Jonty's Blog

Blog? What blog?

2007-01-01T08:53:00.000Z

Why, I do believe it's 2007 again.
New Year's resolutions:

Blog more
Eat less Custard Creams
Scrap Windows XP
World Peace

There, they shouldn't be too hard. All I need is a cheese grater and a yellow umbrella. Oh, and maybe a plane ticket to United-Nations-ville.

Not much has happened here recently, although I appear to have failed a competition to win a cool HP laptop. :( I got some walkie-talkies for Christmas, which means I can continue planning my plan for world domination without fear of being detected, seeing as there's apparently noone in a 4-mile radius who also has these walkie-talkies. Finally, I managed to get together with Beryl, the much better (apparently) alternative to compiz-xgl.

Now away I go, into the mists of blogging fantasy until something else minorly interesting happens!
*whisk*

Warhammer

2006-08-20T07:55:00.000+01:00

About a week ago, someone asked me whether my hobbies included making & using Warhammer models, and I don't think I really said "no" very well, and I might have offended some people. :(
So now, I decided to rectify my position on such matters, in case it ever crops up again in the future.

I said on IRC that I thought people in the UK who owned Warhammer and made them and battled with them and stuff were considered "losers", but what I don't think I said is that I have no idea why. Why should someone be considered a loser because they can contribute the time and effort to making and painting these clever little figures? I have realised now the main reason is probably because the other people are envious that they can't do things like that. ;)
Ofcourse, as I have been told many times before, anyone can do it if they try, but not everyone thinks that.

I think that I probably could make some nice models if I put enough effort into it, but that's not the problem. I'm not really a very creative person at all, I like my icons on my desktop arranged in neat groups, and I like drawing things for a certain isometric grid game very much. I just can't see myself sitting down for hours at a time and painstakingly painting these little creatures.
I can see myself, however, sitting down for hours and programming a game, or writing PHP for a website.

So there you have it. I have absolutely nothing against anyone who does own Warhammer, but, likewise, I will most probably never be persuaded to use it myself.

Office 2007!

2006-06-17T08:33:00.000+01:00

That’s right, I’ve now installed Beta 2 of Office 2007. It came free on my PC Advisor magazine coverdisk, and it’ll work until February 2007.

I’m actually publishing this post through the new blogging features in Word, and so far, it seems to work very well. The biggest innovation I have seen is this new ‘Ribbon’ interface, completely doing away with the traditional menus to favour a simpler, better-looking interface. My mum says she doesn’t like it, but I think it’s great! Now I can access just about any settings without looking through mountains of menus and dialog boxes. The way it works, is you select which category of settings you want to access from the bar across the top, and the ribbon changes to display related things. So, if I click Insert, it comes up with options for adding images and charts to the document, and if I click Formatting it comes up with all the font options.

MS have completely gotten rid of the Windows XP interface and used Office’s own window decorations so everything fits together better as well, and it looks very nice. While this is a Beta, it has almost all the features the full version will have, and it hardly crashes at all.

All in all, I think I’ll stick with this until it stops working, and keep downloading Vista B2 aswell!

Public beta testing ftw.

C'est le birthday!

2006-04-07T07:21:00.000+01:00

That's right, it was my birthday yesterday!
Not much to say about it really, except that I bought a new graphics card with the money I got given and I had a great party in #jonty-comp (despite JTanczos stealing the cake!). Oh, and I've got two weeks school holiday, so I can get some much-needed coding done for the Thomas The Tank Engine Set.

I just thought a birthday was something worth resurrecting my blog for. ;)

Vive la birthday!

Snoooooooooooow! In MARCH!

2006-03-03T19:49:00.000Z

Oh My God I Can't Believe It, I've Never Seen Snow so Far From Christmas!
- Kaiser Chiefs ;-)

Le Snow! Lots of le snow! :D
*Picasa*

The Then that Was, and Is no more

2006-03-03T19:42:00.000Z

*sniff*
I finally got rid of my old computers today...
Fortunately, they're going to a better place than under the bed: the recycling centre!

