Valentin Laube's Blog

Screencast Soaps

2008-02-08T08:43:00.001-08:00

I just discovered "You Suck at Photoshop" [via Fazed], a series of funny Photoshop tutorials by "Donnie Hoyle". The big difference to other tutorials is that you don't only learn new things about Photoshop but you also about the disastrous relationship to his wife...

While seeing the video I was immediately reminded of another IPTV series that used screencasts. The Scene tells the story of Brian Sandro who is the leader of an underground movie releasing group. You can watch the whole series here. (You can skip the second season though, it's not that good.)

A while later it came to me that these "Screencast Soaps" aren't really an anomaly in the time of reality tv, amateur reporters and embedded correspondents. Even Hollywood is trying to bring the aesthetics of a home movie to the big screen with Cloverfield and Romeros Diary of the Dead. With that in mind it's only a small step from filming the real world to recording the things that happen on the screen, a world that many of us are much more familiar with...

Quizfrage: Worum gehts in diesem Abschnitt?

2007-11-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

“Der grelle Spieler, der Pro ist, ist ein handlicher greller Werkzeuginstallationssatz, der als greller Spieler und Manager Macromedia entworfen wird. Es hat einige leistungsfähige grelle Werkzeuge: downloaden Sie grelle Filme, Vorbetrachtung und grasen Sie grellen Film, nehmen Sie grelles Bild gefangen und stellen Sie es, wie Tapete, grelles screensaver mit Mühelosigkeit verursachen, bilden Umwandlung zwischen grellen Filmen usw.”

Hier ist der komlette Text und hier das Original.

I lol'd

2007-11-02T15:27:00.000-07:00

Kommentar in der "NO to the Microsoft Office format as an ISO standard"-Petition:

David Mitzel, Germany, 4 hours ago
Comments: nieder mit der hundesteuer

Happy Hour rund um den Kennedyplatz in Essen

2007-09-27T08:47:00.000-07:00

Die folgende Liste hab ich letztens auf drängen meiner Schwester erstellt weil sie sich sonst geweigert hätte mit Cocktails trinken zu gehen. Letztendlich hat das ganze aber nichts gebracht, da wir doch woanders waren...

Wo?	Wann?	Was?	Link
Café Solo	ab 22 Uhr	jeder gekennzeichnete Cocktail oder zwei Flaschen für 4,90 €	Homepage Speisekarte (Seite 11/12)
Cafe Extrablatt	18-21 Uhr	zwei Cocktails zum Preis von einem	Homepage Infos zur Cocktail Hour
Cafe & Bar Celona	ab 23 Uhr	alle Cocktails zum halben Preis	Homepage (Specials -> Cocktail Club)
Sausalitos	16-20 Uhr	alle Cocktails zum halben Preis	Homepage Infos zur Happy Hour
Sausalitos	ab 23 Uhr	Margaritas zum halben Preis	Homepage Infos zur Happy Hour
La Difference	Fr und Sa ab 22 Uhr	zwei Cocktails zum Preis von einem	Homepage

The Future of IM

2007-04-16T12:39:00.000-07:00

Just had an idea while reading this post on Jamie Fristroms Blog where he explains why he is using his instant messenger as little as possible. His concern is that his contacts may be offended when he is online but doesn't talk to them, or that they want chat with him while he is working so he doesn't get anything done.

"I'd suddenly find myself in the grave after having wasted my life IMing people."

In the comments Joel recommended to use different accounts for different contexts but my idea goes a bit further. What if the instant messenger itself supported contexts?
Every contact could be associated with one or more contexts so they would only see you if you were in the same context, as shown in this image:

Switching between different contexts would be as easy as changing the status from "online" to "away" but would help immensely to keep your friends from distracting you.
A further idea is to block messages from other contexts so you can only communicate with contacts in your current context, this would help to keep all those out who try to send you offline messages in the hope that you are only invisible. :) (And yes, the messages should probably not be discarded, just hidden until you are in the correct context.)

Problems with Miranda again

2006-07-11T13:51:00.000-07:00

Just copy the icq.dll from the 5.0 unicode nightly (found here) into the plugins directory.

Google Video: Movers & Shakers

2006-06-10T02:32:00.000-07:00

War ja klar, dass es in dem neuen Ranking bei Google Video eigentlich nur um Fußball geht.
Ich hab allerdings eine erfreuliche Anomalie entdeckt: Diablo 2 auf Platz 10.

How was your spam today?

