thecircusb0y

Completely there with you man. Initially I started playing and didn't understand why I couldn't use that weak shale you can dig easily with your hands for a pick and why the harder stone wasn't yielding anything. Once I figured out how to make all wood tools to get better resources, It was over man. I've now made like 5 different homes, and learned how to mark them from the spawn point. My memories of exploration and mining trump those of my daily duties in real life. My latest story was of mining a sub basement of my home, and discovering a vast underground cavern with zombies. I died, and lost that homes location. In the effort to find it, I discovered new land, with more features that replicated the movie Avatar. I have picked the tallest mountain in the clouds for my next project. A case of beer or mt. dew, and a free night, and I will conquer that mountain...

This game makes me want to start mining out of my basement in real life. However my landlord won't let me.

I'd also like to point out that this is the exact success story I needed to boost my ego for my day job and daily projects for startups and indie development.

book? just pick a problem and a language, and solve it dude. Start something. You learn through doing. no book solves this.

that lifted my spirits.

I'm not a fan of medication. I believe some people really do need it to balance out, but I think others just need some proper dieting and exercise to balance their body's chemistry out. Our bodies aren't made to sit around all day on a computer, we need to have some physical activity to stimulate the rest of your body and give your mind a break. Perhaps thats the problem people have with focus'ing, is that they are overworking their mind. My friends, colleagues, joke I have adult add, or whatever you call it, because I jump from topic to topic. Perhaps. But when summer came rolling around I began hiking miles and miles of the Adirondack Mountains. I began to bike around. Not to mention I picked up a motorcycle and began riding that. These activities away from the screen, really help. I still jump on topics, but when I work, I'm focused on what i do. Granted I can't wait to get out of work to go on another ride or hike. Get off the computer, and read a book, go for a walk, do something that doesn't require you being near a screen. Get some real achievements in life, not on the xbox. Check your diet for being healthy. You will have to google on this one cause everybody's diet is different. For me as I try and lose more and more weight (so I can go skydiving), I tend to eat leaner protein, and keep on the carbs for energy, making sure to exercise to burn the carbs right. Some of you might want some St. John's Wort, for your moods, others may want to get some more Omega3's in their body. I'm no dietition, I just like to research what I can eat naturally before turning to synthetic drugs pushed by a corrupt government and group of doctors looking for money in treatments and never the cures. Once a day I try and push myself physically to a racing heart, and it in turn clears my mind. The joy you can get from pushing your body will clear your mind and help you appreciate it much more.

I'm fairly young, so I ask this question to the more experienced in life. Isn't this always the case? The rich stay rich by keeping their money and the poor stay poor by never keeping their money. So what is the tone and point of this document exactly, to fix the rich or fix the poor? Or am I overdoing it by looking for a side in this? I'm not trying to be a troll or start a flamewar, but when I read these articles all that I can think of is, "so are we going to redistribute the wealth communism style, or teach people to build their OWN wealth?" Reasons why I can't be a politician or a leader in society, I don't want to be the one that determines whats fair for the people, and define whos the slacker and whos truly in need. Who the hell am I to judge? and who the hell are you to take away my hard earned paper? Thats just what goes through my mind, and I comment here to see if anybody can help me out with my thought process.

I've been using Chrome for the last 2 months, and today was told Firefox wasn't working with a wordpress blog I have to administer... since when does firefox have problems viewing things? I thought that was IE's job.

This is fine, while companies like Infinity Ward / Activision / Blizzard censor artists and developers and remove creativity from PC Gamers, companies like Id, Epic, and Valve are filling in the gaps. Valve just released Alien Swarm for free with all the dev tools needed to modify the game. Blizzard, you need to return to your roots, and remember your fans, not your wallets.

#1, Pick what you love to do, so you are passionate everyday of life instead of hating what you do and being miserable.

From a personal story. I got my degree in Computer Engineering Technology, because I had fallen in love with robotics and computer hardware in high school robotics club. We did the FIRST robotics competition, and that was the best memory I have of high school.

However, after graduation, I've taken a job in the IT sector as a systems admin, and computer hardware has taken a back burner position as a hobby and possibly a side startup skill. I've only been graduated for alittle over a year. Although I haven't landed a job doing hardware like I love, I do have a positive attitude to learn and enjoy the IT side of things. In that view, I have networked with co-workers, employers and peers who have years and years of experience and are sharing it with me. In a matter of a few hours I learned more about software engineering and web programming than college ever taught me.

