first 4 episodes of The Orville... And, being a person with an internet connection, I naturally couldn't resist the temptation to make my opinions known.

For the uninitiated, The Orville is the latest Seth MacFarlane comedy. Immediately this may be a cause for concern, as his animation has become increasingly stale (although I was a fan of A Million Ways To Die In The West).

And yet, within the space of its trailer, my feelings went from curious to optimistic.

In the end, these initial episodes far exceeded my expectations, actually feeling less like a "typical" sitcom than the trailer suggests... Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of one-liners. But the structure of each episode much more closely resembles that of The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine or even Voyager. This actually works incredibly well; as the world is built throughout each episode, the jokes feel funnier as you realise these are people making funny comments in a consistent world, rather than the changing rules of MacFarlane's previous animations. The plots feel like the kind you would fine on any past Trek episode, with the humour instead coming from the character's reactions. You could imagine these characters in the actual Star Trek universe, being given a ship because there's no-one else to pilot it. I mean, I'm sure even in the Federation there must be alcoholism, divorce and tension between senior staff...

Of particular note to me was the third episode "About A Girl". Without giving too many spoilers, it surprised me how well it emulated the way Star Trek would present cultural problems... With my only issues being it was so early in the series there wasn't the chance of more character development which was maybe needed for the situation and characters to feel more relatable. Equally, I can see why an episode such as this was broadcast so early... As a signal that this was aiming to be more than a silly comedy, but to derive humour instead from how it follows (and plays with) the situations from Star Trek itself, I feel it was successful. One thing that did shock me was some discussion this episode was so-called "SJW" and pushing some kind of political message... From people who clearly know nothing about Star Trek or the message Gene Roddenberry tried to convey from his very first season.

Overall, I'm pleased with the show. And I actually can't believe I've written about this first over any kind of review for Red Dwarf XII (whose first episode I also think was great). Maybe I'll get writing about that in the next few days...

The Big Problem with Gamification, GTD, Task Lists, Motivation...

2017-10-06T14:02:00.001+01:00

Task lists are great. There's an abundance of research that shows even ticking a box for the smallest of goals fires off all kinds of chemicals that make you feel good and encourage you to complete (and create!) more tasks than you can possibly imagine. Meanwhile, sites like DuoLingo and KhanAcademy keep a tally of how many days in a row you have engaged with the sites, reinforcing ongoing interaction with them and keeping the consistency of visits up (resulting in more effective learning).

The biggest problem is when that consistency is broken. From this week, I'm going to be involved in work away from home potentially two days a week. Having come back from my first week of this new routine, I have found my previously unblemmished record of learning now replaced with an empty hole for one of the days.

Now, DuoLingo offered a cheeky solution for keeping my streak intact by paying nearly £3 to restore it. I understand they are ultimately a business, and to be fair it isn't too different to those apps that lock away your internet so it isn't a distraction; unlocking it either at a fixed time or by paying a fee to the company. However these ultimately frustrate me, as I'd rather pay money to a charity for missing my goals than paying the priviledge for a company to reduce my services.

On top of that, it is only a solution for my use of that one site... It doesn't fix my record for sites like TypingClub or KhanAcademy (although these two visualise your learning in a better way, either as an average of a week like TypingClub or showing your stats for a month as well as daily, like Khan).

I therefore wanted to announce a new project tentatively called Goalst. It is an app that aims to do one thing: enable you to focus on a single preset task consistently every day... Or a one-task task-list. It specifically needs to be the easiest possible task you can think of.

This is for two reasons: firstly, and I can say this from experience, in the depths of depression sometimes even getting dressed, getting washed, or brushing your teeth can be forgotten. For the longest time my "Goalst" has been simply to brush my teeth. Which sounds ridiculous. But, by being the smallest possible goal I can think of, it's incredibly easy to convince myself to do and earn myself a success. It is one bonus to my health and wellbeing that, at times, would not otherwise be achieved if it wasn't for the sake of ticking a box.

The second thing is that single act of ticking a box, regardless of how easy, starts that chain reaction of chemicals I mentioned earlier. It motivates you to add more tasks, and can kickstart you to keep your consistency with more difficult tasks. For the average person it's a catalyst to keep to your other goals... To someone in a mental health crisis, I think the benefits are also obvious.

