A few weeks ago I finally completed the last game in the Metal Gear HD Collection, and that game was Metal Gear 2: Sons of Liberty. I suppose that the HD collection also include Metal Gear, and Metal Gear 2: Snake's Revenge, but since you have to boot up MGS3 to play them I am not counting them as part of the "HD" collection.

Prior to playing it more recently, I had started playing MGS2 when it originally came out. A good friend of mine in Greece (Θ.Μ.) had a Playstation 2, and one of our favorite past-times was playing games in pass-the-controller style.  We had actually gotten quite far in the game when I had to quit playing it and head on over to the train terminal to head to Athens for my return flight to the US.  I didn't realize how far until now that I have completed the game.  Back then, in 2002, I was almost at the final boss before I stopped playing - D'oh!

In any case, the game starts off with Snake, but then for the vast majority of the game follows a new character character called Raiden.  Raiden is trying to prevent some crazy terrorist group for starting a war, and save the president of the US while he's at it.  The game keeps making reference to the fact that Raiden has had VR (virtual reality) training so he's prepared for such real life missions, but as Snake tells him, nothing prepared you for the real deal.  I guess the game, more than 10 years ago, foreshadowed what we see today with games such as America's Army, and drone operators. The game also had this undercurrent of media control, and the silencing of voices, government propaganda, and so on - which is pretty interesting to have in a game from 2001 considering that we are starting to hear about massive spying operations from leaked documents like those released by Edward Snowden. I guess life is imitating art.

oink!

The game was pretty interesting.  I was recently listening to an older retronauts episode where they were discussing the MGS series and MGS2 came up. It seems that people were pretty annoyed at this game when if first came out, that Raiden was essentially in a simulation and that this wasn't really a "real" mission.  I wonder if everything that has transpired since the game came out made it feel a little more "real" to me as compared to when the game first came out.   The only thing that I didn't like, but I eventually got used to was the mechanic of having to stop and push a shoulder button to aim.  I wouldn't really shoot a weapon while running which was frustrating.  I also didn't get any "real" ammo when the game started, but instead I got tranquilizer darts, which made for a confusing start of the game.  I know that this game is meant to be stealth action, but sometimes stealth doesn't work work me  - I'd prefer to be penalized in rankings and get through the story than try to force the stealth.  Eventually I got used to the mechanic of the game and I made my way through.

I don't even remember how many achievements I got because they are all lumped together for all 3 HD trilogy remakes.  I did get some final stats such as almost 13 hours of play-time, saved 52 times (I actually ran out of save spots!), and based on those save spots I saw that I started the game over 18 months form the time I finished it.  That took a longtime, and it was partly due to a rage quit over the game mechanics.



Overall, interesting game.  After an Assassin's Creed interlude, I think I will go to the Original Metal Gear and make my way through that trilogy.  Now if there were a way to play the original MGS on an xbox...

Well.  As if running MacOS 6 in vMac on your smartwatch wasn't enough, if you are craving some classic operating systems check out PCE.js which allows you to run MacOS 6 in a web browser, as well as Windows and DOS.  I wonder what my younger self would think of this if I had seen this 20 years ago... Now it's time to start emulating Amigas, IIgs, and OS/2. If you feel nostalgic for Windows 1.0, check out PCjs.org.

Windows 1.0, in all its glory

Κοντά στο τέλος της πρώτης σχολικής χρονιάς οι σύμβουλοι της τάξης μας, δύο καθηγητές, άρχισαν να μας βοηθούν να σχηματίσουμε ένα τετραμελές από μαθητές για να αρχίσουμε να έχουμε διάφορες εκδηλώσεις για την τάξη μας. Η κάθε τάξη στα αμερικανικά λύκεια έχει ως μέλη όλους του μαθητές που θα τελειώσουν το λύκειο την ίδια χρονιά. Οπότε αντί να έχουμε κάθε τμήμα να έχει εκλογές για πρόεδρο, αντιπρόεδρο, κτλ., το κάθε τμήμα είχε αντιπρόσωπους - και αυτοί εκλεγμένοι αν θυμάμαι καλά. Τέλος πάντων, μου είχε έρθει η φαεινή ιδέα να πάω στις εκλογές ως ταμίας (ή γραμματέας… δεν θυμάμαι). Έτσι λοιπόν μέσα στο θέατρο του λυκείου είχαμε τα ντιμπέιτ. Πσσσ… Εγώ με την ελληνική προφορά των Αγγλικών, και το πολύ το τρακ έσκισα! Είχα αρκετό τρακ αλλά το ντιμπείτ έγινε. Τελικά μόνο λίγους ψήφους είχα...Κρίμα ;-)

