ScienceWorld

Anti-Hydrogen Captured!

2010-11-27T11:04:00.000+10:00

10:34:40AM, 27/11/10 AEST-11:05:01AM, 27/11/10 AEST

As you may have already heard, or you may already know a lot about it (whether your a physicist, technician or enthusiast), Antimatter has been captured for the first time. It has been created artificially in experiments.

I already knew about the discovery and capture, and know a lot about the physics behind it, however I wanted to inform and educate you all on the subject.

Please note, some of the quotes and statistics come from http://www.news.com.au/technology/sci-tech/large-hadron-collider-traps-antimatter/story-fn5fsgyc-1225956290864 and other sources, while most of it comes from me. I will cite these sources correctly.

Antimatter is the opposite of matter and is annihilated when it comes into contact with matter and vice versa. Instead of an electron, it has a positron (also called an antielectron-but I prefer positron). A positron has the opposite elementary charge to an electron. Instead of a proton it has an antiproton which also has the opposite elementary charge to a proton. Then there is the antineutron which has an elementary charge of 0 (like a neutron).

Now that the basic (and I mean basic) structure of an antimatter atom has been explained, we can get on to the story.

Researchers at the Large Hadron Collider have trapped 38 atoms of antihydrogen for 0.166 seconds using incredibly powerful magnetic fields. [1]

"We’ve been able to trap about 38 atoms, which is an incredibly small amount, nothing like what we would need to power Star Trek’s starship Enterprise or even to heat a cup of coffee,"

Robert Thompson, Head of Physics and Astronomy, University of Calgary said. [1]

Now this may seem like nothing, but that is incredible, this means with the huge amounts of data collected, that we can confirm what we are theorising and/or discover completely new ideas and theories.

For Star Trek fans (like myself) the whole concept of a warp drive revolves around anitmatter. Matter (deuterium) and anitmatter (antideuterium) are injected in to the core by powerful containments fields (magnetic fields to control the particle flow) and collide releasing vast quantities of energy (gamma rays, X-rays, etc.). This powers the warp nacelles and generates a "warp field" and warps spacetime in that field to propel the vessel at FTL velocities.

A paper from the study was published in well known peer-reviewed, scientific journal Nature. [1]

That paper involved cooling negatively charged antiprotons and compressing them into a cold cloud of positrons.[1]

This possibly involves Bose-Einstein condensate temperatures.

“Understanding antimatter will hopefully enable us to shed light on why almost everything in the known universe consists of matter,"

Micheal Charlton, University of Swansea said.[1]

Footnotes:

[1] http://www.news.com.au/technology/sci-tech/large-hadron-collider-traps-antimatter/story-fn5fsgyc-1225956290864

Cubans Don't Like COD?

2010-11-25T16:45:00.000+10:00

04:27:10PM, 25/11/10 AEST-04:46:20PM, 25/11/10 AEST

As I am typing this post, I am also looking at this article (http://www.news.com.au/technology/gaming/call-of-duty-black-ops-attempt-on-castros-life-is-perverse-says-cuba/story-e6frfrt9-1225951908748) on http://www.news.com.au and I don't want to take any credit for something I didn't do (that's just how I roll). However, I do provide commentary and express my opinion.

CUBAN authorities say Americans are living out their Fidel Castro assassination fantasies through video games. Ouch Cuba, I bet that hurt!

"What the United States couldn't accomplish in more than 50 years, they are now trying to do virtually," said an article posted on Cubadebate, a state-run news website.

The brouhaha surrounds highly anticipated game Call of Duty: Black Ops, which went on sale on Tuesday.

The game takes players on secret missions to American Cold War enemies such as the Soviet Union, Cuba, Vietnam and Laos.

The Cuban operation is one of the first challenges players face. Well one of them have to come first!

The mission takes place with John F. Kennedy in the White House in the months leading up to the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion and the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, which brought the world to the brink of nuclear Armageddon.

Players must shoot their way through the colonial streets of Havana on a mission to assassinate Castro, then a young revolutionary who had recently overthrown dictator Fulgencio Batista.

In a twist, they end up killing a body-double and are sent to prison in Siberia.

