Okay, so we made some progress this week.

I did:

• Finished addition of a command queue, for every modification of the system.
• Fixed a bug with surfaces that happened rarely
• Added filepath checks, to ensure the file exists.
• Made significant improvements in audio/video syncing, but it still desyncs within a minute. This took up the rest of my week.

Unfortunately, I’m having a serious issue with audio/video desyncing. I’m going to be studying the ffmpeg tutorial, and ffplay.c for clues and understanding of where I’ve gone wrong. I will try on either Sunday or Monday to replace the current sound system I use with one similar to ffplay’s and see if that makes a difference. But I suspect it is an issue with the video thread, not the audio, because when the video is turned off, the audio doesn’t stutter at the beginning for one of my test videos. Then after that, I will be working to make my module work on Windows.

So if you haven’t seen the new Star Trek movie, and still want to… why did you wait so long?

Its also the reason I waited to post this. I didn’t want to give any spoilers. So, lets say that the suits realized what an abomination of a movie JJ Abrams made, and so they gave it to me to fix. The requirements would be that I stick with the same general plot as they can’t afford to re-film everything. So, here we go, down the rabbit hole:

We start off with old Spock arguing before the Romulan senate, going from a shot of a CGI wonderland supernova to the senate room. He is arguing that Romulus is under threat of destruction from the Hobus start going supernova. The romulans jeer, and boo old Spock off, and he retains his calm(obviously!). A miner, named Nero, youngish, idealistic, believed in what Spock had to say, and wants to help, especially to save Romulus. And again, we go to a scene of Nero and Spock having just finished their presentation, Nero glowing with passionate pride. The Vulcans say “No. It is simply not logical to expend effort on the behalf of a race of people that have sought to destroy us, and will try to destroy us again.” and they all turn to leave. Nero rails against this proclamation, shouting, calling them cowards, emotion-less computers. Spock sighs and tells Nero to cease, his arguments will have no effect.

This is where Nero shrugs off Spock’s arm, and he turns angrily to Spock, “I’m going back to Romulus, to save my wife and child. You can stay here, with the rest of your despicable kind.” and he spits at the floor, marching off.

Unfortunately, Nero is too late, and he has to watch the death of his home-world, with his wife and child on it before him. He struggles to hold it together, but we can see he has become equal parts anger and sadness. His subordinates tell him they’ve picked up the some of the Romulan Senate. Nero whips his around, and growls ferally. Grabbing a knife from a subordinate, he marches down to the senate, and pretends to welcome them. He kneels before the Praetor, then snarling, stabs upward to kill him. Nero’s subordinates, after a pause, follow his lead and kill the Senate members.

Nero pushes the dead corpse out of the way, and snarls, “Now… let us destroy Vulcan… and the rest of the treacherous Federation.”

Then we see a few months later, the small mining ship Narada noticeably transformed into a sinister and nearly undefeatable warship.

His subordinates tell him that a small ship has managed to somehow prevent the Hobus supernova from destroying the universe. Nero discovers this is Spock, whom had finally gotten a concession from the Vulcan council for the equipment he needed. Nero growls again, and orders the ship to destroy Spock’s ship. Unfortunately, Spock’s ship is being drawn into the singularity he created, and Nero’s revenge-fueled rush to destroy him causes the Narada to be drawn into the singularity as well.

Now we come to the alternate timeline, where the USS Kelvin is responding to reports of a massive singularity wrecking some ships. Then we have the Kelvin scenes almost unaltered, except that George Kirk remembers to use the autopilot and runs to the shuttle. Unfortunately, he dies on the way, on the Com channel with his wife. We see the Narada being pushed back into the singularity by the Enterprise’s bulk.

