Sitting Engineer

2009-08-24T19:11:00.000-07:00

Trying to understand the hierarchy of Crimes in the US:

In my ignorant style, I'll use Dante's nomenclature of sins.

Crimes against Self:
Usually minor, but for social cohesion and decorum are enforced.
Drug Usage, Suicide attempts.

Crimes against Property:
Arson, Burglary, Vandalism

Crimes against Others:
Through willful action or negligence cause deliberate harm to other members of society.
These are very serious: Manslaughter/Murder, Rape, Assault

Crimes against Authority:
The government views these as an affront to its survival.
Sedition, Treason, Counterfeiting

random thought of the summer

Merry Crimbo

2008-12-28T22:48:00.000-08:00

Crimbotime has come and gone. Thank god.
Post Partum wrap up. I got a scarf, slippers, sign, screwdriver set, and a tiny Lego kit.
My uncle gave the family Rock Band. Guess what we were doing Dec. 26.

2008 is about to leave. Thank god.
Very little happened this year that made me want to remember it.
Probably the highlight were the Chinese Olympics opening ceremonies, and Barack ripping McCain a new one.

This IAP will be looking for stuff, and hopefully building some stuff as well.
Glowing Dopamine and Epinephrine. mmm

Playing SimCity 4 some more. Increasingly breaking the game by introducing more mods that are supposed to highlight the experience [better traffic pathfinding, more intelligent development, more building diversity]

Saw The Fall. Artistic movie if there ever was one, but the colors were so gorgeously saturated I couldn't hate it. Worth watching.

Hate Fox even more for litigating against Watchmen.

Trying to formalize my political beliefs.
Relative Left leaning I guess, but more interested in Pragmatism. No starry-eyed hippy nonsense about the inherent good of people [oh the educational experiments of the 70's]. It better have been proven or is so grounded in logic we should be dumbfounded on why we didn't have it in the first place.

2008-12-16T19:13:00.000-08:00

Blarg.

Finals week is here. Not a very happy camper. But I cannot complain, most of mine are relatively innocuous subjects, and I'm in no danger of failing any of them, so this is mostly ego speaking here.

Like: "I'll be a monkey's uncle if all the work I put into that will get me a B friggin minus"

Anyway, moving on

Thought the Engineer Update was a step in the right direction. Teleporters are hella useful, and there are practical choices for deciding what goes up first. The problem lies in that ALL of his stuff is very dangerous, so this increases the onus on the other team to really dig that tick out.

Started playing SC4 again in earnest last week. Lots of fun. I have 2 cities that breached the 120K people barrier, hard difficulty, no cheats, no 'plops'. Well, maybe 1 plop. I got the Black Hole Garbage energy collector that takes in all the garbage for $200 instead of $1000.
Well c'mon do you really expect me to designate a city as "Landfill central?" I got most of the undesireables in check. Dirty cities are distinct from clean ones. I named one of the poor slums 8 mile (I'm looking at YOU Eminem).

Bad thoughts I had while playing the game:

I wonder how many people I'll make homeless with this construction plan??

Stupid High rise R$ tenements overwhelming my subway/bus system...

Too many poor people want to move into my city! Must, tax, them, more...

What do you people want from me!? Lousy ingrates...

--------------------------------------------
Other things that may help improve the game (in my eyes)

--STOP CONVERTING ALL C$ into C$$$ or CO$$
C$ gets its ass handed to it when the higher ups, CO$$, even have a smidgen of desireability. I like offices as much as the next guy, but We need laundromats too

--REAL CITIES HAVE MIXED TYPES
Living around boston the most common type to see is:
CS$+ R$, CS$+ R$$. CS$$+ R$$, CS$$$+ R$$$

Example: On Mass. Ave, there's a 7-11 with an apartment above.
CS$ (12), R$ (250). This is a solution for those Residential types that naturally get a shitton of traffic (high density)

--HIGHER CAPACITY MASS TRANSIT
DC has hub subway stations that are purposefully designed to handle a bigger load.
Subway Hub: $2000. Maxiumum Capacity: 10,000. 2X1 foot print, 2X2 underground
To actually get to capacity, the Hub passivly boosts the walking limits of buildings around it, sims will walk 9 steps instead of 5-7

Subway Trunk Line: $500 per segment
The Avenue version of the subway line. Maximum capacity is 20,000 through it.

