* Posts by Caspian Prince

35 publicly visible posts • joined 16 Jul 2007

Epic Games starts Battle Royale with Samsung, Google over app store practices

Caspian Prince

Re: ‘Bout time someone bit back

While you're having fun poking at Tim Sweeney it should be made clear to you that Epic does *not* mandate that purchases are made through EGS - it is purely a convenience. And Epic have actively supported entirely novel mechanisms to manage purchases - eg. digital blockchain stuff (for better or worse - the point is it's not like Apple or Steam or Google where such things are *explicitly banned*)

Caspian Prince

Re: I said it before and I say it again...

Rather than just downvote this comment it's probably worth explaining why it's nonsense, and this from someone who has supported native Linux gaming for 25 years (as a creator) and exclusively runs a Linux rig now:

Epic have no real need to expand their market share by about 1%, which is the realistic maximum size of the Linux gaming market, at a cost to them that will most likely actually exceed any profits they might have made on that 1%.

The empire of C++ strikes back with Safe C++ blueprint

Caspian Prince

And it is extraordinarily *hard* to write pathologically nasty code in Java. The VM conveniently provides a sandbox to stop RAM overcommitment snafus, although unfortunately thread creation is still unbounded.

To toss petrol on the fire ... 90% of all the C++ code out there could be rewritten in a third of the time in Java or C# and be just as effective as it was before, but without the memory safety issues.

Google says replacing C/C++ in firmware with Rust is easy

Caspian Prince

Re: FALSE

You might want to actually look at the rates first before posting. Consistently 2/3rds of the rates for exactly the same skills used making ordinary boring application software. (Which is why I've stayed away from it ... I'd *like* to do it but I can't *afford* to)

Caspian Prince

That might have been the case 20 years ago but it is definitely not the case now and it still evolves into an ever more performance, ever more efficient, ever more expressive, and ever more concise platform. Where it succeeded is that it made more people happy more of the time than any other language before it, which is why it's now ubiquitous. Unfortunately this means it has also attracted the lion's share of mediocre programming talent as well, but hey, at least they can't write code containing use-after-free...

Caspian Prince

Re: Embedded? Don't think so

Unfortunately not, for reasons unknown, embedded programmers seem to be paid bugger all. The rates are abysmal.

How to maintain code for a century: Just add Rust

Caspian Prince

Easier?

I don't think even a seasoned Rust programming is going to tell you it's *easier* than C. Probably safer and more correct, yes. Easier, no. This is the primary impediment to Rust entering mainstream acceptance.

Speed limiters arrive for all new cars in the European Union

Caspian Prince
Coat

As usual the focus is on speed...

...when it is a factor in a very small minority of KSI accidents. But it is a very visible attribute of a moving vehicle, and easy to latch on to, and when it is a factor, it factors rather heavily into the outcome - despite the thing that speed is usually a secondary effect of the real cause of a KSI accident which here in the UK we describe as "DLAC".

We do have some of the safest roads in Europe for one reason or another, and most initiatives that focus on speed have an almost imperceptible effect on the KSI rate in the locations targeted. However, reading between the lines, it is well known that Plod use minor speeding infractions to drag drivers into driver education programmes and re-educate them post test, and this is proving highly effective. I should know, I have attended three over the last 20 years :P The standard of driving knowledge and attitude in the UK is shockingly poor but two things stand out: 1. that it is demonstrably worse nearly everywhere else in the world I've been and 2. motorcyclists are vastly better trained and skilled than car drivers.

YMMV.

Caspian Prince

Re: Good

There are *very* few circumstances in the UK where this would apply though, and in any case, there are *no* circumstances in which it is permissible to exceed the posted speed limit.

Fragile Agile development model is a symptom, not a source, of project failure

Caspian Prince
Trollface

Re: History lessons

And, JIRA. The bane of any project that needs to deliver results.

Research finds electric cars are silent but violent for pedestrians

Caspian Prince

Re: Pedestrian here

Except that motorbikes make quite a nice sound. Each to their own.

Well, not my motorbike, because it's electric, and totally silent. I have to be extraordinarily careful around pedestrians.

Big Brother is coming to a workplace near you, and the privacy regulator wants a word

Caspian Prince

We will be monitoring your acti-

"Goodbye then."

From browser brat to backend boss: Will WASM win the web wars?