The next scene, in dramatic contrast with the dark, gloomy, and sad scene previously, is bright and sunny, and we hear someone call “Kirk!” Chris Pine turns around and greets warmly Doctor McCoy. They discuss the Kobayashi Maru test that Kirk is going to take for the third time. McCoy thinks he’s being ridiculous. Kirk insists. He is still cocky, and arrogant, with a knowing swagger to his steps. Then we see the Kobayashi Maru scenes, and then the testimonial scene of Kirk vs Spock. Only this time, the Admirals consider the situation, and order Kirk to perform community service, by helping Spock improve the simulator, and fix the bug that Kirk exploited. As a reward for creative thinking, Kirk is promoted from Cadet to Ensign. We can put in scene in here about how Kirk has the “rubber-neck” mentality, and chases women.

Then we go a few more years later, and Kirk looks a bit older. He’s calmer, settled, and has Lieutenant stripes on his shoulder. He’s boarding the enterprise, having been transferred there. Pretty women in mini-skirts walk by, and in contrast to the scene just before, he checks them out discreetly. He’s still a skirt-chaser, but is a lot less cocky and arrogant, and doesn’t get distracted easily by women anymore. He’s no longer a Frat Boy. He meets Spock again, at the rank of Commander. “Welcome Lieutenant Kirk. Captain Pike sent me to welcome you, since we are already acquainted.”

Lt. Kirk makes it to the bridge, and looks around, smiling at everyone on the bridge. Pike nods, and directs Kirk to the conn. Then they receive a distress message from a Klingon fleet, talking about how some deadly ship appeared from a singularity…which tenses Kirk right up. He turns and tells the captain that this may be what destroyed the USS Kelvin. Every ounce of swagger is gone from Kirk’s demeanor, and he is genuinely worried. Pike takes the recommendation to heart, and exercises caution on arriving at the latest sighting of the mysterious warship, in Vulcan’s system. Everyone pales and becomes noticeably quieter as they see other Starfleet ships’ wreckage scattered around, bouncing off the shields. They scan the system, and find the Narada. They open hailing frequencies, as per standard operating procedure, but at Red Alert status. Nero sees young Spock and smiles, like a cat finding a mouse. “Send over both your captain and first officer or I will destroy Vulcan.” The communication ends there. The science officers confirm that the Narada indeed has such power, and is ready to do it at a moment’s notice. Pike sighs, and nods to Lt. Kirk, “Take command, myself and Mr. Spock will go over there and try to save Vulcan. Keep locked onto our lifesigns, I don’t trust this Romulan bastard.”

Almost as soon as the shuttle with Pike and Spock on it leaves, the Enterprise receives a message from one of Vulcan’s moons. Old Spock appears, and Kirk has a moment of recognition. “Jim old friend, we have not a second to lose. Please beam up myself and someone you will find extremely useful, Mr. Scott.” Kirk demands to know whats going on, “Jim, all I can see is this is an instance of time-travel, and I had to wait till my previous self left the ship. Please, trust me.” Kirk makes a decision, and orders the two people beamed up. “Mr. Spock, if that is who you really are, I would like some explanation now.”

Just that moment, the lifesigns for Pike start becoming erratic, as if he’s being tortured. Spock tilts his head, and narrows his eyes. He strides over to the science station, and with an ease born of familiarity, inputs information and reconfigures the sensors, with Commander Spock’s authentication code. He raises an eyebrow to young Kirk as if to say, “There. I am Spock.” With these changes, they’re able to beam aboard, to try to save Pike and young Spock. Kirk, Sule and a few red shirts go over. They manage to save Pike, and rescue young Spock, but not before Nero presses the button to destroy Vulcan. The blast lances out, piercing the planet, which begins to crumble inwards. Kirk orders the Enterprise to begin beaming up as many survivors as possible as soon as they can. Young Spock waits in the transporter bay for the first batch of survivors, the Vulcan High Council… but as he watches, his mother’s trace disappears, and the young transporter tech is horrified. Spock retains his calm, and hurries back to the bridge. We see a single scene of Spock’s fist tightening, knuckles turning white, hand nearly shaking, but otherwise, he is completely composed.