Bus Hub, $500, 4000 Riders, 1X2 spot
etc.

Because I'm really getting aggravated of putting down 3 bus stops in 7 tiles beacuase HD-R $$ is overwhelming them.

--Concurrent Road and MT
Chicago inner loop is a great example. EL line, and Monorail would really benefit from this. Too often I bulldoze 3 blocks, only to find that My sims find the MT too pedestrian to use, wasting my efforts. Of course, to reward those who actually plan ahead, over road EL and Monorail would be Much, Much more expensive

--Selective High Lights
SC4 got the right ideas for glowing certain buildings when deciding to place another. This is fine and dandy for buildings that provide the exact same service: Police, Fire, Health
Not so great for Education: where we have: Elementary, High, Collegate, Library, and Museum to worry about and spread around for maximal effectiveness. We don't even need a toggle to select high lights. A poster, tag, sign of which is which would help immensely.

--Higher Employment I-HT.
Seriously, the highest employer for I-HT is 100. The highest office employer is ~ 7000

What the hell.

A tech park can easily hit 1,000 engineers and scientists [Think intel Fabrication plants]. CERN has 2600 full time employees [not to mention visiting and consulting staff], and ~8000 Scientists and Engineers (10000 workers in 1 campus). Please, put in some higher capacity I-HT, I got 2 cities that are pretty much sprawling parks of the same 10 buildings over and over and over again! More variety in buildings is always a plus.

--Regional Metagame
As regional Governor you get some pretty swanky powers that come along with it.
For instance: You can scrape off some of the budget from other cities for mega projects [$$$$] that 1 city usually cannot do by itself!

Regional Awards: You don't HAVE to bestow these on anybody, they are only here to increase challenges, improve other cities, change the flavor of the game a little bit. The requirements to get these rewards need a populous, 'healthy' region.

State Capital. Region hits 1 million inhabitants, only 1 city can be the "capital". That city gets a nice Tourism and Commerical Boost. Unfortunately, incoming traffic and crime [corruption] may increase as well. The capital city gets a cool little star, and may build the Govenor's Home, State Legislature, etc.

Sin City. Designate a city to have laxer gambling laws [and you though Legalize gambling was just bad enough]. Tourism gets a steroid shot. Crime goes wild. The city can place a variety of casinos that really pad the budget.

Grid Central. Designate a City to be a principal supplier of energy. City population HAS to remain under a certain level for safety reasons. All cities that are connected (by some way) to Grid Central's electric network can buy their energy straight from them. Grid Central has the bonus of reduced maintainence costs, Lower achievement requirments, longer lifespan, on all of their plants. Fire Hazard goes through the roof. Cancer rates [damn hi-transmission lines] also increase.

No Man's Land. Cordon off a would-be city to serve as the general refuse pit for the entire region. All cities have an option of choosing to ship their trash to this forsaken land, usually at a premium. The choice of using this lowers the Environment score for the target city to 0.

Hooverville. R$ will move into this city in droves. Illegality, Illness, Illiteracy skyrocket. Why would you make a city into a slum? Simple. Reduces the lower element's desire into moving into other cities. If you provide a lot of services for the R$ types, make them happy, more will want to move into Hooverville, and not into others (makes it easier for High density R$$$ to develop). However, the reduction depends on how many live in the city and how happy they are. If they get too restless, the situation rebounds, R$ will leave your city in an exodus, finding themselves refugees in other cities and boosting the crime/undesireability REGION WIDE. BWAHAHA

So the designation scheme works kinda like a scenario mode, but you choose how and where, and If you succeed, all cities in the area prosper. If you stink at it... well,

Mega projects would be aweinspiring, and require at least the financial backbone of a nation to get behind.

Missile Defense Shield :: (NORAD)
Areonautics and Space Agency ::(Cape Canaveral / Houston Mission Control)
Super Collider :: (LHC)
Great Dam ::(3 Gorges Dam)
Federal Highway System ::(USA)
Naval Shipyard ::(Pearl Harbor)
State University ::(University of Texas)

we can go on and on and on...
but who cares

Time to study some more

Hmm, a 1 to 1 mapping of transgressions against god

2008-12-08T14:23:00.000-08:00

A few things for thought.

