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Tenshi Animétion (tanime.net) Site News (Thread for news page. Linked thread.)

Tenshi

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Reply #25 of 50

It's almost Christmas
posted // Monday, December 19, 2005 10:06 pm

So school's out, and I'm way behind on everything. Well, last night I sat down and made a checklist on my whiteboard with a number of things I wanted to see get done and soon. Among them was a site revamp, 'cause, I was looking at it the other day and I was like "eww." So last night I added a little bit of spice to the site template, such that the title of the page and the upcoming "icons" for the page are now embedded into the site template instead of being displayed in the body of the site. This meant I had to add a table of associations since this is opened before the webpage itself is... so I did that, also. I think it looks a whole lot better now, and once I get icons up that'll just add to the look.

I also removed the Federation Crystal news article from the frontpage. It's listed on the Federation Crystal portal, there is no need for it to be redundantly posted. I also altered the front page a bit, adding a main image (that'll be updated every so often) as well as altering the interface bridge a bit to allow for the other items on the front page to fit on the page a bit better, as well as to display individual posts as I see fit. I removed navigation from the front page... if anyone wants to see previous update posts they can view them here. I tucked the poll in a bit and made better use of space.

I have disabled links to stuff I have no intention of implementing for the time being, and removed some other displays from the site, as well as categorizing links a bit better. This is a better vision for the site, I think, and my goal is to expand on this quickly. Now, if I can stop leveling characters so much (I'm slowly reducing the amount of time I play games now) then stuff'll continue to get done and I'll continue checking off items on my whiteboard and adding new ones.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #26 of 50

Happy New Year, 2006!
posted // Sunday, January 1, 2006 9:20 pm

Wishing a very Happy and Prosperous New Year to everyone. I know things are already off to a good start here. Before the night is over I hope to complete the first drawing of the year (well, technically I drew and inked it at the end of last year, but it's a day later and now I'm coloring it). The point was just to post this message before the end of the day. Actually according to GMT it's the next day already, but whatever.

Here is the latest picture of Michele, in a more relaxed, "holiday" setting. Michele on Holiday. It took a lot of time to get this done... maybe I shouldn't work at 4000x4000 resolution when I make these things... since so much of the detail is lost when I reduce them to reasonable size. Well, when I get around to making wallpapers... this'll be able to fit on any monitor.

Things are picking up on my end, with a string of pictures planned for the upcoming few days... including Setara, Rei, Yasashii, and Kirei. I still haven't finalized a concept of Shara yet so it will probably be a while before I get around to a picture of her. Miyoki, Meyuki, Sora, and Moya are also ready for drawing. Setara's profile is complete, and will be posted once I finish his picture. Starting Yasashii's bio shortly... and also working on Unmei Densetsu. Stay tuned.

—This post last modified by Tenshi on Monday, January 2, 2006 7:21 am—

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #27 of 50

New Years off to a slow start!
posted // Thursday, January 12, 2006 3:58 am

Setara Hakai

My New Year's resolution was to complete at least one picture each week, but already I'm off to a lagging start, as design concerns with Setara's outfit and weapon, and then color choices slowed the process. The problem was that I misplaced the sketch of his outfit that I'd previously done, and then I completely ignored it when I went to draw him, but then when it came time to put an outfit on the body I hit a road-block, as I wanted him to be heavily clothed, but I didn't want him to look like a Jedi, either (and despite what anyone thinks, I've got enough details about weapons and stuff and factions that really remove similarities between my stuff and Jedi). Eventually I picked up the sketch and went with that outfit, and the color scheme is based on Michele's choice of blues (which actually doesn't make much sense since her favorite color is red, but ANYWAY). Anywho, I'd blocked off the completion of the majority of the other items on my checklist until I'd completed this picture, and now it's done, so I'm moving on.

Oh, and yes, I realize that the past two images I've "completed" have large blank black discs where [maybe you didn't know this] the Federation emblem is supposed to go, but those'll be "filled in" when I cement the Federation emblem. Next is a Rei drawing. I'm re-proof-reading Setara's bio, because I've come up with a couple of things I want to add before I post it to Federation Crystal Universe. Meanwhile, I'm off to code Unmei Densetsu and begin the Avatar library for AngelBoards.

—This post last modified by Tenshi on Thursday, January 12, 2006 4:01 am—

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #28 of 50

Rei-Rei!
posted // Monday, January 30, 2006 3:53 am

Rei Hana-Kinu

I'm already realizing the near futility of my New Year's resolution; getting one picture done a week is difficult considering that I am often working out design aspects as I go. Because of this I'm going to have to alter that, though if I were to say "get more stuff done" I definitely am way ahead on that aspect, as my 'whiteboard of truth' keeps me straight. I have altered Rei's appearance a bit for this rendition - I decided to go with a portion of Setara's outfit, but also with a different take on attire, trying to convey a sense of individuality there.

