December 6, 2007 at 3:33 pm
· Filed under Virtual Entertainment
I could watch this all day. Actually, for almost 3 days.
Pi3D: Version 1 (give it a moment or several)
I loaded a text file containing the first million decimals of pi into proce55ing. I then created about 180 PiPoint objects to keep track of waveform values. I have an offset counter that keeps track of what point we’re on, and each PiPoint is smart enough to find out its y-value based on the offset counter and its distance from the front of the ribbon.
In actuality, the ribbon stays in place, while the values of pi tween through it. When the points change direction it means they’ve reached a whole decimal. The slope in between represents the difference between consecutive numerals. For example, if you take 3.14, the difference between 1 and 4 is three. So if you start at a ribbon value of 1 (the 1 in 3.14) and travel 1/3 of the distance between the 1 and the 4, you’ll arrive at a ribbon value of 2. Likewise, 2/3 of the distance gets you to 3, and 3/3 (all the distance) gets you all the way to 4.
A displacement of n in the offset counter is the same as no displacement but starting pi at 10*pi*n. It’s really not mathematically significant at all, but it looks pretty cool.
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December 5, 2007 at 10:57 am
· Filed under Virtual Entertainment
Tried my hand at Processing. Interesting stuff. Just playing around to find out what the capabilities are. Here are some links:
Moving dots: Dots
3D Cube: Cube (takes a little while)
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December 2, 2007 at 3:40 am
· Filed under Musings
 I crossed a line today. 
I’ve opted to brush the dust off of my old PC (you know, that one I was using freshman/sophomore year of college, before upgrading to this shiny new Core-2 64-bit 8-Gig-o-RAM system I built for myself) and turn it into a Linux server.
Why? Because it’s something completely new and foreign to me, and I had some time and ambition to do so. My ultimate goal is to create a (slow but working) Red5 server. Red5 (FREE!) is the open-source alternative to the Adobe Media Server ($$$$$.$$!) – both of which allow users of my various flash programs to communicate with other users. In other words, I will be able to host my own multi-user apps, instead of relying on newmedia.rit.edu for this technology.
In the past few hours, I have learned more than I’ll be able to convey in this entry and the subsequent entries to follow on the same topic. I will summarize to give those who know Linux a chance to laugh at my newbieness, and those who know as much as I did yesterday a chance to gape at my newfound uber-geekdom:
Read the rest of this entry »
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