Cuba said the game attempts to legitimise murder and assassination in the name of entertainment

"This new video game is doubly perverse," the Cubadebate article said.

"On the one hand, it glorifies the illegal assassination attempts the United States government planned against the Cuban leader ... and on the other, it stimulates sociopathic attitudes in North American children and adolescents."

Hey, I'm an adolescent and I'm not adversely affected by playing COD 4, COD 6 and COD 7 (maybe it's because I suck at them-well only on PC. Even though I do love the PC as a gaming platform).

Messages left by The Associated Press with Activision were not immediately returned.

The article said psychological studies show that violent video games can produce anti-social behaviour in the young because players must take an active part in the bloodletting in order to win.

Let me get one thing straight, bloodletting is a far, far obsolete medical practice, used thousands of years ago by Chinese doctors and other cultures. I don't think they would do that at all!

Watching violent movies, by contrast, is a more passive pursuit and thus less likely to produce copycat behavior.

Christopher J. Ferguson, a psychology professor at Texas A&M International University who studies video game violence, said such studies were off-base.

Frankly, I agree with him, not only as a COD-lover, but as a scientifically minded person.

"There is really a lot of, obviously, rhetoric and politics going on," he told the AP.

Which the Cubans said themselves with their remarks on the Americans reliving their assassination

fantasies virtually.

"At this point, there is no evidence that video games, violent or otherwise, cause harm to minors."

Prof Ferguson said youth violence in the United States "is at its lowest level in 40 years", yet studies show that as many as 95 percent of young men have played violent video games at some point in their lives.

Cuba says Castro has survived more than 600 attempts on his life. He must be prestige or something...I wonder if that is on COD 7, COD 6, COD 4 or some other one?

Others count the number of serious plots in the dozens, including CIA attempts to poison his pen and his trademark cigars; as well as efforts to recruit a former young German lover and to hide a gun in a TV camera.

American intelligence agents once allegedly hired a hotel worker to slip a fatal pill into Castro's milkshake.

Like all the others, the plot was unsuccessful.

"I think I hold the dubious record of having been the target of more assassination attempts than any politician, in any country, in any era," Castro said in a July 1998 speech, drawing laughter from the crowd.

"The day I die, nobody will believe it." I will...we all die at some point.

North Korea Fires at Yeonpyeong

2010-11-25T07:35:00.000+10:00

07:25:06AM, 25/11/10 AEST-07:35:33AM, 25/11/10 AEST

On Tuesday (23/11/10) at 02:34pm, North Korea fired several rounds of artillery at South Korean waters and an island called Yeonpyeong. It was largely a coastal bombardment, injuring several soldiers.

Col. Lee Bung-woo, spokesman at South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff has stated that most of them hit the waters just off the island although some of them hit the actual island.

The South Korean military responded with their own artillery.

Source: http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2010/11/23/93/0301000000AEN20101123006100315F.HTML

Today at 07:33am AEST, The Today Show stated that a total of 4 people had been killed (2 of which were civilian).

The US Navy is headed to South Korea to join in "naval exercises" following the attack.

MIT's Transient Imaging Camera

2010-11-22T17:25:00.002+10:00

04:23:00PM, 22/11/10 AEST-05:26:37PM, 22/11/10 AEST

Well, MIT keeps pumping out new technology. One of the latest is a Transient Imaging Camera-with the ability to capture objects not within it's direct view.

It uses multiple bursts of light quadrillionths of a second apart, and only open for a femtosecond, then counts the quantity of photons it receives. Then,it emits another pulse of light and opens for a fraction amount longer, then counts the new photons it receives and uses these to map out the area.

Currently, the images being generated are poor quality (and I mean really poor quality). However, the staff at Massachusetts Institute of Technology are attempting to make them more higher quality.

Here is the MIT link:

http://cameraculture.media.mit.edu/femtotransientimaging

Restructuring Complete!

2010-11-20T07:25:00.004+10:00

07:20:15AM, 20/11/10 AEST-07:26:21AM, 20/11/10

ScienceWorld's organisational restructuring is finally complete! We have some new staff!