Caspian Prince

Re: Welcome back Java promise!!!

You are dead right - it actually did (and still does) deliver 100% on the promise. And 99.99% of all compiled Java code that you will find deployed out there right now *still runs without issue*, 20 years later, because of the extreme care with which the SDK has been evolved.

Forget the climate: Steep prices the biggest reason EV sales aren't higher

Caspian Prince

Re: Too expensive, too heavy, too range limited

That'll be the huge amount of money they made from selling oil and gas.

Those low-code tools devs love so much? They'll grow 20% in 2023, says Gartner

Caspian Prince
Facepalm

Code is only the bit in the middle of the job I do

Low code sounds all very useful until managers realise that the coding part is just the fiddly bit in the middle of what we do for a living as software developers. A significantly large proportion of our time is just understanding what the hell they actually want to something to do. Another rather significantly large proportion of time goes on making sure what got made actually does match up, in reality, with what they wanted it to do in the first place, as well as generally not exploding, falling over, producing strange results when there's an R in the month, etc.

C++ zooms past Java in programming popularity contest

Caspian Prince

Re: Java can’t go away, sadly

We use Java because it's bloody excellent at doing what we want it to do (making games). Haven't found another language that hits so many sweet spots yet, been looking for over 20 years. No, C# isn't any better.

Python 2 bows out after epic transition. And there was much applause because you've all moved to version 3, right? Uh, right?

Caspian Prince

Re: why python ?

Java is very much alive and well I think you'll find, particularly the JVM technology stack, but the language itself has been hugely rejuvenated. All greatly helped by Java mostly escaping the grasping tentacles of Oracle a few years back.

Caspian Prince

Re: Repeat Offenders?

Mind you... still using Java code I wrote 20 years ago. Unmodified.

That this AI can simulate universes in 30ms is not the scary part. It's that its creators don't know why it works so well

Caspian Prince

Obligatory HHT2TG quote

“And to this end they built themselves a stupendous super-computer which was so amazingly intelligent that even before its data banks had been connected up it had started from I think therefore I am and got as far as deducing the existence of rice pudding and income tax before anyone managed to turn it off.”

'Java 9, it did break some things,' Oracle bod admits to devs still clinging to version 8

Caspian Prince

The update was indeed quite painful from 8 (straight to 11 but all the problems that had to be faced were introduce in 9).

However it turns out that most of the issues were actually caused by Eclipse, which is just plain rubbish in its support of modules, and when it's not rubbish it's just broken. With Eclipse misbehaving at every turn, it made trying to figure out how the module system worked almost impossible. Other IDEs are apparently slightly better.

The module system though is rather hugely complex and overengineered for a lot of Java development. Java's biggest strength was that it was like developing with fluffy Fischer-Price gloves. Any idiot like me could do it, and I have been for 20 years. The upgrade to JDK11 was so difficult I felt like an idiot and couldn't get anything to work. No wonder everyone's sticking with Java 8.

The Java release train is moving faster, but will developers be derailed?

Caspian Prince

Re: Ugh, another Java bashing thread

Don't bother waiting for a coherent reply, it's obviously someone who doesn't use or understand Java. Same experience as you here: used it day in day out for 20 years, getting real work done, never had a single problem, ever. And I mean that.

ARM exec: Forget eight-core smartphone chips, just enjoy a SIX-PACK

Caspian Prince

I can quite easily use 4 cores flat out...

... when making games for said phones. Just saying.

Cas :)

Sticky Tahr-fy pudding: Ubuntu 14.04 slickest Linux desktop ever

Caspian Prince

Have they fixed the irritatingly shit window resizing borders?

Every time I've tried to use Ubuntu, I've been thwarted by the unnecessarily fiddly window edges which make it strangely incredibly difficult to resize windows.

Well, until recently anyway, when fortunately the Unity interface put me off going any further before I even bothered trying to resize any windows.

Plusnet shunts blame for dodgy DNS traffic onto customers' routers

Caspian Prince

Re: For me there is a basic question

The Thomson routers Plusnet provided were prone to simply seizing and needed rebooting about 2-3 times a day, due to a VOIP scanning issue; a probe for VOIP services would freeze the router.

I discovered this because I had to run up and down two flights of stairs every time it happened, several times a day.