The aim of the app will be solely on that one task... It will specifically not offer any kind of integration with other app systems, or more than one task. The whole point is anyone can slot it into whatever organisation system (if any) a person has, so a person can open a clean interface with nothing but a tickbox and no horrifying stack of tasks. I might include features to keep a streak or show stats for the month, as well as a "start anew" button (for people who haven't used it in a while because they haven't needed it, and want to start afresh). I may even include some way to push the completed task to other task list sites, but the point isn't to replace these sites nor to rely on them as part of your system; it is meant for periods of "Crisis" in your life (whether it is extreme anxierty, or even procrastination... Whatever a crisis in not meeting your life goals is to you).

Anyway. I'll start coming up with designs... I understand the logic to code it, but still need to learn more on how to code an interface (in Python).

My response to "Where Pain Lives" on aeon.co

2017-10-02T20:14:00.000+01:00

This was a reply I posted on the article Where Pain Lives at http://www.aeon.co on the subject of how much pain can be on the mind. Just to add, I don't disagree with these facts at all. Also, I highly recommend you go and visit Aeon in general... It has lots of brilliant, intelligent long-form articles on a huge range of subjects.

Although I understand the point of the article, I think we should be cautious in how such research might affect medical policy. Not because I think it’s false; but rather, that it would concern me if we automatically assume it is most likely psychosomatic. I’m not saying we should waste lots of money either- even if the personal, heartfelt story I’m about to tell would usually be tinged with “give everyone a scan and never say it’s in their head and waste money” type of response. I’m merely saying that, conversely, there will still be people where there is a legitimate cause, and where surgery might help.

Basically, growing up my mother had Trigeminal Neuralgia… An illness I couldn’t claim to visualise, but which was described to me as a nerve pressing on a blood vessel in (or near) the brain. I can vividly remember growing up how she could get incredibly emotional very quickly… Or how she could be extremely cross, then you knew it hit her when she would put her hand to her mouth and wouldn’t say anything, and would go away. It upsets me discussing it with her nowadays- more the description on her side, that she was a zombie because of the sheer amount of painkillers she was on, she wasn’t really living and yet was in constant agony. It became one of those things where she had looked it up on the internet- and one of those extremely rare cases in these days of self-diagnosis where it turned out she actually had the condition.
Her doctor had referred her for a scan, where the result came back they couldn’t see anything. She had forgotten her Dentist had also referred her for a scan- at a different hospital. Rather than cancel, she decided to go along for a second opinion… Where it turned out they had found exactly what my Mum had read about on the internet. It would have been a 6-month wait for the consultation with a surgeon- which she decided to pay for privately for a few hundred pounds, as she really couldn’t cope with the pain for that long- and within the next month had brain surgery. Which, as a teenager at the time, was frightening.

It took a long time to recover- which I won’t elaborate on anymore- but my point is that she had the surgery, even had a complication when there was a pop in her head and fluid started dripping out- and 16 years later continues to be a successful accountant. It upsets me and feels strange to talk about the past of that pain, as it genuinely feels so foreign and unreal that it was my mother’s life. You would never dream she had “brain surgery”, which conjures up certain images. Yet because she had “brain surgery”, every time she renews her driving licence she has a huge form to fill in about the procedure, her surgeon as well as her GP, she has to answer yes or no tick boxes about whether she has ever had a seizure driving a car, fallen unconscious or the like. Again, it seems so bizarre to think if you know her- let alone it feels almost like a different life that never happened. Even when I use the phrase “brain surgery” to other people, I still have largely forgotten in the moment how huge a thing that was and how much the pain was to her at that point in time. Even just a few years later, starting my GCSEs, it felt like none of that had ever happened.

Again, my point isn’t to preach everyone should have a spine or brain scan for any hint of pain anywhere. On the contrary; the idea that one would have such potentially devastating back surgery when there is the chance you could relieve the pain in a non-invasive way should be a no-brainer (pardon the pun) for any sane human being. I think there does need to be some wider education on pain- it’s too easy to go for the painkillers when potentially even something like a headache can be a reaction to intense stress or even not drinking enough fluids… taking pills only masks the symptoms, not the cause. But it shouldn’t be at the expense of a proper evaluation if they are consistent in showing signs of pain… Although I note with back pain what was said about it being notoriously difficult to even tell the difference between a healthy back with apparent issues and a person who can’t walk with the same issues.

