Schmid blog 2006 jan-jun

Schmid 20:25, 16 Jun 2006 (CEST)#1 'Jakob Schmid' in the world
Yipee! Now I'm number one! In your face, JSO Bohr- und Fraestechnik! (Besides Google, I'm also number one in MSN search and Yahoo, but who cares, right?)

It must be due to my extremely interesting and in-depth articles about such relevant subjects as:
 * Constructive Geometry
 * VST Plug-ins and how to build them using MinGW/MSYS

And who else is touching on the important subject of mathematically defining pacman's shape:
 * $$x^2+y^2<11^2 \quad \land \quad -\frac{4}{5}\pi < \textrm{atan2}(y,x) < \frac{4}{5}\pi \quad \land \quad x^2+(y+6)^2>1$$

Schmid 17:59, 26 May 2006 (CEST) GNU Build System


I have spent some time looking into the GNU Build System (autoconf/automake). It evolved into a schmid.wiki page containing a HOWTO.

I have published my first open source project, JayTracer, right here on schmid.wiki, made with the GNU Build System. It should compile on most newer Linux boxes. It is an example raytracer with PNG or ASCII Art output.



Schmid 20:43, 11 May 2006 (CEST) Clime Fighting


What's up with japanese game designers and their language skills? We all know the 'Zero Wing' catchfrase 'All your base are belong to us'. We also know the R/L ambiguity in asian pronounciation. The screenshot on the right is from the 1998 shooter 'Armed Police Batrider'. This translator spells as he talks :).

Here's another one... this time it is the cool SNK fighter 'Samurai Showdown IV'. VICTOLY!

I might be playing too many games these days...  One more - not very good english - and DonPachi is one of my favourite games right now.



Schmid 23:08, 17 Apr 2006 (CEST) #2 'Jakob Schmid' in the world


Hooray! I'm officially the #2 most important 'Jakob Schmid' in the world according to Google!. If it wasn't for that stupid german woodworking tool company (which I'm not going to link to for obvious reasons), I would be number one...

I'm way down on the list of 'schmid's, but then again, there's about 13,200,000 of us online :).



Schmid 00:20, 6 Apr 2006 (CEST) Force Majeure
The good thing about being a total pessimist is, that when disaster strikes, and, say, your place is flooded, you are not surprised in any way. In fact, you may feel a certain reassurance that your world model is consistant with observations.

Well, yesterday morning, my room was flooded. An electrician decided to drill a hole in a water pipe just above my piano, CD collection, stereo, electric bass, etc. The whole room was flooded. And, being a true pessimist, I wasn't shocked or even that surprised.

Actually, it wasn't all that bad, my piano is fine, my stereo works, my instruments seem to be OK, and my server is up and running again (obviously, if you are reading this :).

The room is cleaned up, and everything is back to normal. I'll just have to endure this uncertain period of time ahead of me until the next reassuring catastrophe occurs. Just kidding. :)

Updates on schmid.wiki:
 * Added Emulator overview
 * Gentoo and Portage pages cleaned up and updated
 * Added Ogre 3D engine information page
 * Added Windows tools page

Schmid 00:36, 14 Mar 2006 (CET) Concert Pic Updates


Finally, here are the pictures from the concerts of the last months...:


 * 2005-10-14: Pictures from 1000fryd concert (Kulturnat)
 * 2006-02-13: Pictures from Mouse On Mars concert at Studenterhuset
 * 2006-02-17: Pictures from upcode festival

More pictures at SuneP's blog.



Schmid 23:24, 25 Feb 2006 (CET) schmid.dk redesigned


I have redesigned my homepage a bit. Now it features a guestbook. I have also freshened the music page up a bit.



Schmid 16:18, 14 Feb 2006 (CET) SSH Tunneling Update
The SSH_Tunneling page is updated with settings for standard software such as WinSCP, Jabber, and Remote Desktop Connection.

Schmid 00:03, 8 Feb 2006 (CET) Mouse on Mars


Saturday, Mouse on Mars are playing at Studenterhuset in Aalborg. I'm DJing at the concert with Yngve. To those of you who doesn't know Mouse on Mars, they are an extremely cool german electronic music duo who are at the very top of their league. Please come to the concert, you won't regret it :).