The Gaming department is now the Entertainment department, with three divisions:

Gaming
Film
Music

Brady is now our FPS Gamer and Kyle is now our Web Gamer. Ethan is now Head of Gaming division and Braeden is Head of Entertainment department.

Bailey is now President (as far authority goes, he's second in command).

Blogging will now return to normal!

Thanks for the wait!

Home Office Weekly

2010-10-31T19:07:00.000+10:00

07:03:45PM, 31/10/10 AEST-07:07:07PM, 31/10/10 AEST

Today, I came across an excellent website called Home Office Weekly (http://www.homeofficeweekly.com).

It is fantastic! Home office tips, home business tips, weekly articles, supplies, art, books, and more.

I recommend it to all people who want top start a home business, start working from home, need advice or just simply want to get better at business.

Deadrising 2 Interview

2010-10-29T05:51:00.002+10:00

05:36:24AM, 29/10/10 AEST-05:52:13AM, 29/10/10 AEST

Here it is, our monthly gaming interview with Bailey.

Q1) How many weapons combos can you create?

A1) If you walk around the city you will find that objects have a blue spanner on them that means you can make something with it its nearly unlimited.

Q2) 0 being the lowest and 10 being the highest, what is your rating of the campaign mode?

A2) If you leave the missions to the last minute you need to start the campaign again yes again but all in there pretty easy and long besides the psychopaths trying to kill you 8/10 very nice.

Q3) 0 being the lowest and 10 being the highest, what is your rating of the multiplayer mode?

A3) Co-op is everything roam around with a buddy killing everything nothing stands a chance against two killers with lots of weapons and humor but there's also a mode thats is most definitely boring is sli-cycle riding zombies just stand there getting slaughted 6/10.

Q4) 0 being the lowest and 10 being the highest, what is your rating of the graphics?

A4) The graphics are nice bloody suits blood on the ground, blood on your weapons besides blood on the people, zombies,stores and scenery. 9/10 for a zombie game...

Q5) 0 being the lowest and 10 being the highest, what is your rating of the gameplay?

A5) Freeplay mode is nice but if you've done everything before then its boring and thats why campaign's there to keep you from getting bored... boring... Left 4 Dead the zombies run at you in, Deadrising2 your lucky to see a single zombie run at you-again boring.

Q6) What is your favourite aspect of the game?

A6) Killing is the funnest thing to do on a zombie game like this...

Q7) 0 being the lowest and 10 being the highest, what is your rating of the storyline?

A7) 6/10 because time runs out you need to keep moving but you cant run fast which gets very annoying during gameplay.

Q8) What do you want to see from the franchise?

A8) A more satisfying zombie game that zombies can have a chance to kill you and can run faster.

Q9) What is your advice for other players or prospective buyers?

A9) Play Deadrising before Deadrising 2.

Q10) 0 being the lowest and 10 being the highest, what is your rating of the overall game?

A10) 7/10 a game that most people would hire not buy.

Well there you have it! The second monthly gaming interview on ScienceWorld. We'll have Medal of Honor for the next Monthly Gaming Interview!

Khanacademy

2010-10-18T07:33:00.000+10:00

07:24:43AM, 18/10/10 AEST-07:33:16AM, 18/10/10 AEST

For all of you who know about khanacademy and Salman Khan, you probably know that he is also:

a) Bill Gates' favourite teacher.
b) Was shown on PBS News Hour for his Khanacademy work.
c) Holds a B.S. in Mathematics, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
d) Holds an M.S. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
e) Holds an M.B.A in business.
f) Has a wikipedia page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Khan_(educator))
g) There's loads more yet I won't go on in list format.

I'd just like to say, If you are having trouble with grades, or are just simply curious (like me) or you want to donate please head to his site today.

http://www.khanacademy.org

As I'm writing this I'm watching Scientific Notation 3 on his site.

StickRPG and There Will Be Brawl

2010-10-17T09:23:00.000+10:00

09:18:30AM, 17/10/10 AEST-09:24:08AM, 17/10/10 AEST

Well, on Twitter I mentioned that a post about StickRPG and There Will Be Brawl is in order-here it is!

