In which I collect together a random selection of observations, thoughts, comments and attempts at humour. Y'know, the usual waffle.
I am unusually excited by this
My hosting's just been upgraded, and the upgrade included an SSL certificate, which means that for the first time ever, custarddoughnuts is running on HTTPS.
This is good because HTTPS provides some security (not that the site can accept or give out any information, but hey) and because Google apparently ranks HTTPS sites higher than HTTP ones (not that I get a lot of traffic).
So there's no real benefit to my site having HTTPS, but I'm still very happy about it. I think not having HTTPS might be equivalent to buying a train ticket but not getting a seat. It's not essential, but you come to expect these things.
Quick plug: my hosting is with Tortilla Hosting.
At the Terminator 6 script meeting
So apparently there's another Terminator movie. I've not seen it. But this time there's a twist! Arnie's character is a good guy! No, wait, they did that. Okay, Sarah Connor's in it, and she's hard as nails. No, wait - the new Terminator is a liquid metal one but with a robot endoskeleton - no. How about the hero looks human but actually is a - wait, they did that too?
There are so many questions I have about how this movie even came to be, but my main question is how did they come up with such a great title?
- James Cameron: Okay, all we need is a title. It's been seven hours, guys. Let's try something different. Let's go round the room and each say a word associated with the Terminator franchise.
- Writer 1: Uh... dark?
- Writer 2: Fate?
- Cameron: Okay, that'll do.
Things I was also going to mock but decided weren't worth the effort
- Independence Day Resurgence
- Bothering to click 'I like this' or 'I don't like this' on a YouTube video
- Solarplicity
The new Steam UI
Wow, okay, what just happened? The new Steam user interface is here and it's dramatically different.
I dislike this approach to user interface development. Change should be gradual, and address specific problems. Changing everything all at once might get rid of all the existing problems, but it introduces a whole range of new ones instead.
I also dislike when change like this happens and it isn't explained. It's far too easy to look at the new interface and be horrified, but if the problems and solutions are laid out clearly it's easier to understand why the new UI could be better.
Personally, I don't like the new interface, although I haven't spent much time with it yet. There's a lot going on - too many icons and boxes and colours - and I'm unhappy that my games library is now full of random screenshots from random people. It's like social media just threw up on Steam. What I'd really like is the ability to customise what I see in my library, so I can turn off some of this noise, but that doesn't seem to be a feature.
It's also noticeably slower, which is hideous. It was slow enough already, but to make it even slower for the sake of things I don't want or need? That's not good.
I think the main problem with what's happened is that Valve have clearly put a lot of effort into this when there are other far worse problems with the Steam client that should be addressed first. It's slow, clicking on menu items doesn't always bring up the right thing, and it falls over whenever there's a big sale. Can they fix those things now please? And while you're at it, I'll have Half life 3 as well, thanks.