Topics

1

General Programming / So, who's going to release the first Battle.net 2.0 client?

« on: June 22, 2010, 02:27:41 pm »

The new Battle.net 2.0 cross-game, RealID chat system is being released, in full, today. This is going to be the first legitimate release of the software in a working client. Safe to say the protocol won't be changing entirely after this point.

An AIM-like client would be badass.

2

General Discussion / BlizzCon 2010!

« on: June 05, 2010, 03:25:34 pm »

Woot, got tickets.

3

Blizzard, WoW and Bots / Cataclysm Alpha!

« on: May 04, 2010, 02:42:20 pm »

Friend and family invites been going out. Hooray for blizzard employee guildy hookups.

http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/8163/cataicon.jpg

Edit: If anyone else gets invited, I'll be on Gilneas PvP server, Horde side. Character's name is Treesus.

4

General Programming / Create a tiff image of any file type?

« on: April 07, 2010, 01:19:17 pm »

I've been writing various revisions of an application that I use at work on a regular basis. The application's purpose is to convert any file type to a tiff image. In other words, create a tiff image of that file.

Originally, I used the Windows Imaging Printer Driver, or whatever it is called. It's the built in Windows printer driver that converts what you print to an image output file. This does tiff, and it was fast. The problem with this was that it was finicky. The application has to run in the background and require no user intervention. The Windows Imaging printer would often error out and I don't think it was able to convert "anything" to an output image.

I looked for toolkit solutions that I could use with C# and that wouldn't require an external printer driver. I found one toolkit, but it didn't support a wide range of file types - lacked Visio, most notably. I believe the lack of file type support is because it doesn't require Office to print, so they're somehow imeplementing their own print rendering methods for each type, or however that works. I didn't find many others that looked professional enough to use.

I went back to the printer driver solution, but this time found a printer driver written for my exact purpose. It can take most any input that I've tried, so far, and converts it to an output image. It still relies on host applications to provide the print feature, but can supposedly be fed raw file data and determine how to render it on it's own. I've tried this and haven't been able to get it to print anything, yet. It just enters and leaves the print spool.

Anyways, I'm just wondering if anyone knows of a toolkit that can essentially do this. I know I could just as easily use Adobe to convert anything to a PDF, but TIFF is a standard we have to follow.

5

General Discussion / beta irc server changes

« on: March 02, 2010, 12:24:46 am »

I know various users check these forums regularly, and might have been afk during today's events.

I was experiencing the world's weirdest internet issue. My verizon fios connection at home was unable to ping or tracert my server's IP address. My server was online and functioning just fine. It was a routing issue on Verizon's end. They were taking weeks to even understand the issue, so I just decided to inquire about getting a new IP for my server. I had asked about getting a new IP for free, and didn't expect them to just give me one. I figured there'd be some kind of final confirmation or something. Well, they didn't give me any notice and changed my server's IP. I was able to change all DNS entries that I have access to, to reflect this change. I do not have access to b3t4.org's, though. So, irc.b3t4.org may come back sometime in the future if it ever gets changed, but immediate action was required and so the beta irc server now has a new "permanent" hostname.

Please use irc.betawarz.com, or beta.tehnet.org to connect to my server. TehUser's server, irc.tehnet.org, also still works.

6

General Programming / C#, forms, single instance app with command line params from additional instance

« on: October 27, 2009, 10:48:01 am »

I'm writing a C# tiff viewer at work, and one requirement is that it re-uses the an application instance if one is already running, instead of opening up multiple instances. The application is a windows forms app, and it opens image files specified via command line params.

Restricting the application to a single instance was the easy part - I just used a named mutex. I'm just trying to find a way to make my main Form reload the newly specified file path, though. I know of 3 ways but none really satisfy me, unless they're the only way.

• The first one is to simply kill the running process and start a new one, but that looks really bad and it would be much nicer if the app just seamlessly loaded the new image file.
• The second is to use some visual basic form class, or something, that supposedly supports this, but I'd rather not start importing visual basic namespaces if I don't have to. I'd rather kill the previous instance instead of using the visual basic method.
• The third is to use RemotingServices and ChannelServices to kind of tunnel the params in, this just seems overkill and I don't know that this will be an options since hundreds of users could be using this app on the same windows 2008 server at a time.

Anyone know of a better way to do this?