2006-06-06T00:20:00.000-07:00

As I checked my mail on sunday morning I saw something special - spam.
Okay, spam is not so special per se, but this one got through my spam filter.
Thunderbirds spamfilter is quite powerful, so I wondered how this mail landed in my inbox.
Looking more closely I saw that there is a quote from "The Hobbit" or some other book of the "Lord of the rings" saga below the usual \/!@GRA crap. Here is the complete text from the mail:

M E R " D i A
V A L " U M
V " A G R A
A M B " E N
L E V " T R A
X & N A X
P R 0 Z & C


all 50 % off - http://www.serromocca.com


astray sometimes when you are off on dangerous adventures over the Edge of the Wild; and Gandalf was a wise enough wizard to know it. He knew that something unexpected might happen, and he hardly dared to hope that they would pass without fearful adventure over those great tall mountains with lonely peaks and valleys where no king ruled. They did not. All was well, until one day they met a thunderstorm more than

As I skipped through my spam folder I found several other mails like this. Maybe I get the complete story if I wait long enough.

Updated comment collapser for Slashdot

2006-06-05T16:01:00.000-07:00

The first thing I discovered in the morning was the new Slashdot layout. How ugly!
It's not the layout I'm complaining about, but my GreaseMonkey script to collapse the comments was broken and didn't look quite right.
It took me about half an hour to fix it, but the I saw how nice the menu to the left slides if you click on the small triangles.
To make a long story short, I spent half the day implementing this behaviour in my script.
Unfortunately UserScripts.org is down again, so I uploaded the script here.
Click here to see the script in action.

Chiptunes Jukebox

2006-05-15T14:20:00.000-07:00

I'm currently listening to the jukebox from chiptune.com and you should too.
Get the required plugin here.

chiptunes and pixelart
almost as good as pc speaker and ascii

Rogelike fun

2006-03-19T14:16:00.000-08:00

I am a big fan of NetHack for quite some time now and today I discovered the wonderful world of other Roguelike games.

The first game I tried was ADOM which has an overworld, unlike NetHack.
Then I found the 7DRL-Contest via Wikipedia, really great stuff.
Check out CastlevaniaRL and DiabloRL.

Here is some more stuff for you to read, I have to take a look at DoomRL now. :)

Steckdosen in vollen Zügen genießen

2006-03-18T13:17:00.000-08:00

Dies ist mein erstes deutsches Posting auf diesem Blog und ich hoffe es werden noch viele folgen.
Leider kann ich aber keine schicken Tags verteilen, wie das Marian, der hiermit gegrüszt sei, bei seinem Wordpress Blog gerne macht.

Ich plane gerade eine Zugfahrt nach Kehl am Rhein, um mich dort für ein Praktikum vorzustellen. Da ich währenddessen noch an meiner Ausarbeitung für Computerspiele 1 arbeiten will, brauche ich eine Steckdose an meinem Sitzplatz.
Auf der Bahn-Seite hab ich nicht entsprechendes gefunden, also hab ich mich mal im Internet schlau gemacht, wo ich auch recht schnell fündig wurde.

Ich habe dann hier nachgesehen, mit welcher Ausgabe des ICEs ich denn Fahren werde. Enttäuscht musste ich feststellen, dass auf der Strecke nur ein ICE der ersten Generation verkehrt, der überhaupt keine Steckdosen besitzt. :(

Einen kleinen Lichtblick gibt es aber noch. Auf dieser Seite hab ich erfahren, dass die alten ICEs bis 2008 überholt werden, sodass, wie ab dem dritten üblich, jede Sitzbank unten in der Mitte eine Steckdose besitzt.
Hoffentlich habe ich Glück und fahre mit einem bereits umgerüsteten Zug...

Sister-Cities

2006-03-07T06:02:00.000-08:00

Did you know that Magdeburg in Germany and Nashville/Tennesee in USA are Sister Cities?

Valentine's Day

2006-02-13T15:10:00.000-08:00

Today I am celebrating Singles Awareness Day, also known by its acronym SAD. :(

ICQ problems with Miranda IM

2006-02-11T09:24:00.000-08:00

Some time yesterday the guys at ICQ decided to break OpenSource clients by changing their protocol. Even if you use the official client you can't send any messages to clients who don't understand the new version, you just get a timeout.
To fix the problem install the latest version of the ICQ plugin and tell anybody else to do the same.

So this fixes Miranda, if you know how to fix the problem in other clients feel free to add a comment.

Three more any-keys

2006-02-01T06:52:00.000-08:00

Finally there: the Optimus Keyboard mini.
Well it has only three keys but it's a start.
Costs $100 and can play animations at 5 fps.
Here is a review.
It's big brother could be available by end of the year.

[via Slashdot]

OGLE

2006-01-25T03:58:00.000-08:00

OGLE is an interesting tool, it can capture 3d scenes from games.
It's like taking a screenshot, but instead of an image you get an ".obj" file which you can open in almost any 3d application.