Then and Now
Wrath:: Trolling [OMG WTF STFU JEW]
Pride:: Blogging [I'm right, they're wrong, listen to me]
Sloth:: Surfing [Sitting in a chair all day]
Gluttony:: Downloading [Must hog bandwidth]
Envy:: Spam [Get a bigger p3n1s! Cheap $$ Drugs! Get Ma1l order Brides!]
Greed:: Piracy [SecuROM sux! I'm ripping em off!]
Lust:: Porn [Self-Explanatory]

Thus Completes my list that anything you can do on the internet can be construed as a sin
Thus The internet is Evil
and for porn.

"Forgive me father for I have sinned, I have rick-rolled seven people today"
"Sigh, 15 hail marys"

Thoughts of the Day

2008-11-16T14:44:00.000-08:00

I wonder how they make salt uniformly sized

"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results"
- A. Einstein
Thanks to Quantum Mechanics, we know this to be not true.

Youtube: Apathy's Fuck You
Zero Pretension
No Apprehension
Forget Empathy
All Antipathy
It so over the top that I can't help but crack into a grin over his misanthropy

But there's still a lot to life that just doesn't [apparently FFox doesn't like the word Doesn't ] make sense. Because the fundamentals of a 'good' life are so uncomplicated it takes human ingenuity to find someway to finagle it.
Work hard, eat right, respect your neighbor, seek truth, act deliberately, hurt no one, love your family, relax, explore.
I know I left out the subtle details that make each existence unique but that's it.
9 Steps to an unregrettable life. Hell if I can actually follow them myself. hmmpf.

Songs I picked Up by trolling the internet. Yech, messy business
World Without Logos : It seems to be a song from a weird anime sorta thing. Eh. Lyrics don't make sense, but just listen to it and get caught up in the beat.

It's All been Done. Made 10 years ago (about), BNL was good back then, still good now

Combination of the above to songs makes me think of Calvino's Cosmicomics. Great book. Qfwfq always wears the same pair of sunglasses in all of his incarnations throughout existence, meeting, loving, and losing the same woman as the universe changes. Swing dancing on a molten planet, exploding meteroites illuminate the sky. Q chasing his friend, surfing on galaxies as they twirl about in the void.
Yeah... I might need something about that. [No doc! I'm not crazy!]

Play it backwards. Play it forwards.
Beat Dubs

Building from the Ground Up

2008-10-25T00:14:00.000-07:00

**Disclaimer** Any ideas that seem to be a coherent and sensible thought are entirely coincidental. If you value your sanity and intellect please leave now.
**End Disclaimer**

Lately from my classes in MITer, and observations of the world, safely cloistered in my room (this is where the bias comes in). I notice that the fundamental aspect of research and our understanding comes from the derivations of small-behavior that can be applied in a pattern to large scale behavior. And that the small system does not need to have many essential qualities and responses in order to dictate massive protocol.

Example 1: I choose LEGO blocks as a beautiful example of this mentality, since almost everyone in the Western Hemisphere has either played with and/or known of them.

Small Scale: The little standard 2x4x1 lego brick is surprisingly well engineered, with fault tolerances of <7um. A block will be made of mostly ABS plastic, if it is a spring piece, some metal, and if it is magnetic, a tiny cermaic magnet. 3 Ingredients, and I have just described about 90%+ of all lego bricks in Existence, with Pure ABS bricks being 80%+
All a lego brick has to do is bind to another lego brick with the Studs or stick/tube.

Large Scale: LEGOLAND, Mindstorms. Each tiny piece contributes to the whole in not entirely expected ways. [Look closely at some lego sculptures and be amazed at the creativity of selection of parts]

Small Scale: A Bird. Fly with other birds. Do not stray too far, do not hit anything. Try to stay at 60 degress from behind to maximize lift.
Large Scale: I have just lain the foundations for bird flocking and predator avoidance

Small Scale:A neuron, essentially the cellular stimulus and Response cell. Input signal-> output
Large Scale: Your Fecking Brain

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I make this point because some people forget that the whole is dependent on ALL of its parts, and that no portion should be neglected or ridiculed because it is not immediately clear how it will fit in.