He reaches the bridge, with Pike sent to the infirmary. Kirk gets up to give Spock his command back, with old Spock having slipped out before young Spock shows up. Spock shakes his head. “I am afraid, Lt. Kirk, that I would not be capable of command in my present state. I am afraid I am emotional, and that these emotions will negatively impact my capabilities. Thus, you must take command, Kirk. Nero said his next target was Earth. Our duty is to stop him.” Kirk nods, and sits back in the chair. “Plot a course to Earth, maximum warp Ensign…” Chekov turns around, “Chekov sir.”

“Fascinating.” Spock says, finding the science station already has information input into it, “With this data, we should be able to beam through the shields of the Narada… but…” Scotty comes over to look, and they confer quietly, as the ship warps to Earth. “Gentlemen, tell me we have a way to stop this ship.” Scotty looks up and gives a trademark grin, “Oh aye, Captain… we do.” Kirk spends some time talking to old Spock in secret, to find out just what is going on. Chekov warps them into the solar system, out of reach of the Narada’s sensors, where Spock and Scotty outline their plan. They’ll need the Enterprise to attack the Narada, to weaken the shields first. They’ve managed to strengthen the shields and power output of the engines thanks to the calculations given by old Spock. Kirk hails the Narada, and tells Nero to let go of his quest for destruction. “What happened to your wife and child was a regrettable tragedy, Nero. One I feel for. But there is no need to do this.” Nero snarls, and says to the viewscreen, “No diplomacy, no peace talks, no negotiations will stop me. I will have my vengeance.” and turns off the communications, yet again.

“Time to try two-fisted diplomacy fellas.” Kirk says, and the crew gets to work. The Enterprise swoops in, rocking the Narada with the force of its blasts. The Enterprise gets hit back, hard, and the shiny uber-Apple bridge begins to get smokey, and filled with sparks. “Keep firing! We’ve got to save Earth!” Kirk holds on for dear life. Finally, the Narada’s shields are weakened, and Kirk, Sulu, Spock, and more red-shirts beam aboard the Narada. This time, they get between Nero and the death beam button. Nero manages to disarm Kirk, while the rest are busy fighting Nero’s crew. Kirk struggles with Nero, and in homage to TOS, uses the infamous Kirk punch. Barely able to stay standing up, Kirk looks almost beaten while the victorious Nero is about to deliver the coup de grace. Spock comes in, and delivers an uncharacteristic punch, knocking Nero over. Kirk yells, “Don’t Spock!” but Spock does it anyway, and vaporizes Nero. He sighs, and turns to Kirk, helping him up. Kirk looks around and tells Spock, “This ship was advanced in its own time, 100 years in the future. We need to keep this technology out of enemy hands.” Spock concurs, and they set about turning on the self-destruct sequence. They escape the ship, and beam back to the Enterprise.

There, everyone is promoted, especially Kirk. However, due to his murder of Nero, Spock receives no promotion, and Kirk is given the command of the Enterprise.

And voila! Took almost 2000 words, but isn’t this a better movie?

I apologize that I didn’t post an update earlier. I didn’t do a post for week 8(from July 6-10), and the next week was only a partial week as I left on vacation on Thursday. I was on vacation from the 16th to the 24th. Then I’ve just completed another week of progress. I’ll just sum up everything I’ve done in one big gigantic post.

What I’ve done since then:

• Fixed video sync issues after pausing and unpausing
• Fixed a bug dealing with overlay and surface releasing and resizing
• Expanded unit tests for all the backends
• Added more commenting, cleaning up code
• Began working on subtitle support but discovered that ffmpeg 0.5 has no demuxers for subtitles so decided to delay this feature for after GSoC
• Worked on various references issues
• Moved audio packet processing to its own thread
• Wrote a more optimized routine for writing data to an SDL_Surface, still slow on large screens
• Added some profiling
• Merged branch with trunk revisions
• Fixed slowdown issues
• Added seeking. No relative seeking yet, it is absolute for now.
• Updated the code to work with older ffmpeg libraries. Only one section is incompatible, and waiting on a response from the libav* mailing thread
• Began working on a command queue to make the module more thread safe.