I wish I was more organized on these thoughts, but I basically have to say, find what you love to do, diversify your knowledge, and be very damn proactive in college, because nobody is going to hold your hand. Get involved in clubs, events, etc. to meet people and network, and find new opportunities. Always talk to your professors about projects you could help with or start up. Do not become a hobbit in your room with world of warcraft or any video games, unless you're passion is to just play video games. Personally we used to hack the games in college and host private servers for downtime after studies.

As far as computer hardware, imaging, robotics, that sort. Computer Science theory plays a huge roll in that for logic analysis. Ultimately I think what you should do, is try talking to advisors, professors, and maybe even try searching for employers and asking them what they look for to prepare you for the industry.

warning, you may think you know what you're doing now, but college opens doors and you will have so many ideas and options, that your dreams may change.

This can be summed up to the following "Be proactive, happen to life or life won't happen to you" .

I've never trusted migration tools to work properly in windows or even on my mac for that matter. I keep everything organized on a samba share, map the drive and tweak the registry to point to that drive for the programs and documents I need.

Thats kinda what I was thinking, but I don't want to be mean, and get voted down. It just feels like another mac love story. we get it, macs just work, fantastic for you. There are plenty of OTHER places on the web for the whole mac addict thing. (Like mac addicts).

I've never installed an update in linux/windows/osx without researching it first for any potential effects it could have... Thats been a rule of thumb I've heard from gurus of back in the day.

I've seen/learned this from many programmers.

Also just another point. don't over work yourself, we're all humans (except those damn bots) and you have to give yourself down time to let your brain simmer on the latest and greatest thoughts.

Buy gum instead, and chew. Seriously. I won't say I quit smoking completely, because I have a cigar on holidays or during celebration, but I haven't bought a pack of cigarettes in years. When my mother was diagnosed with cancer, It really made me think, so I went cold turkey and I chewed dentyne ice peppermint gum whenever I wanted a cigarette. Eventually the store bought cigarettes really became gross to me, and the only tobacco I have now is cured tobacco from a smoke shop, sheisha, or a good cigar. Other then that, my daily routine absolutely rarely includes smoking. You don't need a cigarette when you drive. You don't need a cigarette when you drink. You don't need a cigarette to walk to the car. You don't need a cigarette.

I still hate how they remove LAN play from games now'a'days. My buddies and I have lan parties all the time, and its getting harder and harder to have them when lan play isn't allowed and you can't host a local server.

I just went out during lunch and bought the collectors edition from best buy. Waiting to get home to open it ...

Turns out sleeping pills cause more problems for me then the benefits they present. I'm going to go research the perception of time and figure out how to control it so I feel like I have more time. Thanks for your input, I'm looking forward to when I can live off free lancing on my own time.

From the article I notice that they don't mention how desktop PC's have leveled out more or less on requirements of hardware. I know people still using computers from 2004 that work perfectly fine for their basic needs of web browsing and email. The whole superbowl comment is kinda associated with "duh" in my mind because a smartphone is easier to use and not miss the game. Its all about access. Your smart phone is easier to access, and it has access easily to a fast network connection. Soon you will see wearable peripherals that connect to your MID/Netbook/Smartphone/Tablet, so that you don't even have to pull out the device, you can just tap your forearm (http://hackaday.com/2010/03/31/what-input-device-just-use-yo...) and maybe the device whispers in your ear on the bluetooth headset what time it is and what the weather report will be. Hell maybe you will wear a watch on your wrist that reports your vital signs to your smartphone in real time to your family doctor, as well as to yourself to remind you of medication or to take it easy because your pulse is too high.

Just like how some of you power users automate day to day tasks on the computer with scripts, I foresee scripting ourselves.

The desktop is stationary, and the smart phone is with us all the time. We are surrounded by cybernetics and assimilating with the ease of access to technology.

Ultimately I look forward to the whole "cyberpunk" integrated society with electronics.

Now let me check my email on my smartphone while listening to mp3's, taking a picture of the view around me, and answering a text message to a person halfway across the world, after which I'll finish reviewing the rest of HN's rss feed while walking outside enjoying the fresh air.

Some people do this virtually. They delete their facebooks or myspace pages, and go invisible so nobody can contact them except through email , phone, or meet in person. I'm afraid that in the short term, finding out how many people care about you is great, but if you regularly seek attention in such a serious matter, its like the boy that crys wolf, people will grow tired. Be Careful.

