=VG= SemlerPDX

Happy Birthday! 

Rewatched this one for Halloween - funny as hell

This is an example of what I've been working on for several months, only now finally almost ready to be released publicly - I can speak with ChatGPT and it responds with text-to-speech, like having a proper back-and-forth conversation with a real AI.  I can even ask for code and my VoiceAttack profile will pull that out of the text-to-speech response so it is not spoken, and open it in a notepad!  Coming this week!!

I've been very busy getting things running again - it's up to some in-game admins to finalize their setup now.  If anyone who had some access doesn't have it, let me know and I'll set you up again.

Gonna play on the new VG ARK: Survival Evolved server again today - only Arma 3 and GTA V take more advantage of my GTX 970.  Amazing detail and gorgeous models for a team(tribe) based survival/building game.  Then again, the game sucks for a few reasons, one being the default game system values like Meat Spoil Time (one piece of food spoiling at default in less than 20 minutes real time) or even the time it takes to tame a Dino  (over 4 hours for a mid-level T-Rex, few can game in one session that long!).

I'm testing out custom values for most everything, and it seems good so far - only need to eat 3 times a day unless very active, and meat spoils in 2 hours instead of 20 minutes, even slower in a refrigerator or feeding trough.  If I can get it setup well, I may keep this server up 24/7 and open it up to Whitelist requests.  Anyone with ARK is of course welcome to test with me - message me for the password.

Took some pictures of a tiny tree frog in our back yard - could fit on a US nickel!

Life has been extremely busy, and I've not been feeling well.  This has caused some of the projects I've been working on to get pushed to the back burner, but I expect to be active again real soon - this stuff is on my mind even when I'm not at my PC.  Plans for the VG Store, releasing an update for my voice control project, the VG Clubs Leadership (Wings) program, and getting requested servers installed and working are at the top of my list as soon as I can break away and get some time to tinker.  Apologies to anyone who is waiting on me to act and get things done, I had not anticipated these distractions, and when I do get time at my desk, it's barely enough time to make rounds and make sure things are solid before I'm busy again.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Between physical therapy and dealing with these crazy pills I gotta take to ease the edge, I've been not even wearing my headset and so not getting into TS3 or anything beyond chatting in Discord or here on the website for so long.  If there's anything I said I would do and ghosted on, just know it's not personal and honestly just fallen under the radar.  I get periods where I can do important stuff, and other times it is the last thing I want to put myself through.

Regardless, I have been working off and on for the past few weeks on my AVCS voice control profiles for VoiceAttack again, it's been my greatest passion for nearly five years and I enjoy making things as much as enjoy using them in games - especially now when it's so hard to type for any extended period or use the mouse for longer than a move and click or two, and left-handing it the rest of the time, or using voice dictation to type out most of a chat/text msg and then just edit what is wrong by hand.

This will be the first AVCS profile project to include hardware as part of the system, an external temperature/humidity sensor on a standard USB connection.  Got the parts for the prototypes from Amazon yesterday, and still working out the code, but will soon be posting up a cool DIY Arduino project and AVCS Profile for computer sensors through AIDA64 Extreme with ambient room sensor via the Arduino, and local weather from Open Weather Maps.

It's frustrating to be moving so slow but I keep plugging away, and now I've nearly finished the main menu GUI (something I've never needed for my VoiceAttack profiles yet), and I'm really happy with how it's turning out so far.  All this without needing to run another program, VoiceAttack just hosts the applet for me and saves the values to file as part of the voice profile config:

Hell of a week so far for me, my damn back (up near the neck) has been out since Saturday, that kind where you can only hold yourself upright in one position without stabbing pains.  Can barely concentrate at times, it sucks - then I had to cough but couldn't move my back so I had to hold the front and back of my head just to get through the ordeal.  All I want to do is hang out with friends and play some Fallout 4 - the pain is half of what it was days ago, though, and I'm finally coming out of this... ugh.  Here and there I got a few hours where I felt okay, and I've been playing around with Settlement Building in Fallout.  Built supply lines between them all, and starting to build some shops to add to my in-game income.

Took this screenshot at one of the farther out settlements a little after sunrise - awesome scene of destruction from the nuke behind me.  The detail in this world is freaking gorgeous!

We'll always remember you fondly, brother.  RIP

Slowly helping my Pop get his PC gaming setup(s) working, and I find out new things everyday.

Today I learned why all my attempts to get online (ARK, PR, etc.) fail from this house:  Pop has DSL... 1Mb/s Up...16Mb/s Down ugh!!!  Like stepping back in time!  

Soooooo..... I would be rather grateful if someone in ARK already in the VG Tribe could pop by my castle and fill up the feeding trough with raw meat and a few berries in a week or so.

They can all last about 3 weeks with server settings as is, and I'll be back home in September, but at least once would do them well so I don't lose any of my breeders, etc.

