5.03.2008 г.

The eternal question - Which was first - chicken or egg?



Last time I installed ICQ 6 I noticed the question at the end of the installation - which was first - chicken or egg? I remembered then my hypothesis on this eternal question. I don't pretend of course that I'm the first ever person in the world to suppose this scenario.

So, really which was in the beginning? Answer - the egg of course.

Here is the explanation:
Let me introduce first some piece of terminology.
I mark chicken/egg as we know it nowadays with X (for example chicken^X,egg^X).
I mark cock^Z a cock, which was slightly different than cock^X and cock^Y
I mark chicken/egg which was slightly different than chicken^X and egg^X with Y (for example chicken^Y,egg^Y).
Note: X,Y and Z mark genes which are very close, but howsoever different.

Let's assume that chicken was first! Consequently it came from an egg^Y. If not then the first statement is false.

There are 2 scenarios for this to happen:

1)Chicken^X hatched from egg^Y. That means that chicken^Y genes mutated in the period between laying the egg^Y and the moment it hatched. Otherwise the chicken which hatched would be chicken^Y, not chicken^X. But as we know mutation and evolution of the species is a process lasted millions of years and a period of 3 weeks is far too small.

2)Chicken^X hatched as chicken^Y but later mutated before it's death. This case is also impossible because of the small period.

So here is what really happened:
Cock^Z mated hen^Y. Their genes were so close that this was possible. It is like poodle mating rottweiler(I know - it is awful even to imagine this). They have different exteriors but their genes are slightly different which makes mating possible.
The result of cock^Z mating hen^Y is egg^X. Consequently egg was first.

Check out this video, which supports the hypothesis that it is possible for cock^Z to mate hen^Y.

4.03.2008 г.

Watching Sports online

Today a colleague of mine asked me where can he watch online soccer matches.
THIS is the site I use to watch soccer and tennis. They have Live TV section too, but I haven't explore it yet. The software you need can be downloaded from the site or from their official sites. I use Sopcast now, but I've tried TVAnts too.
Sopcast works fine. I had problems with Vista, but now everything is just fine.
A year ago the streams were lower than 320Kb, but now there are very quality streams.
Enjoy!

3.03.2008 г.

Counter Strike 1.6 + AMX mod X + bots + customization

Introduction

Last 2 months I made myself sure in how customizable Counter Strike is. There are lots of mods that can be easily installed and also there are tools for programming these mods.
This post has a purpose to share my experience in running CS 1.6 with AMX mod X installed and also the tricky part - installing bots with the mod. Also I'm gonna show how to customize the game by changing sounds,names,logos,texts and so on. Creating maps and mods is something I haven't tried yet so this is not included in this article.
So lets start from the begining.

Counter Strike Instalation

First install Counter Strike 1.6. Then if you want update it to the last version.
I updated to 1.6 v18.

The AMX mod X

After that it is time to install the AMX mod X. I downloaded it from
here. This is an archive. Extract the files in a random folder. You should have a "cstrike" folder and a .dll file. Copy them to the folder where you've installed the game.
For example if you have installed CS in "D:\Games\CS1.6" copy these dll and folder to that folder. OS will prompt you whether to replace existing files - do so.

The Bots

It is time now for the bots. I use ZBOT which you can download from
here. When you extract the files you will have again one "cstrike" folder. Remove the file liblist.dll from it and then copy this folder to the folder you've installed CS to. Again it should be something like "D:\Games\CS1.6" as it is on my PC.OS will prompt you whether to replace existing files - do so.
Now we should "tell" the game that there are bots installed. Open the folder (This is my folder tree, use yours) "D:\Games\CS1.6\cstrike\addons\metamod" and create a file named "config.ini" there. Easiest way to do this is to copy the plugins.ini file and rename it. Then open it with notepad or other text editor application and clear all the lines. Then add a single line "gamedll dlls\zbotcz.dll"(without the quotes of course).
And that is all. Enjoy the game.

Using AMX mod X and the Bots

What do you get with what we did so far? The AMX mod X gives you great variety of options. I use it to see how much damage I've done/received and to/from whom.You can also get statistics like "top15" which gives you the best players on this server,can vote for next map, can kick/ban and so on. Feel free to explore the console for other commands(there are many of them!).
When you start the server it is necessary to set your password in the console(it could be hardcoded in some of the .ini or .cfg files that are executed too) by typing rcon_password .
After that you can add bots with the menu or by using the console,set their difficulty,join team etc.

Counter Strike customization

This part is my favourite.

1) The auto buy configuration - Find and open the file autobuy.txt, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike". Change the sequence of items to buy first.

2)Bot customization - Find and open (with notepad) the file BotProfile.db, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike". Explore the content. You will find there bot names, templates and so on. Feel free to change Skill,Aggression,ReactionTime ...
and the funniest of all - their names. I changed their names to funny names and every time I kill someone I laugh at his name :).

3)Command menu configuration - Find and open the file commandmenu.txt, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike". This is a template, from which the menu is generated.

4)Game menus texts configuration - Find and open the file cstrike_english.txt, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike\resource". This file offers you a chance to customize almost every piece of text you will find in the game, including menus,descriptions etc. Feel free to experiment.I tried to add cyrilic characters but they appeared like hieroglyphs.

5)Theme music configuration - Find the file gamestartup.mp3, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike\media". This is the music you hear while in main menu of the game. Change this file with some .mp3 you like but if the .mp3 file is larger than 2Mb you will experience some delay when starting the game. So I cut 2Mb from Guano Apes-Lords of the boards.mp3 and now when I start CS that is what I hear.
NB -> Be sure that you rename your file to gamestartup.mp3.

6)Maps cycle configuration - Find and open the file maps.ini, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike\addons\amxmodx\configs". List there the maps you want to be shown when choosing next map.

7)Game logos configuration - Explore the content of the "resource" folder, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike\resource". Try to replace the .tga files with your logos. be sure to use only .tga (targa file) type 2 or 10 - don't ask me why,but Valve use this file format for logos.

8)Server start template configuration - this is my favourite one. Find and open the file motd.txt, located in my case in "D:\Games\CS 1.6\cstrike".This is the template that you see when connecting to a server. This is an HTML template and you can engage all your fantasy to edit it. I tried adding images and links and it works just fine.You can browse sites from Counter Strike. It doesn't have scrolling capabilities but you can check your e-mail from the game. This is incredible, isn't it?

Conclusion

Counter Strike is outstanding game which allows everybody to adjust it to himself. Installing mods and customizing makes the game more interesting and keeps the gamers obsessed and interested.
Recently I installed Half Life 1 and found that it can be customized too. By the way this is my favourite game :).