1621

Arts & Entertainment / Re: Star Trek

« on: April 08, 2015, 08:16:05 PM »

Huh, I always thought the ending to Battlestar, although emotionally rewarding, was pretty close to Voyageur.

Starbuck fills the same sort of role as Future Janeway and it is sort of Deus Ex Machina in that way.  They did kill the President, but I did not think it was too against the grain.

I was referring more to the subversion of the underpinning theme of the search for Earth, when they find it and realise it wasn't what they'd hoped for. The actual ending of the series came across as simply settling for the best they could find after that, which is a nice contrast from the usual "everyone gets everything they wanted all series".

1622

Technology & Information / Re: On the notion of Ubuntu

« on: April 06, 2015, 01:39:57 PM »

is that a Linux distro' ?

No.

i'v been using UBUNTU....what is yr opinion of that?

Irrelevant.

1623

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Ask a Jew anything.

« on: April 06, 2015, 01:31:30 PM »

This actually makes no sense.
WAP2 is a WiFi encryption.
Ignore is a forum level flag that doesn't display a specific user's post.

He means this: http://forum.tfes.org/index.php?action=forum;wap2

WAP2 isn't WiFi encryption. You're thinking of WPA2.

1624

Suggestions & Concerns / Web chat for IRC

« on: April 05, 2015, 01:59:02 PM »

We now have a basic web chat set up:

https://irc.tfes.org/

It basically works, although there are one or two kinks I'd like to straighten out at some point. I'd like to ask the regulars (particular those who find IRC difficult) to give it a try and let me know if they think it's useful, or if there's anything they think is missing.

I'll be adding it to the homepage at some point in the next week if all goes well.

1625

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Improving our home page

« on: April 05, 2015, 10:05:25 AM »

If, in the event of a merger, will all this wonderful work be for naught?

With the merger as it is currently on the table, yes. However, as we've been waiting for Daniel to provide us with access for nearly three months already, neither pizaaplanet nor I is content to sit around and twiddle our thumbs when there are clear improvements to be made on tfes.org.

1626

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Improving our home page

« on: April 04, 2015, 11:07:17 PM »

In addition to that, the sidebar now features links the five most recently updated threads in FEG, FED and FEQ&A.

And the Information Repository.

I'm pretty excited about this. Our homepage was the weakest part of our site, partly because it had no fresh content and was a major entry point, for the past year and a half. Now we'll hopefully gather more visitor interest, and maybe even better search engine rankings.

1627

Arts & Entertainment / Re: FES Civilization V game: 2015-04-05, 15:00 UTC

« on: April 04, 2015, 10:04:07 PM »

Can I play on Settler?

No, because the AI operates on the lowest difficulty setting for any player in the game, so that would mess up the balance for the rest of us.

1628

Arts & Entertainment / FES Civilization V game: 2015-04-05, 15:00 UTC

« on: April 04, 2015, 10:01:22 PM »

pizaaplanet and I are organising a Civ game at 15:00 UTC tomorrow. I know there are a few other people on FES who play Civ, and it'd be cool to have more humans to play with rather than the shitty AI.

If anyone wants to join, either PM me or pizaaplanet or get on IRC before 15:00 UTC so we can add each other on Steam and get the game rolling.

Our typical game is standard length, with a Small Continents map and simultaneous turns. I feel most comfortable on King difficulty; pizaaplanet usually goes with Emperor.

1629

Arts & Entertainment / Re: Star Trek

« on: April 04, 2015, 09:42:20 PM »

I loved the finale.  I thought it was a clever way to end the series without just saying "Oh they found a wormhole.  All done."

A better way to end the series would have been to kill off everyone on Voyager and have them never reach home. Just once, I'd like to see a sci-fi show with the balls to go against the grain like that. Battlestar Galactica (the 2004 series) probably comes closest, of the ones I'm familiar with.

1630

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Unsubscribe button

« on: April 04, 2015, 09:32:06 PM »

Since it seems to be hated by everyone except Thork, I've removed the button from the unread replies list.

https://github.com/TheFlatEarthSociety/forum.tfes.org/commit/6ddb4e519572f23b40c4cb0d9e7a723a4c0ddb72

1631

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Improving our home page

« on: April 04, 2015, 09:25:14 PM »

This is a pretty epictacular approach. Thanks for the efforts, pizaa.

