News - Archive, July/2005

31 July 2005

OMG, Geocities does weird stuff sometimes. Why, only yesterday it said I had exceeded the monthly traffic limit. I did not believe that. The monthly limit is supposed to be 3 GB. Let us imagine I open my page 100 times each day, and so do 9 other people (though, of course, that's not so). The size of the page is, prior to this update, 9.4 KB (9,624 bytes). If we have 1000 visits each day (when they are in fact probably ~1-2), or let us make them 1024 to be more round, there we have nearly 10 megabytes per day. Multiplied by a 30-day month would be 300 MB. OK, now, I've uploaded some pics and so on, let us imagine people suddenly went insane, found this site and started, for some reason, downloading them like mad. Let's say, another 300 megabyes. Oh, and we shall add some 400 more megabytes, just in case there was some extra traffic. So, what we get, with extremely extremely exaggerated values (like, a 100 times larger than the real ones) is 1 GB of traffic per month. So what happened to the 3 GBs? Of course, today the site works, and the month ain't over yet, so I'm bound not to trust them. Of course, I couldn't move if I wanted, since I've put too much absolute URLs instead of relative ones. Well, yeah, a good find-and-replace can fix that, but to move the site I'd need to access it via FTP, which Yahoo does not allow for free accounts.

Seeing as how this page is getting large, I shall put (tommorrow) all of July's updates in /news/archive/2005/july/, the old ones in their corresponding folders, too, leaving only the most recent month in /news/.

Oh, and I've failed at doing that LFI thing. Well, not like I had really started, but I had to find out the structure of BMP files first, as I want to convert to and from them. However, I found it to be a wee little bit to complex for my simple mind to assimilate. So I shall postpone any attempts to make this till I learn more in the area.

What is the purpose of anger? Rather, let me first see how is anger defined. According to Wikipedia, Anger is a term for the emotional aspect of aggression, as a basic aspect of the stress response in animals whereby a perceived aggravating stimulus "provokes" a counterresponse which is likewise aggravating and threatening of violence. And, of course, (people gotta love Wikipedia... you can find anything there :), there it is, a section called Benefits of Anger:

There are some positive aspects of anger. The first aspect is self-protection, where our bodies are aroused into a state where they can respond with maximum physical energy for our defence in response to potential hurt. This is often referred to as the 'fight’ component of the fight-or-flight response. The second is decompression, where our bodies are given a chance to release pent-up physical tension caused by overexposure to frustration. The safe physical ventilation of anger is an effective way of helping our autonomic nervous system to switch back to its normal relaxed functioning state, which is commonly referred to as the ‘calm after the storm’.

OK, so the purpose of anger is partially physiological, partially psychologically-related. Since the first part is inapplicable if we are referring to anger caused by idiots (sorry, meant "other human beings"), that leaves only the second part. But is it a benefit in this case? That it makes us want to break stuff to be relieved of our anger?

I shall continue with more on this later...

29 July 2005

I've been thinking about developing my own image format. Why? Well, first of all, I want to make something useful (or at least, slightly useful). Second, there are already several image formats, but all of them lack something. Like, JPGs are great, but they've no support for transparency or animation. GIFs have that, but they only have 8-bit color. PNGs look good, and are, as a matter of fact, almost perfect (though hardly anyone ever uses them). They support 24-bit colors, I think, and support transparency, both complete and partial. They only lack one thing, animation. If they had that, I would've wondered why anyone in their right mind would want to use GIF rather than PNG.

But anyway, since I'm not really good at GDI or anything, and besides am lazy, I think what I shall do for now is make a proggy that converts between BMP and my format. I shall check the MD5 of the original bitmap, convert it to my format (LFI for now), then back to BMP, and check the new bitmap's checksum. If they match, good. Then I shall compare the sizes of the BMP and LFI. (I predict the LFI should be much smaller. I suppose I can say that's my task for the day. But to do that, I need to see the structure of BMP files. Meh, to work!

28 July 2005

Don't feel like updating today.


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Meh, I hate myself.

27 July 2005

Not updated in a loong time. LAN card got punished by a rainstorm. ISP sucks, so I had to stand 2-3 days of no Internet.

