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Thread: A good day for LaserBoy!

  1. #21
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    mixedgas is offline Creaky Old Award Winning Bastard Technologist
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    generated wav (no blanking):

    The noise is mostly from the scope, but it takes about a second to draw this 48000 vertice image.[/QUOTE]

    That looks about right!

    Steve

  2. #22
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    Steve. I'm not sure what you are going on about.

    If you benefit from ILDA's efforts to keep laser shows legal and safe, then fine! Join them and enjoy.

    I understand why there are regulating organization of all sorts in professional technology. Some of this stuff is incredibly dangerous!

    LaserBoy is not dangerous. It's math. Good math is proof of itself. It works. It can be examined backwards and forwards. It holds up to all scrutiny.

    As I said before, I did not invent any of the file formats that LaserBoy uses. All of them are open standards. I did, however invent a way to integrate those concepts into a development environment. That should have some value for everyone interested in laser display.

    The original ILDA 3 format to allow for 24 bit color was a very good extension of a format that wasn't too well designed from the beginning. This is the version that LaserBoy implements.

    Then, it was changed.

    I think it was changed for the sole purpose of busting LaserBoy. Look up the time line. There is a lot about it in alt.lasers and the laserist-list.

    It was changed in a way that is so obviously wrong, it's almost funny!

    Anyone with a passing understanding of C/C++ data structures can tell you that.

    I can't believe that the people responsible for that would publish it with their names on it!

    I would never attach my reputation to something so dumb.

    This kind of industry manipulation is not good for anyone.

    It is highly irresponsible to publish crap as a world standard.

    It doesn't make ILDA look very good in the eyes of a competent engineer.

    AND...

    If the newer versions 4 and 5 are not to be found in the public domain, then they are NOT open standards.

    James.
    Last edited by James Lehman; 05-09-2008 at 13:48.

  3. #23
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    James, the standard for ILDA was designed by developers that have been writing software many many years and they know everything, just ask the germans that were in charge of the tech committe at the time. The fact that ILDA has approved that standard, it's a STANDARD and if you don't like it, nothing you can do about it. Because you don't get why they did it, doesn't mean you can change it. It's there and it's there cause one developer and the group approved it for a reason.

    ILDA format is a format to share Frames between systems, not for displaying shows, or anything of that sort... it's to move Logo's to other systems.. or import frames from custom software to any system.

    If you don't like it, make your own LaserBoy Format, and just be able to read/write ILDA you don't have to champion the 2 bytes wasted... 4GB fits on your thumbnail now.

    Read it ILDA and store it in your code in your space saving format. no big deal..

    The other thing with what you feel is "Arbitrary" points that pangolin puts out... that's the difference between a "Frame" And what's outputted to Scanners.. There are reasons for it, and I'm sure Bill will be glad to tell you all about it and why... if you are at Selem.. you will learn alot Bill has been designing lasershow software for many many many years.. and he's really really good at it.


    rMuD

  4. #24
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    Rob.

    You're a programmer too. It's pretty simple stuff, really. There's no mystery. And I know you know a lot more about this very issue than most people. Can you explain _ANY_ benefits of the way it was left in 2004?

    And, during the evaluation period of the _proposed_ change to the standard, do you think it is reasonable for those "germans" to tell me that they don't need to explain anything to me, because I'm not an ILDA member?

    Who says I can't change the standard? I think I already did! There is a reason why the first good idea got F...'ed up!

    You say that ILDA is not for transporting show information. Well then, what is? ...Nothing that is an open standard; except for possibly the use of the wave file format.

    And as for the timing thing... I don't really care! I'm sure there are good reasons for many of the design concepts that are embodied in the Pangolin system. I was just pointing out an observable difference in the look of the wave files.

    Unlike many other systems developers out there, I did not attempt to copy the Pangolin model. As a matter of fact, the core concepts of my code came from "many many years" of using sound cards to play and record sine wave test tones for speaker measurement and development. Add to that the fact that I've been programming graphics stuff of all sorts since about 1980.

    The reason I care about this is because I consider what I do to be art. My pigments are math, logic and rational thinking. These must be as pure as the hues of light we all enjoy so much. That is the only way to make a solid foundation that will stand the test of time and accurately represent all possible aspects of a problem's solution in code. In other words good code writes itself. Crappy code falls to pieces. You know that!