There are some current issues at the moment.

• If using surfaces, and you resize the window smaller, there ends up being corruption in the bottom of the window. I have no idea why this happens.
• I will be adding relative seeking this next week.
• Found an issue where commands issue from the Python interpreter thread in sequence but with no delay cause a big crash. Thus the necessity of the command queue.
• Code seems a bit slow, and very very rarely, audio and video get desynced.
• No path expansion yet.

And there we go!

Recently, the Canadian Government opened up, asking for input from the public on copyright laws, and what they think needs to be done. They’ve already talked to various industry groups, consumer groups, etc. Michael Geist has more information here: Michael Geist.

Here is the letter I sent in:

Preamble:
Copyright is exactly how it sounds. The right to copy a work for profit. When copyright was formulated, the only way to copy a work was extensive manual effort and with expensive machinery. Copyright as it was developed then does not take into account a world where limitless perfect copying can be performed. Copying a book carried a risk of typos and missed pages. Copying an e-book now, once the DRM, if there is any, is circumvented can happen endlessly, with not a single bit out of place. In the era copyright was devised, copying a work meant profit was almost invariably involved. Now, the same is not true. Copying could be innumerable reasons, like making backups, sharing a song or video a friend or family member would enjoy, or reusing parts of the work to make a new work. This is a tipping point in future’s history. What we decide now about copyright will have repercussions for the worse or better of society. Concerns about individual companies or even industries pale next to these concerns. They will inevitably die or be replaced by new companies, new industries. But our society will change and continue, possibly in unpredictable ways.

I will eventually start a company when I graduate from school. We will produce creative works, from the efforts of many employees. We do intend to profit from these. But we do not intend to sue our customers. We do not intend to control or cheat our customers. We know that downloading works, and sharing copied works act as marvelous forms of advertising, and can lead many to spend more than if they had not downloaded or shared. I speak as a representative of this putative company, as I want to protect both our interests, and those of our customers.

Thank you in advance for reading this.

1. How do Canada’s copyright laws affect you? How should existing laws be modernized?

Canada’s copyright laws have affected me many times. Generally, they are better and more robust than the copyright laws in the United States, meaning I am protected from being sued in civil court for many multiples of what I earn yearly. However, this has happened to American citizens. These citizens made no profit from copying a work. They may have shared. But they either settled out of court for a few thousand dollars, or were sued in court to the tune of several million dollars. No profit was made from the copying activity. And yet they were punished. Canadian copyright laws as they stand now protect me from this, for downloading and accessing media I have no other legal way of accessing. I have also been protected from being considered guilty merely for the use of a program which has many legal uses as well as illegal uses. Just because a gun could be used for murder doesn’t mean having one automatically makes one a murderer.

As well, under Canadian copyright laws, I have the freedom to use code called DeCSS to watch DVDs I legally purchased or rented on my non-Windows or MC OSX computer. I have benefited from the freedoms and protections of the copyright laws in Canada. Were I in the United States, I would have none of these freedoms, and none of these benefits.

To modernize copyright laws, Canada needs to return them to their original purpose: ensuring the creator or creators of a work gets appropriate recompense. Let us take the example of the music industry. Many smaller artists receive almost no return for the work they have performed, despite the profits the record labels produce. I now direct your attention to the article by Courtney Love, the widow of Kurt Cobain: http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2000/06/14/love/print.html

In it, she addresses the math by which record labels defraud and rip off new, struggling, and defenseless artists. These are verifiable facts. It is a crime. Yet, because contracts were signed, it cannot be enforced. The companies benefit, while the artists suffer. This is not how copyright is supposed to work. Copyright should be not transferrable to a corporation. Copyrights should not be enforced by corporations.