I've been playing StickRPG for 3 years now and it has only gotten better. A nice simple RPG with many different possibilities and systems. I urge you all to go to http://www.xgenstudios.com/play/stickrpg and play it. Or check out other flash games there (Motherload, Creative Kill Chamber, wpnfire, etc.).

Also, a web mini series that has really got me interested. There Will Be Brawl is classed as a Machinima but I'd class it as a Game-based Live Action. Nonetheless it is still very good. Ten episodes to see and there site is:

http://therewillbebrawl.com/.

Got to go play StickRPG now, but stay listening for Bailey's Deadrising 2 interview!

New Twitter Account!

2010-10-16T13:41:00.000+10:00

01:25:10PM, 16/10/10 AEST-01:41:46PM, 16/10/10 AEST

ScienceWorld has a new Twitter account! At the time of writing it was made under half an hour ago. So follow SciWorldBlog!

It will mostly be news, random thoughts and other announcements.

Feel free to tweet, retweet and follow SciWorldBlog!

RED Premiere, FRAG And New Email

2010-10-15T17:47:00.000+10:00

05:25:10PM, 15/10/10 AEST-05:47:05PM, 15/10/10 AEST

RED premiered today on the red carpet, Machinima's ETC covered the movie premiere today. For that video goto:

http://www.youtube.com/user/Machinima#p/c/6656FE6D5A4D6973/3/4LTaXSmSMVg

For the trailer goto:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ci6US-MfUcI

A fantastic cast, with names such as Morgan Freeman, Bruce Willis, John Malkovich and Helen Mirris-just to name several of them!

Also,

Machinima's ETC 14/10/10 episode covered a documentary called FRAG about pro gaming and the stresses of the occupation.

For that video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnmZ3hcf_tg

The official website is http://www.fragmovie.com/ and the trailer seems interesting. I might check it out if it screens in Australia-what do you think?

Also, head to our Communications page for the correct way to email us, our new email address and tips.

Thanks, that's all for this post, we will be back with a Deadrising 2 interview from Bailey.

SecretAgentBob And Blog Silence

2010-10-05T18:39:00.000+10:00

05:30:38PM, 05/10/10 AEST-06:39:35PM, 05/10/10 AEST

Hello again!

My internet connection has been offline recently, so I've switched to another computer. Hopefully this explains the recent blog silence.

Also, FilmCow (and the YouTube channel SecretAgentBob) do some great work. I've known about Jason Steele for about two years now and just wanted to try to spread the word about his work. Hilarious videos on YouTube and great merchandise. His cartoons are so funny I start crying because I laugh that much!

His latest video is Bino the Elephant (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mt1kWNImkxo).
My favourite videos are The Cloak, Charlie the Unicorn series, Llamas with Hats series, Spatula Madness and Bino the elephant. However, I do love them all.

I strongly advise that you check out is website (http://www.filmcow.com) or his YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/SecretAgentBob).

View, subscribe favourite just check out his work.

Microsoft Buzz

2010-09-27T10:00:00.000+10:00

09:48:20HRS, 27/09/10 AEST-10:00:46HRS, 27/09/10 AEST

Well, after browsing the popular news website http://news.com.au and their tech centre, it seems the buzz is on IE9 and after certain reading reviews I must admit I am excited. As you may know, my Google Chrome Review has my opinion as great on chrome. But, I am excited with these reviews and predictions of IE9 I am going to try it when it is released.

On a different topic but under the main one, Phone 7 seems like it may boost Microsoft's phone market slice. Sources from http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/exec-tech/microsoft-eyes-phone-7-app-developers/story-e6frgazf-1225910019798 app developer attendance to Tech Ed at the Gold Coast has increased by 200 from 2009 and Phone 7 should be a break from Mobile 6.5. However, according to that same source, Microsoft's slice of the phone market has decreased from 9.3% to 5.0%. So Microsoft has a bit of catching up to do. In fact, I hope they gets good slice of the phone market this year.

Machinimas with iGrabber

2010-09-19T15:10:00.000+10:00

02:49:09PM, 19/09/10 AEST-03:10:00PM, 19/09/10 AEST

Remember the iGrabber I mentioned in previous posts? Well, yesterday and today, I've been making machinimas. They are very bad film technique, no audio, and are just for my two little brothers.