Την τρίτη χρονιά που είχαμε πάλι εκλογές ξανά έβαλα το όνομα μου ως υποψήφιος, και αυτή την φορά για δημόσιες σχέσεις. Τι ήξερα τώρα για δημόσιες σχέσεις; Τέλος πάντων, ότι και να ήταν θα το μάθαινα...αλλά ούτε και εκεί με ψήφισαν… Την τελευταία χρονιά του λυκείου (4η χρονιά) δεν το έβαλα κάτω. Ξανά υποψήφιος! Αυτή την φορά με ψηφίσαν - νίκη σαν το Ρόκι. ;-). Το Τετραμελές από την πρώτη χρονιά έγινε πενταμελές την τρίτη, και εξαμελές την τετάρτη χρονιά, αφού τώρα είχαμε δύο άτομα για δημόσιες σχέσεις. Την τελευταία χρονιά βασικά οι δημόσιες σχέσεις ήταν το μόνο πόστο για το οποίο ψηφίζαμε επειδή στα άλλα τέσσερα δεν είχαν αντίπαλους. Ενδιαφέρων, και την τελευταία χρονιά μπήκα στο εξαμελές πια και δεν είχα και πολύ δουλειά να κάνω - μόνο σε τίτλο ήταν η δουλειά - όπως μου φαίνεται με αρκετούς πολιτικούς. Το μόνο «μεγάλο» θέμα ήταν το θέμα του τελευταίου σχολικού χορού...αλλά περισσοτερα γι αυτό αργότερα.

Όσο δεν ήμουν στο τετρα-πεντα-εξαμελες ήμουν αντιπρόσωπος τμήματος (εκεί με ψήφιζαν) και μετά από τις πρώτες εκλογές μας είπε ένας από τους σύμβουλους το σχολείου άμα θέλαμε θα μπορούσαμε να γίνουμε μέλη του σχολικού συμβουλίου, το οποίο είχε μέλη απ όλες τις τάξης, και μεγαλύτερους από εμάς, και μικρότερους. Η δουλειά το μαθητικού συμβουλίου ήταν να κοιτάει τα συμφέροντα όχι μόνο μιας τάξης άλλα όλων των μαθητών. Έτσι πήγα και υπηρέτησα εκεί τέσσερα χρόνια. Κάθε τρίτη πρωί στις 7:30, πριν αρχίσει το σχολείο. Αυτό που θυμόμουν από την Ελλάδα ήταν πως το μαθητικό συμβούλιο είχε κάποιο λόγο στις εκδρομές που κάναμε τρις ή τέσσερις φορές τον χρόνο. Στη Αμαλιάδα οι εκδρομές ήταν πάντα στο γήπεδο της πόλης οπότε ήθελα να δω που πήγαιναν τα παιδιά στην Αμερική για εκδρομή. Αυτό που έμαθα ήταν πως δεν είχαν εκδρομές, με την έννοια που την είχα στην Ελλάδα. Το μαθητικό συμβούλιο οργάνωνε χορούς, μίλαγε με τον λυκειάρχη για προβλήματα με το σχολείο όπως διάφορα βρόμικα WC, για την ποιότητα του φαγητού στην καφετέρια, και άλλα τέτοια. Ήταν δηλαδή κάπως σαν συνήγορος του μαθητή. Ενδιαφέρον, και αρκετά διαφορετικό από την Ελλάδα, αλλά εγώ ήθελα εκδρομές! ;-)

I've been experimenting with Linux on and off since 1999.  I was first introduced to linux when I was working at Barnes and Noble and I was working on the textbook floor with a number of other computer geeks. I think the first distro that I heard of was Slackware, but I don't think I have actually ever actually installed slackware.  I remember seeing their software boxes at stores like MicroCenter and CompuUSA when I was in High School.

When I started my bachelor's degree in computer science we used to telnet into our school's server, a Sun machine, to write, run, and test Java applications.  If I had the money I would have most likely bought a sunbox (I actually did later on, but gave it up since I had no space).  In the meantime, in order to facilitate my coding I decided to purchase LinuxPPC - a distribution which ran on PowerPC based computers, including my Blue and White G3. After I completely formatted my hard drive, installed linux on one partition, and MacOS 9 on another, and got cranking on setting things up. The experiment didn't last long One of the main issues I discovered were drivers - LinuxPPC didn't really support the G3 all that well, and I couldn't get online with my 56k modem.  The linux partition went dormant until I installed MacOS X on it a couple of years later.