I had been trying to make a password-protected page entirely with JavaScript. Problem is, of course, anyone can check the source and find out the password. The solution is, of course, MD5 encryption, BUT there is one problem with that, too. So what, I verify the md5 of the pass is ok, now what? Do I redirect to another page? What stops anyone from directly seeing this other page from the source, and opening it straight away. And the solution came up to me: part of the URL of the page to be redirected to will be part or all of the entered password. For example, if the password is 'foo', then the script will check whether the entered pass's md5 is equal to that of foo (acbd18db4cc2f85cedef654fccc4a4d8), and if it is, will redirect to foo.html. Of course, it won't say foo.html in the source, it will say something like, document.forms[0].pass.value+".html". And in addition, the way to be redirected can be with document.location, which makes the old URL still appear in the address bar, making it look like a server-side script. Woot! :)

22/3 July 2005

A


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I don't know what to say. I've mentioned two people I know so far in this blog, but I never knew what their attitude towards each was. One of them seems friendly with me. The other... well, see below. <NOTE: Entry was not finished. And I have no intention of finishing it. In fact, I shall delete it in a few days.>

21 July 2005

Not another uneventful day... But I can't really say that. I mean, no day is really uneventful, if it includes me seeing, or at least hearing her. And, no, I'm not saying that because eventually she might open this, (as a matter of fact, that is more of a hindrance for me to express any feelings and thoughts, rather than a motivation) it really is true. I believe- and why do I only believe? Because I've never before felt this feeling- that I love her. She's changed me... or made me change myself, as I think of it. I saw no purpose in life before. I mean, I wasn't really unhappy with it, but I suppose I could have died at any point and I wouldn't have cared, even provided I had time for that. And now, it's the same thing, only she is what I care about. I don't care about anything else. Okay, not entirely true. I shall correct myself. She is what I really care about. Of course, these words sound a bit... weak. I mean, I could never really express feelings with words, and now is no exception. How can I express them, though? Good question. Something to think about... Actually, do I have to express them? I mean, I could kind of skip that, it is unneeded. However, as I have always been rather shy, uncommunicative, I am not really sure I will be able to tell her I feel. Perhaps I am writing this here exactly in hope she might encounter it, and it would be easier for me to indirectly tell her this way. (Oh, and of course, if you are reading this, you've surely guessed I'm talking about you, Boryana.) That in the brackets proves it. That is exactly why I write this here... Meh, why am I doing something for a reason I myself have difficulties uncovering? Well, as I have reached this far, I might as well tell her straigh: There is a message for you, hidden on this page. And I said hidden, but it is actually in a larger font than everything else in it. And I mean this page, this one, with the "news". Or it's actually a blog, but no matter. Hint: chronology (2005).

Do I really want this here? Well, I've written it, and I wish not to have wasted time on it.

20 July 2005

Ah, finally, I will be able to make an update. Reasons for not being able to do so on previous days included the lack of time, my laziness, and my brother's existance.So, I shall, I think, resume where I left off a few days ago.

I'd been having a little discussion with a few friends of mine, and I simply couldn't understand females: What's the whole point in all the make-up and stuff? I mean, it's not like it is anything exceptionally productive. In fact, I think it is useless. Of course, I have no right to judge females like that, really, being a male myself, but I have not really found proof there is something useful in all that. Females waste time, energy and money applying some pointless make-up to themselves, and then waste as much time and effort removing the above. OK, I am inclined to accept that, only, however, if I am given an advantage having make-up has over not having. Upon sharing these thoughts of mine with my friends, one of the females observed that it makes you more beatiful. OK, good, but what of it? Why the hell should it matter whether you are beatiful or not? I mean, given the choice whether to look nice or not, of course I'd choose the former, but I do not think it shall have any effect whatsoever on my life. If one is extremely beatiful (which is, btw, quite a subjective term), one could participate and possibly win contest and such, but I strongly doubt that make-up could make one "worthy" of such a contest if one is not already so without it. One might argue that being more beatiful would incline people to have a more possitive attitude towards you. If that is so, this is called prejudice.

All of this, of course, assumes make-up does make one more beatiful. As I have said, beauty is something quite subjective. In fact, of the many characteristics an individual may possess, I am inclined to think beauty is the hardest, most subjective, strictly opinion-dependant to be judged. So I still have no proof on the matter of make-up.

Task for the day? No, can't. Need to finish this thing here, it's a sort of goodbye present we're doing for the friend of mine leaving for the USA, to whom I have previously alluded. And since it needs to be ready in a couple of days, I'd better get to work. It wasn't my idea to do it, really, and I am only joining the separate elements together, the person who both provided the idea and made most of the stuff for it is... meh, it is really difficult to speak about something like that here, knowing no one'd read it, yet knowing eventually, the person of whom I was speaking shall read it. How do I know? Well, it is I that shall direct her here. The reason for which is hidden on this page (yes, this one, with the news). It is not yet complete, but will be in a couple of days. And when I said "hidden", I should perhaps have employed another term, because this message's text is larger than every other text on the page. So, the person I mentioned above has changed me, and not by a small bit (I believe I mentioned that in one of my first updates). As a matter of fact, it was she that motivated me to write this "blog". But she is now online, and I'd much rather talk to her than write in this thing.

