Marowak's Lawn

Dragon Nest

Dragon Nest is an action role-playing game that incorporates elements of classic RPGssuch as Zelda, Grandia and even the Final Fantasy, a Japanese manga style graphicsattractive, and MMORPGs alike. It has a quickly-play style with a dynamic fighting combos and great visual impact. With third-person view, in combat you can switch to first person perspective.
It can be played with keyboard and mouse or with Jostick.

As you saw the game is a hack & slash with air to Ragnarok Online (no variabilityobviously)

The game works with a system of "combos" so to speak, but not as the CABAL or othergames where you have to follow the sequence as default and press the same string of buttons forever.
The game is very fast and the number of movements that can be done, and magic skills, allow us to attack non-stop and in the sequence we pretend.

This type of non-stop combos is what, for me, diferences this game from all the others, because you can keep enemies or characters (PVP) bouncing off the floor unable to defend themselves.
Obviously that PVP is not as easy to keep the combo infinitely.

Each server has a number of channels, such as the world map, the Coliseum (PVP) with ladder system / equipment and other maps that have not yet come to explore.

The Game 1997

Original Title: The Game

Duration: 128 minutes

Genre: Thriller
Director: David Fincher (The Social Network, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Fight Club, among others).

Cast: Michael Douglas, Sean Penn, James Rebhorn, Deborah Kara Unger.

Personally I think a thriller is good when it keeps you in suspense all the time and you don't know what's coming up next. That's why i belive this movie is brilliant: It has all the necessary ingredients for a good movie including unexpected twists in the story. It will keep your ass on the chair from the minute 1 until the end.

Synopsis:

Everything begins when a lonely and embittered millionaire named Nicholas Van Orton (Michael Douglas) receives as a birthday gift from his younger brother (Sean Penn) an invitation to a sort of an exclusive club where it is promised that will change your life. Giving up to curiosity, Nicholas visits CRS (Consumer Recreation Services). Rapidly after that he discovers that he has been enrolled in a game - "a profound life experience" that begins quietly but soon erupts in a rush of devastating events.

The slow motion sequence at the end is also well done and this has got to be one of the best endings of all time.

Trailer:

Cornell Notes

This wednesday i'll start going to college so i thought that i should improve my study methods (i'm really desorganized and lazy =( ). Surfing the internet i came across with the Cornell note taking system, and i found that it could be helpful so i decided to share the knowledge of this system to everyone that never heard of it.

A little wiki intro:
The Cornell method provides a systematic format for condensing and organizing notes. It was devised in the 1950s by Walter Pauk, an education professor at Cornell University. Pauk advocated its use in his best-selling 'How to Study in College'.

Divide and Conquer!

Note Taking Area: Record the lecture as fully and as meaningfully as possible here using brief and concise telegraphic sentences. Try to abbreviate common-long words to save time.
Cue Column: You should write here after the reading. Here goes all the main ideas, questions that actually makes you think (try to predict the exam items), important relationships between pieces of information and reminders. The main idea of this column is to write down info that help connect ideas listed in the notes section. When you're studying, you will look at these cues to help you recall the salient facts in your notes, so keep that in mind when you create your cues.
Summaries: Write a summary of the main ideas using your own words.

Examples:

http://www.englishcompanion.com/pdfDocs/cornellintro.pdf

Cornell Method PDF Generator: http://www.eleven21.com/notetaker/

Very useful tool to create your own 'custom' Cornell Page.

PDF Template: http://www.freewebs.com/lanzbom/cornellnotes.pdf

Creating an Ad-hoc network - Windows 7

I'm really sory for not posting daily, last week was a hell for me. I was really busy and i didn't had time for anything.
Today i'm making a mini guide to create an Ad-hoc network to share internet from one pc to another without the need of nothing more than a wireless adapter.

Asuming that you have already installed the drivers the first step is crating a new network on the pc that has internet.

Control Panel\Network and Internet\Network and Sharing Center

Click on:

'Set up a new connection or network'.

A new windows will pop-up. Choose:

'Set up a wireless ad hoc (computer-to-computer) network.'

Here you should choose one of the 3 options. I'm going to chose an open network (there's no need for any security since this is only an example and i'm not going to use this network. You should asign WEP/WPA2).

So we created the network, but it' is not displayed in Control Panel\Network and Internet\Network and Sharing Center.

Why? Well since this is a computer-to-computer network you'll need that someone else (other computer) connects to the network. Lets do it.

Go to the computer that does NOT have internet access.

Control Panel\Network and Internet\Network and Sharing Center > Connect to a Network.

I named the network Guide-Blog.

Windows XP GUI

This is how it looks like in W7

Ok we've created the network and both pcs are connected to it. What's next?

On the pc that already has internet.
Control Panel\Network and Internet\Network and Sharing Center

Click on :

Wireless Network Connection->Properties->Sharing (the network that provides internet to that pc)

Check the box:

'Allow users to connect through this computer's internet connection.'

Click 'Ok' and the without exiting the other windows click on 'Details'.

Write down the DNS Server adress.

Now same thing but, with the other network. (Guide-Blog).

Wireless Network Connection->Properties->Internet Protocol V4->Properties.

