My wife is addicted to Christmas.  And so this year we decided to line the trees up the drive way with Christmas lights.

I’ve been watching the fall-out from the destruction of Hostess.

I’m not going to get into the “blame” game other than to say it’s kind of dumb for people who go on strike to be shocked that they lose their jobs.

What I will get into is the never-ending stupidity of complaining about CEO pay.  Americans have no problem with paying athletes and entertainers tens of millions of dollars annually. But they rage about people getting paid a couple million for running a multi-billion dollar company.  Frankly, it just amazes me.  Our society just seems to have its priorities totally messed up.

For those of you who aren experienced modders, much of which follows is just preaching to the choir.  But for those of you new to modding, you may find this useful..

As some of you know, FE development was led by modders.  Derek Paxton and Jon Shafer are best known for their Civ 4 mods (Fall From Heaven in Derek's case).  As for myself, I got my modding start with Civ 1, MOM, Total Annihilation, and so on.  My love of Civilization 1 ultimately led to writing Galactic Civilizations.

And this brings me to the frustrating part of modding: the limited lifespan of the mod.  I eventually got to know Total Annihilation so well that had they made a Total Annihilation 2 with a derivative of their original engine I'd been already set up to do crazy cool stuff.  But that didn't happen (and don't talk to me about TA:K).

So our approach has been to approach Elemental from the perspective of it being a platform that mods can be built with for years to come.  Many of the mods that worked with War of Magic work, with slight changes, with FE.  That's because WOM and FE are built on the same platform which we call Kumquat.  

Kumquat is a relatively new engine and we have land-based strategy games scheduled to use it and upgraded versions of it for the next several years -- and not just Elemental universe games.  So the skills and understandings of what you get from modding FE will lend itself to more modding. 

We also plan to support both Nexus Mods and the Steam workshop as we go forward in ways that make what we have today seem very primitive.  

The point being, the age old issues of short-lifespan mods is something we are hoping Kumquat addresses. We looked at Kumquat as a platform that modders can use to create increasingly ambitious mods.  I can't promise source code or scripting support yet. Resources are tight, but we will be supporting this underlying platform and the expansion of its capabilities until *at least* 2017.

If you played WOM in 2010, consider what FE is like in 2012.  Now, consider what Kumquat will be like in 2014. 

There's a school of thought that it's better to have fewer but bigger updates to software.  I tend to be in that school of thought.

But as a developer, we really enjoy sharing what we do with our customers as quickly as humanly possible. 

For example, in v1.02, if you're using it right now, you hopefully noticed that we were able to vastly improve the per turn times over v1.01 and earlier.  We thought that a big deal (we came up with a different algorithm for finding units more efficiently which, late game, is a big deal).  v1.02 also starts out using a lot less memory due to dynamic memory caching, a technique we have been working on for awhile but wasn't expected to be ready until v1.1 but actually got done early so we included that.

Right now, for v1.03, we're working on a new way of storing compressed textures and clearing the texture cache (right now, we cache textures for the entire game session which gives a slight performance improvement but over the course of the game can eat up a lot of memory).  We're doing this because we know how many users like really big maps and we'd like to pave the way to larger sized maps eventually.

So anyway, are these regular updates annoying you? Would you prefer if we slowed down and had fewer, bigger updates?

Thanks!

I'm really digging my Surface RT.  However, it's the hardware that makes it so compelling. It's compelling despite the software called Windows RT. But the hardware is so great that it's the first time I've used something that made me think I was using something from the future since my first iPhone.  It's that good.

And yet, Microsoft -- the software side -- has failed in Product Management. Someone, pretty far up the chain there, is incompetent. There's no other explanation. 

Below I will list a handful of oversights that are unnecessary, baffling and detrimental to the success of what they're trying to accomplish.

In no particular order:

1. SkyDrive is not fully integrated.  Surface RT has about 15GB of space. That means, realistically, you need to deal with your stuff in the cloud. And yet, I don't have an easy way to access it unless I use the SkyDrive app or if I essentially launch it from within an app. I can't, for instance, just have a music folder on SkyDrive that the Music app just looks at. Or a Video app. If I want to load a file, I'm going through the hundreds of gigs of SkyDrive stuff. 
   
   For example, I can't go and my Photos folder from SkyDrive to my Photos library.  The integration is basically to just add SkyDrive as a drive to everything rather than letting me quickly get to stuff as if it were on my local drive.
    
2. Skype.  Microsoft bought Skype awhile ago. And yet, the RT version doesn't support searching -- like for contacts.  That makes it very limited for heavy users. It's also strikingly annoying to use as it has the same annoying issues that it has on tablets where it seems to insist on downloading the entire conversation history before it gets you caught up. I'd rather they get the *latest* discussion first and then fill in the back history later. It diminishes its use as a quick and easy way to deal with instant messages.
    
