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Coincidence Posted @ 21:11 on 13th October, 2008
Tomorrow, Apple are set to be launching new MacBooks and MacBook Pros.
Today, my MacBook Pro broke.
I think the gods at Apple are trying to tell me something...
Specification Posted @ 13:02 on 12th October, 2008
One deadline out of the way! We had to hand in the specification last Thursday, and so here's a bit of an update on where I am with the project.
Firstly, the goals of the project. Mainly, this is going to be a reasearch project, and so I will be looking a lot into the existing methodologies in computer based Scrabble agents, and trying to extend them where I can. The goals of the project are going to be to:
- First, define what optimality means for a Scrabble strategy
- Produce an optimal algorithm
- Attempt to find a greedy algorithm which produces comparable results to the current world class agents
After doing this, I will hopefully find the time to attempt to generalise the findings to games of the same classification to Scrabble (imperfect information games), but this is more of a pie-in-the-sky objective.
I used LaTeX to produce the specification report, and I have to say it's proved invaluable. It makes document production so much easier, I will definitely be using it in the future. I've been a bit soft and have started using TeX Shop, which takes a lot of the headache out of it (syntax highlighting, a few useful macros, and pdf production in a handy little button). Give it a go!
jPod Posted @ 00:51 on 12th October, 2008
I just finished watching the TV series of jPod. I absolutely loved the book, and have read it many times over. The TV show, whilst a bit rocky to begin with, turned out to be FANTASTIC. AND THEN THEY CANCELLED IT. The last episode ends SO abruptly, it hurts. I don't know if all the cliffhangers were supposed to be answered in the next series, or in some unaired episode, we may never know. And this upsets me. Very, very much. Stupid CBC.
The show itself has left me in the middle of a mental turmoil regarding the rest of my life. Although I've got a couple of years of uni left (although, technically less than 40 weeks of lectures - scary) I think I need to start thinking about what I want to actually do when I graduate. This way I can focus my application energies on one things rather than on the four different options I have at the moment. Perhaps I shall share these with you in a later post, once I've cleared things in my head a touch.
In other news, the third year project is coming along wonderfully. I shall give you an update tomorrow (hopefully...) when I've completed a couple of little tasks.
iPod Touch First Impressions Posted @ 15:40 on 26th September, 2008
Yesterday I received my 8GB iPod Touch - which I was very excited about! I wanted an iPhone (obviously...) but O2 wouldn't let me upgrade. Since we're thinking of going into the iPhone App business, I thought I'd get a Touch to tide me over until my contract runs out next year.
So what do I think of it? I find the keyboard difficult to use, but hopefully that will improve as I get more used to the device. Other than that, I love it! Everything works really well, and it's so damn pretty. So very, very pretty. I'd love to know how the current location functionality works on it (I'm sure it's out there, I just need to do some research...) but it works very well, getting my location pretty damn accurately, and also quite quickly. My only disappointment is that the Facebook iPhone app seems to be quite limited, but I'm sure that's something the guys at Facebook will be working on over the next while. Browsing and working in Safari on it is really easy, and pretty quick (though that may just be the network here). Also, multitouch RULES.
So now I'm waiting for my iPhone Developer status to be approved and I can start putting some little apps of my own on there. Exciting times for Griffs!
Adrian Belew Posted @ 11:13 on 16th September, 2008
...is my latest musical obsession. This man has done everything! I've been a huge Krimson fan for a long time, but have never ventured into the Belew stuff until now. I ordered Side Four (his latest live album with the Power Trio - more on them later) and it arrived today (complete with US Customs label signed by Adrian himself - he actually posted it to me! how cool is that?!), and I must say it's fantastic. When I have some money I need to get some more of his back catalogue.The Power Trio - his live band - are superb. It's comprised of Adrian, and then Eric and Julie Slick, who are not only brother and sister, but are my age. MY AGE. And they're amazing. Why am I not this good at my instrument yet? I really need to get on that...
On a similar note, I've been coveting the Adrian Belew Signature Parker Fly. I have a pretty wide collection of guitars as it is (I'm a bit of a gear whore), but this guitar just about covers everything. It has normal magnetic pick ups, a sustainer pickup, Piezo pickups in the bridge, 13-Pin MIDI output AND it's got the Variax technology built in. So you can control all the MIDI synths you want with it, sound like any guitar you want, hold a note for as long as you want, and then sound like a normal guitar again. And, probably, do all of these things simultaneously. HOW AWESOME IS THAT? If only they did a 7 string model, I would be outside washing cars to raise money right now.