It should look something like that. Remember the IP Adress: 192.168.x.y

Where 'x' is a value between 1-255.

Where 'y' is a value between 2-254.(1 is reserved for the network adress, and 255 it's the broadcast adress).

Ok it's all done with this pc, lets go to the other one.

Same thing:

Wireless Network Connection->Properties->Internet Protocol V4->Properties.

>IP Adress: It should be the same that the other computer's adress but the 'y' value must not be the same!.

>Default Gateway: The other computer's IP adress.

>DNS Server: Do you remember the adress that you write down before? Goes in here!.

If you have any question, i'll be more than happy to help you!

Music Videos

Besides of the fact of sharing with you my muscial taste, this post has the purpose to intoduce a few videos that i belive are worth to watch. Without further ado, the videos!:

Weapon of Choice - Fatboy Slim (2001)

Possibly the best fucking moves i've ever seen. The video won multiple awards at the 2001 MTV Video Music Awards and earned a Grammy Award for Best Short Form Video.

Do the Evolution - Pearl Jam (1998)

The first time i watched this video i was amazed. It represents so well the essense of the lyric.

Losing my Religion - R.E.M. (1991)

This is my personal favorite. R.E.M. is a band that i sort of inherit from my father. One of the best band IMHO.

The Scientist - Coldplay (2003)

The music video for "The Scientist" was very popular with its reverse narrative. In order for Martin to appear to be mouthing the lyrics in the reversed footage, he had to learn to sing the song backwards, which took him a month to do!.

One - Metallica (1989)

This was the first Metallica song for which a music video was created. Great debut in the film industry :D.

Ok no unkwown or new bands in this post, just old classics.

Bitcoin

What is Bitcoin?

Bitcoin is a digital currency designed in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto.

What makes this new currency great?

>There’s no central authority managing it.

>You can transfer them to anyone that has a digital wallet, for free (in any country). Ther's no third party involved.

>Your account can not be frozen.

Damn Bitcoins how do they work?!

The first subject I will talk about is transactions: In order to give and recibe bitcoins(BTC from now on) you will need the official client (download link is below). Once you got this, and it connects to the Bitcoin network, it performs two primary actions:

>It generates a pair of unique keys. One public and the other one private (both mathematically linked).

An example of a Bitcoin adress: 1GkNSJurCKkv2jj2Ajcwf2So1JKt639qcV.

>It downloads the hole public log that contains all the transactions ever done.

When you send some bitcoins to someone, you create a message (transaction), attaching the new owner's public key to this amount of coins, and sign it with your own private key. After this is done, the transactions is broadcasted to everyone in the network (clients that are not involved in the transfer).

This way all the clients verify the integrity of the message: they check that this transaction is legit (uses the public key to confirm that the true owner of the pair sent the money) and that the person that sends the money has the BTC to spend (they can check this with the block chain).

Some of these clients (a.k.a. miners) are in a race to solve some sort of a cryptographic puzzle so they can add a new block to the block chain and this way be rewarded with BTC.

"Bitcoin transactions are broadcast to the network by the sender, and all peers generating coins collect them and add them to the block they're working on."

When your software receives the updated log it knows your payment was successful.

Glossary:

>Block: Data is permanently recorded in the Bitcoin network through blocks. Each block contains all recent transactions, a nonce (random number), and the hash of the previous block. A block is "solved" (published and considered valid by peers) when the SHA-256 hash of the entire block is numerically below the current target.

>Block chain: A full copy of a currency's block chain contains every transaction ever executed in the currency. With this information, one can find out how much value belonged to each address at any point in history.

How do I get started?

First of all you need a digital wallet . You can either download the official Bitcoin client from here: http://www.bitcoin.org/ or you could use online wallets such as: InstaWallet or MyBitcoin (I’ve never tried this, use them at your own risk). If you choose to get the downloadable client make sure to back up the .dat file frequently.

After that you can get 0.05 BTC for free from here: https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/ to get started with.

How do I get moar of this awesome coins?

You can: Purchase or Generate them.

Generating BTC: Mining

I owe you this section, it's a little bit long and i'm thinking to make a new entry explaining it since this is just an intro to Bitcoin.

What’s a pool?

It’s a server where multiple clients contribuite in order to generate a block. After it’s done the profit is shared among all according to the power of process of each client (Mhash/s).

This is a list with a few pool’s that I’m aware of:

Deepbit : https://deepbit.net/

Slush: http://mining.bitcoin.cz/

BTC Guild: http://www.btcguild.com/index.php

BTC Mine: http://btcmine.com/

Bitcoins.lc: http://www.bitcoins.lc/

Eligius: http://eligius.st/

Swepool.net: http://swepool.net/

BitcoinPool: http://bitcoinpool.org/ << I belive this one is down.

Simplecoins: http://simplecoin.us/

Bitclockers: http://bitclockers.com/

Online webs to buy/sell BTC

BitcoinMarket: https://www.bitcoinmarket.com/ ConBitcoin: http://conbitcoin.com/
BitMarket: https://bitmarket.eu/
TradeHill: https://www.tradehill.com/
Mtgox: https://mtgox.com/