As much as it pains me to leave a work with obvious errors in it, it's necessary to move on if I'm ever going to get things accomplished. As it stands now I still am clinging to Setara/Rei's bio... the goal's to get that posted this week, while I am trying to finish Yasashii's design. The problem with Yasashii, though, is that when designing her, it is necessary to make sure that her outfit matches the History of her tribe, which at some points isn't defined as yet.

In other news, Unmei Densetsu was switched over to OpenGLUT, no longer making use of what were apparently Windows-specific API calls. THe point of this game is its cross-platform playability, so we'll be having none of that.

I will be starting a web comic of sorts pretty soon... stay tuned for that.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #29 of 50

Slow week...
posted // Tuesday, February 14, 2006 5:24 am

The past couple of weeks have been slow in the Federation Crystal department as I've been struggling to finalize a design for Yasashii, as well as to come up with a version of Setara's profile that doesn't appear too wretched to show. Well, suffice it to say, I don't think I managed to accomplish the latter.. but I've posted what I've come up with thus far anyway. Any information posted on the Federation Crystal Databank is subject to change anyway, but I'm quite sure I'll end up changing some of the information posted there anyway.

Yasashii's design is pretty much solidified, though I am still working on her weapon design and her bio, as well as the kente and her outfit. Fortunately I have already established solid information regarding her beads, and I will post that information as soon as I can wrap it up into a format presentable to the public.

I can't expect that I will have one picture a week done since these pictures are [thus far] complete redesigns (or finalizations thereof) characters. Producing images of established characters isn't a problem, but I don't expect to get to that for a little while. However, sometime in the next couple weeks I intend on posting the first edition of my Comic strip... which... still is awaiting a catchy name that kinda makes sense. Stay tuned.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #30 of 50

Site News // February 28th, 2006
posted // Tuesday, February 28, 2006 9:58 pm

There's a bit of stuff coming up that you need to be aware of.

Site Move
Today I purchased an account with Site5 and over the next few days I will be putting the site up my account over there. I expect this process shouldn't take too long... I have to familiarize myself with the control panel and all of that jazz, but once that's all straight I will be switching the domain pointer over to that location. My goal is to make this transition process as smooth as possible, hopefully there will not be any problems... I mean, after all, I don't have a huge forum following so it's not like there's a chance there'll be a large number of posts in two locations.

I am not saying there is anything wrong with the current host, but monetarily, this is indeed a better option.

Yasashii
I am almost done inking Yasashii. Still having a couple of problems with design... but hopefully I should have those resolved soon. This new design really fits her background much better than any previous ones have.

Angel-Boards
As I strive to separate Angel-Boards from being a phpBB wannabe (not that I used any of their code, I never even looked at it

) I will be adding a couple of features that I have not seen used there, including File Attachments. I'm curious if anyone has any suggestions for things they would like to see added that might encourage more posting, if you have any, please feel free to offer them.

Unmei Densetsu
I haven't forgotten about it... .

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #31 of 50

Nested!
posted // Thursday, March 2, 2006 1:58 pm

Hopefully this transition was relatively smooth... at least on my end the Nameserver propogation only seemed to take a few hours, but it can take up to 48 for slower servers to catch up. There shouldn't be too much of an interruption, and those who arrive at the old instance of the forums should be notified by a blank script.

If you notice any files missing or database access not working, please take a moment to drop me a line so that I can take care of them as quickly as possible. Thank you.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #32 of 50

Yasashii Enjeru, the latest 'incarnation' :D
posted // Sunday, April 30, 2006 2:16 am

- So a couple of days ago I decided that I'd been working on this picture of Yasashii for way too long and I finally let it go and posted it. It has a lot of mistakes, I feel, and in general, I probably could spend a few more hours going back over it trying to get things right, and y'know what, maybe I will (the beauty of Photoshop and a bajillion layers) but for now I'm going to move on to something else. Yasashii's Bio can be accessed from the Federation Crystal portal, http://fc-universe.tanime.net under Characters.

- The FC-Universe viewer has also been a target of intense upgrades in the past couple of days, as I am trying to make it a bit more "wiki"-like, while maintaining my own unique (and heh... my own code) approach to Wikis. Also being updated is the XML format itself (each data entry is read from XML and that's why publishing an entry can take a while, because XML is good like that). Pretty soon I hope to remove all of the excess 'garbage' output by the parser, and really pretty-up the presentation for everyone's viewing pleasure.