19 July 2005

Yet another day with unfotunate circumstances disallowiiing me to update.

18 July 2005

Really nasty having an older brother... can't update now, either. I hope I'll be able to make a longer update tommorrow.

17 July 2005

Oh, finally got my hands on HP6... reading time, no time to update. :)

16 July 2005

Besides HP6 being out today, nothing interesting. If I don't find something productive to do, I might as well try to incorporate the formulae I discovered a few days ago into the OpenGL application I am/was making (though it does nothing productive for now).

I've been having a little discussion with a few friends of mine, and I simply can't understand females: What's the whole point in all the make up and stuff? I mean, it's not like... darn gotta go. Might finish this later.

15 July 2005

Ugh, I sorta messed up the updates... anyway, I'm lazy today, so I doubt I'd do anything productive...

14 July 2005

Only I was unable to update the last couple of days. Reason? Well, on tuesday I was rather busy, and that, combined with my brother's tendency to spend every minute during which he is awake in front of the PC, made me unable to find time to do it. Yesterday? PC won't turn on. The, er, I-have-no-idea-whatsoever-how-it's-called-in-english (meh, the part that distributes power to the rest of the pc) apparently wasn't working, so it had to be replaced ($13).

I guess my task for the day would be to go under Knoppix and see if I can compile Xpaint from there.

13 July 2005

Y

12 July 2005

Eh, well, I'm a bit busy today, so I will probably not be able to do much of a good job today... perhaps I'll try tommorrow... So, my task for the day (or maybe tommorrow) is to compile Xpaint under Linux. It's not for me, and I'm not really competent on the matter, so I doubt I'll have much success, but I WILL try.

If anyone who happens to be able to show me how to do it does so, I would be delighted (provided anyone reads it at all). If you do, then mail me ([email protected])

11 July 2005

Very strange, I've always found it, when I do NOT want to do something, and I know it is better for me id I do NOT do it, and then I DO it. A week or so ago, I discovered this puzzle thing called Petals Around the Rose. It seemed interesting. I generally enjoy puzzles, and this one truly interested me, because I've never seen one like it. I spent hours and hours rolling those dice, trying to guess the numbers. I started seeing certain patterns that seemed close. And, throughout that time, I tried NOT to look at the source and see the answer. And, of course, in the end it was exactly what I did. The answer is quite simple, most obvious... and now I'm angry with myself for doing that. I mean, not truly, because I know now that I wouldn't have guessed it in the future week or something, and that now at least I can show it to other people. But I can never really know whether I wouldn't have figured it out.

Dreams are a strange thing. I've almost always ignored them, but they often bring my interest back to them. Ever since I understood that if you know you're dreaming, you could easily alter your dream, I've been trying to do that. I've managed a few times, of course. It's an interesting thing, by the way, Lucid Dreaming. Anyway, I had a really strange dream this morning. I can remember absolutely nothing of the dream, except that it ended (or included) me seeing my ICQ contact list, with one person online (I believe I even saw her status was Away). I woke up, saw it was a bit early, and went back asleep. Then, when I woke up again, guess who was online. I mean, it's not that weird that she was online, it's that I dreamed of it. Who the hell dreams of seeing the ICQ contact list?? Her comments on the matter:

08:50:51 Elanor: LOL
08:50:57 Elanor: g33ky :P

Well, yeah, I do spend quite a bit of time in front of the PC... but, lord, what a thing to dream of. So anyway, I've got to set myself an assignment for the day. Don't have any ideas right now, so I'll update later.

10 July 2005

On further reflection, I saw I was wrong. Merely by saying that this page fulfills no purpose, I gave it a purpose: to hold these words. Funny, my life used to have no purpose, and now it does. This page used to have no purpose, and now it does. As it was said in The Matrix: Reloaded:

There's no escaping reason, no denying purpose - because as we both know, without purpose, we would not exist. It is purpose that created us, Purpose that connects us, Purpose that pulls us, That guides us, That drives us, It is purpose that defines, Purpose that binds us.

I discovered that although we may think that external influence changes us, it is really we who make the change in ourselves. So I decided to change what I do not like in myself, namely the thing I mentioned yesterday. From now on, and I write it here, a publicly viewable place (well, no one ever reads this anyways, the counter barely has 200 hits, and most of them are from myself opening the site to see if it looks alright), I will set certain goals for myself, and I will follow them through to the end no matter what. Only then can I really change that negative part of me. I would set myself some "assignment" each day that I will try to do, and I will NOT abandon it. And, I will write here every day. Not that I see any difference, whether I simply think about all this, or write it. But it just seems more productive this way. If I reach certain conclusions, why not show them to others? Sure, I doubt more than 5-10 people'd read this... I don't know. Life is very confusing sometimes.

