No Zytrons In Range

Hardware:
Case: CoolerMaster Silencio 550 Gaming Case – Black
Processor: Intel Core i5-2500K Processor (4x 3.30GHz/6MB L3 Cache)
Processor Cooling: Liquid, 120mm fan
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z68AP-D3
Memory: 8 GB [2 GB X4] DDR3-1600
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti – 1GB
Power Supply: Thermaltake TR2 TRX-750M
Primary Hard Drive: Plextor PX-256M2S
Secondary Hard Drive: 500 GB (spinning) Hard Drive
Optical Drive: 24X Dual Format/Double Layer DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW Drive

OS:
OS: Windows 7 Ultimate
Windows Performance Score: 7.5
Processor: 7.5
Memory: 7.7
Graphics: 7.8
Gaming Graphics: 7.8
Hard Disk: 7.9
(Keep in mind the scale maxes out at 7.9. Good thing Windows 8 is coming out soon…)

Accessories:
Primary Monitor: Dell 22″ 1920×1080
Secondary Monitor: Dell 20″ 1680×1050
Keyboard: Microsoft Comfort Curve 2000. (I love these things; I literally have 2 spares in my closet.) (Discontinued; links goes to Comfort Curve 3000)
Mouse: Cyborg RAT 5. (I love this thing. I should buy a spare.)
Game Controller: Microsoft Xbox 360 wireless controller, with the little USB wireless dongle thing for Windows use
Speakers: Logitech 2.1 system, looks like the Z323 or the preceding model perhaps?
Webcam: Logitech C910, full HD
Headset: Logitech USB, looks like the H530 or the preceding model?
Digicam: Panasonic Lumix LX-5, nothing to do with the computer system but I gotta brag.

The SSD I grabbed out of my old computer. (Which, BTW, is fully functional, it lacks only a HD– and I have a spare. I should really put it back together and donate it to someone.)

I agonized over whether to upgrade to an i7 processor or not. In the end, I figured my old computer’s CPU usage never went above about 66%, even when playing Skyrim, so I cheaped-out and got the i5 instead. Maybe I’ll regret this after Windows 8 is out, we’ll see.

The rest of the equipment comes complete, assembled, and tested from iBuyPower. Their customer service and ordering process is great, the build quality of the machine looks pretty damned good to me. I can’t comment yet on how long it’ll hold up, since it’s only a few days old, but they also throw in a 3-year warranty so that’s pretty nice. Also you can order without an OS.

There. Now you know. So stop asking.

Bethesda, I love you guys. I love Skyrim. But it’s fucking buggy as shit, and it’s bugging the shit out of me. Mainly because I have the weird type of OCD that requires me to finish every quest in a RPG, and your bugs make it impossible to finish a lot of Skyrim quests.

Before we start, some basics:

1. I’m playing Skyrim on PC, the Steam distribution of the game.
2. These bugs are all from my second play-through. My first was actually quite a bit more buggy than this one.
3. This game was started before the November 30th patch, but the bugs still exist after the patch. (This may be normal. I know frequently patch fixes only apply to new games.)
4. This list is ridiculously incomplete. I’ll try to add to it as new bugs arise.

Beware! Spoilers below!

Stuck Quests:

• (Misc) “Go to Dorian in Solitude and pick up the item” – Dorian is inside a ship, doesn’t exit. When you go inside the ship to talk to him, he says only “you shouldn’t be in here” and doesn’t engage in conversation. (Edit: Managed to complete this quest; see Michael’s comment.)
• (Misc) “Return to Esbern” – Esbern has been broken most of this game (and most of my last play-through). He won’t engage me in conversation. I believe this quest is supposed to lead up to the potion Esbern gives you to help fight dragons, so I can’t get that buff this play-through. (And for those who have played through the main quest, no the state of the quest “Paarthurnax” doesn’t have anything to do with Esbern’s broken-ness… he’s busted either way.) (On another note, this is my second play-though, and Esbern has been ridiculously broken both times. It’s actually hard to tell when Esbern’s busted, because I have no idea how he’s supposed to work!) Guys, the NPCs required for the main quest are broken!
• (Misc) “Ask Esbern about dragon lairs” – Since Esbern’s busted, I can’t turn this one in, either.
• (Misc) “Visit the college of Winterhold” – Quest points to Nirya, who is standing in Winterhold (not in the college), and only has one dialog option which does not complete the quest.
• (Misc) “Investigate the Bards College” – Quest points to Viarmo, who has two dialog options, neither of which complete the quest.
• (Misc) “Disrupt the skooma operation” – Quest points to a cave, Cragslane Cavern, where illegal dog fights were taking place. Every NPC in the cave is dead, but the quest isn’t marked as completed. If killing every single skooma dealer in the city doesn’t “disrupt the operation”, I don’t know what would!
• (Misc) “Kill the bandit leader at Broken Helm Hollow” – The objective pointer points to the wrong location.
• (Misc) “Purchase a house in Windhelm” – Apparently this quest cannot be completed after joining the Imperial faction, but remains in my quest log all the same. The steward says only that there has been some trouble and the house is not available.
• (Misc) “Speak to Verulus about the Hall of the Dead” – Verulus is dead.
• (Misc) “Collect bounty from Brina Merilis” – This is a weird one: this quest can’t be selected! As opposed to the Svidi quest, where it can be selected but there’s no objective arrow, this one simply can’t be selected at all. Weird.
• (Misc) “Assist the people of Haafinger (5/5)” – As you can see from the quest’s name, I’ve completed it by assisting 5 people in that region. And yet, the quest hasn’t been marked as completed, and nothing I do can complete it.

Weird Stuff:

• A character named only “Khajit” wearing orcish armor and attacking with magic attacked me for no apparent reason. He had no bounty notes on him, and nothing identifying what organization he was affiliated with. Maybe not a bug?
• My character got stuck mining a Corumdum Ore Vein for… well a very long time without actually producing any ore or gems. When I finally cancelled the ore mining, the rock face wasn’t mine-able anymore (but it also wasn’t depleted.)
• In a cut-scene as part of the main quest, Alduin is supposed to appear but didn’t. The other characters involved just stared dumbly in the direction he was supposed to show up for about 4-5 minutes before I gave up on it. I ended up having to re-load my game and start the cut-scene over again. Guys, the cut-scenes in the main quest are broken.
• Characters occasionally appear buck-naked (well, wearing underwear), when (I presume) they’re supposed to be clothed. One of these characters was the Courier.
• After the end of the civil war quest line, you’re instructed to destroy camps of the opposing faction as you come across them. Despite this, the commander of those camps are still set as non-killable, and so it’s impossible to actually clear the camps.
• After completing The Forsworn Conspiracy and escaping Cidna Mine, Markarth guards stay stuck in quest mode and won’t let you pay your bounty in the normal way. It gets worse – if you tell the guards to take you to Cidna Mine, they won’t. Instead they just immediately arrest you again and again. This bug makes Markarth practically inaccessible.
• The treasure that goes with Treasure Map X does not exist on my game. This drove me nuts, I spent something like a half-hour looking for it before Googling for a walkthrough… turns out it just doesn’t exist in my little Skyrim.
• Oghma Infinium disappeared after being read – this makes it impossible to achieve the “Oblivion Walker” achievement, as only 14 Daedric Artifacts exist in my game world. (There are 16 total; one of them, Skull of Corruption can be destroyed based on your choices during the quest.) Edit: Researching this some more, the book is supposed to disappear when you use it! But on the other hand, the UESP blog says “Using the book before acquiring all Daedric Artifacts will not break the Oblivion Walker achievement. It will still count toward the 15 required.” So obviously this is another bug. (Needless-to-say, using the console to add the item doesn’t work, as it marks that save game as “invalid for achievements”.)

