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I've lately come across a quite nice note taking / documentation tool called Obsidian that may be of interest.  It's based on plain text files using Markdown formatting. It features a live preview (WYSIWYG) editor, linking, embedding, etc.  I have been using it to collaborate with colleagues.  We have a vault (i.e. folder tree) on dropbox to which multiple people can simultaneously access and modify. It's not fool proof as content will be lost if people don't take turns editing the same file and allow a few seconds for synchronization.  Images are easily embedded as are external web links.

It could be a good tool for managing and coordinating teams or for documentation.  It takes a little getting used to as the interface is geared more toward keyboard rather than mouse operation.  Think college student, sitting in lecture hall with laptop on lap, taking notes. So there is a little of not knowing how to do this or that at the beginning but is quickly overcome. Plenty of youtube tutorials as well.

obsidian.md

It's not very often that a new band or musician's cover is better than the original or hit version of a song.  Recently I discovered my new favorite band of musicians "Leonid and Friends" while searching an old song, "Vehicle" on youtube.  Has anyone else made similar discoveries? 

https://www.youtube.com/embed/fX8g_JEJol8

Well, it's that time of year to get a new development computer.  Here are the CPU specifications of the new unit.  Let me know what you think.   

CPU Features and Full Specification

• Cores: 100
  
• Threads: 200
  
• DDR5 RAM support: Sure, probably
  
• Base clock: 1.4 PHz
  
• Overclock capable, but doing so might create a small black hole inside your CPU (and void your warranty)
  
• PCIe Lanes: 28. Oh you're really gonna use more? Please...
  
• Socket LGA1151 compatible. We're as surprised as you are
  
• RGB lighting capable
  

What's up with the French these days?

https://twitter.com/sotiridi/status/1085129853509271552

Has anyone used DragonBones animation editor and if so what do you think of it?

[Stories Outside the Lines]

My short story "Future's Promise" is is included in a collection "Stories Outside the Lines" that is being published on Amazon Kindle.  A free advance review copy is available from the link below until May 30th.  Please feel free to share with friends, family, etc

Stories Outside the Lines

Moho Pro is currently on sale for 50% off and I'm seriously considering purchase.  In the past it's been highly recommended but I am wondering what the current thinking is.  If anyone has an opinion please share. Thanks.

For a non-AGS application what are the ins and outs of using a third party C++ API with C#.  How easy or difficult would you expect the task to be?  What kind of pitfalls might there be?  The C++ API would be doing math and communication through an ethernet port.  The C# application would likely be a periodically scheduled task.  Any insights or commentary would be greatly appreciated.

For those who appreciate pixel art I thought you may be interested in this trailer for "American Pickers" a TV show the runs on the Hstry Channel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGibCaCBxOQ

Here is my first try at making a Youtube video, slide show accompanied by Eric Matyas game music. I am working on a talking demo/tutorial to go along with this one. Not a game making thing but I thought I'd share anyway since I am using some of Eric's lovely music.  Feel free to comment or make suggestions as well.

https://youtu.be/6uTkH8EkL7Y

Thank you very much Eric

We don't normally do political activism here.  However, the issue of net neturality affects our AGS activities and so I thought I would share the following email I received today. Sign the petition by ckicking one of the links below if you desire to be herard.

https://savetheinternet.eu/

Hi thereâ€"

We've been working on a ton of things in tandem lately: defending the future of encryption, trying to stop the anti-privacy bill CISA from passing, and preparing our final effort to stop the TPP.

But there's one more extremely important thing happening this week, and it's in Europe.

The European Parliament is about to vote on net neutrality rules, and here's the thing: the current draft rules are terrible â€" much weaker than the rules we won in the US this February.

Can you help? We have a chance to fix it:

Yes, I live in Europe and I'll email the European parliament to defend net neutrality!

I don't live in Europe, but I'm happy to write them anyway!

Whether you live in the EU or not, your voice matters. Part of our strategy is to make Members of European Parliament feel sheer embarrassment at passing rules that are worse than the ones we passed in the US.

Plus, if European telcos can slow any website to crawl, or extort payments for special “zero rating” deals, that affects every one of us, wherever we live!

The good part about all of this is, if we're successful at passing all the amendments we're asking for, the EU rules will actually be pretty good. It's a long shot. Europe's ISPs have been working hard to corrupt this process, and it's really common for EU-level decisions to be ignored by Europe's press. But if we rally now, we can win decisively, and permanently, next week!