1632

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Unsubscribe button

« on: April 04, 2015, 06:51:10 PM »

I'll remove the New Replies button later if nobody objects. I'd just like to give others time to present alternative opinions/suggestions first.

1633

Arts & Entertainment / Re: Star Trek

« on: April 04, 2015, 04:08:06 PM »

If you watch Voyager just skip the finale. You won't regret it.

The finale was a total cop-out. It's like somebody realised they had to write an ending with one episode to go, and then tried to make it a climax without any plot development leading up to that point.

1634

Arts & Entertainment / Re: The Pink Floyd discography listen-through

« on: April 04, 2015, 03:21:27 PM »

Syd Barrett
Opel
Studio album


Recorded: 1968-1970
Released: 17 October 1988

All tracks performed solo by Syd Barrett, except "Clowns and Jugglers", featuring:

Mike Ratledge (organ)
Hugh Hopper (bass)
Robert Wyatt (drums)

All tracks authored by Syd Barrett, except where noted.

Side A

1. Opel (6:26)
2. Clowns and Jugglers (Octopus) (3:27)
3. Rats (3:00)
4. Golden Hair (Barrett, James Joyce) (1:44)
5. Dolly Rocker (3:01)
6. Word Song (3:19)
7. Wined and Dined (3:03)

Side B

1. Swan Lee (Silas Lang) (3:13)
2. Birdie Hop (2:30)
3. Let's Split (2:23)
4. Lanky (Part One) (5:32)
5. Wouldn't You Miss Me (Dark Globe) (3:00)
6. Milky Way (3:07)
7. Golden Hair (instrumental version) (1:56)

Review

Yet another collection of early Syd recordings, this one mainly consists of just Syd playing guitar and singing. The alternate versions of previously released songs are generally better done elsewhere; exceptions being Clowns and Jugglers and the instrumental version of Golden Hair, which are both fantastic on this release. But it's the new material that really sets this album apart.

Most of the new songs on side A are fairly boring, evidently suffering from the lack of overdubs that the material included on The Madcap Laughs and Barrett would later accrue. The title track is interesting while Syd is singing, but the verses are separated by lengthy portions of strummed chords. Dolly Rocker isn't much better, with Word Song being a highlight of side A; it just consists of Syd saying various words while strumming the same chord repeatedly, which I find entertaining in spite of its inanity.

Side B brings a huge improvement right from the start, with Swan Lee being one of the best Syd songs I've yet heard; an exemplary presentation of Syd's inimitable eccentric rock 'n' roll. The next major highlight is Lanky, which is a lengthy instrumental consisting entirely (it would appear) of improvisation; parts of it sound a lot like the midsection of Interstellar Overdrive, albeit with more percussion and less organ. Milky Way, as the final new song on the record, doesn't disappoint either.

Unmistakeably a Barrett album, and with all the standard flaws and caveats that come with his unhinged post-Floyd career, this has more variety than Madcap and more soul than Barrett. Overall, I'd rate it as on par with those releases, and definitely better than The Peel Sessions. A must-hear for any Syd fan.

1635

Status Notices / Scheduled maintenance, 2015-04-11

« on: April 04, 2015, 02:52:02 PM »

The forum, wiki and IRC will be going offline for about five minutes on 2015-04-11, between 07:00 and 07:15 UTC.

For convenience, this means:

EDT (USA east coast):
2015-04-11, 03:00-03:15

BST (UK):
2015-04-11, 08:00-08:15

AEST (Australia east coast):
2015-04-11, 17:00-17:15


The intent is to install security updates on the server which hosts the forum, wiki and IRC. These will be non-disruptive to functionality, as the server is running a stable OS release that gets critical fixes only.

1636

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Unsubscribe button

« on: April 04, 2015, 01:38:21 PM »

One thing I'm not sure of is whether people should automatically get resubscribed to a thread if they post in it again after unsubscribing. Neither pizaaplanet or I uses the new replies feature, so it's up to the people who actually do use it. What do you guys want to happen?

Deployed, without this functionality for now. Please let me know if you notice any problems with the change, or if you have any desire for said auto-resubscription to happen.

