For those of you who didn't know, I spent 31/2 weeks at a Jewish camp in New York - the URJ Kutz Camp, between June 25th and July 19th. I posted my pictures using the Google Picasa service. Click here to check them out. I would recomend the slideshow view (link in upper-left hand side of the photo subsection); just don't click on "hide captions" because the captions are important.
A new story's come aboard, called The Reality Coaster. To check it out, go to http://sheltx.com/Dustan/Stories/TheRealityCoaster.html. There's no preview; I think it's short enough to just dive in and see if you like it.
Now you can play Find 0, too, with the new Find 0 3.0 GUI version! If your browser and PC supports zipped files, you can download Find0.zip. Otherwise, you have to manually download the program and, if you want it, the Help.txt file. Click here to do so.
Happy new year! And with it comes a happy report on my pets in the Life and Death of My
Pets Updates.
Find 0 is hard to understand in its current form. However, I have a graphical version on the way.
The only thing in the way is the fact that I haven't got the option for users to sign in and be remembered yet. If you
want it anyway, I think I'll release it after a few tune-ups, and after removing the test-confirmation junk (see screen
shots in General Comments and Previews).
It's a year for a fresh start. If you've got ideas for improvement of my website, or maybe a new
Email Interactive game (based on an existing instance please; I've still got some that haven't been used), I'd love to hear
them. Just remember my refusal to program the host computer of this website; I don't even know if that would work
anyway. In other words, no interactive interfaces. Send an Email to dustan@sheltx.com to submit your ideas.
One more thing. I don't know the exact date, but I know I started this website some time in January
2005. So a Happy first birthday to this website!
I've put a link to Find 0 on my Python page (don't know why
it didn't occur to me to do that before), as well as a link to something new.
Execode, so fancy it deserves it's own mini-logo,
is simply an interactive Python interpreter. It may not be new, it may not be special, but it's mine. Oh, and this
time, I'm copyrighting it.
Some notes on the making of it (geeks only past this point). Though I did refer to the other
interpreters that exist, I did indeed make my own version. As a matter of fact, you may notice that internally, I
structured my interpreter drastically differently. I used simple techniques to do mostly the same things that other
interpreters can do. The biggest difference between Execode and other interpreters (this is for all to read) is that
you can only execute one line of code using Execode. However, a new feature is that you can import several lines of
code from any text file.
Find 0 entering Graphical User Interface format! It's not yet released, but I got a few preview screen shots here.
A new Find 0 version has been released! Download the zipped folder if your browser and computer supports it, otherwise you have to download 2 programs at http://sheltx.com/Dustan/Python/Find0 (version 2.1 at the top)
My father's got several new photos on his site at 2005 photos, including the halloween party where we dressed up as the blues brothers, Miscellaneous stuff, including a trip to the zoo and my Sunday School trip to a Hindu temple, among several other things. There's a wedding, and Miriam's done some painting with her art class. There's also a few new Mosaic Photos.
If you've been burning to try out my Find 0 program, then now is your time. It is still Windows-only, so just don't download it onto a different machine (it won't do anything bad; in fact, it won't do anything at all except run an error message at you). First you need to download Python if you haven't already, then you can download my zipped folder or if your browser doesn't support zipped files, click here.
I have switched my announcements system over to Google groups. If you want to join:
Remember, it has always been entirely optional that you get on my list, and that remains the case. I will not add anyone except by request; I will only invite.
My first limited release of my Find 0 Game (that's what it's called; pronounced 'Find Oh') has
been released, and my second one is in the foreseeable future (within a couple of weeks, likely this weekend). My
second release will be an improved version released to a wider audience. I will publish it on my Website within a
couple months for sure, but as usual, I will exceed my expectations and have it in a couple weeks. By then, it'll
probably be 3.0 or a bugfix release of 2.0, or even 4.0 and up.
My numbering system for releases is similar to the official Python Version Numbering Scheme -
see it under FAQ at their official website.
As if you haven't heard enough on page-design updates, I added the 'title' attribute to the
<A name="date"> tags. It's value is a more descriptive version of the date (so you don't mess up different
schemes for numbering dates). How your browser handles this is up to the browser, but if it doesn't just ignore the
tag, it supposedly shows the name when you run your mouse over it. So try putting your mouse on top of '11/1/05'
above. On my browser, a little box appears next to the mouse. Cool, isn't it?
I've embedded the What's New stuff into a frame at my home page. If your browser
doesn't support frames inserted into a page, you should see a link to What's New there.
I've added a couple updates to
The Life and Death of My Pets. I'm still
pondering whether this update idea would really capture the happy moments...
I'm working on a cute little game in Python. It is my most complex program yet, and I'm not
going to have it public anytime soon. I will, however, be selecting some people to test it out before it's opened to
the public (besides my immediate family, who have gotten to do so quite often). Even that, however, may be a short
while into the future. At least for now, it is only compatable in Windows (because it uses the readkey function that's
only available on Windows). Here's a brief introduction to the game (italics means a given name to a number):
you see a long list of visible numbers increasing by a rate with each itteration, and you can change
that rate, which will in turn change the visible numbers. Your goal is to return to 0.
The Follow Me Frame is official (Finally! I've been working so hard on it)!
It's right here, at the home page, to the left (if you don't see it, something went wrong...)
I've also added images to my main directories (Python, Stories, and Email Interactive), as well
as the Follow Me Frame, as you should be able to see to the left.