I did continue to experiment with SuSE linux on a Virtual PC on my Mac to continue to learn more about linux, but it was more of a hobby - not something that would really replace my day to day OS.  Over the years I have gone through and tested Red Hat, and subsequently Fedora, older versions of Ubuntu, and various smaller distros and live CDs.  Nothing really has swayed me to switch. About six months ago the Linux Foundation had a MOOC on EdX as an introduction to linux. I signed up to see what it was all about and it piqued my curiosity again and Windows 8 was increasingly annoying on my secondary work PC. It would go through a cycle of updates, only to fail, and reboot, until the next time it wanted to try updating where the process would start again. Microsoft bungled the update from 8.0 to 8.1 on enterprise, and as an early adopter I felt the pain.  If I was going to have to erase and reinstall everything, I might as well try out linux again. I decided to retry Fedora and Ubuntu.  After some hickups I got Ubuntu running and it's been a couple of months now as my daily secondary machine - running on a Dell GX620 (standard hardware config).


Thus far I've been able to do everything I did on Windows with this linux machine  - since most of it involves dropbox, documents, email, and chat clients and skype.  The one thing that I felt adventurous about trying was trying to get the department's scansnap ix500 scanner to work with it. I didn't use it on Windows, but I thought it might be good to have this scanner setup in case I needed it to work.  I had marginal success in getting it to work.  The linux software that I got for it produced poor quality scans, and the windows software that came with it did not work with WINE. I did get the software to install, I just couldn't get the scanner recognized after the software was installed.

Things seem OK thus far. I think that I can make Ubuntu work as a work machine - at least for the things I use my secondary "email" computer (which is usually underpowered hardware anyway).  The one issue that cropped up this week is the curse of the update.  Updates on ubuntu, thus far, have been seamless. The update client pops up, says that there are new updates, you click update, and you're done.  Now I am getting an error indicating that I cannot update because my /boot partition is full.  I've done some cursory checks and it seems that old kernel files are to blame.  I need to get those removed in order to be able to update the system. Ugh... will update issues be the end of ubuntu as well? hehehe.  Maybe I'll spend part of my summer troubleshooting this and getting more familiar with linux - after May and graduation are done at work.  The silver lining is that this is the longest I've ever used any linux since I started back in 1999.

Prodigy σε Windows 3.11

Ένα από τα καινούργια πράγματα όταν επέστρεψα στην Αμερική ήταν τα κλαμπ - δηλαδή μαθητικές λέσχες, που είχαν ως επίκεντρο κάποιο θέμα. Μέσω του Χόλιγουντ όταν ήμουν στην Ελλάδα έβλεπα στην στην τηλεόραση το πως, τάχα, ήταν αυτές οι λέσχες στο σχολείο, κάτι που τότε δεν είχαμε στα σχολεία στην Ελλάδα Η λέσχη μας ήταν βασικά το να παίζουμε ποδόσφαιρο στην πλατεία, ή να μας τρώνε τα πενηνταράκια τα φλιμπεράκια. Έτσι λοιπόν το πρώτο κλαμπ στο οποίο πήγα να γίνω μέλος ήταν το Ski Club. Πάντα ήθελα να μάθω να κάνω σκι. Ήταν κάτι που φαινόταν αρκετά ενδιαφέρον, και άμα ήμουν σε κλαμπ θα είχα και παρέα. Ο σύμβουλος του κλαμπ ήταν ο ψιλο-τρελός καθηγητής των Γαλλικών, οπότε αυτό μου έλεγε πως αυτό το κλαμπ δεν είχε και πολλές προοπτικές Πήγα πάντως στην πρώτη συνεδρίαση του κλαμπ για να δω ποιος ήταν εκεί Στο κάτω κάτω ήθελα να μάθω να κάνω σκι.

Στην πρώτη λοιπόν συνεδρίασή του κλαμπ έμαθα πως θα έπρεπε να είχα δικά μου σκι, ρούχα, μπότες, και εξοπλισμό για σκι - κάτι που δεν είχα. Οι τιμές για σκι είναι τουλάχιστον $300 σήμερα άμα θες να είναι δικά σου. Πιστεύω πως μπορούσες και να ενοικιάσεις τον εξοπλισμό, αλλά δεν έλεγε. Εγώ, αρχικά, νόμιζα πως το σχολείο τα πλήρωνε όλα, οπότε ήμουν μες την τρελή χαρά. Μόλις άρχισαν να μιλάνε για χρήμα την κοπάνισα από το κλάμπ.