On top of that (and which if anything adds to the argument that “pain” can equally be in the brain) is the idea of the “nocebo”… Being too flippant about it being in a person's head, even just if that person gets the impression that is what you’re saying, can also have negative consequences. This flies in the face of evidence-based medicine, yet makes more sense if “pain” has a mental health element. And again, saying there could be a mental health element could also have a negative effect. Which is where I think it all comes back to education, and acknowledging mental health as an equal or large part of the “health” system. I read how people with chronic back pain have differently shaped brains, and it reminds me of neuroplasticity and how it’s equally possible to restructure the brain with training. Which is far preferable to having surgery which might result in you permanently being in a wheelchair.

GameHut Channel on Youtube Offers Wealth of Info on SEGA Genesis Game Programming

2017-10-02T16:16:00.001+01:00

This is just a very quick shout out to a Youtube channel I discovered today that has some excellent videos from a former Travellers Tales (now Tt Games) employee. Calling himself GameHut, I was drawn to his videos after watching how they cut Sonic 3-D Blast into two pieces so that it could be downloaded from SEGA's early internet service Seganet onto a Genesis. Then, straight after, I saw another video explaining how wiggling the full Sonic 3-D cartridge on a live console activated the level select, thanks to some ingenius debugging code.

The beauty of the videos is, even though it jumps into the deep end of code in some places, he explains everything in a way just about anyone who has turned a computer on can understand.

Even though it is at a much lower level than what I am learning at the moment, it was still interesting to see what is actually being done at a lower level. Also, thanks to this video explaining how 3-D was achieved on a beta Toy Story 3-D stage, I now have a much better understanding of how they created the illusion of 3-D on a Genesis (as well as how games like Wolfenstein achieve this).

EDIT: Posted wrong Toy Story video (although it's still very interesting, so I'll leave the wrong link up still underneath this)

Learn Python the Hard Way Exercise Solutions Now On My Github

2017-10-02T00:58:00.002+01:00

Call it the "gamification of Github", but interestingly one of the motivators for me to continue studying a programming language was the little indicator that shows how much activity you have contributed to your projects each day under your account. Without uploading my progress there, I felt a little stifled... Whereas before I could see the progress I had taken each day.

I was thinking how to do it, and decided to just upload the contents of my exercise folder to Github. Mostly as a mark of my own progress, but also for anyone to poke around who might be struggling on the same course, or just looking for alternative solutions, or whatever. At some point I intend to give the full contents human readable comments for each line (at present maybe three quarters of the files are fully commented).

Needless to say, I'm mostly loving the book, and felt the end of the first section of the book (up to exercise 26) was the perfect time to upload my progress so far. Even though most of the information in those exercises I already knew, what sets the course apart is it fully deconstructs each new topic you over over a number of exercises, so you know inside-out how to implement it before moving on. The focus on forcing you to type it rather than just copying and pasting is annoying initially, but it gives me a better understanding of the code line-by-line and what it should look like (although I'll tell a secret, I didn't do things like memorise my own dictionary, it seemed overkill when I was also commenting line-by-line and hadn't run into anything I needed to look up).

Again, the idea of "trying to break the code" seems non-sensical to me, as there are an infinite amount of ways to break it... Trying to aim for collecting many different kinds of errors seems tedious as well. Instead, I've been trying to mod and hack the code with as many of the skills I've learned as possible and still keep it working... e.g. adding lots of user inputs, moving repeated lines of code into functions, doing the same thing a different way with other things I've picked up from my other attempt to learn Python. It seems akin to taking apart an engine and putting it back together in order to learn the mechanics of it- and I think it's great.

My exercises from the course are available on GitHub.. Also, the course I am now following is "Learn Python The Hard Way" by Zed A. Shaw

Lingvist and Duolingo for language learning

2017-10-01T01:46:00.001+01:00

Along with my other learnings, I have recently become addicted to a web app called Lingvist. It is one of a number of gamified language learning sites, but I guess rather than earning XP from specific lessons, you can learn by the card and dip right in and out whenever you feel like it. Whether you want to do 1 or 1001, the main page just has a new flashcard with a missing word you need to solve.

The story behind the site is very fascinating, in a nutshell, being born from the desire of the developer to combine machine learning with memorization in order to help him learn French; all the way to the point he was able to pass a French language fluency course. When he realised a lot of people were interested in it, he started hiring developers to help him work on it, and it exploded from there.

Basically, it times when to next repeat a flashcard based on how many times you have answered that card correctly previously... Cards you keep answering correctly will appear less and less often (as your brain stores it in long-term memory), whilst cards you answer incorrectly will occur more often. It's the kind of tried and tested research-based learning that makes sense for its simple format.