Man, that had to be one of the best concerts I've ever attended! Kiloton started out by playing a beautiful ambient set, and Mouse on Mars totally rocked. The crowd was small but extremely enthusiastic. I played some IDM, beatmixed at about 115 BPM and after Mouse on Mars, a 135 BPM strange techno set. Yngve played some nice tracks, including one of my all-time favourites, Brothomstates' Viimo.



Satire
Well, Denmark certainly isn't popular in the Middle East these days. September 30th, Jyllands-Posten printed 12 satirical drawings about 'the face of Mohammad'. The most provoking drawing featured the Profet Mohammad with a bomb in his turban, as a sort of bitter commentary on the (mis)use of the Islamic faith by terrorists. These drawings has resulted in diplomatic discussions, boycotts of danish goods, riots, and burning of danish embassies in the Middle East.

How did it come to this?

 * I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
 * - Evelyn Beatrice Hall

Originally, I considered this a standard free speech situation, and my view would always be in favour of free speech against any modifications, be they religous or otherwise. Conversely, I would normally not approve of satire that insults religious groups, but I have slowly accepted satirical portrayals of religious figures in cartoons such as South Park or The Simpsons. Also, I have been annoyed by the reactions of religous groups against works of art such as Martin Scorcese's "The Last Temptation of Christ". And the Mohammad cartoons just don't seem to be that insulting, in fact, most of them are, in typical danish satirical tradition, kind of harmless.

I spoke to my friend Nabaz, who comes from a Muslim background, and he explained to me how Muslims could feel in this situation, and how any portrayal of Mohammads face would seem insulting to a modern muslim.

My analysis of the situation reduces the conflict to two opposing dogmas, the Islamic and the Democratic. The most basic rules of each dogma prevent the understanding of the other. The muslims cannot accept the drawings as they insult everything they value, and the democratic danish society cannot accept the indignation of the Muslims, because the basic democratic principle of freedom of speech seems threatened.

This is how wars start.

Misinformation
But Jyllands-Posten has made a formal apology for the whole affair, and everything should have blown over weeks ago. Now for the part that makes me angry:

It seems that representatives of the Islamic Society in Denmark, among these Ahmad Abu Laban, has traveled the Middle Eastern countries with the 15 drawings, inciting rage in muslim groups. 15 drawings? Wasn't it 12? Well, to add a little nitroglycerin to the spark, the representatives also brought 3 "bonus" drawings, depicting muslims and the prophet in pornographic and humiliating situations. These drawings were never published by any danish newspaper. The general theme conveyed by these representatives was that all Danes, including the prime minister, and the queen, are anti-muslim.

So we have a highly engineered situation, based on misinformation, resulting in religously fueled riots.

As a side effect, a christian neighbourhood in Beirut was also attacked, because the Danish are viewed as a christian society in the Middle East. To me, this is just evil religous racism on the part of the rioters, without any justification.

Supported by Idiots
And who supports Denmark in this situation? I looked at an online petition to support Jyllands-Posten, there were some 17,000 signatures tonight. It made me sad to find that a large part of the signatures were from racists, raging anti-muslims, and war-crazed Texans (sorry, Texas, but there were a few of those).

So in conclusion: Muslims all over the world hate the danes, partly due to the political engineering of Machiavellian clerics in the Islamic Society in Denmark. Innocent christians in Beirut are being attacked for no reason. And Denmark is supported by idiots and racists.

Who would want to be Danish right now?

Schmid 21:35, 6 Feb 2006 (CET) Schmearch


I have created a meta-search engine called schmearch, more than a little inspired from YubNub. Feel free to use it if it meets your demands.



Schmid 12:57, 26 Jan 2006 (CET) Google Hacks


Check out these Google Hacks. They misuse Google for some interesting and funny results. I can recommend Google Talk (not the IM system) and Land Geist (which actually uses AltaVista, but who cares).



Schmid 16:41, 19 Jan 2006 (CET) Androgyny Remastered and Joined mymusic.dk


Hi, and happy new year! Check out the final 2005 entry for some of the 2005-related stuff I didn't get around to mention before now.

I have remastered my EP, Androgyny, so be sure to download the new version and delete the old one. The new version actually has treble, which is a new feature for my music ;).

I have joined mymusic.dk and uploaded a few tracks. Check it out at j4k035chm1d.mymusic.dk, and also check out some of the other artists, for instance Tone (missSofy), Kiloton (Mads W) silentBoom, Sune P, or YngveSin.

However, schmid.dk/music/ is still the main site for my music. Check it out now - there's a new single called 'Used Abyss Andante' available for download.

