• New Resolve…maybe

    Posted on by suguay

    I have unintentionally taken something of a break from WoW the last couple of weeks. I had thought it was just because I was bored with it. That is partly true. I’m more in a mode of doing things in the “real world” right now and have a few projects going that easily side track me for a considerable amount of time. However it turns out there maybe more to it than that.

    You may recall that I was taking the opportunity, while my friends were taking time away from WoW, to explore different servers, races, and classes. While doing this I ultimately went back to a character I had created a while ago, my Troll Rogue Y. I have really been enjoying playing Y in spite of her relative squishiness. However, I had been compelled to go back to playing some Alliance side characters on the server my friends play on because they have started playing again. And I have become somewhat reticent in my playing.

    It’s not that I don’t enjoy playing with my friends. I do when I get a chance. The truth is more often than not we are not on at the same times. They often do not get online until much later than I do and usually after I have logged off. If we are on at the same times they are usually in a raid of some sort. So we don’t actually spend a lot of time playing together. I think, as part of the frustration, is also that when I leveled my DK to 80, I had basically dropped everything else to level her up to 80 while shunning all else within the game except for questing and dungeons and whatever else it took to get there at the behest of my friends.

    Now I’m enjoying playing my Rogue and would really like to level her all the way up to 80 on my own, and in my own time, taking the opportunity to enjoy the bits along the way. For example, Brew Fest. I did participate in that on one of my characters last year and it was a lot of fun. Even with the really blurry screen from too much Dwarven Ale or whatever my Toon was drinking. I’m planning on enjoying it again this year with my Rogue. And of course Hallows End is coming up. Who can’t isn’t looking forward to that.

    I got the second level of riding skill the other day for Y and got the achievement that comes with it, I can’t remember if that’s “Need for Speed” or a different one. Anyway, I was looking at my achievements and realized it has been almost a month since I made level 40 and I’m still sitting at 44. Then I thought about how I haven’t really been on for the last 2 weeks or so and when I was just before that I was working on other things, like my DK’s Jewel Crafting, leveling a Human Warrior, stuff like that. It’s really a shame because I do have fun playing Y. Especially the pick pocket part. I managed to pick pocket a very nice dagger. It’s a blue level called Vendetta. BONUS! Or when I can stealth past all the other mobs to get right where I need to be and only have to knock off one or two that are in the way of that item I need for a quest. I like that too. Ok, I’m a Combat Rogue, I’m “not supposed to use stealth” that much. Right. Like that’s going to happen. I’m going to use whatever I need to make it fun for me and, that makes it fun. Besides, you have to use stealth to pickpocket.

    So now I have new resolve and a new focus for my WoW play time. I’ve got Y stuck in Stranglethorn Vale right now trying to finish off the Green Hills quest. I’ve to about8 more pages to go for that quest and then in a couple of levels I’ll try killing off the elite tiger that I have to kill to get the first of the Nesingwary (is it one s or two?) hunting achievements. After that, I think I might be ready to head back over to Tanaris to run some quests over there. It may all have to wait a little though because of Brew Fest. I’m going to have to head back over to Orgrimmar to enjoy the festivities. It should be fun.

     

    Originally published at: suguayproductions.com/joomla which has been discontinued.


    📂This entry was posted in Games Land

  • I Got Bored and Then…

    Posted on by suguay

    Last week I got all my housework items done that I intended to and even an extra item and realized that I was bored. This is a really bad thing for more. I have several things that I enjoy doing and for me to be bored means I didn’t have anything at that moment that offered much challenge or in depth involvement.

    I don’t know about you but sometimes I like to have something to do that is going to have me so engrossed that I completely forget about time. I also like to build or make things or fix things or renovate things. I live in an apartment. That means the only real renovation would be to my stuff and most of that doesn’t need it right now. I do have a dresser I could refinish again, however; that’s more mess than anything. I could play World of Warcraft and that would suck up some time. But that is really all it would do is suck up some time. I needed something to do that doesn’t feel like just killing time. So what to do.