Το δεύτερο κλάμπ στο οποίο έγινα μέλος ήταν το computer club του λυκείου. Βασικά ήμουν εγώ και τρία άλλα παιδιά, όλοι κάπως geek, και τα απογεύματά, μετά το σχολείο, πηγαίναμε στα εργαστήρια με τους υπολογιστές και προσπαθούσαμε να έχουμε δωρεάν πρόσβαση, με διάφορα κουπόνια, σε συνδρομητικές πλατφόρμες όπως το AOL, compuserve, prodigy, και άλλες. Στο ιντερνετ τελικά δεν τα καταφέραμε και πολλές φορές να μπούμε. Μπήκαμε μερικές φορές, είδαμε μερικά νέα, μπήκαμε σε μερικά chat, αλλά δεν έλεγε και πολλά. Εγώ πάντως από computer club περίμενα περισσότερα video games και λιγότερα ψευτόχακεράκια :-). Το κλαμπ δεν κράτησε και πολύ. Ο ένας τύπος μετακόμισε με την οικογένεια του, ο άλλος αποφοίτησε, και αυτοί που έμειναν δεν του ενδιέφερε το δωρεάν AOL. Πιστεύω πως τότε αρκετοί που είχαν χρήμα - και πιστεύω πως το Dedham (η πόλη μου) είχε αρκετούς κατοίκους με χρήμα - είχαν δικό τους ίντερνετ στο σπίτι, οπότε δεν χρειαζόταν computer club.

Μετά από αυτό το κλάμπ τα παράτησα τα κλάμπ στο λύκειο. Ένας από τους λόγους ήταν το Τάεκβοντό, αλλά γι αυτό άλλη φορά.

Smartwatch 3

Over the past year I've been eyeballing and oogling over the Android Wear smartwatches.  A friend, and word-colleague, of mine has had an original Pebble for a while (I think he may have been a kickstart backer) but I have to admit that the Pebble didn't really appeal to me - at least the original one didn't. One of the things I didn't like was the square display.  I do like watches, and I do like round displays, so the pebble was square, bulky, and not that well integrated with iOS - which is what I used at the time. I was also comparing smartwatches to traditional watches in terms of battery life.  Let's face it, smartwatches pale in comparison to traditional watches when it comes to battery life!

Even Android Wear's offerings didn't really support pulling that trigger and buying a smartwatch until I saw the LG G-Watch-R, which looked like a regular watch, but was a smartwatch as well.  For a few weeks I was mulling it over, which smartwatch to get - once the G-Watch R had reeled me in.  Finally, despite its square display, I ended up going with the Sony Smartwatch 3! So, why the change of mind?  The batteries of the LG and the Sony were comparable in how long they lasted, and most specs were pretty on-par when compared head to head.  The things that set the Sony watch apart were the on-board GPS (no need to rely on phone), it's got NFC, WiFi, and it charges via MicroUSB.  The WiFi and the NFC are a bit of a moot point since Android wear doesn't support either yet, however I can foresee Android supporting this pretty soon as competition with Apple's watch heats up. The GPS, which will allow me to go for runs and hikes around the campus without the need to carry my phone, and the microUSB charger are major selling points for me.  With MicroUSB I can use the same charger as my phone and not have to carry around another charging cable.

I've been using the watch for a few weeks now.  The most useful thing tend to be notifications.  I can leave my phone in the office, charging, and walk around the area and not miss any important notification, or have to pick up my phone to see what came in while I was away from my desk.  I have gone out once or twice for walks (when the weather was nice), and the GPS is pretty good in my experience.  The one bummer is that as of this writing Nike+ does not support the on-board GPS on Android Wear so I need to use RunKeeper to track my walks and runs. Hopefully this will be fixed in the next few months as Android Wear becomes more popular.

I've experimented a little bit with dictation for text messages.  It is a little spotty at the moment, I am wondering if it needs more training.  I think the main thing about responding to messages on this thing is that it's a bit weird, on a social level.  I feel like Michael Knight, or Captain Picard dictating to my device. In those contexts it's not unusual for people to announce "computer pause recording" but at this point in time on our planet it is more than a bit weird to say "OK google - text wife mobile phone train is running late". I might as well pull out my phone and do it.

Sleep tracking seems to be the thing to do these days (wonder if it's going to become a fad like calorie tracking).  I did get some free money to spend on the Google Play store, so seeing that some of my friends have downloaded Android Sleep, I decided to give that a try.  I got some nice graphs thus far, but let's see what the aggregate of data tells me in a month or so.  I wonder if Android Fit will be tracking more info about you, like Apple's Health toolkit, in the future.

Finally, as far as the battery goes - it gives me around 2 days on a full charge.  Not bad.  I honestly thought that I wouldn't be so psyched about having to charge my device every day (or every other day), but considering that I don't charge it overnight, and that it only takes 30 minutes to fully charge, I have gotten in the habit of plugging it in before I leave for work, and giving it a full charge each day.  This is not as annoying as I thought it would be given the utility that this device offers.