Last.fm "Pendulum Radio"

I remember reading an article about a room at an IVY league school like Stanford or Yale that contains a copy of every test(with answers) for every teacher ever given. Apparently students ( don't know if it was a select or open) could just look at the tests, and majority of teachers would test for the same things or similar items. I wonder if anybody else on HN has read the same thing I have.

It was new to me, and It was interesting to read. But I'm very interested in interpretations since I actually found it hard to understand the tone and pov of the author.

Not straight programming, more about software engineering

The Mythical Man Month http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month

Too true man. This is both a blessing and a curse. You have so many resources to choose from to help you, and yet, you have so many resources to weed through to know which one will help you. I always research before I try and reinvent the wheel. Unfortunately this can turn into procrastination and a drain on ones self to get the job done.

Personally I'm trying to get over doing it right the first time, and just getting it done so I can learn to do it right from my mistakes.

2 things I can suggest.

1.) Try setting a goal with someone else, it doesn't have to be the same goal between you, you both basically have to spot eachother and make sure one another do what they require themselves to do. That said you could do both goals together doubling your experiences.

2.) I have a fear of heights too. However, the way I've tackled it was with indoor rock climbing, which transfered to outdoor freeclimbing, and once I lose the weight, skydiving next year.

is this just an article to hype about what could happen, and that nothing is concrete yet? Therefore the people can still pressure their Representatives of the government to help the people and stop taxing them so much? I thought we were supposed to lower taxes to businesses and banks so that consumers don't get punished in the end with new fees and higher costs. Whats going on?

I don't understand why I was voted down. There are a mass of people that treat Apple products like a drug. They have to have their fix of the latest and greatest apple products even if their current product works just fine. I just think that Steve Jobs fits the profile of a dealer, because he can be so 2-faced about the product. "This right here is the future of cell phones, you can do everything on it!" to "Its just a phone". How do you go from telling people that this product can do everything, theres an app for all of it, they get dependent on this product and then the product doesn't work when they get their next fix, they are helpless in the water, and they're told not to worry. Microsoft has been the same way in the past. People stuck with Vista on their new PC's when XP worked just fine. Though I can't come up with an example for google... perhaps they are truly not evil..

Freezer ziplock bag full of ice to go around your neck will cool your core down quick. You can also just regularly goto the faucet and rinse your wrists and neck with cold water to help cool your body down as well. I live on the river, so I keep the windows open for the breeze and the blinds down to block sunlight. I've heard of constructing a water tank that fits to your windows, and what happens is the sun heats the water up over the course of the day, but still lets water in, and then at night when its cool outside, the windows maintain an even temperature releasing heat. I know some people do this in their kitchen windows using clear glass bottles filled with water stacked on top of eachother to fill the window.

[So I guess my real question is, did you give up gaming to become a better programmer? And if so, what sort of things did you replace it with? I am the kind of person who needs some sort of competitive hobby and I having a hard time finding one.]

So I too did Counter-Strike and WC3. When I was in college, my friend and I ran a website called thewac.net (kinda dead now, don't bother going there), and it was associated with our custom counter-strike servers with a zombie mod. That taught me alot about programming and community. I moved on to create a DC++ Hub on the college network and that taught me more about systems administration, data/user management, social community, etc. etc. Then I graduated.

I've been working at my new job for almost a year, and my coworker has like 20 years under his belt in experience, and I've learned more from him about programming and technology in less then a year, than I did in 5 years of college. He's also a gamer, so we also discussing gaming as well. (Currently Bad Company 2). If you want to keep at programming, I highly suggest you jump into the Unreal Tournament 3 engine or the Source engine (Valve) and try programming for a game.

That said, if you want something competitive, I recently took up hiking in the Adirondacks, and I've decided I want to do all the summits of the ADK's and the Catskill's here in New York State. The amount of punishment it is on your body is brutal to me, and yet liberating.You compete against yourself. Your other options are to look for local sporting leagues to join, or pick a hobby for competition.

Look at yourself and think of what you want to improve and then ask "What can I do to improve that part of me?"

For me, it was my physical shape, and my lack of adventure. Hence, hiking in the largest state park in the United States, and picking Mt. Marcy for my first hike. Eventually I'll move to Colorado and do the rockies.

I hope that helps.

You know what makes a drug dealer successful? He doesn't use his own product, and so he can be ignorant to the problems the product has/causes while he markets, deals, and benefits.

Granted it says "Sent from an Iphone" but that could be an auto signature.