Harehunter

I have a version that would read either format, but write the extended format. i also have a document detailing the format. These are available on my website. Did you have a chance to look at how I dealt with the special nodes? This is in the version I have on my website. The direct link to the page is: http://www.hasenjs.byethost33.com/BoE/ExScenEd.html

One thing I found most frustrating about the current scenario file is that there are many things that have a fixed number of entities; only so many fields, monsters, items, special nodes. I had a concept of a layout that was more dynamic, where some towns/dungeons would have, for example, more special nodes than the 200 allowed, and others would have less, depending on their need. This would apply to signs, town entries, and other things as well. Another thing I found annoying was the inability to see the location on the design map things like horses, boats, etc. I fixed that in my VB version of the editor. Finally, the special node form had no way to see the meaning of a stuff done flag, or a sound setting or an inventory item. My VB editor addresses this problem as well by using list boxes and an additional file for the stuff done text. I really would like to get this re-written into a more common language so as to be accessible to the MAC community. If anyone has the time and the talent, I have uploaded the source code to my web site, and welcome any one to use any part of it. If there is interest, I will also upload my concept version of the dynamic database editor.

I also have a copy of version 1 for both Exile I and Exile II on my website, along with the hint books.

Dev-ccp is out dated as I understand it. Code::Blocks does keep coming out with newer versions. The Special Node structure is not bad in itself, What it lacked was a symbol table for the Stuff-Done flags I also found the arrays of radio buttons to be cumbersome, which is why I used drop-down list boxes on my editor.

The Wise family of Hobbits was so-named because they all had 32 teeth.

Enjoy it while you can.

Too much fun at work. So much so that I get to take it home with me. This is not sarcasm. I really do enjoy what I do, but trying to fill two jobs at once does take a bit more energy.

Congratulations Sylae. I hope it is one you can grow to enjoy once you get past the ritual of morning. If not, then I hope it makes a good stepping stone toward a job you can look forward to going to in the morning.

Getting a job that you enjoy, one you look forward to each morning, is like having a lifetime paid vacation.

Depends on whether I'm in the middle of a rather intense project. No project, and I sleep soundly, wake up refreshed. Big project and I wake up before O-Dark-Thirty with a brain buzz that won't let me sleep. All last year was one major project after another. I've always been a morning person, intolerably happy while everyone else is blindly groping for their coffee. My worst time of the day is between 2 and 3 in the afternoon, I think siesta should be a standard practice. Micro sleep does help to get through the day.

Re Drug trafficking and gun trafficking. http://unidir.org/pdf/articles/pdf-art918.pdf

Drugs and guns are not comparable with regard to their purpose. That is not my point. My point is that we have attempted to ban things that have been deemed to be dangerous. It is not the object of the ban that I am talking about. it is the ban itself. This is what I believe is an exercise in futility.

The only thing I can see coming out of increased gun control is futility. We tried to ban alcohol, even going to the extent of passing an amendment to the constitution. That worked out really well... NOT. We are still trying to ban the sale and use of marijuana. Slowly it is dawning on people that this is equally futile. Other hard drugs are still as abundant as ever, despite the so-called war on drugs. The notion that making guns illegal in this country will make them less available does not make sense to me given that our borders are so porous as to make a sieve seem like a pipeline. Maybe I am a pessimist, but that is what I see.

I apologize for the sarcasm in my last post, but I used it only to indicate that with respect to gun control, it is a very emotional issue. The arguments I have presented supporting the right to keep arms will never be accepted by those who believe that stricter laws will actually make them safer. On the other hand, the arguments for repealing, or severely limiting, the 2nd Amendment make just as little sense to me. Not everyone is as rational as the members of this forum are. There are people in the world that respect only strength, and who see discussions like this as a sign of weakness, a weakness that can be exploited for their own gain. While the vast majority of people are moral and law abiding, there are those who do not hold to that standard. Guns are out there, and there are already networks in place that will continue to supply them to immoral people bent on committing crime. The genie is out of the bottle. I see no way to effectively stuff it back in.

I'm guessing you have not heard of the present day Minutemen organization. Although they have not taken to secure the border by means of force, the deliberate lack of enforcement may mean that they may have to. I was a juror in a murder trial where the weapon was a fire extinguisher. Do we now ban fire extinguishers? A woman murdered her philandering husband with her car, running over him repeatedly. Do we now ban cars? Baseball bats, kitchen knives... the list goes on. To assume that just because a person has a firearm they are more likely to commit a crime is ludicrous. That is like saying that any person who has a few beers are 100% more likely to cause a homicide than someone who abstains completely. There is a saying that goes like this, "A locked door only keeps an honest man honest. The dishonest don't care about it either way." So it is OK to punish those who have committed no crime, in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, the people who seek to do harm won't get their hands on a tool with which to cause harm. Like a hammer, an axe, a shovel...

Actually, Texas has a militia independent of the National Guard and the regular army. In addition to this, there are many small informal militias that are completely dissociated from any state or federal control. I also understand that Texas is not alone in that regard. Disarming the law abiding citizens may sound like a good idea. Now if we could just disarm the drug cartel gangsters south of the border. And how does this take guns out of the hands of people who have already have a complete disregard for the law in the first place?

