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476

General Software Discussion / Amazon Lumberyard goes open source, renamed to Open 3D Engine (O3DE)

« Last post by Deozaan on July 06, 2021, 10:59 PM »

On July 6th, 2021, the Linux Foundation announced the public availability of the Open 3D Engine (O3DE) open-source project and the formation of the Open 3D Foundation.

As a founding partner in O3DE, Amazon Web Services and the AWS Lumberyard team has been working on this effort for awhile, preparing the code and tools for a developer-centric initial release.

-https://o3de.org/blog/posts/welcome-post/

Amazon is contributing its Lumberyard game engine to open source, and it will be known as the Open 3D Engine.

The Linux Foundation will oversee the project and form the Open 3D Foundation to accelerate collaboration with game developers to enhance the triple-A game engine.

-https://venturebeat.com/2021/07/06/amazons-lumberyard-becomes-an-open-source-3d-game-engine-with-support-from-20-companies/

So what’s changed? Is this Lumberyard with an open-source license?

In short, a lot! Yes, it’s open source, under the permissive Apache 2.0 license. And no, O3DE is very different than the artist formerly known as Lumberyard. We leaned heavily on our Lumberyard experiences, iterated, and improved O3DE for eventual collaboration and creative control. We kept the parts that customers loved most about Lumberyard and significantly revamped the rest. We aimed to build an engine that could stand the test of time in an open source world. Because game engines tend to be monolithic, we leaned heavily toward becoming modular with extensibility, embracing open standards tooling from the onset. However, we remained unsatisfied, so we added a new prefab system, a new build system, an extensible UI, many new cloud capabilities, numerous math library optimizations, new networking capabilities, and far too many performance improvements to mention here. Also, for good measure, we even added a whole new PBR renderer capable of forward+ and deferred rendering with ray tracing and GI support!

-https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/gametech/open-3d-engine/

from o3de.org

477

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on July 03, 2021, 08:53 AM »

Why Windows 11 won't run on your new $5,000 Surface PC, but a Mac from 2013 can run the next-gen macOS from zdnet

-wraith808 (July 03, 2021, 05:44 AM)

What that article says (or insinuates) is that Microsoft announced that Windows 10 would be the last version of Windows when they thought there would be higher adoption of UWP and the Microsoft Store, so they could rake in ~30% of all sales taking place on their store and not have to concern themselves with earning money from selling new versions of Windows. Now that they've seen relatively little adoption of their storefront, they've decided to re-theme Windows 10 and force people to pay them for it by requiring them to buy a new computer (and therefore require a new Windows license for the new hardware since Windows 10 licenses are tied to the hardware) to run it.

478

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on July 01, 2021, 09:17 PM »

The Raspberry Pi 4 can run Windows 11:

-Deozaan (June 29, 2021, 08:25 PM)

Kind of makes a mockery of MS' minimum hardware specs, especially w.r.t. the CPU.

-4wd (June 30, 2021, 01:09 AM)

To be fair, the RPi 4 has a CPU that was made within the past few years, so it may support TPM 2.0.

479

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on June 29, 2021, 08:25 PM »

The Raspberry Pi 4 can run Windows 11:

480

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on June 28, 2021, 01:03 AM »

And having an older laptop with higher hardware specs than most of the brand new crap available on the current market won't save your ass from obsolescence, any more.

My 2.90GHz quad core CPU doesn't qualify, even though it meets the minimum requirements of 1 GHz and at least 2 cores, simply because it's not on their list, by name.

-app103 (June 27, 2021, 05:57 PM)

Your CPU may not have TPM 2.0. My still-quite-capable quad-core (8 threads) Core i7-2600K 3.4GHz CPU certainly doesn't have TPM 2.0 since I bought it in 2011.

AFAIK my machine meets or surpasses all other requirements.

And it's not a good time to buy a new PC due to all the shortages, etc., anyway. Maybe by 2025 or so I'll be ready for a new PC, and the shortages will be a thing of the past. But right now I'm still pretty happy with my 10 year old machine.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on June 25, 2021, 05:46 PM »

Looks like I may not be getting Windows 11 any time soon. According to BGR:

The best part about Windows 11 is that it’s available free of charge, which means Windows 10 users will be able to update their devices without paying any upgrade fees to Microsoft. However, some people will have to shell out extra cash for Windows 11 because Microsoft has stricter compatibility rules that exclude many older computers from running the new OS.

Microsoft will officially support 8th Gen and newer Intel Core processors and Apollo Lake, and newer Pentium and Celeron processors, reports The Verge. Over on AMD, you’d have to have Ryzen 2000, Ryzen Threadripper 2000, or Epyc 2nd Gen or later to run Windows 11.

Also, Windows 11 now requires a TPS (Trusted Platform Module) of 1.2 support or later as well as UEFI Secure Boot. This should help improve protection against malware and ransomware. And Microsoft did say that Windows 11 will be more secure than ever.