- I have 'fleshed' out the 'fina' designs for Sorabella (name extension from "Sora" to remove any "Asian" context from her name) and Kirei Enjeru, Yasashii's mahs. Who I will end up rendering fist is still anyone's guess, but having at least an idea of what the final designs will look like will be useful. These can be found in the Linked Thread on Yasashii's bio page and also on the Forums by clicking on the Forum link.

- Also in the pipe are Unmei Densetsu updates, the publication of Yjitahr, GEM, Ohmah, Pahmah, and Nonimah (these may be up either tonight or tomorrow), as well as adding File attachments to AngelBoards (though I'm still researching the pertinence and the exclusiveness and security of adding file attachments to the forums. Nonetheless my to-do list is huge.

- I'm also setting up to learn Blender, which is an Open-Source 3D modeler... so that I can begin to render equipment and starships (first up is the Crystal Genesis, Michele's latest ship). Stay tuned!

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #33 of 50

Beep Boop Beep
posted // Saturday, May 20, 2006 3:58 am

I have been a bit laxidazical in posting updates, I suppose. Granted, that isn't to say that I haven't been doing anything, it's just I haven't mentioned what it is I have done.

Angel-Boards
A couple of days ago I posted Angel-Boards 3.8, which is basically a complete overhaul of the Message Rendering Class (or Engine, whatever you want to call it). Anyway, what I did there was take the time to learn Regular Expressions (from the beginning, and getting it right this time by actually buying and reading a book), and then taking time to actually understand that both ereg and preg functions have their benefits, and that the notation is different in the two. So once I did that, I decided that I wanted to use an XML Parser (XSLT , I believe) to generate the pretty stuff for posts, and that's the end result. So, along with the incorporation of another neat little Javascript function I wrote, I've improved the forums quite substantially.

Federation Crystal
Currently I am working on drawing Yuri Kirei Enjeru. I am also finishing up Sorabella's bio, as well as coloring her picture. I've taken the time to start up another section in my iFolio, which includes sketches and concept drawings, at a friend's suggestion. I hope to drop some stuff in there on a regular basis.

Web Comic
If you've been here before, then you probably have noticed that I just activated the "Comic" link in the menu at the top of the page. All they are right now are just thresholded sketches lightly vectorized in Flash. Since they only take about an hour to an hour and a half or so to do, I definitely plan to do these on a regular basis, since they don't really interfere with accomplishing other tasks.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #34 of 50

So ... yeah
posted // Friday, June 30, 2006 6:50 pm

It's indeed been a while since I made an update post. For a while there things got pretty hectic. First it was an overnight trip, then it was job interviews (still haven't heard back from the second one yet, but I'm hopeful of a positive answer), then I managed to get the parts to build a new computer (loving it so far, it's really nice), and then came Silkroad Online, and then a HUGE site revamp for a site elsewhere (not affiliated with this one at all, sorry) which I devoted shiatloads of time to (like, over a week putting in like 8 hours a day or more) and then came World of Warcraft. Hah hah. So ... yeah, that's why things have been so quiet here.

It's been something of a chore to break my power-grinding habits in World of Warcraft, which has been my recent affliction. I have been playing the game for almost a week now (day 5) and I have a Level 23 Healer-focused Night Elf Priest (will be making something of a carbon-copy Blood Elf version when the expansion comes out, so I can play with both 'parties' that were like "zomg, play!").

So anyway, now I'm working on refocusing myself (still playing a lot, but having a multitude of windows open and still able to see what's going on in WoW at any moment is pretty useful :3 ) and get some other things done. I've been working on the Sorabella picture, almost done coloring that, and I am trying to iron out the Kirei picture and get Nova's picture started.

I also have some more comics I want to do... as well as a site layout revamp I'm thinking of trying out (reduce the size of the top banner and drop the menu down underneath it... but while doing so, I want to hide it so that I can use the full 775 pixels for site content (800x600 is still considered industry standard so that's what I build pages to accomodate). Also... I'm thinking of only showing the current update article on the main page, and then putting a blog sort of thing below that -- 'cause I have things I want to say every now and then also.

I also have some forum updates I wanna get up.

