Posts for Warp


Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Actually the gregorian calendar was set in 1582.
Post subject: Re: a rickrollin' good time
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
IdeaMagnate wrote:
zogmg hear is a funney video about cats and ninjas.
That's so 80's!
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
nfq wrote:
Warp wrote:
Yeah. It's a well-known fact that sound, like all electromagnetic radiation, can travel in vacuum. Also, like all electromagnetic radiation, sound travels at the speed of light in vacuum.
Just because they can't do the same things doesn't mean they are not parts of the same thing. Light can't go through opaque walls but it can go through vacuum. Sound can go through walls but not vacuum.
And this demonstrates their sameness how? It's curious that you use the term "electro-magnetic wave" even though your definition of "electro-magnetic" clearly differs from how science defines it. How do you define "electro-magnetic" wave? Note that in science, as the name itself implies, such a wave has an electric field and a magnetic field (which are at 90 degrees of each other). Sound does not have such electric nor magnetic fields. Electromagnetic radiation has also other properties which sound doesn't. For example, EMR behaves in some situations like a stream of particles instead of a wave (the compton effect is the classic example).
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
nfq wrote:
everything is a part of the EM spectrum. even sound and thoughts.
Yeah. It's a well-known fact that sound, like all electromagnetic radiation, can travel in vacuum. Also, like all electromagnetic radiation, sound travels at the speed of light in vacuum.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Baxter wrote:
Because all particles interact with one another
That doesn't matter. Total angular momentum is always conserved. A (sub)system cannot gain (or lose) angular momentum without any external forces. If its total angular momentum is 0, it will stay like that no matter how much it changes internally, unless an external force is applied. (The only way for a system to "change" its angular momentum is by ejecting part of itself, and only if after that we forget that ejected part and only examine what is left as the new system.)
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
nfq wrote:
the problem i have with these theories is not the mathematics, but the interpretation. einstein claims that time slows down in gravity, which is illogical because time is a mental thing.
A mental thing which can be accurately measured and compared? That's like saying that distance is just a mental thing and thus making any statements about distances is illogical.
i know that einstein probably wasn't serious about spacetime curvature and all that
You *know*? And exactly how do you *know* this? Do you have some information everyone else lacks?
And you have proof of this?
if you think logically
Unfortunately nature doesn't always work like the limited logic of a given person would predict. Besides, what you are referring to sounds more like intuition than logic, and intuition differs a lot from person to person. Is your intuition (or, as you call it, "logic") better than other people's? Many phenomena which may at first seem illogical usually become quite clear when it's explained.
you can realize that a finite universe is illogical.
According to whose logic? Yours? Mine? That's like saying that an Earth of finite size is illogical. It just makes no sense.
for example, according to scientists space is made of nothing
Do you have some kind of reference of this?
so it can't be curved
By the same logic there can't be any distances in space because, after all, space is made of "nothing" and thus there can't be anything there, for example, distances.
there can't be an absence of space other than matter because space is absence of matter.
Yeah, things like heat, light and radio waves do not exist because the only thing which is not "nothing" is matter.
there's no evidence of a finite universe, not even logical evidence.
There's plenty of evidence. Claiming there's no evidence means that you would have to explain all the existing evidence as false. Can you do that?
If you only believe in what you see, then explain me how electricity works.
what do you want me to explain about it specifically? what you're asking is kinda like: explain how the universe works? too broad question.
It's not a broad question. Just explain me, for example, why a LED emits light when it's connected to a battery. And don't start with any electrons or similar because we are now dealing with your view of the world, where we don't believe anything we can't see and experience first-hand. I can't see electrons, so they don't exist. They are illogical.
Baxter wrote:
Too bad there isn't a single particle in universe that moves inertially.
You mean because of spin? But the total spin of an object can be made to be zero. (While it may not be possible to cancel total angular momentum, you can make the angular momentum of part of the system, the part which we want to be an inertial reference, to have a total zero angular momentum by applying external forces to it.)
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Why would you want to hide this information from public view?
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
mmbossman wrote:
The object and observer may not be accelerating when compared to each other, but not when thought of in absolute terms. I'm currently not accelerating in reference to my laptop, but what about in reference to Jupiter? Or Alpha Centari?
