This is the semi-mythical "lost" serial from Doctor Who. Written by Douglas Adams at the height of his powers, and cruelly lost to an industrial dispute. There have been many attempts to recreate the show - but this is the definitive edition. All the missing sequences have been animated - with the original cast providing their voices. And what a show it is! The dialogue is sharp - rarely a…
Continue reading →
Palia’s emotions are in turmoil. After watching her son succumb to Empyrean fire, she barely escapes the same fate. Guilt ridden and alone, she will not stop until his killer is brought to justice. The Protectorate forbids Ferrash to have emotions. That suits him, since he cannot avoid the people who control the Empyrean. Making this sacrifice prevents them from hijacking his feelings and using …
Continue reading →
(I *sure* this was the basis a short story I read - but I can't find it. So I'm (re)writing it. If you know of the original, please let me know…!) The speed of light is a universal constant. This "speed limit" is fundamental to everything we understand about physics. Information - when propagated via the electromagnetic spectrum - cannot travel faster than 0.3 Gigametres per second. There is no a…
Continue reading →
This is not one of the best Doctor Whos. But it is fascinating as a template for New-Who. A cold open on an alien planet! A celebrity comedian cameo! A feisty female companion! Wales! On paper, Delta contains all the ingredients for a great serial. What if all the weird people at your holiday camp are weird because they're aliens?!!? Is that bus really a spaceship? What if your best friend's…
Continue reading →
At the start of 2020, for some strange reason, I decided to publish a new blog post every single day of the year. And, a third of the way through that, COVID struck. In a way, it was good for my motivation. I didn't have any fun and exciting trips to go on - so I had plenty of free time. But there's only so long you can stare at four walls while your friends are sick and dying, without going out …
Continue reading →
What a treat of a movie! Kate Winslet shows, once again, how great acting isn't about who can shout the loudest, but who can convey the most meaning through a single glance. It is a movie of delightful contrasts - the sound design is overpoweringly loud, until it suddenly disappears. The silence is rarely punctuated with anything so crude as dialogue. In a way, the sex scenes feel not…
Continue reading →
As previously discussed, I'm doing the Certified Blockchain Professional course. It is self-directed learning, so I'm going through it at my own pace. In order to consolidate my learning, and help organise my thoughts, I'm blogging about my reflections on each module. These are mostly notes to myself - but I hope if you find something interesting (or incorrect) that you'll leave a comment. …
Continue reading →
Why do I do this to myself? Why? As part of my ongoing MSc, I have to take 3 professional training courses. I've completed my cybersecurity course, and I have a Machine Learning course booked for January. So what to do next? There's a lot of discussion in government circles about Blockchain. As with any new tech, there are plenty of Thought Leaders™ and sales drones trying to push it. For e…
Continue reading →
I recently purchased a book for my MSC which was only available via a crappy Android app. There was no obvious way to decrypt it to read on a more sensible device, so I resorted to the ancient art of screenscraping. This is a quick-and-dirty way to grab images of the pages and convert them to a standard PDF using Linux. There's a lot more you can do to make the end book more useful, but this'll…
Continue reading →
How efficient are modern codecs? Can we ever work out whether the power use of compression algorithms is a net gain for global power consumption? Come on a thought experiment with me. I have invented a new image compression format. It shrinks images to 50% smaller sizes than AVIF and is completely lossless. Brilliant! There's only one problem - it is 1 million times slower. If it takes your…
Continue reading →
I'm not a big fan of superhero movies - and the Marvel ones are particularly bad - but this is… pretty good! It's nice to see a modern / westernised "Kung Fu" movie. All the budget of a blockbuster, all the cheese of cheap Wuxia. It's refreshing that so much of it is subtitled - and surprisingly brave for a Hollywood studio. There's no daft love-story wedged in, and no obsessive call-backs to p…
Continue reading →
Over the last 20 years, open source software has undergone a significant shift—from providing an optimistic model for public collaboration to undergoing constant maintenance by the often unseen solo operators who write and publish the code that millions of users rely on every day. In Working in Public, Nadia Eghbal takes an inside look at modern open source software development, its evolution o…
Continue reading →