    Being in a position to screw up the world standard should come with, at least, the responsibility of explaining why it was done.

    James.

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    Well regardless of the whos and whys the reason I brought up the format issue is because you don't match the published format but you still advertise it as format 3. This make is impossible for anyone but you to use your files. Also, format 3 is dead, which again, pretty much makes it impossible for anyone to use your files but you. That's fine if you only want people to use LaserBoy but not if you want to allow them to use the files elsewhere. Since LaserBoy is really not adequate for show creation and playback, I would think you would want to be able to exchange files with other software. You could at least change your format code to some other aribitrary number other than 0 - 5. I would be happy to add support for your format if you did. But, I am not going to modify my code to match your format 3 when it is not correct. Whether you like it or not, the standard always defines what is correct.

  6. #26
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    Here's a good analogy...

    Lets say the objective was to take a classic shirt design and simply add a pocket.

    OK. So the new shirt comes back from the designer and it has a pocket.

    Great!

    But it also has three sleeves and the extra one is twice as long and inside out from the rest of the shirt.

    Well... You put your arms into the right holes and it seems to cover your body. So all is well. Right?

    The only problem is that anyone who has ever seen a shirt before knows that it looks ridiculous!

    That is ILDA format 3; a shirt with a pocket and three sleeves.

    I just don't see any point in passing this kind of poor design on to other people for any reason.

    It SHOULD be protested and FIXED! That is how just about any other technology standards are figured out. They call them RFCs for open source computer science standard proposals. That is "Request For Comments". And those comments are welcome from anyone with a valid point of view.

    This isn't a creative writing exercise. There is NO subjectivity here. It's not a matter of whether I "like" it or not.

    BTW This is why I got fed up over three years ago and faded away for a while.

    And all I have ever asked for is a reaonable explaination of why it was changed!

    To be completely honest, I think maybe the thing to do is keep the header type 2. It _IS_ a palette. The only difference is that a standard type 2 palette must be less than 256 colors; whereas a color table is assumed to have more than 256 colors. If it was done right, there is a possibility that old ILDA file readers might get through it OK. They might still see the first 250-or-so colors and if the vector data that followed was indexed properly, it might match most of the proper colors. The way an up-to-date file reader would distinguish a palette from a color table could be just one bit of information stored in the "future" byte or something similarly noticeable, but not destructive.

    Also remember, when I wrote that part of the code, there was no "accepted" ILDA format 3. It was only a proposal. So there certainly wasn't a 4 or 5. How could I know to number my color table section headers 6?

    I'm not trying to be an ass. I don't want any of you to not like me. I'm a decent person and I want to contribute something truly meaningful to this technology and artform.

    If ILDA format 4 and 5 are legitimately available to me as a non ILDA member, I would like to have them.

    James.

    PS. I know a little bit about German programmers who know everything. I may not live in Germany, but my last name is Lehman!
    Last edited by James Lehman; 05-09-2008 at 22:09.

  7. #27
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    Actually, the analogy is that that the shirt came back with 3 sleeves and then they threw it in the trash. Except, you didn't get the message and are wearing a shirt with a pocket that you sewed on yourself. Meanwhile everyone else is wearing the new style of shirt that has a hood and won't talk to you because you aren't hip with the new fashion.

    I emailed the ILDA spec to you yesterday, by the way.

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    Well, at least you seem to recognise that the format is bad. No one else has ever acknowledged that much. It's a bummer that there are files out there with that structure.

    James.

  9. #29
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    Format 3 was completely removed from the ILDA file format spec. So, I guess you could say that it was acknowledged by the ILDA committee as being a bad idea. I have run into a few files out there using Format 3 but they did at least match the format as defined in 2004. So, even though it is a goofy format, it does work if you follow it.

  10. #30
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    Couldn't have said it any better!

    Quote Originally Posted by carmangary View Post
    Actually, the analogy is that that the shirt came back with 3 sleeves and then they threw it in the trash. Except, you didn't get the message and are wearing a shirt with a pocket that you sewed on yourself. Meanwhile everyone else is wearing the new style of shirt that has a hood and won't talk to you because you aren't hip with the new fashion.

    I emailed the ILDA spec to you yesterday, by the way.

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