It has been expressed that people want to be able to give money directly to the artists. The high prices of works,like CDs and DVDs is distasteful, especially when one finds out how little makes it to the artist. As it stands now, there is no real service or way to do so, except by buying merchandise and tickets for live concerts. Any copyright law in Canada should provide a system whereby the consumers can reward an artist directly for their work.

Another reason people copy works, is because they have no money to buy the works legally. This is especially true of students and a good percentage of Canadians. If a student had no money in the first place, there can be no logical argument that the artist lost money. And it is typically not the artist that feels they lost money, but the corporation that now owns and controls the copyright. It cannot be said that every download is lost income, as you cannot guarantee that if there was no way to illegally download the work, it would have been bought as a final recourse. To say otherwise is a logical fallacy, which should be rejected and ignored in debates of policy.

A modernized copyright system would account for all of these interests, and seek to ensure that the works of the artists are protected and paid for, where possible. As well, a modernized copyright system would account for the interests of the consumers, in that consumers have a right to do as they wish with their product(doctrine of first sale), and cannot be controlled or restricted in the name of preventing piracy. Consumers must be guaranteed freedoms. They must be guaranteed freedom from invasion of privacy, the freedom of making new works from the old, and the freedom of not being shackled to any one company.

Last year’s bill C-61 sought to make me a criminal for watching DVDs on Linux. Last year’s bill C-61 sought to make me a criminal for talking about how to circumvent a DRM measure that prevented a product from working. Last year’s bill C-61 sought to make many activities now considered normal illegal and punishable for amounts far greater than companies would lose. Last year’s bill C-61 was wrong, and unconscionable.

1. Based on Canadian values and interests, how should copyright changes be made in order to withstand the test of time?

It depends on what you believe Canadian values and interests are. Canadian values and interests seem to lie in freedom and equality. They seem to lie in the interests of finding something that works for everyone, with less regard for the financial well-being of corporations than they demand. Canadian values and interests lie in human rights and civil rights and consumer rights.

Whatever system of copyright we end up with needs to ensure consumers are free to move their purchase items, even digital, to any format they wish. Consumers cannot be restricted to using only one kind of mp3 player for music bought from a store. Consumers cannot be restricted from making backups to ensure the safety of what they have purchased.

1. What sorts of copyright changes do you believe would best foster innovation and creativity in Canada?

I believe that Canada needs to ensure artists are paid properly by the music industry. Public accounting needs to be done, and substantial fines need to be levied against companies that profited from any media sales while the creators received no money. I believe that Canada should create a fund to encourage and sponsor new, Canadian artists to develop their works, and be able to sell them via any media they choose. I believe that Canada should legislate specific protections of consumer rights in regards to DRM. No consumer should be prevented from working around and deactivating DRM if that DRM prevented proper technical performance of the work. No consumer should be made a criminal for activities many do. No consumer should be restricted in making backups into any format they choose.

The rights to create mashups should be protected, as new creative works will come out of those activities. The public begins to learn formerlly difficult skills like video editing, music composition, film direction, and so on, which can do nothing but benefit us all. Any system of copyright we develop should encourage people’s desires to create, rather than legislate consumption. Yes companies will be hurt by these actions. No, we do not have a responsibility to defend their profits or business model. It is capitalism. They must be left alone, and they must adapt or die. Buggy whip manufacturers could not realistically sue auto manufacturers, could they for causing buggies to no longer be used? No. So why do we allow this to happen now?

1. What sorts of copyright changes do you believe would best foster competition and investment in Canada?

Give the people control of what they make. Ensure the artists make their fair share rather than being ripped off by predatory corporations. Ensure and guarantee the freedoms of the consumer. Let the people learn and create. Where there is no profit made, civil suits should not be able to apply punitive damages, or even a fine beyond the loss of one single purchase. Recently a woman was sued for 2.9 million dollars USD, for downloading 28 songs. This is more per song than the Canadian government gives to the family of dead soldiers. Which loss is more real and more important?