3. Basic Apps.  Remember when every gadgtet/widget program always had the same 10 apps? At this stage, there's a half dozen "gotta have" apps for any tablet.  They include: Mail app, Web Browser, A Music Player, a Video Player, Twitter App, Facebook App, Photo app, Map App, IM app.  These are basics.  And yet, let's look at them:
   
   The Mail app is decent. But it relies on People and People doesn't have my contacts like it's supposed to so it's not working quite right.
   
   The Web Browser app is great.
   
   The Music player is hampered by the weird RT UI standards. Creating a playlist with it is a big pain. There's no cloud integration (beyond having a simple SkyDrive short cut if I want to load a file). It's just plain a pain to use.
   
   Video player is the same as the music player with the same problems. Luckily, most people only care about videos from the net and in that area, the XBOX stuff is pretty good.
   
   There's no include Twitter app and the ones out there on the store are quickly hitting their 100k tokens.
   
   There's no Facebook app.
   
   The Photo app suffers the same problems as the Music/Video apps. There's a SkyDrive folder. But the app is extremely difficult to navigate. I don't even know how to create an album. I'm stuck using the desktop Pictures folder except...there's no SkyDrive availability there. I hate to say this but this app is basically useless.  Does Microsoft just hate folders / organization?
   
   The Map App is pretty decent.
   
   Skype RT is better than any version other than their desktop PC versions.  Which means to say, it's still not very good. You can't even search for contacts which makes it very problematic.
   
   These are the apps Microsoft should have had nailed.  You could argue that the stock and weather apps included are decent. They are. But they're more like bonus apps AFTER you get the basics done.
    
4. Weird UI choices. There is good UI and there is bad UI.  Metro has some bad UI in it.  The most obvious to me is that sliding from left to right takes you to the last app you used and sliding from right to left brings up the Charms bar.  What a lost opportunity.  Right to left should have taken you to whatever app you just switched to from that direction and left to right the opposite. That's intuitive.  The Charms bar could easily have been placed as a button in the app preferences (which you get to by sliding from top down or bottom up). Alternatively, you could have given it its own gesture (like slide right and back to left immediately to correspond with the left and back to right immediately on the  other side to bring up the window list). 
   
   Once you get used to using Windows 8/RT as a touch device, it's amazing how often the inefficiency of getting around apps comes up. It's baffling and reeks of some compromise due to infighting at Microsoft.

Just 4 things. All fixable. None of them technically challenging for Microsoft to have addressed long before Windows 8 shipped.  And that's why I think it's incompetence at the upper levels of Microsoft.  They clearly have the development talent.  But the people who were supposed to have the cohesive vision just blew it here.

I think the outcry from early adopters will get these things fixed.  But the tragic thing here is that they released something that, with just a bit of common sense could have been a revolutionary product. Surface RT / Surface Pro are MacBook Air / Ultrabook killers. 

I can't imagine very many people who sit down and use a Surface device would want to go back to an Ultra book. The superiority is that great -- except for the fact that Windows 8 / RT have these glaring deficiencies that force users back to the desktop, using other apps, to get real stuff done.

BTW, this article was written on a Surface RT.

So here I am at Starbucks doing some quick work.  This is, obviously, not something you'd do with an iPad.  You never see people with tablets at Starbucks.  It's either they're messing with their phone while waiting or they have, more commonly, various MacBooks. 

What is making MS Surface so great for me is that while I can use it as a tablet, though not as good as my iPad, it is much more practical to lug around than my 11 inch MacBook Air.  Is makes a much better light computing device for me than my MacBook Air.

Part of the appeal is the keyboard. It is flat on the surface of the table. I don't know how many millimeters thick it is but it's trivial. It makes it a much nicer device for typing, something the traditional Notebook can't yet touch. It's a design choice. The guts of a Surface is in the screen (the tablet). In a typical laptop/notebook, the guts are shared in the same place as the keyboard which always makes it slightly thicker.

Before I got the Surface, I was thinking that the Surface Pro would be a better solution. Now, I'm not so sure.  In fact, I suspect the Surface RT is a better solution for the role I've put it in - light computing.  It's not like I'd be doing development work on one of my Ultrabooks.

Again, the biggest flaw in Surface RT remains the software. It's unrefined and SkyDrive remains woefully under integrated.  However, these are things that are likely to be addressed.  They've already released an update that made it significantly peppier overall.

After having such a negative first reaction to the Surface (the OS really doesn't give a good first impression) I've concluded that this is a pretty amazing device. It's gotten to the point where I don't know if I'll be getting another MacBook Air (the MacBook Pro remains my primary laptop device, taking over the role my ThinkPads had held since the early 90s).

The Genius at Oatmeal does it again. Here is a tiny snippet:

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/making_things

Read the whole thing.