    I started out getting some Lego Bionicels. They’re cool and all but they only took a few minutes to put together. How very disappointing and unsatisfying. I have a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and I bought a 2000 piece puzzle. I’ve also bought a model airplane to put together. I got one of the old style that is made of balsa wood and you cover it in tissue paper. I remember helping my dad put together one of these when I was a child. Really a child, like about age 5 or so.

    Last night and this morning I worked the 1000 piece puzzle. I’ve got other things I need to do today so I probably won’t be starting the other jigsaw puzzle this weekend. What I think I want to do is to work up to doing some of the cool projects I’ve seen on the website HacknMod (http://www.hacknmod.com). I saw that they have a project to make an off-road skateboard that is electric which looks really cool. I also saw a project that is a create your own segway type of vehicle. This really excites me. I’ve ridden a real Segway and think they are just a blast. How cool would it be to build one of your own.

    Currently what I’m planning on doing is working on progressively more challenging build projects and working my way up to building my own segway type of vehicle. If I stay interested and on track I might be starting on it in about two years. If I don’t stay on track it will be longer or I will have lost interest or gotten distracted by something else that looked more entertaining at the time. That happens.

    Now I’m off to do some housework type stuff and to work on cleaning off a computer that I’m getting rid of.

    Cheers

    Originally published at: suguayproductions.com/joomla which has been discontinued.


    📂This entry was posted in The Blog!

  • Working on Professions and Skills for My Death Knight

    Posted on by suguay

    Alas, my friends have come back to WoW which means it’s time for me to get out my level 80 Draenei Death Knight and start working on those things that I still need to get up to level. This unfortunately means that my cool Rogue Y hasn’t been getting quite as much love. And as a part of my friends coming back to Wow I am working on an Alliance Warrior, C. I’m going to learn to tank.

    So this weekend having been a holiday weekend in the states should be a good time to do all sorts of time consuming things.

    I had planned on running dungeons on both Y and C because I figured they were low enough level they would be stuck with the really long dungeons. I need to get a dungeon in for C as I don’t want to level any higher before I start trying to tank. I tried to run a dungeon with Y and decided that I didn’t want to wait the, at least, 30 minutes that was estimated by the dungeon finder. That tells me there aren’t really a lot of people at about that level running on Horde right now. Sigh. I did run a dungeon on the Death Knight, M.

    Running the dungeon on M was really a good thing. It let me see how out of practice I am. I sucked at first. Seriously. Ugh. I was almost worthless. It’s actually the second one I’ve made it all the way through this week. I was in Nexus and the tank and healer left and then after about 10 minutes it was just me. Ugh. Anyway, by the end of the second dungeon I was starting to get warmed back up and things were going better.

    Dungeons are not, however, how I spent the holiday time in WoW. I have finally been leveling my professions for M. Yep. I’ve finally got the Mining to 398 and I think I’m ready to take that to Northrend. And I’ve finally got the Jewel Crafting up to 350. I’m not so sure that it ready for Northrend but I’m thinking it might be time to try it. I’m otherwise not sure where I’m supposed to get some of the gems that I’m going to need for the new JC patterns that I’ve got. I’ve spent several hours now just flying back and forth over the different areas of Outland to mine up Fel Iron or Adamantite (or whatever it is). A bonus side effect of this is that I now have the Explore Outland achievement. I was also able to get the Skills to Pay the Bills achievement when I got my JC up to 350.

    The really annoying thing about the Gems that you can make with Jewel Crafting at Outland level is that no one wants them. The value is fairly low and no one wants them. I was hoping they would be salable much like the low level rings and such are. They sell, not because people want them for what they do. They sell, because they are fairly cheap Enchanter fodder. Meaning, I sell them at low enough prices that Enchanters can afford to purchase them and then disenchant them for the materials. That seems to not be the case with the Gems. Bummer.

    At least, as I started getting into the new ores and the new patterns the work this weekend was quite as mindnumbing as say mining for Mithril or Thorium. It’s actually been a bit fun. I know, it’s a game and it should be however, with many of these types of games, much like with life, there are aspects that can be less than fun and so you find yourself putting them off.