I bought a Cisco router to replace it. Problem still occurred. Most vexed, I turned to Cisco support forums, and discovered the firmware the Cisco router came with suffered from exactly the same problem as the shitty consumer Thomson router.

The crucial difference was *the Cisco router could be patched*. And so all my troubles finished.

Facebook user locked out of account even with ID

Caspian Prince
Unhappy

Doesn't help to have an unusual name...

I was locked out of my Facebook account a year ago - apparently only "real people are allowed to have accounts on Facebook." I pointed out that I'd spent a fair amount of money advertising through them over the previous year and that though I may have a slightly unusual name it was reasonably obvious I was a real person. My account was reinstated a week later without much of an explanation as to why it was flagged in the first place.

Caspian Prince

Yes, really.

Top Ten Retro PC Games

Caspian Prince
Coat

As someone previously said, those games are just "old"

... these games are retro: www.puppygames.net

Shameless plug! But the register has wasted years of my life so I think they can share the love.

Cas :)

Microsoft's Silverlight 4 - more than Flash envy

Caspian Prince

Much nerd rage in here

I thought the days of childish Microsoft bashing were long gone as the nerderati have switched their attentions to the Fourth Reich (Apple)?

What's all this pointless Silverlight bashing from anonymous cowards who've never used it (and who also claim to have never installed Flash. Well I suppose it won't run on your Lynx browser anyway eh?)? It does what it says on the tin, it works, people can use it to make stuff. Go and rant somewhere else!

And to think I'm a dyed-in-the-wool Java developer, too, defending it.

Sun's cloud and gaming execs leave Oracle

Caspian Prince
Coat

Cheerio ChrisM

Well, a big goodbye to Chris Melissinos from Puppygames, he was one of the few people to believe in a Java games studio and a tremendous help to us over the years. It is a great shame he wasn't really given the resources to achieve his goals at Sun.

Cas :)

Steve Wozniak, your time is up

Caspian Prince

Fatso

Indeed he may have done fuck all of note for 20 years but it might be prudent not to take the piss out of how fat he is (and he isn't massively fat anyway). I bet half the Reg readership are in the "overweight" or "obese" BMI categories anyway.

PC Gamers get Bill of Rights

Caspian Prince
Linux

Re: 2 & 3

Why the hell should it be a *right* to receive *free stuff* for a game you buy?

Tux, for the freetards.

Snap Sun decision launches Java at iPhone

Caspian Prince
Thumb Up

Good news for me though...

because then all my Java games will be a cinch to port to it, especially as they use OpenGL too. Who'd have thought it?

Paranoid partners to get GPS snooper

Caspian Prince

Brilliant!

I'll just stick one in me bike then if some toerag tries to half-inch it I'll be able to wait till it's stopped moving and turn up with a van full of very angry bikers and some cricket bats.

Nine Inch Nails cracks net distribution (maybe)

Caspian Prince
Coat

Indie gaming's been doing it for years

We've been doing "free demos" with limited content and looking at optimising our conversion rates with clever upsell techniques for years and years now at Puppygames and then this music guy suddenly does exactly the same thing the rest of us have been doing since teh intarnets were invented and he's hailed as a genius?? Gah. Is there something fundamentally wrong with everyone in the music industry?

The Return of iTuneski

Caspian Prince

Re: Awesome news!

Steev, it may have escaped your attention but the reason why we use Allofmp3.com is because it gives us what we want, and none of the other online music vendors do. The others:

1. Give us stuff recorded at shitty bitrates in formats we don't want

2. Charge ridiculous money for the music and what's more they price fix it so the Yanks get charged half as much. Internet global economy my arse.

3. Encumber the music in extremely annoying DRM.

4. Don't even have half the music that allofmp3.com has

So perhaps if Napster, iTunes, etc. actually got their act together and *competed* by addressing those four points there wouldn't be problem, hmm?

Top 10 e-commerce developments of the decade

Caspian Prince

Paypal and Bittorrent (or various other p2p things), Messenger, Hotmail

...seem mysteriously absent, but are arguably two of the most fundamental factors in the digital economy these days. Paypal makes paying for stuff and receiving payments a little easier, and bittorrent makes not paying for stuff and giving away stuff for free a little easier.

No mention of instant messaging, which has fundamentally changed the way we communicate?

Nor Hotmail?