And yet, I mention DuoLingo too? That is correct. I see both sites as complementary to each other and focused on different goals (even if I'm not quite as addicted to Duolingo right now). Whereas Lingvist focuses on building your vocabulary quickly, Duolingo feels more focused on the context of that vocabulary and the common phrases of the language. It means I reach a point in both apps where I already know certain words or phrases so I can speed ahead- but it never feels like duplication, as aiming to tick the box for studying both sites each day means I'm performing more gymnastics with that knowledge. And with Lingvist, which I'm slightly newer too, it just means those flashcards I'm already strong with just get pushed to the back of the pack quicker. Although I can't show any statistics to prove it, it feels like I am learning something greater than the combination of each service in isolation. It doesn't mean within 24 hours I'm fluent in German- but regardless it feels like I am progressing quickly.

Mental Health and Crises

2017-09-29T23:34:00.001+01:00

This is a repost of a reply I made to Isabel Hardman's Post on Mental Health... The themes seem relevant, and I couldn't think of a way to word them better here so I decided to post it here verbatim, apart from a response to an unhelpful person who had left a comment.

I can’t quite relate to forgetting TV shows, but I can relate to feeling how bizarre it is that I feels being such a different person between crisis and “health”. For a number of years I had given up computer games, as I became more focused on really forcing myself to socialise and wanting to go out and do a lot more. About a year ago I had my own crisis, and after months of literally just staring into nothingness, I got myself out of that by playing games again. And for a while I was more hooked on being a gamer than I ever did as a teenager. Luckily, that’s a state that it’s then easier for me to improve on and as distraction from the hours of daring myself to keep on living… I can move from games to Duolingo or Khan Academy to get that same “instant reward” from small and measurable goals… Before I know it I’ve sunk 10 hours over a week into learning German. Then by then I’m back out of the door and able to work (with a gradual return). It’s that feeling where I don’t understand how playing a game is what I want out of my life in this moment, and yet knowing in those moments it can be my most important distraction, after a phone call to my doctor and friends.

Learn Python 3 The Hard Way: Initial Thoughts

2017-09-29T13:56:00.001+01:00

I'm on exercise 15 now, and I'm finding I really enjoy it. It's going slow enough that I feel I can write something from scratch from the concepts I've already learned, and actively encourages hacking and breaking the initial code.

My only complaint is I'm not sure I like the snarky attitude of the author. I hope it's meant to be humourous, as I would really despise him as a tutor. It's very right side/black and white/arrogant thinking that seems to permeate some of the web development scene, which discourages questions and discussion and focuses solely on a RTFM approach. It's an approach I feel puts a lot of people off learning programming or getting more involved, as different people have different ways of internalising difficult concepts. He even says himself to not just stare at code but interact with it and print more outputs to diagnose what's wrong rather than just staring at it... And yet tells people to just "do as he says" rather than ask questions, which seems rather hypocritical. Also, on the one hand he chastises experimentation from "actual" questions he has received ("You shouldn't do that and just write it like I originally said"), and yet simultaneously chastises those who haven't taken time to experiment or break the code.

Again, I hope it's meant mostly in jest. Otherwise he really comes across a dick.

I'm still figuring out the best way to integrate the new course with my GitHub, nonetheless, the old work is still available there. Also, the course I am now following is "Learn Python The Hard Way" by Zed A. Shaw

Move to Learn Python the Hard Way

2017-09-29T00:54:00.001+01:00

I had my last straw with the "Python Beginner to Advanced" course today. It was after I finished a task on API calls using POST requests to the Google URL minimizer. I thought I'd take what I learned to attempt some fancy stuff with my Last.FM library (or even basic stuff)... Yet realised I actually knew very little about what I needed to go. I had a decent, surface-level understanding... But couldn't get anything to work. I realised I needed a course a little deeper. I finally lost it with that course.

So first I tried Codecademy... Which gave me my very, very first coding experience years ago with its intuitive interface. I progressed fairly well, then we got to booleans. They seemed to think the best way to explain it was to copy, word for word, the code they had already explained before you actually type it. So you end up typing stuff you already know, just to get the tick and move on. Don't get me wrong; the course I ended up going with takes pride in asking you to type and retype verbatim what is written. But it at least leaves you to test it first before explaining why it works, then it makes sure you investigate yourself why it works (or, if there's a bug, doesn't work). I was so switched off with Codecademy I left an angry message on their feedback forum... Then hunted elsewhere.