    I also managed to level my Fishing all the way to 450 finally. That’s got that one done. So with actively working on Mining and Jewel Crafting the only other thing that needs some attention, badly, is my Cooking. Yep, I haven’t been really working on my cooking. It’s sad I know. But I haven’t. Right now my Cooking skill sits at a whopping 137. I’ve got up to making Croclisk Stew. I’ll need to spend quite a while farming Crocolisks for that to not be orange. I suppose I should get to work on that, however, at the moment it seems so much less pertinent to my progression in the game. Ok. I should do it just to say I’ve done it. And that’s really why I want to do it. I want to max out all my skills just to have done it on at least one character. Which means I guess I should be getting back to mining and making gems.

    Laterz.

     

    Originally published at: suguayproductions.com/joomla which has been discontinued.


    📂This entry was posted in Games Land

  • Software Status Update

    Posted on by suguay

    It’s time to update my interactions with some of the software that I may have mentioned here. Most of it I was evaluating or testing for others who had indicated a desire to do some particular something on the Internet and were in need of an application that would make this possible. Some of the software I have looked at just out of curiosity, and some of it has been for my own use. Now seems like a good time to update everyone on what I’ve finished looking at, what I am still desirous to look at and what I intend to continue to use, research, play with or whatever you may call it.

    To start with, I have removed the following applications
    : Moodle, Gallery, and Zen Cart. None of these have I removed due to a problem with the software, rather a lack of need.

    Moodle: I was evaluating for another person who indicated they wanted to be able to hold classes online. They have changed their focus and are no longer interested in this idea. I am not inclined to host online classes and thus have no need of the application.

    Gallery: quite frankly, I don’t entirely remember why I installed this. I think it had to do with a group whose site I was supporting and they had expressed a desire to be able to share photos and such. Beyond installing the software and looking at it, I never did anything with it. I’m not inclined to share a lot of pics with people. I don’t even have a personal picture up on the social networking site I frequent. So there is little use for this particular application for me.

    Zen Cart: Again, I was evaluating this software for someone else, who was expecting to need a way to sell products online. They have chosen to do something else so they no longer have a need for this software. I do not currently sell any products. I host advertisements for others and beg for donations, however, I don’t currently have anything to sell. So I have no real use for this application. Additionally, not in favor of this application, one of the other applications that I do continue to use has the capability of adding a module to handle sales, including download sales and so this becomes somewhat redundant for my purposes.

    I have one application installed that is sort of in limbo and that is, Simple Machines Forum. The site that I initially needed it for has not been active for sometime and will soon be disbanding. I will not need to continue to do anything for it on that site. I have it installed on my site however, I do not currently have a use for it. I am ambivalent about removing it as it is still possible that I will have a use for it. I have discovered that there had been an issue with one of the upgrades that I have not looked into. I just had to recover the application this weekend and have not looked into what the problem was, or even the state of the environment. I suppose I should add that to my “To Do List”. So, alas, Simple Machines Forum remains in limbo for me.

    There are a few applications that I continue to use, work with, evaluate, tweak or whatever. I am either actively using them myself at the moment or someone I help is actively using them and so I have it installed for reference. Those happy, active applications would be: Joomla!, Drupal, and WordPress. Yes, all of those.

    Joomla!: I actively use this application. It is currently the primary application I use for my site and the one I have used longest. I’ve recently come across a need to make some serious adjustments and need to either learn to tweak a template or two or to write my own. As a result I’m spending a lot of time with this one. I am still trying to figure out how to embed a flash animation in the header. To be fair, I haven’t spent any real time scouring the Joomla! forums so the answer is probably there and I’m trying to reinvent the wheel. So this remains at the fore of things that I am working with and working on. It will continue to be a potential topic for discussion.

    Drupal: Ok, initially I did not like this software. I thought it was too difficult to get started with. With more experience with a CMS program in general, I find this less of a challenge. It still takes some work to get my head around the difference in concepts, however, I am making progress with it. Part of what has caused me to revisit the software has been it’s publicity lately with regards to some of the sites that are using it. So I am learning how to setup a Drupal site. What I have decided to do for this is to essentially duplicate everything or at least all the articles and features that I have at the Joomla! version of my site within Drupal. I think this is the best way to get a reasonable comparison of the look and feel of the differences and similarities of the applications. It also gives me content to work with and not requiring me to come up with lots of new content. I can post the same articles on each site and then determine how easy it is to do and such and report back on that.

