Posts for Bisqwit


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Just in case someone doesn't know it -- you don't need to be a TASVideos approved publisher to fill in the missing gap between judge's "accept"-judging and actual publication. In fact, you can be ANYBODY, even a nobody, and simply provide an encode and let some of the publishers download it from you. They will review it and if it matches the encoder guidelines, they will take it and publish the movie with that avi/mkv which YOU provided. Though publishers usually are also encoders, the publication job is merely a clerky one: The publisher's job is to write a fitting description, choose proper categories and obsoletions and screenshots and ensure that the player listing is sufficiently maintained. Part of that even overlaps with regular editors' work. In other words, the bottleneck is not in TASVideos not appointing people to those fabled positions. It is about people stepping up and volunteering. As for why I have not used those encodes people have provided to submissions -- they have not offered them to me or any other publisher. I tend not read the discussion thread pertaining to the submission when the judging has already been done. Such communication is best done at the IRC channel.
Post subject: Responding to mz's complaints on Bisqwit's persona
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mz wrote:
Bisqwit. I think he'd rather have another MTV interview for himself instead of having a community the size of YouTube. He is only worried about having the highest possible quality for anything in his website. Thanks to this we only have published TASes for the most popular games, the encodes for more complex systems take years to appear on the website, the website is more static than most 1998 FrontPage sites, the community is completely separated from the real website (forum/real website... Most new people don't even know there are so many people behind those TASes), our TASes a lot of times receive more comments on sites like YouTube instead of ours, because it's much harder for a newbie to leave comments here, etc etc. And don't get me started on things I've been personally annoyed by him: it took him more than a year to accept PCSX or at least show interest, he doesn't want to accept runs with hacks in them (like that finished Resident Evil 3 TAS or Metal Gear Solid...) at least until we have pSX, his complete lack of social skill drive away any new coder, with his mostly stupid new-emulator requirements and his blunt way to criticize the work other people are doing for free to help his website; and how we have forums for Famtasia, DOSBox, Dolphin, etc... and for PCSX it took more than a year to have one. And he should be the one making the changes needed by this community to be more alive, and not just this elitist soon to be dead thing; but I guess Bisqwit really likes all this, and he's just interested in more interviews for MTV and all that.
To summarize, you are accusing me of the following: 1. Interested of responding interviews (fame) 2. Overly interested in minor technical bits 3. Not curating the community 4. Not developing the site to put the community in a more promiment position 5. Demanding diamonds on a silver platter 6. Not acknowledging hard work until #5 is met, and sometimes not even then Have I understood correctly? I will respond. 1. TASVideos grew from amidst the need to provide information about TASes. The gamer audience was extremely uneducated about TASes, and accusations of cheating were common. Thus, for a long time, a major goal of TASVideos was political as much as it was about bringing entertainment. To hope helping this goal, I accepted any honorable interview requests that came in. I have no ambitions of personal fame. Now that I have shifted that responsibility away, adelikat will be responding any interview requests that will be come, except this one that I will be answering for Pelaaja-lehti in Finnish language next week. [EDIT: Which I actually forgot about. :( No interview.] 2. Being a geek, can't really help that. Also, the desire to provide good quality videos at an affordable file size was one of the founding goals of this site. 3. I'm not really a charismatic person, and I'm not good at managing communities, and therefore I've done my best to balance on the edge between staying from the way and enforcing some discipline. After more moderators were recruited, I stepped further into the shadows. Instead of insisting people work under bad leadership, I've admitted my shortcomings from time to time and I've been calling others to step forward, while stepping backward myself. You know how hard it is to actually find people willing to carry responsibility? 