And now a message to the hateful, degenerate scum of the Internet:

Dear soul sucking trolls,

If you’ve publicly posted that you won’t buy stuff from my company because you don’t like me then I say to you: Thank you. The last thing I want are horrible stupid people benefiting from my work.  I realize that things I post, email, tweet, facebook, etc. can occasionally be taken out of context and be spun to fit whatever agenda the person in the media needs it to fit that day to get their page views. But nothing forces you to buy the crap they’re posting.  If you hate someone you don’t even know, you should probably seek counseling.

Making stuff and putting yourself out there can be very rewarding.  I know hateful trolls out there froth at the mouth whenever there’s some individual trying to express themselves. I understand your problem. You’re weak. You’re cowardly. And rather than trying to improve yourselves or having the courage to take a chance and try putting yourself out there you lash out at those who do. You’re pathetic.

In the end, you’re irrelevant. Once the people who create content realize that you don’t matter, you lose whatever power you might have had. Your predictions of their demise, your hateful tweets, your promises to not support whatever it is they make ultimately amount to nothing because most people aren’t horrible, pathetic creatures like you are. Good people outnumber you 1000 to 1.

My advice to you is this: Quit hating people. Look at yourself. Do some soul searching. Become a better person.  Don’t shit on stuff you don’t like but try to make things better. Don’t spend your energy trying to bring down someone you don’t even know who has done nothing to you. Make your own stuff. Share it with others. And if you can’t, then shut the hell up.

For everyone else, read this: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/making_things

The point being, don't take out your personal baggage on other individuals. 

Update:

And for those linking in and being offended by my message to trolls:  I have no means to keep stupid hateful trolls from being customers. I can only hope that they self-select themselves for removal. It makes life easier for us all.  I realize most trolls don't see themselves as such. So let me give you a hint: If you you are emotionally invested in harming some individual you don't even know, that should be a hint. If you're putting your time and energy to try to harm someone you've never met, has done nothing to you you might want to talk to someone.

If what I write rankles you, don't read it.  Find something else to do.  If you disagree but can control your angst, feel free to participate. Talk about it here. Join the discussion. But if I don't like Windows 8 and you do, then don't assume that I'm some Mac fanatic and thus an avatar of all things you imagine Mac fanatics are (which are probably in themselves false). If I have a different political view on some issue than you do, that doesn't mean that I subscribe to every political view you disagree (or hate). 

Remember, I'm just one guy with strong opinions on tons of stuff. I have no power over you. Until I'm made emperor of the planet (which, I think you can agree, is inevitable and my castle shall be constructed with the skulls of my real and imagined -- mostly imagined -- foes) use this opportunity to hang out, debate and talk about whatever.

Update 2:

I saw a thread that thinks this topic was inspired by one particular trolling event -- from September at that.  Get over yourselves.  Any time you put yourself out there, there will be hateful nasty people.  If you've visited her from some nest of hateful, nasty people don't assume this post is about whatever your particular grievance of the day. 

Microsoft Surface RT is not a great tablet.  I wouldn't generally use it instead of my iPad...in general.  But it has obliterated my use for the MacBook Air which was a constant companion of mine.

What makes Surface so compelling comes down to 3 basic design decisions that have far reaching consequences:

1. The removable keyboard works extremely well. Especially the upgraded one.

2. It supports a mouse and mouse cursor allowing for precision control.

3. It integrates much better into the Windows ecosystem than anything the Apple ecosystem can offer.

Right now, the biggest drawback, which I've harped on considerably, is that the software, at release, was not ready for prime time.  It's still woefully under polished.  I remained shocked at how poor the integration with SkyDrive is.  They want me to use this as a cloud device but SkyDrive isn't accessible from their own apps (music, video, etc.).

But once SkyDrive is integrated, it'll make iCloud look primitive.  I want to love iCloud but it's so limited and there's no apparent road map that indicates that iCloud is going to become flexible enough to use in ways Apple hasn't thought of for you.

In the meantime, HomeGroups and general network connectivity means that you can easily integrate all your "stuff" in your home or office as being accessible from Surface.  That means my XBOX, my Windows PCs (videos, music -- including my iTunes music), my Wireless printers, even my televisions are seen by it.

The biggest obstacle remains the generally poor quality of the software (the lack of being able to organize things -- creating play lists with their music app is a huge pain, the dearth of software options -- no Facebook app? No MS provided twitter app? No Amazon app?, the general usability limitations of Metro -- I can't sort my search findings by size, date, etc.).  If they can fix these things, and quickly, Surface and Windows RT could be a killer app. 

I'm really coming to enjoy it.  I just fear that the first impressions will be negative due to the rather weak state they launched it in.

Very soon we plan to release the very first Map Pack for Elemental: Fallen Enchantress.  In addition to a new hand crafted map for every map size along with new stamps to spice up random map generation, it also includes the full Anthys map. A gigantic map that contains the entire known world of Elemental (at least, as of ~150 AC).

I'm a desperately lonely guy. I need constant attention.

My big contribution to v1.01 was setting myself up with a performance profiler and going to town on FE.  

So, is anyone noticing a big performance boost with v1.01 over 1.0?