A friend of mine is leaving for USA for 1 to 3 years. It is very interesting, the way he presented that information in his blog. He leaves on the 23rd. Very strange, how your life could suddenly change. Poor him. I mean, he'd be probably happy there, too, but leaving your entire life behind to start a new one, in an unknown place, with unknown people? Of course, it is not of his own will that he goes there, and, judging by his reactions on the matter, he isn't too eager on departing. I know I wouldn't be, if I was in his position.

Not that I've no problems myself, actually. Having an older brother who spends every second he is awake in front of the PC is very nasty. But it is a problem that will (hopefully) solve itself by September. He's going to study in Germany, so the PC will be all mine. I've other problems, too. Who doesn't? I don't know, of course, how much I am prepared to reveal here. True, nobody does read it, but one can never be sure.

Well, I guess I'd assign myself something for today. I will find a free host that supports PHP, has no annoying ads every centimeter (I don't mind ads, but when they look nicely, and aren't all over the place, because then they fulfil their purpose). I will transfer the site there, and modify it to take advantage of the PHP support.
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Update: I regret to say, I have been attempting to move everything to another site, with PHP and SQL support. However, the things I've written here are so specific, it's as if I never planned I could move the site. Most of the links are absolute, not relative. I've used IFRAMEs for the top and bottom of each page (easily avoidable with a simple PHP include). And besides, I've failed to find a free PHP host that does not have annoying ads. The one I found seemed sort of nice, but then I discovered it added some code for the advertisements each time I upload a file, which means that if I use include(), it would stick in more and more ads. At least they're only text. Perchance I can make it think the files I include are txt's, and it wouldn't add any HTML code to them. But I've still a lot of modifying to do.
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The TXT trick didn't work. Apparently, people are idiots. I can't find a site without at least one of these:
- idiotic ads that take up half a page, use deprecated HTML tags, and non-working JavaScript
- stupid script that adds the above advertisements at the very beginning of the <body> tag
- little to no possibility to edit the files on the server instead of constant reuploading
...and my goal is yet again not completed. But there's a major difference this time - it isn't complete because I couldn't, and not because I wouldn't.

I was thinking, some time ago, to buy a domain with a friend of mine. We never did it, though. In fact, that's the same person that's leaving for the US. And I'm wondering now, whether I shouldn't do it. I mean, there's some pretty cheap ones. Of course, the quality's as low as the price is, I'm certain, but something's better than nothing. Or is it?

9 July 2005

Life is rather a strange thing... You have dreams, goals, ambitions. You go for them, seeking their achievement. You think about them every moment.

A week later they are forgotten.

When I first created this webpage, it was merely to have a place to upload stuff and link to it. It looked a piece of trash, and had bits of HTML code stitched together from this place and another. Then, around fall last year, I decided to make it look better, like an actual site. So I struggled a bit, spending a large portion of my free time to make it look nice. I liked orange over black at that time (as you can see by the design). The result was this.

And what use was there? What was the purpose of creating it, if it serves no goal? I have not added a single thing to the site since, not counting the WEM news post below... In fact, I had pretty much forgotten about its existance, if not occassionally, when registering an account somewhere (a forum, for example), writing its URL in the "homepage" field. I'm not really suprised. I've been like this all my life. It's not like I can't create things, it's that I can't focus on them and finish them properly that's the problem. I always start work on something, being really enthusiastic about it. In the end, it is left unfinished.

I mentioned something above, about the point of this webpage. And I've asked myself that question a few times, not really thinking about it. I've changed recently. I mean, I change every day, but recently...

A thing inspired me today to think about this meaning, and I've found the answer: There is no meaning. Then why did I make it? I've never thought of it from this point of view, but this is merely a means of expression. The idea sounds funny, I know. I laughed at myself when I first thought about that. But why does an artist make a picture with no purpose, if not to express themselves. What purpose does drawing a picture of something serve? None. What purpose did making this webpage serve?

Of course, there is still the problem with the unfinished things I strive to make. Is that a means of expression, too? Perhaps. Perhaps it represents an emptiness in my life. I am sure there always was one in me, though I might have never felt its presence. (Or absence?)

I said I've changed recently. The reason?

Reasons don't matter, it's the results that do. Before, I doubt I'd have written anything like this. I'd think about it, yes, but not actually write it somewhere, blog-style. That is only a small piece of evidence I've changed.