So... yeah.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #35 of 50

Bella!
posted // Thursday, July 20, 2006 4:09 am

Recently I purchased a second monitor, which has made things not only easier, but a lot faster for me (I can be writing on one monitor, referencing on another, and so on ans so forth)... but the greatest advantage is that if / when I'm enraptured in a game or watching AdultSwim's Fix I can still get something done on another monitor. It's definitely been useful and I've not regretted going that route. The only down-side is that earlier today (well 'yesterday' now) I tried to use my tablet, and it turns out that the tablet is working with a 3200x1200 area instead of 1600x1200 like I want it to , so I have to find some way to only make it work on one monitor.

Federation Crystal
I finally got back to "finishing" Sorabella's bio. That can be viewed here (article #16) and I will have the definition of Aetami up pretty shortly, too (am very tired right now and I plan on going to bed before the sun comes up... for once). I basically hit writer's block while in the middle of this, which happens every now and then on a project this big I would imagine.

There're also some background changes going on in the Databank. I put the XML document data for each article in the SQL table instead of as a file that is accessed when the document is requested. This will make Article searches much easier when I get that part up (it's really not a priority, since I only have 16 documents as it is right now).

I am also working on converting that code. .. like pretty much everything else... to XHTML 1.0 Transitional (or strict in some cases).

Forums
Along with that conversion process, the forums are being pushed to version 4.0.0. There're still some changes to be made to specific aspects of the forums before it can be labeled that officially, but check out what I've posted so far... it's looking pretty nice.

Site Plan
I'm renig'ing on the whole 800x600 thing. Reuters and Netscape and a lot of other 'mainstream' sites are using site layouts that're 1024px wide... and I kinda want to as well... so that's what I'm switching to. The new layout should be pushed online in a couple of days, barring any difficulties or time outside.

* I am also no longer using separate news threads for various aspects of the site because in the new layout / design all sites will be consolidated. This includes legends.tanime.net, fc-universe.tanime.net, and angel-boards.tanime.net. These subdomains will remain, but they will be aliases more than complete 'sites' like they are now.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #36 of 50

Rawr!
posted // Thursday, October 12, 2006 6:58 am

Because I couldn't think of a more concise way to state that I'm "back" (well, other than "back"). So yeah... there was a period of things not getting done... lots and lots of World of Warcraft... but I'm getting a lot of stuff done now. It probably helps that I have a level 60 Night Elf Priest so now I don't feel like I have to grind levels anymore... though gear's a concern now. :| Moving on.

Forums
Recently I published what I am now calling Angel Boards 4.0.0. It features a LOT of enhancements (the changelog for it is relatively long, take a look!) on Angel Boards 3 and some complete revisions to handling, as well as a lot of security fixes and updates. From here I'd like to continue to upgrade the Document Model, and upgrade the classes to php5.0 because PHP5 is so hawt, but I'm going to leave it as it is for now. The next patch for Angel Boards will be admin upgrades, because I relatively 'neglected' those panels because since there're only a couple of instances of AB running on the web... and I run them... it's not like too many people SEE them anyway.

Anyway, AB is on the backburner... unless a pressing bug /exploit is otherwise discovered or something.

Federation Crystal
A rendering issue with the Stat box (as I call it) normally displayed with character documents has been fixed. This was an issue with ... well ... every other browser but MSIE *blush*. A bit of an oversight on my part, I guess that since I do all of my site work on my 'box' now, locally, using FireFox as the guinea pig, that I had done the same for the original Databank... which was not true. Oh well... anyway, the stats now behave properly so... yeah.

Databank Document Version 2.0
I have been working on Document Version 2.0 for the Federation Crystal Databank. Currently I have the XML format and readers done pretty much... I'm just adding nifty little goodies to it at the moment. Version 2.0 is a COMPLETE rewrite of the original XML format, a redesigned Document Model, complete "object orientation" of the parser, and utilization of PHP 5.0's new Object model to construct the classes. Did I mention I love PHP5's Object model? It's such a great improvement over the old one, it's a lot more natural... kinda like writing Java or C++ (but ... well... with PHP limitations

). Anyway, one of the great features coming with version 2.0 is the ability to interact with the document in various ways. You will be able to view a document summary [if one is available] OR the full document. Navigation will be dependent on the document type you are viewing. Also, the document's modularity better supports multiple document types (character pages, regular definitions, or more simplistic pages). Along those lines, you will be able to view certain aspects of the page in metric or SI units. These will automatically be parsed and converted. Version 2 will also have better context highlighting and a number of other significant improvements.

Kirei's definition will be the first document to use this new format (it unfortunately is NOT backwards compatible, so documents will be flagged on version number and displayed using the proper viewer). Along with that I will be posting some of my RP characters for Aberrant, Mage, and Star Wars the RPG (because I can).