Nano technology is another clear example on tiny contributions lead to macroscopic changes that could not have been acheived otherwise

The finale I'm trying to make comes from a moment of paradoxical implications, wherein a math fundamentals describes Set A contains Set B, but Set B contains Set A, and B does not Equal A.

Philosophy->Sociology->Psychology->Biology->Chemistry->Physics->Mathematics->Philosophy
Engineering is Just Physics
Physics is just Engineering [If you want to do any experiments]

Next Time: Biology, and why every organism deserves an examination

Extra projects and progress

2008-10-22T22:22:00.000-07:00

Is this going to be a seasonal thing? (Update every sunday perhaps?)
Things I managed to get done since September-October
Finally install uBUNTu on my second computer, hooked it up to a cheap Hub
Got 2 free LCD monitors with broken backlights, will be replacing the original bulbs with cheap Cold Cathode Florescent bulbs something this weekend

Got a tiny camera flash unit. You switch it on, and when it's charged, press a button and the flash goes off. It is easily my new favorite toy. Wheee! *Flash*

Finished the hall sign, it is now mounted and not-so-blindingly-glowing

Started drinking coffee on a more regular basis
(missing half a class cuz you passed out during it is no fun at all), its nowhere near as restful as sleep, and it makes you look bad in front of the prof

Fan Crap: Valve claims to delay any new class/content until 2009... I call shenanigans until they have an official post.

www.brickset.com-- Excellent Archive of all Lego sets. 1992. 1991, and 1987 were good years in my book (yes i'm comparing Lego to wine, shuddup)

I got to vote absentee, wee. Go Obama.
Nothing wrong with McCain, aside from various verbal gaffes, but I'll cut the man a break, He's almost as old as my Granddad.
Problem's with Palin. Acting Cute does not make one a leader. Being unaware of foreign developments while dictating policy is tantamount to driving while blindfolded. The Executive has at it's disposal the most powerful Army [Firepower], Navy, Air, and Nuclear forces. Although our troops are courageous and valiant, they have a limit. Knowing the nuance between speaking softly and carrying a big stick is going to be critical for getting us through. This I feel Palin lacks. She may know what Main Street feels, but she doesn't know how the World feels.

Long Time Away

2008-08-05T23:29:00.000-07:00

Ok, it's now August 6, 2008 in the name of a Christian Lord year 2008.
Lets do a ramble of what happened in the last 6 Months

March: School
God was that the longest month

April: School, that's about all I can remember

May: End of School
Made a kickass LED sign for my dorm hall
Finished Finals strong
Nearly went insane after writing a paper on Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest

June: Hung around the house
Power Washed the Deck

July: 4 o July
Helped renovate Grandma's house
Painted the kitchen and Hallways
Redid the Floor (Composite Wood Flooring FTW)
Threw out lots of Junk(Mostly cardboard boxes)

August:
Went to New York City
Did NOT do the classic tourist "Lets see all the overcrowded national monuments"
Went around and saw more down to earth typical New Yorker Fare
Chinatown, where we got some really good beef and pork jerky
Time Square (bought a T-Shirt, and looked at the work needed to rig up those millions of lights)
New York Botanical Garden. This place has an amazing collection of Lilies, Roses and Lotus flowers this time of year
7th Avenue Bazaar. Saw plenty of vendors. Found a welding expert's shop and bought a bitchin' tank sculpture from him. Gave the sculpture as a present.
Took about 500 pictures during the trip

Found the New Jersey wasteland somewhat alluring. The desolate, functional industrial look kind of reminds me of a sad puppy waiting for someone to take it home.

My thoughts, which, because of devaluation, is worth about a penny, instead of 2

--Barack Obama is still my favorite candidate, even if it's because McCain is making himself look like an idiot on a weekly basis.

--The economy is in a fairly shonky state. The storm of mortgage collapse, rising gas prices, foreign outsourcing, corporate mismanagment and incopetent administration will take a few years to fully resolve.