Let them Rest In Peace:

And here's my new one!!!

/me hugs Picasa for the Sepia and Glow effects

And the speaker on the floor? Its the subwoofer! :P

GCSEs...

2006-02-18T07:57:00.000Z

Oh, and I forgot, I handed my GCSE options form in!
Subjects:

Maths
English
Double Science
ICT
Systems and Control
Geography
French

Hooray for school!
I must be delusional...

OGame!

2006-02-18T07:47:00.000Z

On #tycoon yesterday, James Vassie told me about a game he played with loads of other people called OGame where you registered, got your own planet, and had to build things on it and defend it from other attacking planets, while also spying on enemies and attacking them. It's really addictive, and it's in real-time, so it's still working even when you're not logged in!

I am now a part of the #Gung-Ho alliance, ranked #17th in Universe 3's Alliances listings!
Yay!

New PC! Yay!

2006-02-05T09:31:00.000Z

Finally! My new PC's arrived! Here are the specs:

MSI K8M800 Motherboard (VIA Chipset)
AMD Sempron64 3400+ CPU
512Mb DDR400 RAM
64Mb integrated graphics

I had to put in my existing HDD (80GB, IDE) and CD/DVD drives (CD-RW, DVD-RW), but that wasn't a problem.

And all for £230!

Now everything is so fast, I can hardly keep up with it! I used to double-click on 'My Computer', wait about 10 seconds, and then see the window slowly render, but now, I double-click and, almost before I've finished clicking, it's there! I am astounded. It's just a pity I couldn't acquire the x64 edition of WinXP, that would be even faster!

Oh, and in response to Sionide's comment, I'm going to install Ubuntu 64bit edition as well!

New PC! GCSE Options!

2006-01-24T16:23:00.000Z

Phew, it's been a hectic day!

First, I got my GCSE Options booklet from School! Here are the options I have:

Compulsory courses in:

Maths
English & English Literature
Double Science
ECDL ICT (European Computer Driving License - Basic stuff like using word processors etc.)

I also have to take non-tested courses in:

Religious Education (Philosophy etc.)
Physical Education (I'm rubbish at PE!)
Personal Development
Citizenship
Careers

And the options...

Art & Design
Business Studies
Dance
Design & Technology - includes

Systems & Control (Robotics etc.)
Textiles
Resistant Materials (Woodwork, Metalwork etc.)
Food Technology
Graphics

Drama
Geography
German
Health & Social care
History
Home economics
Advanced ICT
Music
Physical Education
Religious Studies
Spanish
French

Out of those, I have to choose four as options. At the moment, I'm thinking of ICT, Geography, Systems & Control & Business Studies. We have a load of meetings and parents-evenings to go to before I actually choose, but I think they're the best for me.

In other news...

My computer broke again! I've decided to buy a new one now though! Hooray for cheap PCs! For £250, I got:

AMD Sempron64 3400+ processor
512MB PC3200 DDR SDRAM
80Gb HDD (the one I already have)
128Mb onboard Graphics (I'll shop around for a better one)

And a load more...
It should be arriving in 3-10 working days, and I'm going to download a 64-bit Linux distro before then, and maybe 'acquire' Windows XP x64 editon from somewhere...

Phew! And an even longer blog! I hope you didn't get bored...

Should I buy this PC?

2006-01-21T18:25:00.000Z

I've been looking for a new PC for less than £250! Crazy, you might say, but there are actually some quite good offers out there on t'Internet! I managed to find a PC for £239.95 with these specs:

AMD Sempron64 3100+ processor (256kb cache)
512Mb DDR400 RAM
40Gb HDD (I also plan to add my 80Gb one)
Onboard graphics*

*I chose to have the onboard graphics, and shop around for the best dedicated card.

I think I'm going to buy it!...

Sllooww School PCs...

2006-01-20T16:03:00.000Z

Sheesh! I'm fed up with the school computers...

Even though the IT staff just bought new ones, they still only have Celeron D processors, and rubbish little TFT monitors. Worst of all, they seem to have gummed up the whole network.