Site
I took down a few pages that I found were very old and had potential exploits in them. Also, I've altered the layout of the front page to be more concise. You will notice that as time goes on, more "front page images" will be cycled through at random when you visit the front page.

Please keep coming back! It's encouraging.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #37 of 50

Databank Version 2.0 Premier
posted // Sunday, November 5, 2006 7:29 am

This morning I posted the first release of the Databank Version 2.0 viewer. The document used during testing and building of this viewer is Tenshi Moya's character bio from Star Wars Galaxies. Essentially it's just a copy and paste of a pretty blah bio that I kept running for 3 years when I was playing SWG. It does demonstrate the versatility of the new version, which is built using a new, more sensible (and less repetitive and situational) XML format, and SimpleXML, also using the XPath capabilities that are within SimpleXML. It's a pretty powerful library, which will one day make its way into the structure of Angel-Boards... but that's down the road -- I'm not going to delve into another serious forum upgrade until I get some more content up on the site. There were a couple of issues when I was building the new Viewer... I actually ended up rewriting the whole parser when I came up against a problem with embedded HTML as well as some other situational issues that I was having trouble with using plain old XMLReader. SimpleXML also didn't solve the problem initially, but eventually I got around that as well. And now preg_replace_callback is my new friend. :3

This week is going to be pretty busy for me. I will be out of town Thursday morning through Sunday night, and on Monday I start my first day of work-work at a non-campus job. So ... my late nights have to go bye-bye. But I seem to be more creative when time is limited, it's just a question of how I'll be able to fit everything in -- if I will be able to fit everything in. I'll make it work. In any case, I plan on having Kirei's document finished and / or posted by this weekend, if not early next week. As for her picture, no guarantees on when that'll be finished, I may just scrap what I have and just redraw it from scratch, we'll see.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #38 of 50

Unmei Densetsu Progression
posted // Thursday, November 30, 2006 8:36 am

Well, it's coming up on December (8 days till my birthday, yay), and I realize there're are some scheduled shortcomings. The Yuri (Kirei) document is not done yet, and I haven't invested more than a page in it yet (though I have like ... 3 pages of notes). Hopefully I'll sit down and type that up soon, but I've been very occupied with other changes.

Unmei Densetsu
My job entails a bit of programming and code tracing... which has put me in the mood to get work done on Unmei Densetsu lately. The past couple weeks have been filled with evenings of coding, making a number of significant improvements in current code as well as changes to other code that have not only helped to create a more unique feel for the game, but they are making the game-writing itself a lot easier (the scripting). The complete list of changes can be found Here, or on the Unmei Densetsu "homepage." I hope either by this weekend or next week to have a new series of screenshots available for all aspects of the game highlighting all of these changes.

Other than that, I've cut back time spent in World of Warcraft (and games in general) what with work and all... been doing a bit of financial research recently what with my newly acquired financial freedom. I also recently bought another flat panel for my old computer, which I've made into a Fedora 6 (Unix) machine, and a WACOM 9x12 tablet to replace the AIPTEK one that I was using. Unfortunately my old one does not work properly in a dual-monitor environment, so that was one of the huge reasons I didn't pursue finishing Yuri's picture. Anyway, when I get that, hopefully I'll sit down and finish it up. Also, I am going to look for some more models for Poser, since I have a full version of that now. It's really going to be extremely useful, seeing as drawing from reference is what I'm best at.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #39 of 50

It's March
posted // Monday, March 5, 2007 10:34 pm

Yep, it's March. And I'm way behind in stuff, as is pretty obvious by the lack of updates recently. I got enraptured in World of Warcraft for the last month and change leveling my Blood Elf Paladin and really didn't feel like doing much of anything, be it because of stress or whatever else is going on, but eh, that's my personal sob story, I will not belabor the point. Needless to say, I'm making an effort to come out of that shell this week and get things done.

Over the past few weeks I have managed to work on little tidbits of things, but nothing substantial. I am further along on Kirei's document, and I've started Nova's document, and begun mapping out Sade's document as well. I have also managed to get a substantial amount of information down about GEM, which is a very important faction in the Federation Crystal Universe. My whiteboards are also littered with various notes that I need to consolidate and create documents out of, a lot of which should prove very interesting in the world-building process. I have also spent a lot of time theorizing on Space travel and how best to approach it for various races. Space Shortening seems to be a favorite, so I'm going to be looking into that in more detail.

