Dick of the Week

Do we think this twat is shitting his pants now his face is splashed all over the media... I think so... Guess he'll loose his benefits, the trash

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-33967375

I'm into Python

This week has been an interesting week for me, as I have, for the first time in about three years, began to learn the ins and outs of a new programming language.

This language is Python.  I've heard a lot about python, it's use at google, it's use by those who are on the sharp end of internet based development, but whom want to remain serious programmers.

Now, of course, I'm an old style programmer, and I like my code to communicate to me exactly what it's doing, so the first problem I've had with Python is it's use of white space as code flow control.  This is perhaps my biggest bug bare with the language, it totally grates me, and there are ways around it, using perhaps a semi colon to close a class, or an if statement, or simply to indicate that the current stanza/block of code is about to end, rather then using indentation to indicate this.

This particular problem is put into great focus on Python for windows, when loading Idle (the IDE supplied) and it constantly starts to moan about unexpected uses of spaces or indentation... You can literally pull your hair out over this, but that's a bug in that editor not the language.  The language just shows up the problem.

The power of the language though is strong, string editing, numerics, you have a C power straight out of the box, exploring the libraries like urllib and you have extremely simple (2 lines of code) methods to download files from the internet.

Within 200 lines of code I had a working application, which would trawl a website following all the links and listing them.  It's clearly very powerful and not as I had feared a toy language.

One frustration is getting a GUI working, there are perhaps too many options and nothing solid to follow in order to get an interface running.

I'll keep you posted, perhaps I'll come back with some Python code soon enough.

Our Guy

So, Guy Martin's come off his bike again... Check it out...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/northern-ireland/33818081

And yeah, I admit Guy looks a bit banged up... But look at the poor sod at the 40 second mark... he's ruined those jeans... just ruined them, taking a tumble like that!

WarThunder - Simulated Log

I've been spending time, time after time, trying to get my Track IR set up just right for my new monitor positions on the desk.  Last night, I think I finally cracked it, but the unit does seem to be very quirky.

But, un-phased I went into WarThunder and queued for some Simulated Battle... Long Queue times they were too, 6+ minutes.

I flew out my BF109-G2/Trop three times in all... My take offs were good, handling was good, climbing to altitude and maneuvering all pretty good... I got one burst at a target and got hits, but beyond that my whole flyouts were total disasters, the first flyout, I was hit from below and behind by a Russian i185... This plane was painted bright red, and I simply never saw it, the rear view from the 109G2 is pretty bad with the armour plate, plus he was below me, but I was in a descending left hand turn and he just swiped up and got me, it annoyed me that I was at over 1800 meters, and he must have been at ground level and saw me against the sky, whilst I could not discern him from the ground clutter.

Next, fly out, twice I approached dots only to find they were friendly players, whilst watching in the combat log friendly bombers get slashed from the skies.  Not one of those bombers called out a location for the enemy, so ther was myself and two Fw190's flying from enemy bomb target to target trying to find anything to shoot at.  We finally ended up in a swirling fight around cloud level at 3000 meters, I closed on a target trailing an fw190, if the 190 had just turned or done something else it would have been a better engagement, I fired a burst, it missed, he then split S, and I went into a hi, yoyo turn... and boom, my tail was shot off by a second unseen Russian aircraft, not only did I not see him, but he was at less than 100 meters when he fired, and I didn't hear him... I could hear the other two aircraft, and was recording, I went back and could not hear this guy.

But, even with better look-out I would not have seen him, again because of the G2's armour plate arrangement.

The final flyout, just annoyed me, I flew at near tree top level, against the ground clutter, I circled over brown fields using the brown summer camo the aircraft has to best advantage... I'm there looking all over, I see dot after dot coming from the German direction, finally see a dot coming from the Russian base direction, and move to intercept... As I move... BOOM... one shotted by a Yak.

I just, don't know... It's clearly player skill, or their knowing how to spot me, but I didn't see this guy, and I tried every trick I know to stay low and fast to blend into the ground clutter.