SoT, You bring up a valid point. While the militia made a significant impact during the revolution, the Colonies would not have succeeded in their war of independence without the aid of France. Lilith, Your point is equally valid. The Confederacy lacked one key factor that the Revolutionaries had; support from another world power capable of nullifying the Union blockade. That being said, it does not diminish the effect that those militia had upon either war. SoT, I understand your experience with the AR15. My first ROTC experience on the rifle range was with an M14 rifle. Quite a difference between a 7.62mm and the 5.56mm of an M16, which is selectable to semi or full automatic, unlike your Canadian clone, which was most likely an AR15 that has only two positions on the selector; safe and semi-automatic. BTW, there are far more gun owners that obey the laws than there are who violate the law. Will disarming those law abiding citizens get the guns out of the hands of those whose intent is to break the law in the first place? If outlawing a thing was so effective in removing it from the street, there would be no cocaine or methamphetamine being peddled.

I was inspired. There is a great deal of discussion as to the originating ideas behind the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court has ruled, and I believe rightly so, that the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right, not reserved solely for federal or state controlled military forces. The reference to the militia in the wording of the 2nd Amendment is not meant to restrict that right, but to provide support for it. But why did the framers of the Constitution want that right explicitly defined in the Law of the Land? The Federalist Papers are one of the prime historical references as to what was going on in the minds of the people, and those elected to represent them. There is reference to the idea that a well armed citizenry was the last bastion against the encroachment of tyranny. It was due in no small part to the militias, volunteer groups of men with no mandate from the state, that the presumed tyranny of the King of England and Parliament was thrown off. Had there not been a well armed citizenry to start with, there would have been no militias, and no independence. Is it possible for a tyrant to usurp the authority granted to the legislative body of government, and thereby become dictator over all those who had elected him to office? Witness Germany in the 1930's. Witness Cuba in the sixties. Witness the Bolshevic Revolution. Yes, it has happened, and it could happen here. I do not say that it is happening now, but there have been statements made that indicate a desire to strip our citizens of the rights guaranteed by the Law of the Land. In the heated passion invoked by the recent events, there are people who would willingly give up those rights if they believed it would make them safer. "Peace at any price" led to a global war. Appeasement has failed to stanch the acts of violence against the west. And gun-free zones make better targets for deranged mass murders than someplace where they may be confronted by a law abiding citizen who has the means to put a stop to their antics.

Lilith, I have a bone to pick with you. You've initiated a boneafied distraction that has thrown this discussion completely out of joint. You've even gotten Nikki to pun gravely. I'm trying to get a project done with only a skeleton crew, and I've been working my fingers to the bone. Meanwhile, there's quite a skull session going on here that's got everyone's jaw bones flapping. It is really quite humerus.

I will not broach the breech of the brocaded brooch.

I hear that the illustrious Senator Feinstein has introduced a bill that would confiscate any firearms that one may have upon their passing away. Actually what she said was that, if this bill were passed into law, that any guns a person owns could not be passed along to their heirs. What's next?

@Excalibur If negative specific heat isn't anti-intuitive enough, consider the relativistic concept of time-dilation which includes a factor of the square root of negative 1. As for the safe storage of hydrogen gas, I have heard of a method of combining it with certain metals to form a metal hydride compound. Very stable, relatively, and it can be coaxed into releasing its hydrogen readily for whatever use, either combustion (poor efficiency) or fuel cells, (requires expensive materials for catalysts). Interestingly enough, the wikipedia reference to hydrogen storage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_storage#Metal_hydrides) also mentions another chemical hydride that is stable, and in fact is already in common use today; carbohydrates.

Solar energy is not as eco-friendly as it seems. Either you destroy the eco-system of large tracts of land for solar-thermal generators, or you can build very clean solar panels. The problem with solar panels is that they are made with materials that are extremely toxic. Not only that, but energy required to mine, purify, and transport that toxic material, then to manufacture those solar cells themselves is greater than the energy produced by those solar panels. And where does that energy come from? Ethanol is a cleaner carbon based fuel than hexane. But then again, the energy required to produce it exceeds the energy output of the product itself. Hydrogen is absolutely the cleanest fuel to be had. Zero carbon emissions, and there is a vast abundance of it on this planet. Unfortunately, that vast abundance is already oxidized, and the energy required to reduce to molecular hydrogen again exceeds the energy output of the product itself. Hydro-electric power is also totally clean, except for what it does to the eco-systems of the streams that are dammed. This is particularly troublesome for those species of fish that migrate to the headwaters of those streams to spawn. Apparently there are trade-offs with any technology we choose.

SoD, Your wit is truly stunning. All that switching polarities must really hertz. The only way to rectify his current situation is for him to cross the Wheatstone Bridge. Once across the bridge, he'll need to be inducted into the civil service, where he can increase his capacitance for doing good. Only after discharging his civic duty can he become a direct electromotive force that can make the logical choice between one and zero.

Lilith, You're gooood. After the man was convicted of a-salt and battery, they locked him up in a dry cell. And if that were not shocking enough, the prison food they served was revolting. When he tried to put up some resistance, they took him before the circuit judge, who was only 5 feet tall. The resulting feedback was so negative, it left his ears ringing. For a whole week afterwards, he kept trying to answer his cell phone. P.S. I thought about the fruit flies last week, but I figured that I would spare you. Silly me.