Naked Paul Toast’s Insights

Just discovered SoulScroll, a blog with a lot of Game Maker content.

Created by SoulRed12, AKA gmXpert2000 on the GMC, I was impressed by his SoulHow tutorials and essays. Easy to read, good background information, examples with GML and actions. A good place for the beginner to intermediate.

I’ll link a few, judge for yourself.

• SoulHow to deal with errors
• SoulHow to actually do stuff with GML: Part 1
• SoulHow to actually do stuff with GML: Part 2
• SoulHow to make two health bars

There’s a lot more.

Definitely worth a Blog-roll.

I stumbled upon an excellent set of YouTube videos.

These videos describe the science behind; how we know how far away planet’s, stars, galaxies, age of the earth, rocks, evolution, etc. What is so wonderful about these videos, is not just the evidence is presented, but the layman’s explanation of how the meaning of the evidence is important.

potholer54 is pretty critical of creationist, largely Christian dogma. I don’t disagree with his criticisms, but I think the video’s are likely to disenfranchise a lot of Christians, to the point where they will not watch the complete series. Given potholer54 is encouraging people to download and create DVD’s of the video, this could be a fatal to the video’s success.
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I noticed an interesting statistic today. For the first time FireFox pulled ahead of Internet Explorer, accessing these pages.

 FireFox - 48.5 %
MS Internet Explorer - 47.8 %

And the numbers are lying a bit as well. I almost exclusively use IE, when adding content, and my accesses, by far, heavily skew the numbers in IE’s favour. Removing my numbers would shift the numbers, putting FireFox well into the lead.

The browsers wars, is one thing that I absolutely never get into. Now, I know what most of you are thinking. You’re thinking; NakedPaul, of course you don’t get into browser bickering, it’s just not in your personality to be argumentative and adversarial.
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In my previous entry, I discussed why floor(), when used with random() is often preferable than ceil().

Now, it’s time to discuss why round() is undesirable, when used with the random() function.

The round() function will round real values, towards the nearest whole number. 10.2 is rounded downward to 10, 8.7 is rounded upwards to 9.

Values with exactly .5 after the decimal point are a special case, as they are exactly halfway between the nearest decimal point. Game Maker uses a technique called Bankers’ Rounding when rounding .5 decimal points. Essentially, half the time it rounds downward, the other half upward. Always creating an even whole number.

0.5 will be rounded down to 0, 1.5 rounded up to 2, 2.5 rounded down to 2. This form of rounding is used to reduce cumulative errors that can be introduced by a lot of rounding.
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Often on the GMC, a poster is interested in obtaining a random integer within a certain range.

IE.

How can I get a random number in the range 1-10?

Responses, typically will be:

r_number=floor(random(10)) + 1;
or
r_number=ceil(random(10));

The problem is many do not recognise the dangers of using ceil(), in that context.
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I’ve discovered a number, 649090867, that has significance within Game Maker. I call it NakedPaulToast’s Number. The object is to guess the significant property. A Google search won’t reveal the answer, I’m fairly confident the property, while known to exist, the number until now has been unknown.

I’ll reveal a new clue, everyday, until the property I’m looking for, is revealed.

So, what is the significant property, regarding 649090867?

I picked up the new Caravan today. Love it.

And no, it wasn’t free, it is actually the most, I have ever paid for a vehicle.

I’m using the term free, somewhat loosely. It’s income that I normally would not have had, had it not been for Game Maker and Poker.

I bought it with income that was 100% derived from Game Maker and Poker.

This topic was recently posted on the GMC.

this question is probably really stupid, but i want to know what comes first.
the events in the CREATE event of an object, or the CREATION code of an object(when you CTRL+RightClick an object in the room)

Took about 10 minutes for one responder to post a correct response, though he indicated he wasn’t sure, but had just heard that was the answer.

About 15 minutes later a second poster, quoted the manual, which definitively answered the original question. The original poster acknowledged and thanked the responders over an hour later.

The thing is, this type of question, demonstrates a huge failing on the part, of the original poster. Not necessarily because he didn’t use the manual, but because this is the type of question that can easily be resolved within minutes, by yourself.
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I made the following post and followup on the GMC, as a response to a query, asking what member hardcoregamer meant. hardcoregamer posts often on the GMC. Let’s put it this way, almost never will you find me, clicking his username, and choosing, Find member’s posts.

I fully expect the original post to be removed, and understand that it’s underlying ad homonym and off-topicness is unwelcome. I’m blogging it for preservation.

I understand, many don’t see the need for preservation.
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It has been somewhat trendy to attempt create a Game Maker-like game maker product. Of course, it’s not good enough to just write the damn thing, the important component is to promote the hell out of it, marketing it as an alternative to Game Maker.

Before, I continue, let me absolutely set the record straight; I am not against such ambitious projects. In fact I’m actually in favour of them. The academic benefit of these endeavors, is tremendous. Even if you never get beyond simple parsing, you will have learned a hell of a lot. There is no shame in not succeeding.

What I take issue to; is the over-zealous, unrealistic, misleading, parasitic promotion on the GMC, for a product that will probably never see the light of day. If and when a product ever does reach the stage where it is a viable product, at that time market it as an alternative.
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