7

General Discussion / Windows 7, Win Classic theme

« on: October 11, 2009, 09:22:11 pm »

Well, I remember on Vista that the Windows Classic theme just felt jerky, or sluggish. It had redraw issues while dragging windows. It seems that this still exists for me in Windows 7.

Does anyone know if there may be something I need to disable in order to make the Windows Classic theme feel less sluggish? Hopefully somebody knows what I mean. I'm in the mood for some Win Classic!

8

Gaming / Batman: Arkham Asylum

« on: October 02, 2009, 05:00:36 pm »

I've been looking at pictures of this game today and am kind of in the mood to buy an xbox 360 game. I hardly play my xbox anymore, and wouldn't mind a fun game to pick up and play for like 30 minutes each night before hopping in bed.

Is this game any good?

9

Trash Can / Adobe Flash CS4

« on: September 15, 2009, 11:42:03 pm »

If anyone sees this, and knows where or how I can get a cracked version of Flash CS4, could you send me a private message about where or how. The torrent sites I use don't seem to have any torrents for a cracked version.

10

Blizzard, WoW and Bots / What do "hardcore" raiding guilds want to see from an application?

« on: August 31, 2009, 02:42:20 pm »

I have horrible luck with guild applications. I don't tend to make online friendships in WoW (I just play, and don't often talk on vent for fun), so I rarely join guilds based on reputation. I always seem to start over fresh with every application.

But, I think most hardcore guilds want to see a few things from applicants.

• Ofcourse effort into gear, gems, enchants. This should be obvious.
• Experience in whatever content the guild is attempting. Your achievments will be scrutinized.
• A raiding spec that'll result in maximum raid utility. Don't fuck up here, or you're in for some trolling.
• A functional UI.
• Are you a clicker? Clicking takes away the use of your mouse for mouse turning.

I mean, I don't know. It seems pretty standard and simple. I just applied to the number 1 guild on our server, and they're like top 10 in the US, also. They're making fun of my app, sort of, because they think I don't use the mouse to turn based on my action bars. I always use my mouse to turn. =\

11

Blizzard, WoW and Bots / World of Warcraft: Cataclysm announced

« on: August 21, 2009, 03:25:00 pm »

Check it out: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/cataclysm/

12

General Discussion / Longest crash ever...

« on: August 21, 2009, 01:59:05 pm »

This is funny: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XeJL-hcIQTk

Similar in quality to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0Asjh-HjRE

13

General Discussion / QuakeCon 09

« on: August 12, 2009, 03:08:54 pm »

I'll be going with a group of my friends. If anyone else is attending, let me know. I can pwn you at CS, or share my inifite knowledge of programming.

14

General Discussion / Looking for more classic, well-known gaming terms.

« on: August 05, 2009, 09:30:42 pm »

I'm trying to compile a list of short phrases or terms that apply to gaming, in general. Terms that probably any gamer of any genre would perhaps know. Terms like.. 1up, fragged, ding, instagib, etc.

If you can think of any, I'd appreciate it.

15

General Discussion / PayPal dispute - what should I do?

« on: June 10, 2009, 06:07:14 pm »

So, I've been playing WoW with 2 accounts over the past year or so. I wasn't double boxing, but for a period of about 2 months I paid for an extra account so me and a friend could do RAF. The account ended up with a level 80 Paladin, and a 74 Hunter on it.

So, on Sunday I sold the account to somebody that I just randomly contacted through craigstlist. I made sure he gave me the money first, and I immedietly withdrew it from paypal. Today, I found out that he opened a dispute claiming the transaction was not authorized and that he was unaware of the transaction. The money is already in my bank account. Paypal stuck me with a -390$ balance. They're investigating the dispute and have asked me to deposit the money or refund it to him while they investigate.

I looked on wowarmory and it looks as if the account got into the hands of gold farmers, because the paladin is completely stripped except for his teir gear that cant be vendored. The hunter seems to have been deleted.

Think I should just keep the money? I don't quite know what to expect paypal to do. I have a feeling they'll side with the gold farmers because I doubt this is their first time stealing accounts and I think they probably know what to expect from PayPal as far as disputes go. I don't want the account back, either - that's why I sold it to begin with.

The guys paypal was not a confirmed address. It apparantly belongs to some mexican living in the Houston area, using a PO box. I wonder what I should do. The fact that it appears to be some type of gold farmer, though, makes me think that if I just refuse to refund him via paypal then I don't think he'd take it to civil court.