4. Frankly I have never even realized that this would be an issue. My main concerns have been with ensuring that authors are always properly credited (I even went as far as enforcing a realname principle whenever there would be concern that people's nicknames change or are very generic). 5. History has left me a bit paranoid about various problems that can arise. Thus the various demands. Then there are usability issues: If I am verifying whether an emulator actually meets those requirements, and I hit a stonewall a hundred times trying to use the emulator, I'm not very happy. Can't help it. However, it's easier for everyone if the knowledgeable parties just fill a checklist on what's implemented and what's not :) 6. Now this is something I have no excuse for. I take much for granted. Even when God performs miracles, I think "now this was a normal day". So, I apologize. As for ignoring the work in progress as if it did not exist: when I have no personal interest on the subject, I approach the project only in the role of the administrator, and from #3 it follows that I check it rarely and only when necessary, and from #5 it follows that bad experiences can make it even rarer. To sum it up, personal interest can make a lot of difference. If I'm interested about something you are doing and I'm not burdened by policies and other administrative responsibilities, you'll find that I'm not really that antisocial.
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Thereisnospoon wrote:
Thanks for the help. A nice unsigned int worked much better than the iterator. Fixed, and on to new bugs:)
Rather than unsigned int, I recommend size_t, or if you aren't afraid of verbosity, std::vector<int>::size_type. This helps your program's portability. It won't crash on a 64-bit platform if your vector contains an excess of 4294967295 elements. I've learned this the hard way, by having many programs crash when they have this kind of code:
std::string k = "kupo";
unsigned pos = k.find("q");
if(pos != k.npos) k[pos] = 'u';
Works just fine on 32-bit, crashes on 64-bit. When you change the unsigned into std::string::size_type, it works as intended.
Post subject: Submission file alerts infrastructure
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Due to the demands caused by the PXM movie file format, I added a new feature to the submission system. Previously, if you submitted a movie file that had something fishy in it, such as it starting from a savestate or having a "hacks enabled" bit set, it would outright reject the submission file. Now, instead of rejecting the submission, it receives it gladly, but it posts an "ALERTS POSSIBLY COMPROMISING MOVIE INTEGRITY" message on the top of the submission page listing every detectable thing that could possibly compromise the movie's credibility. These things are currently: -- M64, FCM, FM2, VBM, SMV, MMV, PXM: Movie starts from a savestate -- PXM: Movie has preinitialized memory cards (memory card contents are listed) -- PXM: Movie uses cheats (frames where cheats are enabled are listed) -- PXM: Movie uses hacks (frames where each hack is enabled are listed) This shifts some work from the technology behind the site to the judges, but it also makes exceptions possible for actually publishing some unordinary movie. Apologies to Arukado and Pirate_sephiroth who had to wait a really long time to have this done. You can now submit your movies, folks. Caveats: -- GMV file start mechanism is still not recognized, and an alert is not posted if the file begins from a savestate. -- Currently the "alerts" are not shown on the forums; it is only posted on the submission page.
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Thereisnospoon wrote:
Thanks, but I'm pretty sure I don't copy the dag object. My main function is here: http://rafb.net/p/NHbFWb31.html
Oh yes you do.
dag d; d = dag(points);
The first line constructs a dag object. (Scope=program, destructor will be called at program termination) The second line constructs a second, temporary dag object, and then calls the operator=() for the first dag object, with the second dag object as its parameter; then the second dag object is destructed. d = dag(points); is equivalent in function to the following code:
 { char temporarybuffer[sizeof(dag)];
new(temporarybuffer) dag(points); // construct a temporary