I decided to focus on Learn Python3 The Hard Way for a number of reasons. Firstly... The website looks pretty. Joking; I mean, it's a pretty website, but I'd heard a lot of good things about the course. Not only that, but when I read through the materials earlier in the year it really appealed to my desire to understand code inside-out, rather than just copying snippets "because it works". Even though maybe 90% of the stuff I covered in the first 10 or so exercises was already information I knew, I appreciated the focus on encouraging me to comment each line of code in order to explain exactly what is going on. I felt like some of these ideas on what might be happening were finally given some form... Not only that, but I now feel much more confident creating something very basic from scratch than I ever did following the "Ums" and "Ahs" of the main course I'd been featuring up to now. The flow of activities often includes researching Google for the meaning of something, then coming back and integrating that with what I have already worked on (not that it should be mistaken for laziness on the author's part; he often has the concepts explained in a future exercise). There is also a great focus on hacking and "breaking" your code... The breaking part I find tedious I admit... I mean, I get he's getting us tuned onto debugging and figuring out what's wrong myself. But often I'm pretty honed in on where I make a mistake already just from the error messages I'm left with. Instead, I take "find ways to break your code" to mean hacking it so its purpose and operations become something entirely different from what was initially coded... And including inappropriate expletives wherever I can.

That being said, I have felt extremely lethargic today. Maybe it has been from focusing more on courses in the last week then I have done in a long, long time. I'm surprised I typed as much as I did for this post, as I just feel slow at this moment.

I'm still figuring out the best way to integrate the new course with my GitHub, nonetheless, the old work is still available there. Also, the course I am now following is "Learn Python The Hard Way" by Zed A. Shaw

Python App 2: The Finishing Touches (For Now)

2017-09-27T22:01:00.000+01:00

Firstly, I again need to make the point... The tutor making mistakes then correcting them mid-video is extremely frustrating. I guess it is good to see his troubleshooting process, but again it nearly broke my game... I had to rewrite at least one portion, which I put my hands up could have been due to my unorthodox changes, but equally I was coming across the same errors he did during the video so it compounded the problem quite a lot.

Really it sounds like I did nothing much else when I word it as putting the "finishing touches", when in reality there was quite a bulk of work. I added multiple enemies (and being able to target those multiple enemies), and also gave them the ability to attack individually and give them a rudimentary AI (they heal themselves while their health is low, otherwise that is the one ability they don't use). In my own version, I also gave them the "Pray" magic I had created myself earlier, meaning they also replenish their own MPs. It has really given the enemies some real teeth, and needing some strategy to defeat!

I had also spent maybe 45 minutes trying to see how I could recreate it as a GUI application using Kivy, but realised I didn'y actually know enough about the ins-and-outs to effectively transfer it over, with buttons and the likes, even if I can create on a whim fancy buttons (that don't actually hook up to or do anything). I decided to continue with the course instead, at least until I've finished his lessons on using the built-in Python interfaces. Maybe then I'll have a better idea of how to manipulate the code better?

As usual, my code is available to peruse and learn from at my GitHub page. The course I am learning from is Nick Germaine's "The Complete Python Course: Beginner to Advanced!" Available at StackSkills.

Python App 2: Working, animated HP bars + Working items + building my Party!

2017-09-26T22:57:00.000+01:00

Firstly, I think I'm in a fair position now to offer some constructive criticism of the course. Although it is amazing that in the 10 years since leaving school this is the first course I have finally gotten more than a quarter through, let alone genuinely learning a programming language finally in my life, I sometimes find the lack of certainty frustrating. It would be one thing if it were a real lecture, but leaving in mistakes rather than editing them out doesn't help my own confidence in what I have learned. Especially when one or two mistakes broke the game I was working on (even more frustrating as I tend to deviate slightly, at least once making me think it was my own fault before rewatching and realising his error). It would be one thing if it was an end of video test to spot a deliberate error, but I should at least be able to trust the tutor's own code as a barometer with which to measure my own (especially for an absolute beginner).

I have turned it into somewhat of a game, where I pause the video and try to spot the error myself first, but still. It makes the learning experience needlessly difficult and harder to grasp. I don't want these words to be taken as slagging off the course, as on the other hand I enjoy the more conversational style. It means I can, generally, follow along. One other minor frustration is that he tends to have the program front and center on his recordings, wheras I would prefer either to have it only covering one one half of the screen (so I can code along with it on the other side), or to have the video tall and fill the entire screen, so I can snap it to one of the sides.