Graphical Glitches:

• Khajit sideburns clip through helmets, which is hilarious:
  

Utterly Inexplicable Design Decisions:

• Unlike every other Elder Scrolls game, Hand-To-Hand is not a first-class skill. It has no perks, and it doesn’t contribute to leveling. Despite this, it’s got its own custom animations, it’s even used as a persuade option. So the game’s pretty bi-polar on this!
• Quest items cannot be dropped or stored in chests. Which is fine except… they also have weight! Sometimes they are quite heavy. This reduces the amount of items you can carry as your inventory is full of useless undroppable items. (Special bonus goes to dragon claws, where each dungeon requires a specific one, and figuring out which is quite a challenge when you’re holding 6-7 of them.) Especially egregious, because (correct me if I’m wrong) this wasn’t an issue in Oblivion.
• The guy who’s famous all over Skyrim for winning a war and personally killing a dozen dragons still gets attacked by bandits wearing hide armor. I know people didn’t like the auto-leveling NPCs in Oblivion, but this is ridiculous—better would be the bandits trying to bribe you to leave them alone, or simply running when you approach. Either would still give the player the desired sense of badass-ness.

Remember when you could just double-click the icon for your game and be playing right away?

I just ran an inventory, and I have eight games installed on my computer (the oldest being Overlord II, Oblivion, meaning they’re all newish), and six of them have launchers. Let’s take a look (as always, click to enhugeify):

Sony’s DC Universe Online

Hi-Rez studios, makers of Global Agenda and Tribes Ascend

Ubisoft’s Might & Magic Heroes VI*

Special added super-bonus: it crashed in the 45 seconds it took me to open the window and take a screenshot!

Blizzard’s World of Warcraft

There’s certainly a pattern forming here:

1. Either a non-rectangular window shape, or (what we in the Mac Classic era used to call) a “borderless” window. None are resizeable, and finding a “handle” with which to change the window’s position is difficult.
2. No standard Windows controls in sight! Forget that they’re well-designed, have been tested to rock-solidness over 20 years, and are instantly readable. Not good enough. Only the WOW launcher deigns so much to have menus.
3. Everybody loves black. “Make the background black”, the designers say, “it’ll make us stand out!” Look at how much those launchers stand out! Color schemes are either black with offensively-colored call-to-actions (Hi-Rez, WOW), or just plain offensive all-around (DC Universe Online).
4. The primary purpose of the launcher seems to be “buy downloadable shit!” (Or, in a noble exception for WOW, “watch a TV commercial!”) Sure, the launcher also patches the relevant game, but that is obviously a tiny, secondary concern.
5. 75% of the launchers have creepy people/things staring at you. (Maybe 100%, depending on what the Tribes dudes are looking at under those helmets.)

Now that we have the pattern down, let’s look at the last two:

Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

What… what are these? They’re actually… tasteful? They’re not offensively-colored, or animated, or trying to sell me some worthless downloadable junk (and yes, both games have downloadable content for sale)? There’s no Twitter feeds, no Facebook links, no social features of any kind? The options presented are actually all relevant to the actual game itself? Nothing creepy staring into my soul?

Of course you still have to ask, “why do these launchers exist?” (Actual answer: because PCs don’t have a unified way to handle installing/uninstalling content packs and mods, and console versions don’t have advanced rendering settings necessary on PC, and thus the PC version needs a UI for those things somewhere, and they didn’t want to put it in the actual game because then the Xbox and PC versions of the game code would diverge too much. It’s a good reason, but still an compromise that makes for a worse product.)

So what is the lesson we have learned? Fuck if I know. Maybe, “launchers are only present for games that are trying to nickel-and-dime you to death, or bad console ports.” Maybe, “don’t have creepy things staring at the guy trying to play your game, sheesh.” Or maybe even, “Sony sucks.”

I think it’s really, “details matter.”