    WordPress: I am not yet actively using this. I have someone who is and I assist them with their site and changes they want and the like. Because of this, I have WordPress installed. I don’t have anything in it at the moment though I do have a theme other than the default installed on the site. In addition to helping this other person with the application, it is my intention to actually use this myself. I have an idea that I think the WordPress software might be ideally suited for, as a start. And I eventually intend to do with it what I am doing with Drupal. The key here on this is the eventually part. I do not anticipate getting that deeply involved with it for a while. Of course if the other idea takes off all that could change. However, sooner or later I’ll have a report on this one as well.

    There is still at least one application that I would like to “play” with. I changed one of my hosting accounts over to Windows from Linux so I could install and look at DotNetNuke. The only problem I have run into so far is that the version of Asp.Net on that new server is not compatible with DotNetNuke. I haven’t really decided what to do about this yet. I’m not going to switch the hosting back yet though because I may still play with Silverlight from Microsoft as an alternative to Flash and I have a feeling I may want that on a Windows site. Not sure yet. Then again, I may have to find a way to get convert my Flash animation into HTML 5. So many things to think about.

    A final note: The application X7 Chat is falling by the wayside as well. I do not expect to be continuing with this program since it was researched and implemented strictly as a tool for the site that is expected to disband soon. They never made any use of the application anyway so I have not kept up with it.

    That about covers things as they stand for the moment. As you can see I have quite a bit of work that I still need/want to do and there is still a learning curve to address with different aspects of each bit of software I am using. My goal is to find the one that is easiest to learn and get up and running and to keep up to date.

     

    Originally published at: suguayproductions.com/joomla which has been discontinued.


    📂This entry was posted in Software Used - Other Software

  • Social Data and the Enterprise, Some Thoughts

    Posted on by suguay

    I was reading an article about how social data should be integrated into enterprise analytics. It talks about how the data from who you contact and subjects discussed or researched should be integrated into enterprise level analysis to so that if that bad a company can associate that bad review with the person that did the work and engage in problem correction. It also lightly mentions the application of online and offline connections with store visits and sales.

    I walk a fine line with regards to the coolness of the data
    being tracked and analyzed and the better targeting of products, friends, information, or entertainment that I might be interested in and the paranoia of big brother looking over my shoulder. I read far too much science fiction to not see both sides of the coin in this case. And unfortunately for the people I know that would like to find a way to stay anonymous to the greater marketing and research world as well as all the other entities tracking our existence, I don’t think it’s going to happen without completely going off grid. And even then you will be track-able at least to your extrication point.

    The evils of the idea are the same as the benefits. If the research shows that people are only looking at certain things then the impetus for innovation is limited. Why try a new product when all research shows no one is asking for it. Or the variety of that product is limited because, well the only color people are buying is in black. Perhaps because it only comes in black and since people want the product they buy it in black. The next similar product will only be offered in black because people only buy those type of items in black. You see the circle of thought we can get into here.

    As I was reading the other thing that occurred to me was that all that data could be used to socially engineer society towards more environmentally sound practices and desires. It could be used to slowly play on our subconscious so that our tendencies are towards recycling, lower power consumption, more fuel efficiency and more cooperative behavior. Sadly, the idea that this social engineering would be used for only some altruistic outcome is naïve at best. While it would be a great idea and potential boon to the planetary population it can also be used for outcomes much less pleasant. As much as it could be used to unite it could be used to divide.

    I suppose the question is: Do we really want to go down that road and let that genie out of the bottle? I think we already have. And if we haven’t I think it is inevitable. And once the marketing and sales types get done with all the data will the social scientist get a chance to see if there is a way to make it benefit society? Probably not because there is not money in it and that is the whole point of integrating social data into enterprise analytics. How do we sell you more things and make more money, not how do we make things better.

     

    Originally published at: suguayproductions.com/joomla which has been discontinued.


    📂This entry was posted in The Blog!