As for concrete updates, I have wanted to change the Angel iFolio for some time now, so I sat down and over the past couple of days I have managed to completely revamp the iFolio. It now revolves around 2 classes, and because of the review, I have removed many unnecessary loops through the directory structure, which should definitely result in an overall speed increase. It also uses some new icons which kind of adds a bit more of a professional, easy-to-use feel to it. In any event it's much better than it was. Also, because of how I've rearranged it I can now permit easy searching and sorting of various images and galleries. But all that in time. I just really wanted some sort of concrete accomplishment made for now. I really also want to switch Angel Boards' Message Core over to SimpleXML, but we'll see when I get to tackling that.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

Tenshi

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Reply #40 of 50

Move AX, BX
posted // Tuesday, March 27, 2007 9:09 am

Over the past week and change I have been moving into an apartment so there hasn't been anything concrete to present lately, though I have a bunch of stuff that I would have loved to [and will very shortly] get done. I never imagined moving yourself would be this much work, especially the first time... so I have to spend almost every day acquiring various things I need. My computers and network are up, and I have Wireless in there, so it's so much more convenient to be elsewhere and still connected.

So I bought this desk from OfficeMax and then I went back to get more stuff for it, because I figured getting more room and a cabinet would help ... and it's a discontinued item. To make matters worse, they were sold out of the item I wanted (so remove the g-d "available in-store" sign, geez!). I called the next-nearest OfficeMax, and they're sold out of it, too. So I'm going to look elsewhere.

Then came the Entertainment center in the living room. Bought that at Value City. Now, I set everything out and start going through the instructions. I'm a tart, so I read the instructions as I do things: step 1, stick blah in blah... I do so. Step 2, same thing... and so on for step 3. So I have 3 boards with little pegs in them. And then comes the foreign language translations of the instructions... and no more pictures. It's like "WTF?! What happened to the rest of the manual?!" I check the manufacturer's website for it, and it's not there. So it's ... "Step 1: ... ; Step 2: ... ; Step 3: ... ; Step 4: Go f**k yourself." Anyway, I manage to put it together. I had to take it apart once 'cause some stuff ended up being backwards, but it hasn't broken yet, so I'll take it.

I definitely want this weekend to be productive, so stay tuned this week for 'stuff.'

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #41 of 50

I love eXtra SaLT.
posted // Sunday, April 1, 2007 8:33 pm

XSLT... I love it.

I don't know why I never bothered to look into what this was before, when I was learning XML, but I definitely am reaping the benefits of it now. XSLT now powers almost the entirety of the Message Class for Angel Boards, and I want to apply it to the Federation Crystal Databank to automatically convert the old document format to the new one. This will save me the time of having to go back and individually modify each document to adhere to the new format.

I hope to have a converter up this week so that all of the old documents use the new document reader, it's just a matter of getting the template together. In the meantime, I realize now that some of the old documents are getting snared by some change made when I switched everything over to PHP5, such that old database documents aren't working at all ("Invalid character").

Now that I'm more-or-less moved in, things will be returning to normal and productivity should be up.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #42 of 50

More XSLT and now XPath in JavaScript
posted // Thursday, May 10, 2007 12:14 pm

So yesterday I got to sit down for a while and work on the XSLT for V2 of the Federation Crystal Databank, and I must say that I am quite pleased with what I have now. Not only does this set the stage for any potential future upgrades, but the flexibility of this version severely trumps the original document version that powers most of the definitions so far. So far the only document I've successfully converted has been the main page, as I've been experiencing difficulties converting the rest of the documents due to issues with Newlines that I hopefully will resolve this evening.

Anyway, a good part of my excitement is that I have solidified one of the major features of Version 2, which is the ability to switch between a Document Summary and the Complete [and typically unnecessarily repetitive and verbose] Document. When a document contains a summary, which can itself be a mini-document complete with headers and subsections, pictures, whatever, the reader can opt to display the summary, which will hide the "complete" document instead. Summaries are hidden by default, and so essentially it's a one or the other. I had a huge hang-up on how to properly do this, and what I am using right now is JavaScript XPath v1 to handle this. It's working like a charm in test documents.

So ... I guess it's content time, no more excuses. Stay tuned.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #43 of 50

Inspiration Buff
posted // Monday, May 14, 2007 10:35 am

No, I'm not talking about a Critical Heal from a Holy Priest in World of Warcraft.

New Line
So this weekend, what of it I was home, I spent a bit of time researching some bugs in my conversion code and in the Databank code for version 2 documents. Anyway, I managed to get newlines working when converting from a version 1 document to a version 2 document (the idea was to leave most of the work to the document handler, so instead of rampant paragraph tags in a document, there're simply newlines handling this). This is major, as now all documents convert to version 2 properly.

