The Unauthorised Autobiography of Marc Holmes

 
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September 22, 2009

25 Years of Elite

Man, I'm getting old - is it really 25 years since Elite was released? I feel like a member of a vintage car club. You can grab all manner of goodies for your PC here.

A salute to Elite this is: I managed to play it on the BBC Micro, C64 and Atari ST and it was always engrossing. I seem to remember that:
  • I spent a  lot of time trading Food and Furs between Leesti and Diso.
  • You had to buy a docking computer because otherwise it was really hard to land. Then it was easy.
  • Fuel scoops were a waste of time. Beam lasers overheated to fast and it was only worth having the Military ones.
  • I've no idea how you ended up in Witch Space, or how you got out of it.
  • I did a galactic hyperjump and couldn't figure out why.
  • I never completed a single special mission (IIRC).
  • There wasn't actually that much to do.
Happy days. We need another Elite.

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September 7, 2009

Canon EOS 350D and Win7 x64

I was trying to connect my aging EOS 350D to my laptop last night and found that there are no Win7 x64 drivers. D'Oh.
If you've had similar struggles, then here's a handy tip to get things going. Worked a charm. Phew.

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August 21, 2009

Beach Video

Love this video made from thousands of individual stills. Like a minitature world. Awesome.

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August 21, 2009

Queuing Theory at SeaTac

I try not to think as hard as Eric does when I'm on holiday, but this is a great real-life view on Queuing Theory - a favourite subject of mine back when I had any mathematical skill.

Actually, the most efficient experience I've (perceived) to have had at SeaTac was an M system with handlers specifically managing 2 queues (much like the outcome of this eventual story).  It seemed to work as the handler could managed each side effectively because of the need to shove bags onto the queue (and various other actions required of the customer). If I was as smart as Eric I'd be able to think about this in multi-threading or asynchronous patterns ways, but I'm not.

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August 19, 2009

Aggregate Marc Holmes Personas

Personas is a website that characterises you based on some search and language processing. This is me apparently. Now, it's not entirely accurate as there are many "Marc Holmes" across the internet, but I like the aggregate "Marc Holmes" identity...

Also, the experience is pretty good fun.

Courtesy of SwissMiss

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