No biggie if I lose everything, tho - can always get new animals,  I have a few eggs in the fridge that I can hatch to start up again, slowly, but.... I have already lost the otters and a few dimorphodons, tribe log showed the loss.

When I first got here to my Pop's house in Wisconsin back in July, they had DSL internet through AT&T (coming in though a tiny old school phone line) and were paying $46.99 a month for internet speeds equivalent to circa 2004 internets.  I have just upgraded them to Spectrum (Time Warner) high speed broadband internet via cable, with a top-in-class consumer modem (Arris) with dual band WiFi, 16 channels, and speeds of up to 250Mb/s Down and 20Mb/s Up (for a monthly cost of $47.99)

.... yea.  ... yea.

I feel bad for the parentals that they've been wasting money on terribly frustrating slow speeds for years, but glad I was able to get them up to 2018 USA standards for nearly no change in price.

What a world!  Gonna pop onto the ARK Server (finally) and feed my dinos before the rest of them starve to death like the little ones did a week or few ago.  Don't want to start over with my breeding program, put a fair bit of time into that.

Might even get onto the Falcon server for a multiplayer flight to show my Pops what it's like.  NASCAR next weekend at Road America, the "clowns" of the road course - will be fun to see those 2 ton monsters try to navigate that classic road course.  We'll take plenty of pictures.

(I can't remember if I already posted this, was sitting in the reply box when I was going to make a post - looks promising:)

So, I was reading some forum on a totally different topic, one guy suggested this CompactGUI as a tool for the Windows 10 "Compact" function.  It seems this is no new feature, but the version in Win10 is much more powerful and more optimized.

TLDNR; You can take a program, for example my ARK installation folder (>100GB) and compress the contents with little to no performance loss when running the application.  Doesn't turn it into a ZIP or RAR achive, either - we'd not notice the change as users.  It is a disk space saver, and it's very good at it.  According to the reports, my ARK could potentially turn into a ~50GB folder instead of twice that!!

Check it out, I'm gonna:
https://github.com/ImminentFate/CompactGUI

Happy Halloween!

Today I learned that in Falcon BMS, there is a volume knob in the cockpit for AI Comms only, will be helpful when you want IVC Comms to be louder than AI comms traffic.  Dash-1 BMS Manual, page 24
check it out:

That's not how you mount an SSD....  (j/k, cool art - very "Tron")

If anyone is looking to buy the Oculus Rift before January 31st 2019, or if you know anyone who is, I have 2x 10% off Coupons available from their holiday referral program: 

When you buy an Oculus Rift with coupon code (contact me for code) , you'll receive 10% off your purchase.*

*Valid only at Oculus.com. Expires January 31, 2019. One time use only. Cannot be combined with any other discount code or coupon. May not be redeemed for cash. Discount not valid on prior purchases and cannot be applied towards taxes or shipping charges.

Screenshot by ChrisBV:
"Goofing around with some editing..."

I'll be back... just not yet.... (server maintenance *burp* postponed) 

GOG has a decent sale going on right now; picked up a pair of classics for less than a fiver -- Sid Meier's Pirates (the 2004 remake) and Railroad Tycoon 3
Always nice to put a few more cheap titles in the rainy-day games bin 

We'd like to add a few client side mod keys to the 2nd Arma 3 server (Insurgency) and I tried a few times but failed.  I have no idea what I was doing wrong, literally trying to drop key files in the key folder from TeamViewer File Manager, RDP, or even FTP.  Kinda frustrating - I must be doing something wrong.

Contact me when you can, maybe you know how.  They want st_hud, st_movement (if available), JSRS, and something called badbensonEM.

Thanks!

(also, Nvram said something in chat "PITN Check your steam"  - whatever that means. maybe he sent u a message.

-Sem

Update on my DIY TrackIR project -
Wireless TrackClip Pro has now been on for a several hours and the voltage on the battery has dropped by 0.40 Volts. If I do some very rough estimates, I am assuming this thing might last between 18-24 hours between charges. I'm leaving it on overnight to find out. The other connector for the magnetic micro USB charger tip is shown in this pic. They sell cords, or these tips that plug onto the end of a normal micro USB charging cable. They have a tiny green indicator light when powered. At $4 a piece (for a male and female pair of magnetic plugs) they are so worth it for the bi-directional connection option alone!

$4.00 NetDot Magnetic USB Charging Connectors
$2.92 3.7V 10440 AAA Lithium Ion Rechargeable Battery (sold in 4-pack for around $12)
$1.00 TP4056 (03962A) Charging Board with Protection
$1.00 MT3608 DC to DC Step Up Boost Converter
__________________
$8.92 Total Cost

Happy B-Day man - hope you are doing well!  Miss you bro - take care, have a great day!