d.operator= ( (const dag*)temporarybuffer ); // assign the temporary to d by the means of the assign operator (=)

((dag*)temporarybuffer)->~dag(); // destruct the temporary
} // end of scope for the temporary
Post subject: Re: Weird STL Iterator Behavior
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You did not provide the whole code, so I cannot tell what's wrong. I'll guess though: You're making a copy of the "dag" object. When you make a copy, the iterator continues to point to the original vector's element, not the copy. If the original vector is deallocated after copying, you will have an iterator pointing nowhere. E.g.
dag GetDag()
{
    dag gruu;
    return gruu;
}

void meow()
{
    dag tmp = GetDag(); // this does copying, original gets destructed
    tmp.triangulate(); // works on an obsolete iterator
}
To fix, follow either one of these solutions: 1) Instead of a storing an iterator possessing a pointer, store an index 2) Implement the copy constructor and the assign operator.
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Dear mz, I apologize to you for selfishly choosing where I direct my energy at my free time and for possessing a sizable dose of perfectionist personality. But my free time usable for this site's benefit is not going to increase -- on the contrary -- so I only hope that whoever takes over a particular task will do better job than I have done.
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DaTeL237 wrote:
1) How would someone be able to tell whether or not God has forgiven his/her sins?
Pentecostal people (among others) teach about the concept of "assurance of salvation", which is a peace in mind that a believer receives when they are taught the gospel and they make the conscious choice to repent their life and follow Yeshua. I'm not an expert at this topic personally because I've taken a really low-pitched slope to where I'm now, contrary to the steep one that most believers take. Only I know I have that assurance definitely in my mind.
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Memcache problem fixed. Thanks to Warp (first reporter) and everyone else.
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Tub wrote:
Bisqwit wrote:
Ich sprechen nein doits, sorry.
Let me say this in the name of all of my countrymen: AAAARRGGH!
I'm pleased with the reaction. It's not like mr. pirate needed me to write that in actual German, so I went ahead and made (bad) comedy.
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pirate_sephiroth wrote:
332 - Der gute Acker Der gute Acker. — Alles Abweisen und Negieren zeigt einen Mangel an Fruchtbarkeit an: im Grunde, wenn wir nur gutes Ackerland wären, dürften wir nichts unbenutzt umkommen lassen und in jedem Dinge, Ereignisse und Menschen willkommenen Dünger, Regen oder Sonnenschein sehen.
Ich sprechen nein doits, sorry.
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DaTeL237 wrote:
Bisqwit wrote:
It is deceivingly simple: 1. Your sins are forgiven unto you; 2. Go and sin no more; 3. Yeshua* said: Follow me.
1) does it matter in what way? for instance... if a victim's family has forgiven the person who caused harm, is that forgiveness? In the same case, can the person find forgiveness (such as in god) if the family does not forgive? 2) ok quite clear 3) Do you think it's possible someone follows Yeshua without knowing so (or even without believing in him, or a step further.... believing he did/does not exist?)
1) It's about God forgiving the man's sins. Though it is possible that people hold grudges longer than God does, or conversely are quicker to forget, it's only God's forgiveness that gives them a life, and for that, #2 and #3 are necessary as well. 3) No. Using an allegory from the Bible ― Yeshua is a shepherd, and his followers are sheep. How can a sheep follow the shepherd if they do not even acknowledge the shepherd?
Post subject: Re: What's the policy on uploading other people's "works"
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Not only full credit, but also full indication that it is a TAS and not something else.
Republication of movies from this site is only allowed under the following conditions: 1. Video and audio content must not be changed (including the pointers to this site), 2. The movies must be prominently labeled as tool-assisted speedruns, 3. The actual player(s) (always shown at this site) must be properly credited. Do not label them with speculations. If unsure, read Why And How or ask for details.
If you encode the movie yourself from the emulator, you can scratch over #1, but please keep #2 and #3.
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Indeed. Not to sound elitist, but in a western, nominally christian country like USA or Finland only has a small fraction of the people are actually true christians. Sadly, that even excludes many (but not all) priests working for the state church. Even sadder, that even includes some people who go to independent churches with healthy credo and agree with everything that is taught there. Theology and faith are two quite different things, and not all faith saves. For example, in Finland, if you ask a layman whether they're christian -- there's a high chance that they'll say yes (especially if you setup the question by first talking about muslims etc). If you followup and ask a few fundamental questions, such as whether they will go to Heaven, and whether there are people who will end up in Hell, and whether they think that Jesus actually existed, then you will receive lots of hesitating maybes or plain epileptic trees. The Bible teaches us that the gate leading to life is strait and the way is narrow, and that there are few who find it. (Matt. 7:14) It is deceivingly simple: 1. Your sins are forgiven unto you; 2. Go and sin no more; 3. Yeshua* said: Follow me. All three of these tenets are required; 1 without 3 does not happen. 2 without 3 does not happen. 2 without 1 does not happen. And so on. Little details like whether you go to church (of whichever denomination), whether you subscribe to postmillenianist and/or trinitarian views, and whether you think TV is an altar of devil, are irrelevant, although there are many things that are important for the believer's spiritual growth. *) Hebrew original name of Jesus
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Arflech, I'm granting you the benefit of doubt. Take the hint.
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I strongly think this and the previous movie should both be published as separate categories. I just don't know what to call the category for the older movie... "less glitched", eh?
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Xkeeper wrote:
I am completely unable to focus on any one task for more than a few minutes. I can usually "focus-burst" into a new project and get some grounding ideas in, but after that it's impossible to do any further work on it, leaving projects to stagnate for months and years. Do you have any suggestions on improving focus and getting things done? :|