Now that is out of the way, onto what I was learning today. Firstly, I implemented some proper item usage code. Because I had already created a "charge" function (is function the right word? I get a little confused with the lingo, I mean something that works something out and comes back to you), I could use that for mp healing items too. I also replaced some of my own code with his, to do with only healing max hp/mp for elixers (rather than just healing a blanket 9999MP, which had the same effect but looked strange when the status came up as that on healing to max... It looks cleaner just having "fully restore mp".

After that, it was a kind of combined task to create animated statusbars with adding new party members. In some ways they went hand-in-hand with each other, and to my surprise it was increadiblyeasy (you just use classes, which act like a metaphorical "mould" when there is more than one of something, like characters). It was interesting seeing how to make the code cleaner by only calling a few lines of code a number of times (rather than copying and pasting that same piece of code multiple times, which is inefficient and results in a longer, and uglier, document).

It was quite a similar experience creating the hp bars. There is actually only one code for what a Name/HP/MP bar looks like... Then, for every character, it peeks at that template, and adds the character's own stats to it. Again, it was fascinating seeing solutions to problems I'd never even considered when sat at home playing games. I mean, if I thought about it logically I'd probably imagine it look something similar, but it's cool to implement these things myself and have them do the work for me.

My one frustration was... name lengths. I wasted a great deal of time trying to figure out how to deliver a fixed 9 character field for names on the HP bar, so they are laid out in something like a table rather than all over the place (and so, when a status update is posted like "Ronius attacks for 85!" it doesn't end up appearing "Ronius attacks for 85!". I gave up in the end... Which is maybe for the best, seeing as I want to somehow give this more of a GUI for Android and Windows (using Kivy), which will likely require an entirely different solution!

As usual, my code is available to peruse and learn from at my GitHub page. The course I am learning from is Nick Germaine's "The Complete Python Course: Beginner to Advanced!" Available at StackSkills.

Python App 2: Magic Class, Fixing Heals and Charge MP magic type!

2017-09-25T19:23:00.000+01:00

It's a pretty awesome feeling when you first use what you have learned to fumble around the code and create something entirely new.

The last lesson I completed was to do with moving magic into its own class rather than the main script. And, although the tutor nearly broke his (and my) game because of a mistake he made in the video, I managed to finish it successfully. I then realised I hadn't included a "heal" function for my Player... So I hacked it together, using some of the code for dealing damage, and replacing the minus sign with a plus. I also added an "if" statement that set the hp to maxhp if the HP went above that amount (effectively capping the HP to whatever the max is.

As such, the magic code looked like this:

...
def take_damage(self, dmg):
self.hp -= dmg
if self.hp < 0:
self.hp = 0
return self.hp

def heal(self, dmg):
self.hp += dmg
if self.hp > self.maxhp:
self.hp = self.maxhp
...

I then added a line to my main code copying the black magic code but replacing it as such:

...
if spell.type == "white":
player.heal(magic_dmg)
print(bcolors.OKBLUE + "\n" + spell.name + " heals for", str(magic_dmg), "HP." + bcolors.ENDC)
elif spell.type == "black":
enemy.take_damage(magic_dmg)
print(bcolors.OKBLUE + "\n" + spell.name + " attacks for", str(magic_dmg), "HP." + bcolors.ENDC)
...

Feeling pleased with my work, I decided to create a magic that charges some MP called Pray (at a 0MP cost); first I created another copy of the heal code, but tweaked it as such:

...
def charge(self, dmg):
self.mp += dmg
if self.mp > self.maxmp:
self.mp = self.maxmp
...

And then finished by adding an extra line to the main script:

...
elif spell.type == "charge":
player.charge(magic_dmg)
print(bcolors.OKBLUE + "\n" + spell.name + " charges", str(magic_dmg), "MP." + bcolors.ENDC)
...

And... Well, it worked! Which astounded me! It may be a tiny thing, but it shows me that I'm actually learning the ropes and create my own deviations rather than purely copying/pasting code! It appears I'm actually understanding it!

As usual, my code is available to peruse and learn from at my GitHub page. The course I am learning from is Nick Germaine's "The Complete Python Course: Beginner to Advanced!" Available at StackSkills.