They are filmed off Ben 10: Vilgax Attacks for the Playstation 2. Basically, it's me running around killing the alien enemies for roughly ten minutes.

My Playstation 2 is set up in my room, with the three RGA male plugs in the three RGA female sockets on the iGrabber. The video streams live onto my laptop and I record it (I'm still trying to fix the audio feed). Then after say ten minutes I stop recording, edit the video (brush up frame rates, mute audio-because instead of the game's audio it's my laptops microphone). Then, I burn it onto disc and play it for them on the Television.

So the iGrabber is a very useful device, for programmers, machinima enthusiasts, etc.

Unreal Development Kit

2010-09-14T18:49:00.000+10:00

06:26:16PM, 14/09/10 AEST-06:49:40PM, 14/09/10 AEST

Many of you might have heard of the Unreal Engine (mainly those of you who are programmers, developers, gamers, etc.). Also, you may have heard of the Unreal Development Kit (UDK). Well, I found out about it roughly a fortnight ago.

I was blown away by the graphics on the Sanctum Demo (which I downloaded before the UDK) and it is amazing. Also, the physics components are wonderful. I also enjoyed Bink for video alot.

DirectX 9.0c is the minimum requirement for the engine and the UDK. For those of you who are not aware of what DirectX is, it's and API (Application Programming Interface) for multimedia (graphics, renderings, audio, etc.). For more information on DirectX go to http:\\www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DirectX.

The downside to it is the large resources required for the platform.

I do strongly recommend it to you.

Gears Of War 3 Interview

2010-09-11T20:14:00.000+10:00

08:05:00PM, 11/09/10 AEST-08:14:00PM, 11/09/10 AEST

Well, when asked about Gears Of War 3, Bailey seemed very excited.

These are the questions:

Q1) As a professional gamer, what is the most exciting thing for you about Gears of War 3?

Q2) What is your opinion of the Graphics of the game?

Q3) Do you like the gaming engine being used?

Q4) What is your favourite aspect of the Gameplay (weapons, perks, health, UI, etc.)?

Q5) Do you plan to pre-order it?

Q6) Have you visited ScienceWorld (scienceworldblog.blogspot.com) before?

Q7) Why do you enjoy the Gears of War franchise?

Q8) 0 being the lowest, 10 being the highest, what is your overall rating of the Gears of War franchise?

These are the answers:

A1) The most exciting thing about gears 3 is the new mini cinematics like the pendulum charge and using the enemies arm as a bat.

A2) The high detail of graphics brings gears to the next level as Halo reach begins the expectation of graphics even higher because Halo is a simple man vs alien game the graphics are spectacular.

A3) Yes. The gaming engine is good but can be improved and should be.

A4)Weapons are great but its now not about the bigger the gun is the better pistols in gears 3 are heavy and powerful and look nice and never really got used now they really do, perks-theres not really perks in the game so you have to wait until next year.

A5) Yes...

A6)Yes.
A7) It's just another blood-thirsty game where all you see is madness but with all new ways to kill it should be even bloodier.

A8)10/10 for blood and madness.

Well, there you have it... The interview (via email but still just as good).

Bailey is now the blog's new Official Gamer. He will be interviewed monthly.

iGrabber

2010-09-10T18:53:00.001+10:00

06:51:40PM, 10/09/10 AEST-06:53:50PM, 10/09/10 AEST

Well, as my profile states, my birthday was yesterday and I got an iGrabber. It's essentially a capture card with three female RGA sockets and one female S Video In socket. It can convert VHS to DVD and stream live audiovisual. I will be doing a review of it at a later date, but I some recording to do to test it out first!

Weekly Gaming Prediction #00001-Battlefield: Bad Company 3 And Beyond

2010-09-08T06:53:00.000+10:00

06:42:10AM, 08/09/10 AEST-06:52:00AM, 08/09/10 AEST

My weekly gaming prediction is that:

EA Games will add to the Battlefield: Bad Company 3 sometime next year (or before). Also, to extend to that end, more games in the Battlefield series will be made to compete with Call Of Duty 7: Black Ops and sequels. So basically, Battlefield will attempt to go up to (quite possibly) 9 new games!