*) Note: the name is no longer “Heroes of Might & Magic”, it is now “Might & Magic Heroes”. So in addition to a awful launcher, it breaks alphabetization on my Steam games list. Yes, I also complain about the first DOOM showing up in Steam as “Ultimate Doom” and thus is near the U’s instead of D’s. Details matter, people. Pay attention to the details.

Don’t get too excited, this isn’t a full blog entry, just a quick list of obvious bugs:

• Font sizes are too small and there is no ability to enlarge them. Additionally, Steam doesn’t work properly with Windows DPI settings, so fonts can’t be enlarged the usual way.
• Cloud data can’t be browsed or deleted except through a support ticket. If you are in an environment with limited space (an SSD drive), and download a game with large saves (Oblivion), Steam forces you to also download the cloud data content for that game– even if there are multiple gigabytes of it.
• Pre-ordered games don’t have a scheduler to “unencrypt” their files when (or slightly before, ideally) the game is released. Since the “unencryption” can take a significant amount of time, half an hour or more, this forces gamers excited to play their new game to wait before playing– even if the game has been pre-loaded on the computer, and even if the release date was hours and hours ago.
• Categories: Once you’ve created a category, you can never rename or delete it. Ever. You can’t make subcategories. You can’t drag&drop games into categories. You can’t assign a category to a dozen games at a time. There are no auto-generated categories (for example, game genre.) There’s no way to turn on/off category display in the list of games (except that categories aren’t displayed in Grid View, for some reason). The feature as implemented is very, very weak.

In general, Steam has a habit of half-specifying features (or fully-specifying them and only half-implementing them), and then never ever ever fixing them. For the font size issue, I’m hoping eventually a disabled rights groups gets on their ass about it, but for the other bugs I don’t see much hope.

Although it is worth noting that Steam support representatives have the capability to clear-out cloud data for a specific title for a specific user. If Valve had enough support requests to do this, they might finally add a self-service option just to save the labor costs.

Previously on Blakeyrat.com

A commenter asked for scans of the “build your own radio” instructions from the Usborne Guide, so here they are (as always, click to enlarge):

Not sure you could actually build a radio with these instructions, but there you go.

So I just got a new MacBook Air. To lay the foundation here, I was a long-time Apple user up until version 10.4 (I think…) at which point the annoyance at the direction Apple was taking things, combined with my super-expensive PPC hardware being quickly made obsolete by the Intel switch, I bought a Windows laptop, put my PPC box in the closet and went to Windows full-time. Recently, I got a hold of a decent discount on Apple hardware at the same time I was looking at a new laptop, and since Apple stuff can run Windows now (and, to be fair, their hardware *is* really damned nice), I figured there’s little to lose.
I’m setting up it, and I go through the motions of putting in my name, account name, email and password for Apple support, etc. It finishes, boots into the OS and I’m relieved to see they didn’t load up the SSD with stupid crap like Garageband or whatever they’re shilling now. But after rebooting it the first time, I realized that the thing didn’t ask my password! It just booted right into my account.

WTF 1: OS X defaults to “auto-login”

I go to the Control Panel to find and change this setting. Foolishly believing it to be in Security, I notice that there’s a checkbox for asking a password when the computer wakes from sleep/screensaver– and it’s off. This makes sense, since auto-login is on. So I check the box, set the timer to 5 seconds (it’s kind of nice that you can select the ‘lax time’ before it asks you), and try rebooting again… still no login screen. Now, however, when the laptop goes into sleep mode, it *does* ask me to supply a password to wake it back up.

In this crazy configuration, if a goon steals my MacBook he can do whatever he wants to my user account– as long as he never lets it go into sleep mode! But thankfully if he accidentally lets it go into sleep mode, all he has to do is reboot it and he has full access again. It makes… no sense at all, why is this configuration even possible?