Take action now to protect Net Neutrality.

Thanks for helping keep the Internet open everywhere.

~Holmes

P.S. If you want to see us get more involved in Net Neutrality globally, chip in $5 to support our work. We're planning to get more involved in battles outside the US, and the more support we have the better we can protect Internet freedom everywhere.

Could this be the basis of a multi-player adventure game?  Perhaps other problems could be solved in a similar way?  What do you think? 

Imagine games deployed on social media and game play finds optimal solutions to complex problems?

Game Theory Applications in a Water Distribution Problem
ABSTRACT
A water distribution problem in the Mexican Valley is modeled first as a three-person noncooperative game. Each player has a five-dimensional strategy vector, the strategy sets are defined by 15 linear constraints, and the three payoff functions are also linear. A nonlinear optimization problem is first formulated to obtain the Nash equilibrium based on the Kuhn-Tucker conditions, and then, duality theorem is used to develop a computational procedure. The problem can also be considered as a conflict between the three players. The non-symmetric Nash bargaining solution is suggested to find the solution. Multiobjective programming is an alternative solution concept, when the water supply of the three players are the objectives, and the water authority is considered to be the decision maker. The optimal water distribution strategies are determined by using these solution concepts and methods.
http://www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?PaperID=27121&utm_campaign=linkedin&utm_medium=sx

I recently viewed a video where the speaker talked about Red Code and Green Code in his programs.  He characterized Green Code as the part that says what he wants the computer to do and the Red Code as the extra bits that persuade the computer to do it.

I think this is an interesting concept that could help programmers of all levels simplify and structure their code.  I am unfortunately unable to remember/find the link to the video where I saw this presented.  I thought it was this one (Stop Writing Classes (python)) but now I am not so sure.  But I did find a couple of blog posts that explain the concept in more detail.

http://weblog.raganwald.com/2006/12/economizing-can-be-penny-wise-and.html
http://tapestryjava.blogspot.com/2013/01/red-code-green-code-my-code-your-code.html

This is of course the whole reason to have game engines in general and AGS in particular; a whole lot of the red/yellow code reside in the engine so that the game script has mostly green code.  The story doesn't end there; red/yellow code have a tendency to crop up in game scripts in spite of the engine.  AGS provides additional means of segregating red/yellow code from the main program through the use of modules and functions.

I think it is useful to think about this concept and how to put it into practice.  All of us Engine/Editor Developers, Module Authors, and Game Programmers could benefit from it.

I came across her cover of Different Drum  by accident.  At first I didn't even think it was her voice, just a kid lip-synching.  But then I watched some more videos where she plays real instruments and sings with her real voice. 

I like her cover of If I Had a Hammer and Somebody to Love.

It's my understanding that she has publicly performed 20 or more of her own original compositions such as the ones below.  I think it's a pretty impressive accomplishment for a 14 year old kid young lady.

Ailalalili
Here for You

Enjoy!
Python Game Programming Video
PyCon 2014 (66 Videos)

https://www.humblebundle.com/?asmjs_bundle&utm_source=Firefox&utm_medium=Snippet&utm_campaign=Humble%20Mozilla%20Bundle

I just played a little game in my browser - pretty cool.  The above web page talks about asm.js which they say allows console games to played in the browser.  Don't have time to look any further at the moment but thought someone here may be interested.

Here are a couple of links that may be of interest to game creators.

Free Music Archive
http://freemusicarchive.org/about/

Study of Creative Commons Non-Commercial License
http://mirrors.creativecommons.org/defining-noncommercial/Defining_Noncommercial_fullreport.pdf

Can anyone  recommend a good Android Photo Gallery App.  My wife just keeps them on her phone and emails them to me occasionally.  I am looking for an app that will automatically send her photos to something like Google Drive or Drop Box.  I prefer to stay away from services that seize ownership/control over uploaded material.  I have my own web space so an app that lets one setup the storage URL would also work.

I appreciate any advice you may have. Thanks   

http://www.accellion.com/pricing

I just came across this and noticed that it's free for individual accounts.  I haven't used them so perhaps someone can give it a try and let us know how it works out.

I just had to share this with my friends. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1lTXhXTasA