We have these new School E-Mail addresses, that apparently the whole country has, and I have to say, they are hopeless. They use a web-based interface, and seem to run on one old server that eventually serves up the ASP pages, albeit slowly.

I'm a bit worried actually, because our school uses a new program for ICT SATs, that sends you an e-mail on the school account, and then gives you 10 minutes (for example) to carry out the task and reply with the answer(s) before sending the next one. The problem with this is, it took me nearly 10 minutes to get to the 'Check Mail' screen and a further 3 to get to the Inbox!

They'll have to fix it... :/

Should I be a Junior Scout Leader?

2006-01-16T21:53:00.000Z

Not many people know this, but I've been a Scout for, well, a long time. I joined Cubs when I was 9, and I still go to Scouts now. Unfortunately, when I'm 14 I can't be a Scout anymore, and while I would usually go up to 'Network' Scouts, there aren't enough people in my area to have a Network Scouts group. So, the choices are:

Should I leave the Scouts and forget all the great adventurous stuff I've done in the last 4 years
Should I join a Network Scouts group somewhere close by (I wouldn't know anyone)
Should I become a Junior Scout Leader, which involves, well, being a leader, and going to some Cubs meetings

I can't make up my mind, as I don't want to turn my back on the whole thing, and I don't want to go somewhere where I don't know anybody, and I'm not very good at ordering people around.
And I've got to make a desicion by Saturday!

Whatever desicion I make, be sure It'll be up here. ;-)

Assembly Code... shudder

2006-01-16T17:53:00.000Z

I think I've really put my foot in it now...
I've said I'll try and be a patchdev, and now I've seen the source code, I want to change my mind!!

It's not that it's gibberish to me, I have a book about Assembly Code (what TTDP is written in), and I'm about halfway through it, it's just that most of the stuff there is just bunged together, and one bit of code will often break another bit of code, and... sheesh, I just can't get my head around it all.

I definitely need all the luck I can get...

IRC Woes

2006-01-14T14:38:00.000Z

Hmph!

Everyone's ignoring me in #tycoon... :-(

I'm not spammy, and I'm no more annoying than anyone else there. I only got kicked once because I posted about 30 lines at once accidentally...

I have formulated a plan:

Set XChat to play the 'New Mail Notification' sound every time someone says something.
Post
Everyone will go quiet
Wait until they start talking again
Pounce and go 'A-Ha! Caught you!'

It'll either work like a dream or get me banned...

GCSE Options

2006-01-14T09:21:00.000Z

Well, it's that time - time to choose my options!

I've been thinking long and hard about which ones to choose, and while I'll obviously choose ICT (Because I'm so good ;-D), I'm not sure about the rest.
I don't even know how many I'm supposed to choose!

'Connexions' Leaflet wrote:

Choose courses that:
You know you can do well in
Are in subjects you like
Help you learn in the best way for you
Will help you keep your options open in the future

I guess that means I'll do well in Science, and I might do something Sciency. I also like Music, and I play the Keyboard/Piano, so that'll work. I might also take 'Systems & Control Technology', where you learn how to make/control robotics and learn about things in that area.

I'll have to do some serious thinking...

CDDB... Grrr!

2006-01-12T19:56:00.000Z

I officially hate CDDB now! When I was trying to rip my Now 59 CD, it stuck 'Various Artists' in every Artist box and the Artist name and song name in the title box!

In the end I downloaded the 2 CDs off BitTorrent... It's kinda legal, seeing as I already have the CDs...

Surely!?

:-?

My New Blog!!

2006-01-12T19:47:00.000Z

Well, I thought it was about time to start a blog, seeing as everyone else is doing it, and I don't want to miss out on anything! Hopefully Aegir will add it to Planet Tycoon, a site that puts together all the blogs from the TTD community.

This blog'll probably be mainly about TTD, and my attempts at making graphics for it, but I'll also do the odd rant and rave about something, and if I find something interesting on the internet, be sure I'll post it!

That's all I can think of now, but I'm thinking of doing a rant about CDDB soon...