1. What kinds of changes would best position Canada as a leader in the global, digital economy?

Everything I’ve said above. Give people the freedom. Restrict the corporation’s rights to restrict the public’s freedoms. Defend the artists and ensure they receive their fair share. Doing so will encourage artists to come to Canada to produce, as we will be able to defend and support them. This can only improve our culture, with new viewpoints and creations.

Yours sincerely,

Tyler Laing

I’m just pleased they’re actually listening to the citizens now!

I won a beta key for Star Trek Online today. I won it through a trivia contest about Star Trek to get the key. Yes, I am one of the world’s biggest dorks.

Its a regularly running trivia contest on the irc channel #STO on gamesurge. Every wednesday at 11:30 am PDT. This week was my first try. So i show up, there’s chatting, then one of the mods shows up, we all settle down. He asks the first question, “Cryptic_StormShade 1. What was the name of the Edosian that Navigated in Star Trek Animated Series?” (The answer is Arex)

I try to use my google-fu to find the answer, but its already too late. TerryN gets it first within seconds. Then StormShade gets ready to ask the second question, “Cryptic_StormShade What Captain was found in the pattern buffers of the Jenolan?” I immediately jump in, knowing the answer off by heart. Someone named exracon beats me by a few milliseconds, and types “scotty”. I type “montgomery scott” no more than five milliseconds behind him. But I get the point, as I typed his full name, and not a psuedonym. So now its me and TerryN with one point each.

There’s only five questions, so I have to be really on the ball for the next ones. I’m at the UBC-Okanagan campus, so I’ve got a direct link pretty much to the Internet backbone. You wouldn’t believe the ping times you can get on campus. So I spawn a new firefox window, take it to google, and make it smaller so I can see the question.

The next question comes, “Cryptic_StormShade What rule of Acquisition is this? “Sleep can interfere with your lust for latinum.”" I google, I check the page, and I input my answer. But I was just a bit too late. In amidst all the random guessing(about fifty different numbers… nice try guys!), Vmann gets the right answer just mere milliseconds ahead of me. On my screen, it looks like I got first, but on the mods’ screens, Vmann is ahead. So close! Now, it is TerryN, Me, and Vmann each with one right answer. The next two matter, a lot. (Answer is 103)

By this time my hands are starting to shake, and I can feel my heart pound in its cage of bone. Too much adrenaline. Have to calm down. I made it this far. I got close. I can do this. And comes the next question, “Cryptic_StormShade Name Tuvok’s Wife please.” My google-fu is good. The name is right in the google summary of the first result. I type it in. And… I get it! Two points for me, one for TerryN, and one for Vmann. (Answer is T’Pel)

Getting a bit calmer, this next question is absolutely essential. I must prevent a tie. Only way to do that, is get the point myself. The question comes, “Cryptic_StormShade What was the name of of Trip’s childhood dog?” I use my google-fu, and… I’m having trouble. I can’t find the answer! Where is it! Oh shit, where is it!? By that time, I realize that TerryN had already been tapped as the winner of that question. (Answer is Bedford)

It is sudden-death now.

So the mods provide a tie-breaker, just between me and TerryN. People even start placing (virtual) bets on us! I seemed to be the favorite, though no one knew me, and this was my first time trying for a key.

The question comes, “Cryptic_StormShade For the game: In which sector is the Briar Patch?” I do my google-fu, and I see the answer right away. I sprint to type it in, feeling like I’d just run the 100 yard dash. And… I won. I got it right. But of course, you knew the results from the beginning of my post. (Answer is sector 441)

So thats how I won the key, told in dramatic fashion. I shall be enjoying the beta of STO, but of course, I won’t be able to talk about it. I do intend to try testing the client and MMO on Linux through Wine/Cedega.

And, in honor of the question that won me the key, my ship will be called, “Briar Rose.” I know it may be perceived as feminine, but ships are usually referred to as women, so its a good name for a good ship.