--Got to see the secondary effects of high gas prices, as people are unwilling to commute further out to see friends or engage in commerce (there's gotta be a verb for engaging in commerce)

--People can be idiots sometimes, the trick to being wise is being aware when one is an idiot

--If you feel like you need to share your opinion with the rest of the world [this blog does not count because no one will ever read this and I am just a rambling loser], before you make it public in a newspaper, TV ad, or prominent website, follow this procedure:

1: Find a friend who disagrees with you slightly on what you consider to be a critical issue
IF you just have friends who agree with everything you think, you need more diversity

2: Give them a very well thought out arguement of why your opinion should matter
Remember, opinions do matter, but they are not necessarily relavent

3: If your friend cannot find a well reasoned rebuttal, then your argument has some weight
Repeat this starting with 1

4: If you've run out of friends and you've successfully defended your point, then you can give you now well thought out and tested argument to the world

I used the above method to reason if torture of suspects is ever justifiable
My position is that is is not
Other Disagree... Strongly
My argument is that a clever rewording of the 4th amendment is all that separates us from detention
Others argument is that we need torture to keep the terrorists at bay
I used Franklin's quote: He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security.

Fan Stuff
--Medic Update was crap, so many bleeding requirements to get the goods. And half of the medics didn't even know what they should do. At least time sorts everything out

--Pyro Update was hella fun, although I am kinda sad that the BB is no longer a suitable alternative to the AB, oh well. Deflecting ammo is certainly satisfying. The AXT is probably the most fun melee I've had

--Heavy Update is next, gotta practice my spy skills (I'm god-awful horrible at it)
As always, my moniker is Wumaster125

Ping

2008-02-25T11:32:00.000-08:00

Ping = 5 Million
Yep.
That's how slow I am in updating this
Hopefully I will be able to jot down a few things on my mind once every two weeks.

Thought of the day:
Literature requires us to drill for oil, the deep rich nature of the true work
My brain is only equipped with a shovel
Start digging

Still obsessed with Computer Games. Attempting to kick habit with a ton of work
Brian

Merry Crimbo Everyone!!!

2007-12-26T21:01:00.000-08:00

Yes, Crimbo.
Commercial Christmas.
Christmas was originally about the Nativity, Mary, Jesus and all that jazz.
How did a celebration of a religious Icon become a mass consumer paradise?
Clever marketing sure played a part. Thomas Nast created Santa Claus as an illustration to a children's poem. But I digress.
So I call this season Crimbo. Commercial Christmas. Buy Buy Buy.
And I am a sucker for family. Bought gifts for my siblings. As a way to show I appreciate them.
For all you cynics out there, I try to buy useful things they will enjoy and use.
And nothing too expensive either.

So I got a few things for Christmas:
IPod Nano leather cover
Wireless Keyboard/Mouse
Knit Hat, Gloves, Muffs (Useful, College is really Cold)
Steven Colbert's I Am America: and So Can You

I find the Colbert Report to be mildly amusing, but Colbert's latest book is pretty damn funny
One phrase: "Lavender Armageddon"

Later Crimbo day, I helped out the Family at the Restaurant. A few thing I have learned from this experience (and many before)

1. Jewish people like Chinese Food
2. People will waste a lot of food, but not cocktails or beer
3. The Holidays are very busy, expect service quality to decrease considerably
(The system is pushed beyond optimal capacity)
4. Please be patient during the holidays
5. The more high-maintenance your order it is, the more likely it will turn out wrong
(A customer with Celiac's disease had a very particular order)
6. Other people want to enjoy the holidays as much as you do. Be gentle.

So that's my rant of the week.

Take care, merry holidays.

Finals Done

2007-12-19T20:48:00.000-08:00

Ah, the Inaugural post. Since I am just one out of countless rambling blogs in the Intertubes, I won't waste your time with countless drivel about what you should think. Life is more interesting than that.

On a lighter note, here are some wub-comics that I think certain audiences will enjoy.

XKCD
Requires a certain level of experience to understand the humor, but is clever nonetheless

Bunny
Whimsical, Random, and thought provoking. Abstract art without the snobbery

SMBC
For the morbid curiosity within all of us. Don't show this to the kids

I just finished my finals. They weren't too bad. It also helps that the first term grades do not distinguish between a C and A (God bless Pass-No Record)

For those in the know, this is easy. I'm looking at majoring 6.2, but 6.01 is BS, and it pains me to see 7.015 go. 10-250 is being renovated so where's 18.03 IAP held? I'm doing 6.186 over the IAP but I'm prepared to go AWOL and IHTFP when 6.270's all "Robo > MAS".

I'll be playing Team Fortress 2, handle WuMaster125