Sounds like a discipline problem to me. Are you asking me for hints on self-discipline? Wikipedia tells us so: > Thus, self-discipline is the assertion of willpower over more base desires, and is > usually understood to be a synonym of 'self control'. Self-discipline is to some extent > a substitute for motivation, when one uses reason to determine a best course of > action that opposes one's desires. Here's a quote from the beginning of the Self-control article linked to in the above paragraph: > People demonstrate great differences in the level of self-control. It can be affected > because of illness and past experiences and it can be improved through the course > of life. Many religions have teachings about self control. In the Christian context, > Paul describes self control in the epistle to the Galatians (5:22-23), as one of the > fruits of the Spirit. In the epistle addressed to Titus (2:5-6) he instructs to 'Urge > the younger men to be self controlled.' The Apostle Peter describes an increase > in self control as fundamental to the salvation of a Christian (2 Peter 1:5-8). > > "A man without self-control is as defenseless as a city with broken-down walls" (Proverbs 25:28). Maybe there's a hint or two. :)
Xkeeper wrote:
(that and I figured a change from religion questions would be nice)"
Oh!
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pirate_sephiroth wrote:
Nietzche wrote:
something
tl;dr. I mean literally: My eyes jumped through your post from a random line to another random line, trying to spot something interesting to read, but failing to locate anything of that kind. ------------ As for trinity: I do not subscribe to any -ism or -ian label, or the teachings of any particular church unless they happen to agree with what I've come to understand. That includes the label of trinitarianism. I'll describe here what I believe re: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Feel free to tl;dr this post in return. There is a God, who is known by the name YHWH (the vowels are not known anymore), and who is described extensively in the Tanakh -- the Hebrew Bible. God has a son that is unlike any creation of his. This son is the Messiah of Israel, and he was born into flesh in Betlehem about 2000 years ago. He was rejected by his people, and subsequently crucified -- however, his life was a literal fulfilment of the law. His blood sacrifice fulfilled permanently the role of the animal sacrifices demanded by God's law for atonement of mankind's sins. He rose from the death and ascended to Heaven, but before doing so, he told that he will be the one deciding who gets to Heaven and who does not. This Messiah is known by the name Yeshua. Greek, Latin and English transliterations transformed that name into Jesus. Yeshua has a Father, whom he calls the God, and who matches the description of YHWH from the old testament. They communicated. From this, follows that Son and Father are two distinct persons. Before going away, Yeshua told his disciples to wait until they receive the power. This power was the baptism with God's spirit -- so called Holy Spirit -- and they did receive it at the Pentecost day. This is the same power that was upon the great prophets of the Tanakh, and through that power, they performed miracles and received word from God. The Holy Spirit can be described as a spiritual substance -- it is the "living water" that Yeshua described. People who report having visited the Heaven have described that there are literally fountains and rivers with this "water" there, with the rivers flowing from the throne. At times, some believers report feeling "a lot of" Holy Spirit present, or a little. The book of Acts also describes Holy Spirit as a measure by which people can be filled at varying degrees. However, there are also people -- mostly prophets -- who report that the Holy Spirit has a "voice" distinct from the voice of the Son or the Father, a much subtler and gentler one. I have yet to recognize this voice myself, so the best I can say about my knowledge about God's persona is 2½. In this text, I have thus established that these three subjects are distinct. However, what makes them one is rather implicit: They never conflict each others. They work in perfect harmony. They share the same morality traits. I don't think there's much question whether Father and the Spirit are one. The Spirit is the work-effecting power of God. However, whether the Son joins this union is more complicated. He said himself: "Father and I are one." and, "Who has seen me, has seen my Father". The Holy Spirit that lives in believers, testifies to them about the Son. I am not aware of any other proofs. The text above has little to no value to non-believing non-Israelites, but I wrote it here for 1) future reference and 2) to clarify what is my take on the topic.
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mega_man_3 wrote:
I chose this route because I found a glitch that allows you to access the Rush Jet early. After you beat Shadow Man you highlight his weapon in the weapon switch screen then you press right then start.
Already known on this forum. Although in your merit, I must admit that I could not find it by using a Search. EDIT: Except for passing mentions at: ― http://tasvideos.org/forum/p/172710#172710http://tasvideos.org/forum/p/36378#36378http://tasvideos.org/forum/p/36272#36272. I suggest you study those arguments first, before pursuing your strategy :)
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For jumping & gravity, mayb e use the same algorithm, but choose the list of "corners" from those points that are currently reachable by jumping, rounded to a 16 pixel granularity or something. Those destinations can be found by simulating the jump curve, or maybe in some simpler manner...
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Ooo. 2D pathfinding is very simple if you allow free movement (i.e. flying). . Just use djikstra's algorithm. For efficiency, only consider points that are in the corner of something (i.e. points that are in the transition of letting you see something new). However, when you add gravity... and the need to jump, it becomes much more complicated. Djikstra's algorithm is like this: (pseudocode)
struct point
  var loc = xy
  var distance = float
  var points_travelled = list of xy
end

var locations = list of point

locations.push(origin)

world.add_corner(goal)

while locations.not_empty do
  locations.sort_by_distance
  point spectator = locations.pop
  if spectator.xy = goal.xy then
    print "yay, found the shortest route: ", spectator.points_travelled
  end
  for all corners in the world, as corner, do
     if uninterrupted_sight(corner, spectator.xy) and spectator.points_travelled.has_no(corner) then
       point spectator_new = spectator
       spectator_new.points_travelled.push(corner)
       spectator_new.xy = corner
       spectator_new.distance += distance(corner, spectator.xy)
       locations.push(spectator_new)
     end
  end
end
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andrewg wrote:
Is the correct at all?
No. Your code is not properly indented. More seriously, I get the gist that it does not compile. Try tokenizing it and you should see what's wrong. Especially around the scanf() statement. There's another bug that doesn't prevent compilation, but will cause malfunction. Recall which operators are easily mistaken.
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zggzdfist ... what's the point of this thread, again?
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Anarchy ahoy! Complete absense of any operating system works just fine for NES, SNES, etc. :)
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Any game that has long-lasting and difficult-to-control randomness is hard.