Also, Bailey Hunter (see previous post) agrees with this prediction and might be brought up in future posts.

Tell me what you think.

Gears Of War 3 Interview

2010-09-06T19:57:00.000+10:00

07:51:30PM, 06/09/10 AEST-07:57:00PM, 06/09/10 AEST

Well, I'm happy to say the blog's first interview has been organised. Bailey (who's last name is not public), a professional gamer and game design specialist will be asked serveral questions about his thoughts on Gears Of War 3. I have sent him the email with the questions and he will reply within the next week.

He is a good friend of mine and I value his opinion on gaming (as his predictions are often correct).

I'm posting this just to make it publically known that the interview will be posted (hopefully) tomorrow or the day after. If not, by the end of this week.

Floppy Discs Saved My Research

2010-09-05T20:24:00.000+10:00

07:50:00PM, 05/09/10 AEST-08:25:00PM, 05/09/10 AEST

The floppy disc is an almost forgotten technology. However, I think it is a vital role in a developer's OS projects. E.g.

A Tinkernut.com tutorial on OS programming used floppy technology. Mainly for it's multiple "layers" of encoding and storage to allow for bootloading and filesystem storage abilities. He explains that more if you watch this video (http://tinkernut.com/archives/2326).

Also, for some computers that have no working drivers for their USB ports and the CD drive is strangely dysfunctional, the only resort is floppy drives. E.g.

I have an old IBM Aptiva running Windows 98 and all the instruction manuals and all the software intact. I use it to study Windows 98 and technology before registries (see previous posts) and logfiles.

1.44MB IBM floppy discs are what I'm using. for my laptop, I have an external USB floppy disc drive (it's a LaCie one).

So that's why floppy drives and floppy discs should be used a bit more. Not alot...maybe 15% more?

Tell me what you think.

Google Pacman

2010-09-05T09:06:00.000+10:00

07:38:40AM, 05/09/10 AEST-09:06:00PM, 05/09/10 AEST

I first got on to this when I googled Google. Some of the results were Google Pacman. Wow I thought, an online implementation of Pacman-by Google?

So I followed it (http://www.google.com/pacman) and started playing. It's a Google logo, yet interactive. Intead of I'm Feeling Lucky it has Insert Coin. Pressing Insert Coin in the middle of a game, will restart and bring up Pacman and Mrs. Pacman allowing two-player co-op.

My highscore is 11760. But, I bet some of you could beat that.

Now, this was a few days ago. Just before writing this post, I had the sudden idea to analyse the game. A Google Chrome extension called Pendule is a web developer tool. It is fantastic, I suggest you try it.

So, I used Pendule to analyse the source code first.

Then, I used the in-built JavaScript Console in Google Chrome (see my previous post entitled Google Chrome Review for more info). I also, did a resource track and the game restarted.

<html onmousemove="google&&google.fade&&google.fade(event)">

Was the beginning tab for the HTML code. Now, I'm not sure what this means, as I haven't studied deep enough into HTML to know (I'm mainly in native development). However, feel free to comment if you know.

This happens quite alot in these types of examinations (especially JavaScript libraries that link into the HTML). That is the fun of it, studing it and learning how to interact with it.

So then, I used the JavaScript console to debug and wow! As I type this sentence (08:59:00AM AEST) there is 455 and growing fast errors of this:

Uncaught TypeError: Cannot read property 'style' of undefined.

So just a matter of seconds after typing that error, I paused the script execution-and the errors stopped growing. I paused it at 834 errors (all the one type, just 834 different instances of them).

Well, I strongly recommend you download the latest version of Google Chrome and install it. Then, go to some interesting site and examine it.

It is very rewarding.

Fixing Stuck Pixels Using Batch

2010-09-05T06:55:00.000+10:00

06:25:42AM, 05/09/10 AEST-06:46:10AM, 05/09/10 AEST

Stuck pixels are generally just a jam in the LCD display. They can be fixed many different ways and in this post I'll show you how to do it using a batch file.