Thoughts on Mozilla Add-on Crisis and Firefox 57.0

2017-09-25T14:43:00.001+01:00

I haven't particularly hidden my disdain for the direction Mozilla has taken with their flagship Firefox browser this past couple of years. After a decade of preaching the benefits of Web Apps to my peers ("Better privacy with an app-like experience for Firefox Mobile!"), preaching the advantages of Webrunner-based apps and how customisable they were (remember Songbird/Nightingale, Instantbird?), and anticipating the release of the later cancelled Matchstick... I finally snapped with the news Firefox was to entirely ditch its old, XUL-based add-ons (and even their newer "Jetpack" add-ons).

Numerous add-on developers have expressed their anger (here are some more angry replies in response to their plan to move solely to WebExtensions). What I find most telling is the fact Mozilla representatives seem to refuse to answer or even acknowledge peoples anger, even on their public blog. It leads to the feeling they only discuss and listen within their "open" forums/echo chambers designated for these decisions and discussions. It might seem unfair to label them as such, as this is how open source development generally happens anyway- But it's a label I stand by, as the reality is it can feel intimidating as the average user to even contemplate visiting such a place to air your views... And, more to the point, the "simplified" experience they're aiming at the more beginner user likely hasn't even been discussed and considered with the help of these kinds of users on said forums. Instead, they seem to rely on "questionnaires" which have that sinking feeling of seeking confirmation bias with how they are worded... You know, like when a town council holds an "open consultation" about a project it already intends on doing anyway. It adds weight to the arguments that some people within Mozilla have a "holier than thou" attitude, and think they know the best for their community. It is also an alarming direction to take for an organisation that claims to support the "open web", and seeks pride in being the last big non-profit browser (despite acting incredibly corporate).

But anyway, Mozilla is still an organisation that garners my support, maybe against my better judgement. Their products are those I keep coming back to; I even have gradually changed my add-on habits to ensure I'm no longer using "legacy" extensions. It has meant I have lost some functionality, which only Pale Moon (and in some cases even Google Chrome) can provide.

Then I launched it. And my first thoughts? It's actually incredibly fast. Even with Pale Moon preaching "benchmarks are useless, it's the subjective experience that matters"... My subjective experience, within the first 30 seconds, was that everything felt much smoother and more intuitive. I like the redesigned new tab page (as I mentioned previously, being an avid Pocket user I actually appreciate the integration as well as the fact their article suggestions are, generally, interesting and well-researched). Tab loading is speedy, moving a tab outside to its own window is quick and doesn't result in any video stream freezing (I most do this with Youtube, so I can watch it on one side of the screen whilst I do work on the other). Within a minute, I made it my default browser again, after a few months of uncertainty.,

This doesn't stop me feeling cross with Mozilla. I find their biased language praising moving to "modern web technologies" disgusting, in one stroke implying all the complainers within the add-ons community (as well as the users that champion those add-ons). Equally, I have no problems with WebExtensions, in comparison to the Pale Moon scripture which outright refuses to support them like a toddler. I have never had issues with moving to support them: my only issue is dropping support for well-established add-on systems when WE still isn't feature compatible (and where, in a handful of cases, it never will be). The ball was already dropped with Firefox becoming the browser full of bloated add-ons when Chrome proved it could implenment add-ons in a speedier way. People who jumped ship for speed already made their minds up nearly a decade ago; and Mozilla has been chasing Google's Porsche when Firefox was more of an off-roader in the first place... A Swiss army knife, more focused on customisation. Don't get me wrong, the speed increases they gained within just a few years of Chrome's launch, and without hugely breaking compatibility too, were amazing. But since then they have launched a cocktail of projects which they inevitably ditched... At a time they maybe should have consolidated on just the browser, before the Google Search revenue spring dried up as a result of making Google Default just not having the same value it once did. On top of all these projects, Mozilla put down increasingly difficult hoops for developers to jump through (electrolysis anyone?) leaving most add-on developers feeling fed-up and closing shop.

In my opinion, the best situation would be to either focus on making WebExtensions 100% feature compatible... Or focus on keeping legacy add-on support until it is compatible. I really hope Mozilla realises the error of their ways, before it falls into obscurity. Otherwise it really will be a frightening world where just Google and Microsoft are the internet heavyweights...

To try Firefox 57.0 with Firefox Developer Edition, click here

Mozilla recently updated their "Firefox Nightly" Blog with details of browser version 57 with Firefox Quantum.