Conversions
So with that down, and several more bugs worked out on the image code, as well as some more stuff with displaying and hiding summaries, which, SURPRISE, I found do NOT work in MSIE, so I have to figure out some way around that which will probably require a LOT more excessive JavaScript than I originally wanted to use. It's either that or MSIE users can't view Document Summaries, and web statistics state that the majority of visitors here use MSIE (plus I'm trying to be as cross-platform considerate as possible).

Changelog
I removed the reference to the News page from the Federation Crystal portal because it hadn't been updated in forever (I had put up new entries and they weren't commented on, my guess is I stopped using that thread as an update long ago). Instead I have added a Changelog section to the Federation Crystal homepage which identifies recent change information to various documents.

As of so far I have converted and posted 4 documents over to V2 because they were relatively easy thus far, and I intend on having the majority, if not all, updated by tonight (since it's only 12 more documents anyway). I do have to fix a problem in the V2 code that doesn't properly handle metric and SI conversions for the stats. Sorabella's 194cm height should not make her 1ft tall, nor should she only be 1lb. It's weird because I must have broke something, these conversions worked beautifully in test.

RoboTech
This weekend I had the absolute honor and pleasure of watching RoboTech: The Shadow Chronicles. It was absolutely stellar. I haven't finished absorbing all of it yet, but it was just great. I can only HOPE and PRAY that one day my stuff is that great.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #44 of 50

Rawr! >:3
posted // Monday, July 9, 2007 1:23 pm

I realize a month has gone by since I last posted a news item, so I'm doing that now. I also realize I tend to update in batches, which is fine, granted it's not a continuous stream of content as I would like, but things are getting put up slowly but surely.

Recent changes:
The largest and most recent change is to Unmei Densetsu, and includes a number of significant updates in both design and implementation, and can be read here, on the Unmei Densetsu Devlog.

Documents:
The following documents are slated for completion either this week or next week, depending on where I get to focus my time:
Nova's Bio - It's been difficult coming up with the information on a character whose background information does not tie into any of those I currently have floating in my head (since working associatively has been useful for generating content quickly), but I have managed to come up with some lighter portions of the background, as well as to flesh out the character's behavior and appearance. This document will be posted incomplete, with more to come for his background as information becomes more readily available.

Amazons - The document detailing the backgrounds and behaviors of Amazon societies is nearing completion.

Senshi - The document detailing the backgrounds and behaviors of Senshi societies is also nearing completion, seeing as they're somewhat related to Amazons to begin with.

The next few documents will include Stella Aspira, the advanced side of Tai'ruun, as some of the material also relates to Sade, which will be the next character bio completed, and then hopefully I will be able to bounce back to more Cryssian-related documents as well as begin to flesh out more of the documents of other races.

What happened to Yuri's Picture?
- Yes, I know I said that her drawing was ready to be colored, but I got halfway through inking it and after struggling a long time trying to get her face right (since it was a drawing I put down and came back to a month later, I found it was getting too difficult, the pose was garbage, and I'm scrapping it in favor of a new one). I already have taken the time in Poser to come up with a New Pose (warning: poser model, but contains no 'pornographic' information) and I will get to that this week, also. Sorry.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #45 of 50

Hi!
posted // Monday, February 25, 2008 2:01 am

Um... so it looks like the last time I actually posted something here was July... wow! So I'm sure no one's looking at this site recently.

Well if you're reading this... yeah I realize there's not been much of anything going on. Well, at least nothing I've produced anyway. I've been spending a lot of time with notepads and such trying to design a few things and get some aspects of Unmei Densetsu all hammered out and I think I'm really coming along with that (something of a mid-term design process that should have come before coding of a lot of the other stuff that ended up in there ... ).

I have some drawings I need to complete of course... Yuri's picture is just sitting here unfinished... may as well think about restarting it at this point. Nova's background's not very far along and I don't have a picture of him yet, either.

Well, so why am I making this post if I have nothing to show? The Webcomic is about to start... I just had a desire to post the main character's design.

Let me be clear... The Jaded Barbie is not a Gaming comic. Sure, there will be comics that may focus on gaming... but rest assured, I have plenty to b-tch about... and it's not limited to gaming.