I'm playing the game on Ultra high settings, and I'm figuring I might do better on ultra low, because it's just a case of who see's whom first in Simulator... or of course as GrmlZ pointed out this week, who is in a bomber wins.

World War 2 - Toshio Tamogami - A Proud Japan

A few months ago I was at odds with revisionist thinking in Russia, about their performance, especially in the early years, during world war two.  Today I come back to these pages in utter disbelief at the news that there even is a revisionist movement in Japan; the Japanese people, their culture is to me always one of extreme politeness, of acceptance and unwavering resolution, this is why when McArthur became governor he paid note to the Emperor, though the superior power, this is why Hirohito remained as emperor and his prodigy today hold the Chrysanthemum throne.

But that was at the acceptance that War Crimes had been committed, and I'm not talking about the unclear timing between declaration of war and the Pearl harbour strike, and I'm not talking about the military operations such as Midway where the tide turned, or Singapore which was Britain's biggest defeat, or our British losses such as HMS Repulse & HMS Prince of Wales in the Indian Ocean.

What I'm talking about is that this news article intimates that there were no parts of the true history of World War 2 for Japan to be proud of, the strike planning on Pearl Harbour, the engineering of their fleet, the progression of Naval aviation and the military inventiveness and tenacity of the Japanese soldier meeting western forces and defeating them through the war.  They are all things to be proud of as a nation fighting a war, and should be understood, the Japanese Fleet was Amazingly powerful, a feat of amazing engineering which should be celebrated, and in places you will find celebration of that proud history.

But that proud history should always be remember in context, and the atrocities remembered, Korea, China, the Philippines all suffered under Japanese Imperial rule, as well as World War Two Marshall law.  Japan needed to wage a war, needed the raw material to do so, which lead to their invading all those countries, it's not neat, it's not polite, in some ways it's highly un-Japanese, but it happened.

That article about comfort girls, it's true to listen to, again go back to 1970 the Thames Television series there were Japanese soldiers interviewed, who said that the Japanese girls would collect 1000 stitches for their loved one, and give that 1000 stitches in a belly band, but he would rather her have given him her body for the night.  That was his attitude for Japanese girls, so for Korean or Chinese it would have been utility, blind, brutal, and Warlike, which was the situation.

Now I say it should be remembered, but should modern 20 to 30 year old generation be apologising?... No, it was their Grandparents at least who were involved, it should have been, and was their Grandparents who apologised, the apologies should be over, to brow beat new generations for the fault of old is something we have come to terms with in Europe, how else does Germany hold it's head high at the EU table.

But people like Toshio Tamogami have the wrong end of the stick denying what happened, they should know it happened, accept it and go on about their business, they didn't do it, Granddad did, and that two or three generation difference can never make the same mistake again, that's the best way they could ever apologise to the world, by never repeating the same dreadful mistakes, but the only way to avoid them is to know about them, and in knowing about them the rest of the community needs to realise they can not demand anything more than respect that it did happen, and should never happen again.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-33754932

Hunting in America

With all the furore over the killing of Cecil:

One then has to just smack your hand on your forehead over this American story...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-33724060

Yes, a baby get a lifetime permit to hunt and fish!...

Only in America, that is, only in the country where food and wealth are so abundant do people still feel the need to hunt, and the parents comment that it's a family tradition and

"it was only natural we kind of keep it going"

It just ludicrous, my family name comes from an invading Knight who came with William the Conqueror... So should I keep invading places?... My other family side name comes from being a Money lender, should I continue to be a loan shark?

I mean, it's just stupid, "yeah we live, yeeehaw, in the wild west, and after we been a huntin' for possum, we go to Walk Mart for sprinkles to put on it's corpse!"

But the ultimate idiocy in this whole story lies with the officials whom thought the "Newborn Lifetime Combination Hunting and Fishing License" was a good idea.

I mean, the US has been reporting lately of species decline, and that report was linked to the domestic cat, but look at all the Gun toting citizens out there, blazzing away at anything with nipples and you really just have to beg belief.