For reference, the commit that made this change is:

https://github.com/TheFlatEarthSociety/forum.tfes.org/commit/d968e71b5550994d812751e3d26ee60be31c0938

1637

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Unsubscribe button

« on: April 04, 2015, 01:11:18 PM »

Well, the change is just about done; pizaaplanet has graciously offered to design buttons (since I suck at graphics stuff), and once that's done we'll be able to push out the functionality.

One thing I'm not sure of is whether people should automatically get resubscribed to a thread if they post in it again after unsubscribing. Neither pizaaplanet or I uses the new replies feature, so it's up to the people who actually do use it. What do you guys want to happen?

1638

Suggestions & Concerns / Re: Unsubscribe button

« on: April 03, 2015, 10:25:41 PM »

So, it turns out SMF doesn't simply have a flag for thread subscriptions. Instead, it does a search of the database for all posts you might ever have made in any thread. Every single time you load the unread replies page. Yes.

To that end, I've created a new table in the database to track opt-out unsubscriptions, and I've written code to both update that table and check it when generating unread topics. All that's left to do now is create buttons for unsubscribing, and this should be set to push out.

However, since I'm quite tired at the moment, I'll wait until tomorrow to read through the code again before pushing it, so I don't accidentally break it for everyone and then go to sleep.

1639

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Ask a Jew anything.

« on: April 03, 2015, 07:42:25 PM »

Brought here from the same-sex marriage thread:

In a society that is not governed by religious law, I agree with you entirely. And frankly, I am not so sure I would want to live in a Halachic State (meaning one that is governed by Halacha, or Jewish Law). I mean, it would depend. If Halacha were used as an inspiration for law, that is one thing. I wouldn't mind that at all. But if it in fact WERE the law, that would not be a state I would want to live in.

I'm curious as to why you wouldn't want this. Is it just a belief in secularity, or is there some feature of Halacha that would make it undesirable?

Right now, there is a debate going on in Israel, that started before the last election. A "Nationality Law" was proposed that would define Israel as a Jewish State and would make Halacha "the inspiration for Israeli law". Furthermore, although all citizens would have their rights respected as individuals, their current status as separate national groups would dissolved. The State would be defined as a State of its Jewish citizens. Other citizens would have individual rights, but not group rights, as they do now.

Would that distinction be made on the basis of ethnicity or religion? That is, what rights would an Arab who converted to Judaism have? What about an ethnic Jew who converted to Islam?

I'm not sure if this actually happens in practice, I'd just like to understand where the line is drawn.

1640

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Marriage equality in Australia

« on: April 03, 2015, 07:38:27 PM »

So as long as it's two consenting adults who aren't biologically related

Its 2015. There should be no limits on love, I keep being told. We live in an age of contraception. Why shouldn't two siblings be able to have consensual sex? Because you don't like it? I don't like the idea of gay sex, but I'm shouted down as a homophobe by the carping neoliberals. There isn't a reason on earth two siblings shouldn't have sex. Unless of course you'd like to have a discussion about morality, in which case you need to form an argument as to the morality behind shoving your dick up another man's bum.

I thought you were going to provide us with a reason as to why same-sex marriage is harmful. Do you actually have one, or is this attempt to divert the discussion towards marriage between siblings and women with vasectomies an attempt to distract us from the fact that, yet again, you have no idea what you're talking about?

In a society that is not governed by religious law, I agree with you entirely. And frankly, I am not so sure I would want to live in a Halachic State (meaning one that is governed by Halacha, or Jewish Law). I mean, it would depend. If Halacha were used as an inspiration for law, that is one thing. I wouldn't mind that at all. But if it in fact WERE the law, that would not be a state I would want to live in.

For obvious reasons, as a non-Jewish person I also wouldn't want that. I am somewhat curious about your reasoning, but as we're getting off topic here, I'll post a question in your thread instead.

Even now, in matters of family law, the separate religions govern matters. Secular marriage does not in fact exist. You are either married in Jewish rites, Muslim rites, or Christian ones. In a country like Israel, I think that is appropriate. But certainly in coutries where secular marriage exists, it should be independent of religious influence.

Agreed. I actually don't have a strong opinion as to whether or not secular marriage should exist, just that if it does, then it should be equally available to all couples.

Out of curiosity, does Israel have civil unions, or is there no secular recognition of couples at all?