I don't have any negative comments about the Follow Me
Frame, or anyone telling me it didn't work on their browser, so I'm assuming that means everone who's tested
it got it to work properly. If you got a message saying that your browser doesn't support Frames, please tell me, so I
can get an idea of how many people can't do this.
I plan on putting the Frame file here, and this page elsewhere, which means I have to change all
of the links. I am working on that, as well as debugging the Stories
Instructions for making indented versions, and I'll finish off the last few stories on the transforming to plain
HTML form. This may all be completed tomorrow, or next week. I don't think it will take much longer than that (though
with that much time I may not complete the Story transformations).
I am testing a new interface of browsing my site, and other sites that branch from it, called the
Follow Me Frame. Please test it; it is found here. I'm in general
trying to get it to support all browsers. So, one thing you can do to check that it works for you is check that all
the links on the left work properly, including the 'click here to browse without frames' link.
I tried to get the search box into the frame, but it just wouldn't fit, so I put a link to my
Picosearch page instead. If the frames just aren't showing up right (for some reference, the frame on the left is
supposed to be 1/3 of the size of the main frame on the right, or 1/4 of the whole window), please tell me what's
going on via Email subject 'Frame Browsing'.
And if you are already in Frame Browsing right now, do not, I repeat, do not click on the
'it is found here' link above; it will create bizarre and unwanted nesting of frames, and will probably produce an
error on your browser ('illegal operation').
The HP Poll is now over.
Click here to see the results.
I mentioned on Sunday that
Google has now indexed my site, and you can use Google to search
my site. Under Miscellaneous, search, I've placed a Google search box
right after Picosearch. Choose your pick; just remember that Picosearch is more up-to-date than Google, because I get
to tell Picosearch when to reindex.
I've got a hundred Gmail Invites available, and noone to hand them out to. I know there's plenty
of people who want an invite (a quick search on Google told me that). All you have to do to get one from me is send me
an Email subject 'invite'. Then I'll send you a Gmail invite,
with a few additional tips to make sure your Gmail experience is not destroyed by their strange ways (it's great, but
it takes some getting used to, and in the meantime, you don't want to accidentally lose your Email).
Now there's two possible engines you can use for
search. You can use Picosearch or Google. Yahoo!, the other
major search engine as I know it, has, in fact, deleted my home page which it originally had.
Check how much Yahoo! has indexed right now, just by clicking 'Yahoo!
Search' after this link.
There's not much more time to get your vote in the
Harry Potter Poll. This coming Monday, the results really
are getting published. Better hurry!
I've set up the Harry Potter Poll for tomorrow. If a sufficient number of people enter results by Monday, all will go as planned. All the new stuff is down under 9/10/05; this is just an announcement.
Don't forget the Harry Potter Poll coming up next week! I'm not sure
exactly how I'll do it yet, but I'm thinking along the lines of a new instance of
Email Interactive, by the name of 'poll'.
Speaking of Email Interactive, I've already added a new instance, called MPL, for Multiple Punch Lines. Something else
that's relatively new in Email Interactive (I started it during the
last game) is
Games Help, a basic explanation of each instance of Email Interactive.
There's also my father's Israel Pictures.
Click here to take a look. He has five sets of pictures
linked in the standard way, and he has a link to Jenelle's Nifty Pictures. Since any links I make are prone to future
error, I'm not going to put any direct pic links here.
And one last thing: This is a new What's New system I've set up. (I bet you
could've figured that one out on your own) I moved it to the front page, and placed the most recent in the first cell
of the Links Table.
Added at the last minute: My Gmail address is now completely hidden from view,
so unless you got the one Email that had it, there's no way you can know what it is. And if you did, please don't use
my Gmail address; I want all of my Emails to be backed up on the sheltx server.
My father has added vacation pictures to his site! Here are some links:
New York,
Jenelle's NFTY trip pictures,
Zichron Yaakov, Haifa, Dor Beach,
Jerusalem,
2005 photographs (he might have added more pictures since).
I mentioned a Gmail Address earlier. My sheltx address is still up and running, and
everything sent there is forwarded to Gmail, and I have set the reply-to to my sheltx address, so you don't have to worry about the existence of my
Gmail address.
I do, however, have Gmail invites available. Click here to request an
invite via Email. By sending me this Email, you are promising to test the Gmail features, and give them suggestions, if necessary, to improve
their work.
But on the plus side, Gmail only appears to be Beta (under construction) by name. Very few aspects of Gmail need much
improvement; their work is truly amazing.
An Israel trip, from July
27th to August 7th.
On Saturday, I mentioned a Gmail Address. I have not published it to the general public yet. I will do so
after my trip to Israel (and I belive my father is planning on adding pictures to his site afterward, so you might
want to take a look that weekend).
I will also ask for some check-over on the Email list, via Email to my Email list, just to make sure no one's moved on to a new
Address, or anything like that.
Several things. First of all, I recently got a Gmail (Google Email) Address. It will become my default website address, for
several reasons, mainly for sake of a better spam filter, and altogether better Email Client (the webmail client supplied on the sheltx host computer
is not particularly good, and, being the child of divorced parents, I have more than one computer that I'm working at, so I need my client on the
internet).
Also, you might want to take a look at my home page; there's several things on there.
And of course, this is a brand new page devoted to recent events.