WTF 2: Turning on “ask password on wake” doesn’t also turn off “auto-login”

So I go into the Security control panel again and start clicking around trying to figure out how the blazes to turn off “auto-login”. The third tab is Firewall, which defaults to… off! I talked to my Mac-loving friend (who actually works for Apple) and he told me that it’s off by default because it can “cause issues.” That’s possibly the weakest excuse I’ve ever heard.

WTF 3: OS X ships with the firewall off by default

My friend also pointed me to the correct place to turn off “auto-login”, it’s actually in the Accounts control panel.

And now the petty usability WTF:

WTF 4: The bright arrow indicator that an app is running is now a nearly-invisible tiny glint of blue

That wasted about 5 minutes of my time trying to figure out why the holy crap I couldn’t remove Safari from the taskbar. You can’t remove applications from the taskbar while they’re running, but there’s no indication of that when you’re dragging the icon– the little cloud icon still appears (and isn’t X-ed out or anything), and there’s nothing to indicate *why* you can’t remove the item. I’m pretty sure this was a problem in 10.4 also, but at least 10.4 made it blatantly obvious which applications were running and which were just pinned. One of the reasons I left OS X is because the taskbar (“Dock” to use Apple-speak) was so badly-designed and unusuable… good to see that hasn’t changed.

(Also posted at TheDailyWTF.)

My parents dropped off some books I had as a kid, including the Usborne Guide to Audio and Radio (ISBN 0-86020-641-6). Published in 1982, it’s an education book teaching kids how modern technologies like radio and cassette tapes work.

Anyway, I thought these two pages were interesting:

(Pre-usual, click image for biggification.)

I’d like to make fun of it, but actually their predictions aren’t far off, even the satellite radio/TV and the fiber-to-the-home. (Although I can’t get fiber to my house, screw you Verizon, other people can so I guess it still counts.) I think I’ve even seen a wristwatch with a radio in it, although I’m not sure.

The self-tuning radio one is just odd… I’m pretty sure that radios in 1982 could “re-call” stations, considering the radio in my dad’s truck from 1965 could.

The CD prediction is cheating, since CDs were invented several years before this book was authored.

Just something I thought of when reading about Apple’s App Store rejections.

(Click for enlargification)

I try to make it a practice to do some basic research about a company every time I get an email from a recruiter. This time, I lucked into getting a letter from a company I already know a lot about.

The recruiter’s name is anonymized, but not the company he belongs to (as that would defeat the point). Also I busted the job placement URL, so don’t try to follow it. The large text size and seemingly-random application of bold is original, as are the lists that start with question marks.

I received your resume from the Web It looks like you would be interested in hearing more about opportunity an that we are recruiting for .

If you are interested in this opportunity, please apply online at our career site by req number. Your resume will be on my desk top for immediate consideration.

I’ve included job description for your consideration below. The position is located in Poulsbo, WA.

Please apply directly to the requisition. We cannot take resumes directly due to OFCCP requirements, except through our web site.

If this contact is in error or you wish to be removed from our data base, please use the unsubscribe button close to the signature. I apologize if this is the case.

Regards,

Alan Smithee

The Integrated Intelligence Solutions (I2S) Operation of SAIC – Operations, Intelligence and Security Business Unit(Maritime Solutions Division) has an opening for a Senior Software Developer to participate in technical development tasks and the development of software and hardware architectures for our customers.

PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES:
Successful candidate will be able to:
?Perform object oriented software development as a technical lead of a team in a structured agile process environment (Feature Driven Development).
?Organize, participate, and positively contribute in technical team meetings.
?Mentor junior software developers by providing guidance in technical execution.
?Assist in the development of software architectures with management, peers, and customers.
?Provide technical suggestions to management for software product and process improvements.
?Interface with customers to document requirements and provide status.
?Generate test plans and perform detailed software unit testing using established tools and processes (JUnit, CppUnit).
?Report directly to software development manager on a regular basis.
?Perform Object Oriented Analysis and Design.
?Document Software Designs using Unified Modeling Language (Sparx Enterprise Architect).
?Administer server software (Subversion, MS SQL Server, Internet Information Server, Flash Media Server).
?Manage software configuration control and deployment.
?Generate marketing and technical documentation (MS Office).

