Games, Game design, Computer graphics. Visualization, Maths, Amateur astrophotography, Informatics, Fun
For some reason Artifact-1.0.2 would crash on level 10+ on some OS X installations. This seems to stem from some issue with my LWJGL version, the bundled JVM and those OS X installations.
Artifact-1.0.2.1 includes a later JVM which seems to work in my tests. If you experience any issues with it please report using the address here.
I made a small scripting language that runs in the browser. It is very ninja. To see the ninja, first open Javascript console and write:
function recur() {recur()};recur();
Hopefully it blew the stack. Then type this into the Scape REPL:
def recur() recur(); recur();
When you are convinced it will infinitely loop without blowing the stack, hit ctrl-c to stop further processing.
Rincewinds rave, that is black magic! Also called tail call elimination. Scape code is not evaluated by snarfing functions from Javascript (JS functions do not have tail call elimination before ECMAScript 6), but instead is compiled to its own set of instructions, which are then run on a stack machine (running in the Javascript VM). During parsing Scape functions are checked for whether they can use tail call elimination. If they can, they get different instructions that reuse the existing stack frame.
Scape has forward mode automatic differentiation as a language feature. Automatic differentiation allows you to compute the derivative of a function, without having to define the derivative explicitly.
Without automatic differentiation, this would be the way to compute the partial derivative of the function 
for 
and 
:
def fun(x,y) * (* x x) (* y y);
def diff_fun(x,y) [* (* 2 x) (* y y),* (* 2 y) (* x x)];
diff_fun(4,5);
[200, 160]
With automatic differentiation in Scape, this is how it is done:
def fun(x,y) * (* x x) (* y y);
diff(fun(4,5));
[200, 160]
This is very useful for a number of numerical methods involving derivatives. The feature is currently experimental, it might interact with non-double types in funky ways.
Mostly just for fun. I also started toying with the idea to make a safe scripting language for use in networked games. A language and runtime that would allow the player to define custom logic during gameplay without being able to ruin the experience for other players.
A dream would be a personalized Starcraft where it is you and your custom control scripts versus the other player and his scripts.
I hope to create a simple real time multiplayer game to show how I imagine it working. For now, playing with the Scape REPL is the only way to try the language.
Sayōnara
Normally I do not answer telephone based marketing or marketing research, I try to answer polls though, since I think that spreading my opinion even if it ends up as one hundredth of one percent in a final statistic is slightly useful. What is critical for my participation in such polls though, is that I feel that my opinion is actually represented. Lately I have participated in several polls where the poll is fundamentally flawed and would lead to misleading statistics.
Last night I was asked if I wanted to participate in a poll on politics. Since there was no marketing questions mixed in I said ok. The initial questions were quite normal ones, like “which party did you vote for …”, “which party would you vote for …” and so on.
After a while the questions deteriorated, I do not remember all of them, but one that had me quire frustrated was this:
“Do you think the norwegian government should hire private companies for public tasks?”
To me this question is a a case by case question, there is no single right answer for the different activities a government might undertake. Now the poll does not allow this answer though, it only allows “I do not know” or strong or weak versions of “agree” or “disagree”.
In another poll on an earlier occasion, I was asked:
“Do you think syntethic estrogen is more damaging for aquatic life compared to natural estrogen?”
This question was extremely confusing to me. First of all I do not know if there is a difference between syntethic and natural estrogen (or what is meant by syntethic or natural in the question), secondly the only honest and respectable answer I could give is: “Whatever is the current scientific consensus”. The poll instead has me rating how much I agree or disagree.
I really wonder what the statistics derived from these questions were used for. Which dimwit made a decision based on the “knowlege” gained from it.
I could rant about this all day, but In my opinion rants alone are not good, it is better to propose a solution. What I think would make these polls much better is if there always was a “The question is dumb” checkbox, which had to be included by law, and which also had to be included in the final statistic by law. This way no ones voice is completely misrepresented as mine probably was in these cases.