Laptops and PCs without TPM support in BIOS might run into Windows 11 installation issues. David Weston, Microsoft’s director of enterprise and OS security at Microsoft, said that “almost every CPU in the last 5-7 years has TPM.” He advises users to ensure BIOS options for “PTT” on Intel or “PSP fTPM” on AMD are enabled. That certainly doesn’t make it sound like the upgrade will be a user-friendly experience.

If your computer fails to pass the Windows 11 upgrade checker, then your CPU might not be good enough for the new OS and you’ll need to buy a new computer in order to use Microsoft’s free Windows 11 upgrade. On the other hand, if you happen to have an older system that’s already struggling with Windows 10, you should probably consider upgrading anyway.

-https://bgr.com/tech/windows-11-update-new-system-requirements-intel-amd-chips-5934547/

Weird how flippantly they seem to say "throw away your perfectly capable device just because it's older, and buy a new one." Aren't these the same corporations and people who claim to be concerned about the environment, e-waste, carbon footprints, etc.?

My system is a 2nd Generation i7 built in 2011. I only expected it to "last" 5 years before I'd want to upgrade to a more powerful machine, but to my surprise I'm still very happy with how well Windows 10 performs on it even 10 years later. My only recurring complaint lately is that I have a small 128GB SSD for the OS, and a fairly large, 5TB, but very slow mechanical HDD for everything else. So I wouldn't mind getting a new SSD to help speed up access to some of my more often used apps and games now that 1-2 TB SSDs are fairly affordable.

Do you know if that is also true of Win11 Pro and Enterprise, assuming they keep those versions?

-rjbull (June 25, 2021, 04:34 PM)

Check out Microsoft's Windows 11 Specifications. It looks like the answer is... "No, but maybe yes."

• Windows 11 Home edition requires internet connectivity and a Microsoft account to complete device setup on first use.
• Switching a device out of Windows 11 Home in S mode also requires internet connectivity. Learn more about S mode here.
• For all Windows 11 editions, internet access is required to perform updates and to download and take advantage of some features. A Microsoft account is required for some features.

-https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-11-specifications

The latest bugbear was Microsoft News appearing on the task bar.  I thought it was a program in itself and couldn't find a way to remove it, eventually realising you had to turn it off.  But I didn't want it there in the first place.

-rjbull (June 25, 2021, 04:34 PM)

I actually was pleasantly surprised to see the current weather show up in the tray. I just wish that clicking on it would open the Microsoft Weather app so I could see the forecast, rather than a million pointless news stories and gossip rags I'd never be interested in viewing.

482

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on June 24, 2021, 10:47 PM »

I also didn't like how it opened up with "[Windows 11's Start button] is cloud-powered."

Maybe Microsoft was right about Windows 10... It may be the last version of Windows for me. I may finally make the move to Linux once Windows 10 reaches EOL if Windows 11 integrates too many cloud-powered, "software as a service" type subscription centered annoyances.

483

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on June 24, 2021, 03:35 PM »

It looks like user interface fashion is repeating the cycle. We went from flat rectangles, to curved edges, to transparency ("glass") effects, back to flat rectangles, and now Windows 11 is taking us back to curves and transparency effects. And every time they change it they say it is more "modern" than the last iteration.

Some companies who are just joining the flat theme bandwagon are going to be left behind again. For example, Unity just overhauled their whole UI to be flat within the past couple of years. I wonder how long it will take them to go back to curves.

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General Software Discussion / Windows 11 Announced

« Last post by Deozaan on June 24, 2021, 03:26 PM »

Well, I had heard the rumors and even the "confirmations" of the leaks, but I had assumed that the "Windows 11" moniker was just an internal name since Microsoft has said that Windows 10 would be the last version of Windows ever. But it seems they're actually calling it Windows 11.

They had a big, hour long presentation today, which I didn't watch. But I did watch this trimmed down to about 7-minutes version from the Verge:

485

DC Gamer Club / Re: Latest GOG Giveaway

« Last post by Deozaan on June 23, 2021, 11:56 PM »

I thought I posted this already, but it seems I forgot to press submit or something.

ARMA: Cold War Assault is free on GOG for the next 12 hours or so.

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DC Gamer Club / Re: Latest GOG Giveaway

« Last post by Deozaan on June 17, 2021, 11:04 AM »

Absolute Drift is free for the next 2 days:

487

DC Gamer Club / Re: Latest GOG Giveaway

« Last post by Deozaan on June 14, 2021, 02:08 PM »

Hellpoint is free for the next ~42 hours:

I haven't played it, but it looks like a mix of Lovecraftian horror, sci-fi, and Dark Souls. It also features co-op.

488

Living Room / Re: swf to gif (or other usable format)

« Last post by Deozaan on June 05, 2021, 01:19 AM »

I've also used SWF File Player with some success in the past.