I don't think you understand. An inertial frame of reference is one which is not accelerating, and this state can be determined and measured without the need to compare to anything else in the universe. The observer in the inertial frame of reference can measure whether his own frame of reference is indeed inertial or accelerating. That's because if it's accelerating there would be a measurable force acting in the opposite direction of the acceleration. You don't need anything else to measure whether you are accelerating or not. From two different observers which see each other as accelerating, if one of them is actually not, it can be measured which one. It's the one which has no external force applied to (and this can be measured). (Of course gravity, according to GR, is a complicated twist to this, as it causes apparent acceleration even though there isn't one. A free-falling object appears to be accelerating, but this seems so only because we see a limited 3D slice of the universe. It's the same type of illusion as seeing the rails of a railroad converge in a photo even though they are in reality parallel.)
I have different accelerations when compared to all these things, it just happens that we usually think of acceleration in the confines of the earth and its atmosphere and its gravity (which is always producing a constant acceleration, since, as you said, it produces a measurable force).
Inertiality can be measured, and from two objects which accelerate with respect to each other, if one of them is in an inertial frame of reference, it can be measured which one, as I said above. A point on the surface of the Earth is not an inertial frame of reference, indeed, but that doesn't mean inertial frames of references don't exist.
Velocity also cannot be measured without reference
Velocity is different from acceleration. There's no absolute velocity (except perhaps in relation to the center of the universe or something like that, but in principle there isn't). An isolated observer cannot measure his own velocity. However, an isolated observer can measure his own acceleration.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
mmbossman wrote:
Non-accelerating in reference to what?
Acceleration doesn't need a reference point because acceleration can be measured. Acceleration causes a force and this force can be measured. An observer in a non-accelerating state can measure that it's not accelerating.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Bisqwit wrote:
As in, there's something tangible in the space which could be used as a an absolute reference point…
Any non-accelerating reference point is as valid as any.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
nfq wrote:
roflmao. ok, first of all... most of einsteins theories and big bang are illogical nonsense without any real evidence
Without any real evidence? There is plenty of evidence, starting from the motion of planets (Mercury being the most prominent example; search Vulcan in wikipedia for an interesting story) to GPS. Did you know that if GPS calculations didn't have the non-Newtonian relativity corrections they would give wrong results? Gravity lensing is another good example: It simply happens, it works exactly as predicted by general relativity, it works nothing like Newtonian mechanics predicts, and it cannot be explained by anything else. Just because you don't believe in the experiments and measurements doesn't mean they are not real.
and third: the universe is infinite
And you have proof of this?
Raiscan wrote:
Basically so long as you have mass, no matter what energy you have, you'll never get as fast as light. :(
maybe according to relativity, but not according to reality. there's no evidence that mass increases as you come closer to lightspeed.
Just because you don't believe in the experiments which demonstrate the phenomenon doesn't mean that the phenomenon doesn't exist or that the experiments aren't valid. If you only believe in what you see, then explain me how electricity works. Don't start any BS about electrons. I can't see any electrons. I don't believe you.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Warp wrote:
What happens in a medium is that the light gets absorbed and then emitted again with a delay.
It seems that this explanation is, after all, incorrect. Light never travels slower than c even inside a medium, but the reason for the average speed being smaller than c seems to be something else.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
If I'm not completely mistaken, a particle with no rest mass at all (such as a photon) cannot travel at any other speed than c. There's some physical reason for this, AFAIK. Any particle traveling at a speed lower than c has rest mass (and thus cannot travel at c). The average speed of light through a medium is slower than c, but that's only its average speed. At no point does the light actually travel at a speed lower than c. What happens in a medium is that the light gets absorbed and then emitted again with a delay. This delay is what causes the average speed to be smaller than c. Between emissions and absorptions it travels at c.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Guybrush wrote:
Well, first of all you'd better check this page and it's history.
When you blame someone of lack of writing skills you should usually try to avoid making grammatical errors yourself or someone is going to point them to you...
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
For some reason it reminded me of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smV9rFH1ep8
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Btw, where do emulator makers find all the detailed hardware specs of a console like NES or SNES? It doesn't sound like something a company like Nintendo would publish.
