Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers • Hacker News Board

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#141

Post by eternityforest » Fri, Dec 15, 2023, 10:31 AM UTC

_8j50 wrote: post #115

eternityforest wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm more saddened by the state of hardware. It's amazing and very practical and basically perfect for everyday use... But it was a lot cooler back then. WebGL file management doesn't seem to hard to implement, I'm guessing it would be a weekend project to make a demo, now that one doesn't actually need math to draw 3D stuff.

> now that one doesn't actually need math to draw 3D stuff. Even for camera movements/projection stuff? News to me, haven't messed with 3d since around 2010.

I'm assuming you probably still need some math to make everything look actually good, but you could probably get something working just with assorted random hackery.

Most of the libraries seem to just be "Put X object on the screen at Y coordinates and rotation and size with Z texture and material", it's not like you're dealing with how rendering actually works by hand and figuring out what color each pixel should be.

But I've never done much of anything in 3D, aside from CAD work so idk.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#142

Post by calgoo » Fri, Dec 15, 2023, 12:03 PM UTC

Zelphyr wrote: post #86

I remember seeing this movie when it came out and, while I enjoyed it, I chuckled at how silly the UI graphics looked. However, after rewatching it years later I really enjoyed it even more because I realized that, yes, the UI graphics weren't realistic, the movie did a great job of capturing what tech felt like at the time. I just rewatched it again recently and find it a thoroughly enjoyable film. It doesn't look l…

Sneakers is one of my favourite hacker movies. I have always loved the scene where they trace his travel path based on sound. And it was the first time I saw how an interface for blink people worked.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#143

Post by jonhohle » Fri, Dec 15, 2023, 2:44 PM UTC

roughly wrote: post #105

jonhohle wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or a laptop with a translucent case!

I still want one. Apparently Framework looked at it, but they couldn’t find a good plastic with the right combination of traits.

iBook G4s had too and bottom panels that could have their paint stripped to be transparent. The earliest iBooks were translucent. Maybe a hunk of machined gorilla glass?

There are translucent lower receivers for AR-15s that are both light and durable[0]. Perhaps there is still hope.

0 - https://www.tnarmsco.com/store/tnarms15/tnarms15-clear/

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#144

Post by ethbr1 » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 2:28 AM UTC

secretforest wrote: post #137

chromaton wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I tried to picture clusters of information as they moved through the computer. What did they look like? Ships, motorcycles? Were the circuits like freeways? I kept dreaming of a world I thought I'd never see. And then, one day, I got in..."

Tron Legacy. Such a good film. My kids and I watch it a few times a year. I tried watching the original from 1982 and it just felt so... dated? Perhaps I'm spoiled like most people from all the great CGI and effects.

Would recommend reading a background on how they made Tron 1, then rewatching.

If nothing else, it's fascinating from a special effects technical standpoint, for when it was made.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#145

Post by scroot » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 12:17 PM UTC

adamomada wrote: post #36

scroot wrote: post #34

Has anyone written about the computers/interfaces in HBO's "Silo"? I've been trying to find information about that because they seem quite interesting.

It’s an Apple TV show and those props definitely gave me an old-school Apple computer vibe. Now I’m wondering how intentional it is

Right after I pushed submit, I thought to myself "Apple? Max? MGM+?" I can't keep track anymore.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#146

Post by btbuildem » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 6:52 PM UTC

mk_stjames wrote: post #83

btbuildem wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is really neat! I wonder how they chose to represent the inner structure of these binaries visually - there seem to be some similarities between the .exes vs the other types. Reminds me of pointing the viewport address to a block of code on the Amiga 500, and watching it run.

Those are trigrams of all 3-byte sequences of binary executables arranged in a cube. Here are some more examples of that type of viz: https://codisec.com/binary-data-visualization/ And here is a talk about binary visualization by the legend Christopher Domas, which is where I first saw it used: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bM3Gut1hIk

Thanks! My first questions there were about the choices of the cube dimensions (where the stream folds, etc, what's best to make cyclic patterns stand out, how come we see diagonal artifacts as on a heatmap) - the video seems like it covers that and so much more.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#147

Post by anthk » Sun, Dec 17, 2023, 9:47 AM UTC

mportela wrote: post #82

This movie is the reason why I became a programmer. I watched it when I was starting in high school and got inspired by it. Then, I literally googled "How to become a hacker" and found this incredible page by Eric Raymond [0], which I used as an mentor throughout my high school and college years. I ended up developing the recommended hard skills (learning programming, UNIX, open source culture...) but also the "point…

I can't stand the ESR view on hacker-supposed media, music or martial arts. And I say this as a former Shotokan branch graded Karate alumnus. On music I can shift from psychodelic rock to Tangerine Dream to hard rock to electronic avant-garde jazz.

On sci-fi, OFC I like it, but the mistery genre it's really fine as it's pretty close to debugging a problem but with real life issues.

On tech, Unix philosophy and Emacs are polarly opposite. Unix it's focused on multiprocessing parallel tools doing the work for you (preferabily scripted) where the less code your run, the better; while Emacs wants you to reuse Elisp functions everywhere, with an always-loaded philosophy and not lightweight at all if you have tons of modules in memory. Also, Emacs it's single threaded, so Emacs is very prone to be I/O locked, while Unix will spawn background subprocesses like nothing not affecting your main task at all.