489

Living Room / Re: Opt out of Amazon sharing your bandwidth with your neighbors

« Last post by Deozaan on June 03, 2021, 12:40 AM »

I kind of like the idea of having a more decentralized, mesh-style network for everyone to have access to the internet and reduce the chance of a single point of failure preventing you from being online. But IMO it needs to be an open standard and not tied to any one hardware or software company.

In my mind, a mesh network combined with something like IPFS would be amazing!

But yeah, I'm pretty leery about big companies trying to sneak in ways for their hardware or software to get a free ride off of my infrastructure to provide "better service" to their other customers. It reminds me of Windows 10 essentially making everyone's PC a BitTorrent client (or whatever) to help spread Windows Updates around the internet.

I might be more likely to be a bit altruistic and share my resources for things like this, even if there was no real benefit to myself, but for the time being it's an automatic no-go for me if for no other reason than because data caps are still a thing, so I can't allow freeloaders to use up my limited resource.

490

Living Room / Re: Need help recreating some music -- full band needed?

« Last post by Deozaan on May 28, 2021, 10:49 AM »

Not to rain on your parade, but I thought the second was heralding a weather report.

-cranioscopical (May 28, 2021, 10:41 AM)

What a downer. I prefer your usual sunny disposition.

491

DC Gamer Club / Re: Latest Epic Games Store Giveaway

« Last post by Deozaan on May 28, 2021, 10:46 AM »

Among Us is free on the Epic store this week.

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DC Gamer Club / Re: Latest GOG Giveaway

« Last post by Deozaan on May 28, 2021, 10:40 AM »

Samorost 1 is now on GOG, and is currently free. I'm not sure if it is permanently free or if it's a limited time promotion.

https://www.gog.com/game/samorost_1

493

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sChecklist

« Last post by Deozaan on May 21, 2021, 04:48 PM »

I had some ideas I wanted to script to read the .checklist files - I just wondered what the first column (seemingly just 0?) on each line pertains to?

-Redhat (May 21, 2021, 03:58 PM)

If I had to guess, I'd say it's whether or not the item is checked. 0 for false (or not checked) and 1 for true (or checked).

494

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Deozaan on May 21, 2021, 04:38 PM »

I was present when this random discussion about a nursery rhyme occurred, and I thought it was so funny I had to share. You know the rhyme:

This little piggy went to the market.
This little piggy stayed home.
This little piggy had roast beef.
This little piggy had none.
This little piggy went wee-wee-wee all the way home.

Alice: "I've heard that's a commentary on capitalism vs. communism."
Bob: "So they're communist pigs?"
Alice: "Yep."
Bob: "Which one is Napoleon?" (Referring to George Orwell's Animal Farm.)
Alice: "The one that says oui oui oui!"

495

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Deozaan on May 20, 2021, 08:43 AM »

@Deozaan would this count?

-x16wda (May 20, 2021, 06:00 AM)

I think that would make you a bloody souffle.

496

Living Room / Re: freenode exodus

« Last post by Deozaan on May 20, 2021, 02:13 AM »

all the drama around freenode today and the mass exodus

-Gothi[c] (May 19, 2021, 05:40 PM)

Where can we learn more about this?

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Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Deozaan on May 19, 2021, 11:24 PM »

If you are what you eat, then the only true human beings are cannibals.

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DC Gamer Club / Re: Ludum Dare 48: April 23rd-26th, 2021

« Last post by Deozaan on May 18, 2021, 11:13 PM »

Out of 3866 submitted games, here is my submission's final ranking:

Overall: 929th (3.5 average from 42 ratings) (76%)
Fun: 682nd (3.488 average from 42 ratings)  (82%)
Innovation: 1716th (2.538 average from 42 ratings) (55%)
Theme: 1336th (3.288 average from 42 ratings) (65%)
Audio: 414th (3.713 average from 42 ratings) (89%)
Mood: 1008th (3.438 average from 42 ratings) (74%)

We expected to place somewhere near the middle, so we weren't too surprised by our scores.

499

DC Gamer Club / Re: Ludum Dare 48: April 23rd-26th, 2021

« Last post by Deozaan on May 05, 2021, 01:58 AM »

that video, is that made from your pc or other competitor?

-KodeZwerg (May 04, 2021, 08:18 PM)

Each video is of a different person working on the same game as a team. The one labeled "Deozaan's LD48 Timelapse" was made using screenshots of my PC while I worked on the game. The one labeled "Roidz's LD48 Timelapse" was made using screenshots of my teammate's PC while he worked on the game.

500

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Deozaan on May 04, 2021, 04:29 PM »

Why does everyone seem to rip on WinRAR?!?

I've been using it for years, and never had a problem with it.

-Stoic Joker (May 04, 2021, 02:22 PM)

I don't think the joke is that WinRAR is bad software. I think the joke is that everybody uses (or has used) it, but nobody has purchased a license.