It's not that easy to use, so here is a little description:

Install GLIntercept
Extract OGLE
Move the extracted directory to the plugins directory of GLIntercept
(eg. "C:\Program Files\GLIntercept0_5\Plugins\")
Rename the directory to OGLE

Add the following lines to your "gliConfig.ini" (found in "C:\Program Files\GLIntercept0_5"):

OGLE = ("OGLE/OGLE.dll")
{
Scale = 1.0;
CaptureNormals = False;
LogFunctions = False;
ObjFileName = "ogle";
FilePerFrame = False;

TRIANGLES = True;
TRIANGLE_STRIP = True;
TRIANGLE_FAN = True;
QUADS = True;
QUAD_STRIP = True;
POLYGON = True;
}

Make sure you have these settings in the same file:

LogEnabled = True;
...
LogPerFrame
{
Enabled = True;
...
OneFrameOnly = True;
}

Copy the files "OpenGL32.dll" and "gliConfig.ini" into the directory of the programs executable you want to use (here is a list of working programs)
Start your Application
Press the shortcut for single frame capture (normally Ctrl-Shift-f) in the scene you want to capture
Quit the Application and load the file "ogle.obj" in your favorite 3d program

[via Raphs Website]

Slashdot Nightmare

2006-01-13T05:01:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I postet my first comment to Slashdot (second from the top). Today I had a nightmare that it got the rating (Score: -1, Redundant).

I guess I should post more often to get used to it. :)

Casual Games

2005-12-30T13:03:00.000-08:00

I just finished my 60 Minute trial of PopCap Games Chuzzle.
If you first take a look at it you probably think that it's just another "match-three-of-the-same-color" game (like Bejeweled 2), but this one is special.
I don't really feel like describing the game, just play for yourself.
The developers definately had too much fun making the game, left click on one of those furry balls multiple times or left click them a single time (deluxe only) to see what i mean.

Pandora

2005-11-18T08:12:00.000-08:00

I just read this post on Raph Koster's Blog where he mentions Pandora, a great music discovery service.

You feed it with your favorite songs and it generates a playlist with similar tracks.
I currently enjoy listening to tracks described as

"features disco influences, danceable beats, excellent vocal technique, a laid back female vocal and a high-pitched voice" (Lavaa - Wherever You Are)

"features disco influences, a laid back female vocal, romantic lyrics, the heavy use of chordal patterning and melodic part writing" (Milk Inc. - The Sun Always Shines On TV).

And it all started with adding "4 Strings".

VMware Player "hacked"

2005-10-24T10:33:00.000-07:00

A few days ago VMWare released "VMWare Player" which can run virtual machines but cannot create them.
Today I saw this how-to on hackaday.
I just installed Ubuntu and it works great!

Here is my modified how-to:

install the VMWare Player
download the "Browser Appliance" virtual machine
make a test run of the virtual machine to verify that it works
download the Ubuntu CD-Image
replace these two lines in the file "Browser-Appliance.vmx":
ide1:0.fileName = "auto detect"
ide1:0.deviceType = "cdrom-raw"
by these:
ide1:0.fileName= "ubuntu-5.10-install-i386.iso"
ide1:0.deviceType = "cdrom-image"
start the virtual machine and press ctrl-g to direct the
input to the virtual machine
press escape and boot from cd-rom
install ubuntu
revert the changes made above
done (you may want to delete the iso which you don't need
anymore)

SVG in Firefox

2005-09-13T13:40:00.000-07:00

If you are running Windows 2000 and try to play SVG Tetris (or view some pictures), you may be wondering why the download dialog appears. This is because you are missing the file "gdiplus.dll".
Get it here from Microsoft.

Search Engines

2005-09-13T13:05:00.000-07:00

At the moment all visitors of my blog come from the GreaseMonkey mailing list, to be more specific from this post.
To make my page more open to the public I decided to add it to some search engines.
Here are the links:

http://www.google.com/addurl/
http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html (requires yahoo id)

Slashdot - add mirrors

2005-08-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

I have added an image to the description of my "Slashdot - add mirrors" script at Userscripts.org. As you probably already guessed it adds links to some mirrors to the articles and comments. Check it out here.

Greasemonkey UI

2005-08-08T07:54:00.000-07:00

This post on the Greasemonkey mailing list inspired me to make a toolbar button for Greasemonkey.
It doesn't tell you if Greasemonkey did something but it allows you to disable individual scripts and Greasemonkey by the click of a button (the monkey greys out too).

Update:

After fixing some bugs I guess I should release this modification. Here are the modified files. Make sure that you are using Greasemonkey 0.5 beta and have made backups.

Userscripts.org

2005-08-08T07:48:00.000-07:00

Here are my scripts.

fp

2005-08-08T07:11:00.000-07:00

first post