Typing Club and Touch Typing

2017-09-24T23:42:00.001+01:00

So, in my current educated-oriented mood, I decided to broaden my horizons. I have been an avid use of Pocket (known years ago as Read it later) for a number of years now, mostly as a repository of all the articles I've read (as, inevitably, I would lose articles that might be useful for academic argument... Or pointless internet arguments...) but also as time went on for reading things later. I was also probably one of the few people that loved Mozilla's decision to purchase and integrate Pocket into Firefox, and also quite like Pocket recommendations (one of the rare places you can find curated, intelligent, content I've found... Like a Google News/Facebook Feed of more in-depth articles... And zero Daily Mail). Anyway, this suggestion for additional learning came from one of those recommendations.

It is an article about someone who recently learned to touch-type at 29, and how it has improved his workflow as a programmer. Fitting the bill of being both 29 and learning programming, it seemed to make sense I may as well try to start learning touch-typing as well. It's something I'll aim to do daily, alongside my programming course.

My first thoughts when visiting the aptly named TypingClub were that it was very reminiscent of DuoLingo from its home page. It is clear they have gone for a similar gamification route (where tasks are cut up into small 3 minute chunks, and you are given "badges" or achievements for doing a certain amount each day). That is fine by me; I have seen through learning German that Gamifying it turns it from a chore to something incredibly addictive, that you can quickly dip in and out of (usually meaning you end up spending more time with it each day than you might have done learning traditionally, because of its easy pick-up-and-play design). My only gripe is it doesn't quite have the polish of DuoLingo in some places... The results screen looks pretty ugly, and isn't helped by having an ad at the bottom. Although I guess it is better to have it on your results, rather than while you're trying to type!!

Starting from the beginning turns your keyboard from that familiar thing you can just about "pretend" to touch type, to something entirely alien where you find yourself constantly pausing to think where the next key is, and constantly hitting the wrong key because of muscle memory. And yet, as you start learning more finger/key placements, you slowly find something "clicks", like something is being reconnected in your brain, and you start to find the placements tallying up with that map in your brain again... Just that the map now covers all your fingers, rather than a few. Seriously though, those first couple of sessions learning to touch-type just random combinations of F and J repeatedly feel so alien... Suddenly it's like the letters look completely unfamiliar, the keyboard feels unfamiliar; it's so strange to think how our brains chunk up the words and know how to spell those words from that muscle memory, whilst changing up how you type completely shatters all that and feels like you're relearning to type all over again.

Anyway, I ended up spending 20 minutes with an average typing speed of 14wpm, which interestingly was consistently well above the minimum speed to pass. It doesn't compare with the 40wpm I can type while writing this (I most certainly didn't write this post as slow as my touch-typing speed!), but hopefully it will make this one task that takes up most of my life more efficient.

Python App 3: "Plong" For Windows

2017-09-24T20:13:00.001+01:00

Another common problem I find with learning a programming language is how far you really need to get into learning a language before you get any useful returns in creating anything that even resembles an everyday Windows/Android game.

So, I was desperate to move on to something as an "Interlude" to my second Python app to investigate how difficult it actually would be to port some form of Python code into a ".exe" or ".apk" we are used to.

In my investigation, I discovered Kivy... Which acts as a library to create and compile apps to Windows, iPhone, Linux, Android and pretty much anything else you could name. So I dived into their Pong Game Tutorial

It was refreshingly simple to set up, as I had already used pip to set up PyCharm (pip feeling very similar to how something like apt-get works). Installing everything I needed was a breeze... Even typing, running and making changes to their code was quite easy considering I'd already had some deeper experience of Python now under my belt... I was probably at about the right part of my education to start "experimenting"!

The only fiddly part was subsequently completing their tutorial to Create A Package For Windows, only really fiddly because you had to manually park command prompt in the empty folder you wanted to compile to, manually add a name in the command you type in then manually edit the created ".spec" file to include the files of your project. I mean really it was easy stuff too, although used to the ease of projects up to now I only question why no-one has simplified this experience as of yet. Equally, it finally made me feel like doing "real" coding.

It spat out a "Plong.exe" file, I launched it... And it ran exactly as it did in PyCharm! Finally, I had created my first ever application! There are some things that niggle me, like the command prompt that opens before the actual game which I wish I could silence (saying that even Steam Games such as Metal Gear Solid V do the same thing). There is also the small fact it isn't completely mine, it is largely the unedited code from their website at the moment as I wanted to quickly progress to actually compiling the thing. But, actually, if you're an intermediate at computing like me (and barely an intermediate at programming) you'll actually find the whole compilation process pretty simple.

Plong.exe is available at https://github.com/GlitchWalker/Python-and-Kivy-Pong-Game/releases, and as always my source code is available at my GitHub