Post subject: Re: Writing an emulator (need compiler resources)
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Thereisnospoon wrote:
Anyway, I hear that an emulator is pretty much a compiler
I don't think an emulator has anything to do with compilers. What an emulator really is, is a bytecode interpreter. A compiler is a program which takes an input in some high-level syntax, parses it and produces bytecode from it (could be eg. native machine code or some abstract bytecode for some VM). An interpreter is a program which reads this bytecode and interprets it. An emulator doesn't have to parse anything. It simply reads the bytecode of the game and interprets it. The core of an emulator can probably be simplified as:
switch(ram[IP])
{
    case OPCODE1: (do whatever OPCODE1 is supposed to do); break;
    case OPCODE2: (do whatever OPCODE2 is supposed to do); break
    case OPCODE3; ... etc ...
   ...
}
Of course implementing the 'case' blocks will be quite laborious, as you need to emulate the entire hardware, etc.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
I haven seen the movie (and thus can't vote), but I'm looking forward to seeing it. Sounds superb.
Post subject: Re: Using a controller is okay, right?
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
mmbossman wrote:
Warp wrote:
We use tools, any tools, to create runs as close to perfection as possible.
Although I agree it seems like a somewhat strange original question, I think this sentence is downright wrong, as there are a couple types of tools we don't allow.
What I meant was that any tools to create the movie file, ie. the file containing timed keypresses, is ok. Emulators, macros, robots, hex-editors... anything goes, as long as the result is a valid movie file. You can't create a valid movie file eg. with game genie.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
aznxknight wrote:
I'm confused. On this site it says that the player aims for the fastest time. But watching it on google, when reading the description, it says the player aims for the fastest time. Which one is it?
Um? What's the difference?
If it's aims for fastest time then i have a lot of say about saving frames.
Aiming for the fastest time doesn't mean that we always get it perfect on the first try. New tricks are constantly being discovered, new tools are being developed and old runs are being obsoleted with more perfected ones. It's a normal cycle of life with these runs.
Post subject: Re: Using a controller is okay, right?
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Pekopon wrote:
So what I'm asking is, Controller attachments are allowed. Right?
I'm honestly curious why you even need to ask this. What makes you think it would not be ok? These are *tool-assisted* speedruns. We use tools, any tools, to create runs as close to perfection as possible. Why would it make any sense to say "everything else is ok, but using a game controller is prohibited, because we say so"?
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
FractalFusion wrote:
Warp wrote:
Actually there's no technical reason why the button states could not be stored in the file with as few bits as possible.
There is. Reserved bits are safeguards in case you need to put some other function in there (for example, reset).
That's not a technical reason. Technical reason means "there's something inherent in computers which makes it impossible to do it". Besides, the extra space is simply a side-effect of the chance that there just happens to be less buttons than a multiple of 8. It's not a question of "I will reserve n bits for future use" but a question of "there are n non-used bits left in this last byte, something which I cannot control, but which may be convenient for future use".
Post subject: Re: How much space does 1 frame of a TAS movie file take up?
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
moozooh wrote:
While the premise (button states occupying a bit each) is right, the information is stored in bytes, not bits. As such, any number of bits will get rounded up to the closest multiple of 8.
Actually there's no technical reason why the button states could not be stored in the file with as few bits as possible. It just makes the writing and reading routines slightly more complicated than when reading entire bytes, but it's not very difficult and definitely possible. Of course in practice the people who created the file formats probably took the lazy path and used whole bytes for each frame.
Post subject: Re: So, why can't TASes be done on the Nintendo DS?
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
ICheatAtGolf wrote:
I mean, the DS uses cartridges, no? That means there's probably an emulator around somewhere, with ROMs as well.
Cartridges have nothing to do with emulators and roms.
Banned User
Joined: 3/10/2004
Posts: 7698
Location: Finland
Xaphan wrote:
Well, I'm used to having minimal configuration. I configured many bindings for different applications
Those two sentences are actually contradictory. The only difference between your scheme and what people usually use is that in your scheme all the shortcuts are bound to keyboard/mouse combinations (which you must remember by heart) while in the more usual scheme the shortcuts are visual and don't require nearly as much remembering.