Now, step one, open up your text editor (mines Notepad) and enter this code:

:LOOP
@echo off
@color 53
@color 23
@color 35
@color 32
goto LOOP

Now, an explanation. :LOOP is the name of our subroutine. @ echo off turns on the echo function (I just put it in their it's not required). @color displays a color (which one depends on the number after it). Then finally, goto LOOP executes the LOOP subroutine.

This code will be an infinite loop (not really but theoretically). So, save it as whatever you like but end it as .bat filetype. Then execute the batch script and move the window over the area of the stuck pixel(s). Leave it for 5 seconds and then close the program. Feel free to edit the source code as you wish, but leave the colours the same.

Now, if that didn't fix it, try going to http://tinkernut.com/archives/442 and watch the video.

Yes, I sourced of Tinkernut.com, but I think it follows the sites philosophy of spreading knowledge. He also has other great tutorials I suggest you watch. In this video, he also has other methods of fixing stuck pixels.

Enjoy.

Canon MP140 Review

2010-09-04T22:36:00.000+10:00

09:38:10PM, 04/09/10 AEST-

Well, I've had my Canon MP140 Scanner-Printer for roughly half a year now, but I thought another review to the blog might be helpful.

PROS:

Good scanner resolution.
Easy maintenance.
Handles different types of paper.
Print cartridge compatibility is average.

CONS:

Paper feed backing doesn't go high enough and thus causes papercurling.
Didn't come with data cable (had to buy one that had USB 2.0 for the laptop and some other protocol for the printer end).
Power cable isn't very secure.

Now, the one thing I hate about papercurling is that, it requires maintenance and also can misalign the printing and comes out deformed.

But, however on the whole it's done it's duty (so far) and has been an average release from Canon.

.INI Scripting

2010-09-04T21:22:00.000+10:00

09:08:10PM, 04/09/10 AEST-09:23:00PM, 04/09/10 AEST

.ini files were basically the thing before Windows Registries. For more information on Registries, check out my blog posts on registries and the HackerPort posts on them (which go into more detail).

Now, .ini stands for initialisation and they are used to store runtime values (now DLL's are used), store log data (now .log and .txt files are used) and to store boot information and user preferences (now registries are used). Basically, initialisation files are pretty much under Windows legacy code. However, very interesting autorun files can be developed and implemented with relative ease if you know how. So in this post, I'll give you some basics on their coding.

Firstly, comments are denoted by a semicolon (for those of you who do programming languages, semicolons often represent the end of a line). E.g.

; This is a comment.

Now, a comment is not parsed (or read by) the system. They are merely there for other users, developers or anyone else.

Secondly, parameters have two parts. A name and a value. E.g.

name=value
date=04/09/10

These make up the most fundamentals of initialisation files.

Thirdly, sections help to organise these parameters. E.g.

;An example of some basics.
[section]
name=value

Finally, I use Notepad but any text editor should do, just type the code and save it as whatever you like, but always end it as .ini filetype.

Please comment for errors, questions or anything else.

Also, other links include:

http://hackerport.blogspot.com

http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INI_file

Enjoy!

Google Chrome Review

2010-09-04T18:06:00.000+10:00

05:56:00PM, 04/09/10 AEST-
Well, I haven't been on the blog for quite some time now, mainly because of working on my studies and other collaborative programming projects.

I recently installed Google Chrome on my laptop because of some key features:

Front-end looks very attractive and incorporates ease levels. E.g. in the Options dialog, it has three tabs (Basics, Personal Stuff and Under The Hood). Under The Hood is for system admins, programmers, ICT support staff and other developers. While leaving other levels of ease, thus not assuming your an ICT guru, programmer or developer or some other occupation while not assuming your a complete novice with ICT.
It's extensions promote developers for that platform, enables all different types of people to customise their browsing experience. Also, there is an extension (apparently) that allows the Internet Explorer engine to be used.
It's developing features i.e. the Developer tab, which includes a View Source function, a JavaScript Console, a suite of Developer Tools and a Task Manager.

Now, yes I may be Microsoft on certain things and Apple on certain things and Google on certain things. But, I am Google when it comes to Internet browsing.