Citizens of Tech 012 – Biofuel Pyramid Cables

We start with a discussion of jail time. Jail. Time. And…147 MPH. Yeah. Eric tells the story. And then we hop into our show. Present Doomception: How modders got Doom to run inside of Doom http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/07/doomception-how-modders-got-doom-to-run-inside-of-doom/ * Doom was open sourced in the 90’s. Folks have gone nuts porting it to all sorts of things. * Now, you can run Doom inside of Doom. “OK, if we’re being technically accurate, this is actually Doom running inside GZDoom, a heavily modified Doom source port that was first released in 2005 to bring a slew of modern gaming features to the 1993 original. The author also warns that the in-game versions of Doom and Wolfenstein 3D available in the mod are only “semi-complete.” Still, the sheer amount of near-pointless effort and dedication needed to get GZDoom to run what is essentially a version of itself within itself is impressive (and kind of frightening). * Action code script makes this possible. ”ACS was designed to allow modders to create more interactive environments through simple bytecodes that did things like open doors, play sounds, or move items and characters around in response to player actions. The basic bytecode-based language in that game was later extended in the ZDoom source port to allow for high-level programming features like named scripts, functions, arrays, and entire libraries. Those additions made their way into the later GZDoom as well.” We tear apart a $340 audiophile Ethernet cable and look inside http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/07/ars-prepares-to-put-audiophile-ethernet-cables-to-the-test-in-las-vegas/ http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/07/gallery-we-tear-apart-a-340-audiophile-ethernet-cable-and-look-inside/ * Audiophile people are special kind of crazy. Some are willing to spend exorbitant amounts of money to get tiny improvements that most of us (maybe none of us) could actually hear. * Cables are a prime example of this madness. Maybe fancy cables made a difference in the analog world. But in a digital one? The ones and zeros make it, or they don’t. * Ethernet cables are already manufactured and can be tested to be within a specific performance rating. For a twisted pair Ethernet cable to perform at a particular “category” level, specific pairs must be twisted a specific number of times per foot. Beyond that, the 4 twisted pairs must be then twisted around each other in certain category definitions, all to avoid crosstalk, electromagnetic interference, and errors. The shorter the cable, the less likely these issues are to be present. Even with errors, Ethernet can detect them, discarding the errant frame, and probably get a retransmission assuming an acknowledged data protocol like TCP is running over the Ethernet cable. * So. What’s in a $340 “audiophile” Ethernet cable? * “The cable itself is of reasonably high quality, with braided and foil shielding around the entire cable coupled with foil shielding around the individual twisted pair bundles.” * “The plugs are high-quality Telegärtner MFP8s, which cost about 9 EUR each depending on where you get them.” * “There’s every indication that the cables conform to the listed Category 7 specifications and,