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS:
Experience in:
?Feature Driven Development Process, MS Project.
?Object Oriented Analysis and Design, Unified Modeling Language, Sparx Enterprise Architect.
?MS Windows, Visual Studio, Linux, Eclipse, .Net, C++, C#, Java, ASP.Net, GSoap, SQL, Flash, XML, VirtualBox.
?JUnit, CppUnit.
?Subversion, MS SQL Server, Internet Information Server, Flash Media Server.
?MS Office.

Required Education/Experience:
Bachelors Degree and eight years related technical experience.

SAIC is a FORTUNE 500® scientific, engineering, and technology applications company that uses its deep domain knowledge to solve problems of vital importance to the nation and the world, in national security, energy and the environment, critical infrastructure, and health. For more information, visit www.saic.com. SAIC: From Science to Solutions®

SAIC offers a competitive salary and benefits package. For Immediate consideration, please apply on-line at .www.saic.com, through requisition number 167512. SAIC is an Affirmative Action Employer who values cultural diversity in the workplace. EOE, M/F/D/V”

To apply to the Poulsbo ,WA location:Candidates may apply directly to this job posting on SAIC.com through: https://cp-its-rmprd.saic.com/MAIN/careerportal/Job_Profile.cfm?szUniqueCareerPortalID=224335&szOrderID=43754512.

My reply:

Alan,

Isn’t SAIC the company that bilks the government out of millions of dollars by charging through the nose for incompetent consultants who couldn’t finish a project if their life depended on it? Like New York’s CityTime system, or the FBI’s Virtual Case File?

http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=10/03/27/1228219
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Case_File

Why would I, or anybody, want to work for a company run by charlatans and staffed by incompetents? I’d be too busy wiping the drool off my co-workers face, or explaining socks to them (once again!), to get any actual work done. And on the rare chance the project was successful, management would bin it anyway so they could steal another few million from the taxpayers.

No. Not interested.

I’m sure SAIC is a great company to work with, if you’re not saddled by those little things like “ethics” or “pride.” Please visit the above two links, these guys really are scumbags and the public deserves to know.

Special added bonus: I just found out that the security certificate used on their job portal is invalid:

cp-its-rmprd.saic.com uses an invalid security certificate.

The certificate is not trusted because the issuer certificate is unknown.

(Error code: sec_error_unknown_issuer)

Rock on, Firefox. Rock on.

Slashdot has always been a buggy piece of shit, but recently it’s exploded into a buggy metric fuckload of shit. No matter what I do, every Slashdot article looks like this:

(Click image for a closer view)

Seriously. Slashdot is supposed to be full of smart and technical people, and they can’t even get a goddamned website right? How is that image even being shown to me, the end-user? Have they ever heard of the concept of “staging servers?” It’s fucking disgraceful.

It’s not like I’m using the hated Internet Explorer browser, or some experimental web browser from beyond the stars, or that I’ve hacked the shit out of my system, it’s fucking stock Firefox with one fucking add-on.

Oh, and to make it all worse, I have Slashdot set to use the “classic” (read that as: “working”) comments system, not this new piece of shit they’ve been shitting out over the last year. Not that anybody at Slashdot gives a fuck for my preference, since I still get the new version on my user page, and half the templates.

Maintaining this site is somebody’s full-time job. In fact, there are several people who work for Slashdot and only for Slashdot… what the hell do they even do? Think up more creative ways to cram so much fail in such a small space?

Slashdot is the only website I’ve ever seen where the owners/administrators of the site simply don’t fucking care.

They just do not care.

I got to stop posting about Slashdot, it’s kind of pathetic. Not a third as pathetic as Slashdot itself, though.