This isn't even finished... but I want to go to bed. Anyway, meet Jade. I have been practicing this style for a while now to try and get used to not using any detail and using simpler lines and such to get the point across such that it can be recreated quickly and easily.
Image [http://tanime.net/comic/jaded_barbie_splash.jpg]

Image [http://tanime.net/comic/jaded_barbie_splash.jpg]

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #46 of 50

First Webcomic Up
posted // Tuesday, May 27, 2008 1:38 am

It's like WTF?! I just don't get anything done and everything lately has been fraught with delays. Well, I have FINALLY posted the first episode of The Jaded Barbie. I still have a bit of work to do with the interface and what-not, and I'm certainly not pleased with how the comic came out... it's definitely not in a format I'm going to continue to use -- namely I drew the character art [months ago ... ] and then didn't do backgrounds, and when it comes to drawing on the computer I'm really really ... very finicky about it -- I do sprite work mostly. Anyway... what it boiled down to was either I didn't do much in terms of background art or this wasn't going to get done. And I'm probably going to rethink what gets colored from now on, but we'll see what kind of update schedule I can commit myself to first -- 'cause it's not like I have a shortage of ideas for episodes (they'll often be non-sequitor so it's not like I have story arcs to worry about).

Anyway, for ease , I have created a subdomain that points directly to the Jaded Barbie comic series. It's thejadedbarbie.tanime.net . It will always bring up the latest TJB episode.

Nothing really visible has been done for Unmei Densetsu. It's all been on paper (paper -> code is exceptionally quick for me) as I'm still consolidating and balancing ideas to prevent constant rewriting. Good news is that I have spoken to my professor and there's a good chance I will be able to use Unmei Densetsu as my Thesis! So there's a good chance that UD will get some major development this summer.

I haven't been doing much in terms of character art or anything lately. I have been contemplating the Mary Sue problem I have run into with Michele though, as well as putting some power caps on Setara as well. I think I have come up with some good solutions for Setara , but it's going to take some additional characters to spread out Michele's accomplishments. That's going to take time so bear with me. I'd like to get Nova done, Yuri's character art restarted, and get to Sade.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #47 of 50

Election Day 2008 - Yes we can!
posted // Tuesday, November 4, 2008 11:53 pm

Tonight was a vindication of hope and faith. At the time of writing this Obama is leading in projected Electoral votes 333 to 156.... Good job, America. We have ushered in a new era for this country... an era where anyone in America can achieve the highest office in the country -- if they work for it... if they are respectful... if they are straightforward... if they are articulate ... if they are intelligent... and if they are willing to bring the country together.

I am so proud.

Congratulations, Obama....

We have a lot of fixing to do... and it will be rough.

The Jaded Barbie #6 should be up this week. It's halfway colored now.... I am sincerely sorry for the delay.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #48 of 50

Pro Tip . . .
posted // Wednesday, November 19, 2008 1:30 am

Here's another Pro Tip... don't mess with your hormone levels in the middle of making a comic.

So after struggling for months with motivation issues, bit by bit I managed to get this comic done. I'm sure lack of enthusiasm can really show in it. There'd be points when it'd come back to me, but then I'd get tired so I couldn't finish. In fact I actually lost an hour plus of sleep having to beat my head against the server because phpMyAdmin doesn't like to work for me on the normal cPanel so I'm supposed to use a specific one ... except I couldn't figure out how to log IN to that particular panel so ... I had to write the PHP code to update it by hand.

I should actually write something on-site to do it for me, but that'd require actually doing it.

I am going to switch comics to black and white for the most part to help prevent against this happening in the future. I inked the comic in July. I scanned it back then. I didn't actually get it colored and completed until now, and that was over a period of like ... 6 - 7 weeks or so. That's how bad this is. I can usually focus myself through a drawing. I'm going to have to shift the time of day I attempt to do my hobby work, because late-evenings is no longer my most productive period.

Anyway, it's late.

Oh, and I'm social-networking now. I can be found on Twitter at http://twitter.com/JadedBarbie
and on Blogspot at http://jadedbarbie.blogspot.com .

How often I blog, however, will be a different matter ... since I had intended to put up 2 additional Blogs today , but that didn't happen. Not that there'll be anything interesting to see there anyway.

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

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Reply #49 of 50

Not "dead."
posted // Wednesday, September 30, 2009 5:35 pm

I received an email last week about the state of the site, because nothing has been updated recently [read: in a year]. While this is disconcerting and I do realize that it has been a while (and I do get questions every now and again from people locally about when the next comic is going to be up) I am not abandoning these efforts, I have the focusing capabilities of an ADHD Squirrel right now and my attention is currently [poorly] invested in MMORPGs (Aion & Warhammer). That isn't to say I haven't been doing some work, it's just not in digital form.

I have plans to try and get focused. I would say the best thing to do right now is just subscribe to the RSS and then once something is posted you will be informed.

Thank you for the concern!
<3

.wonk uoy naht noitceffa erom deen I

50 replies since topic was posted on Saturday, Jun 14 2003 at 1:15AM.

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