妖怪世捨て人

This is a blog entry about Shirakumo's sound system Harmony. While Harmony was released some months back, I spent the last few weeks rewriting large parts of it from the ground up, and I think it's worth it to write a short article describing how it's built and what you can do with it. So, if you're interested in doing sound processing and playback in Lisp, this is for you.

This is a listing of projects that I've started, some of which I've completed. The intent is to spread awareness about the work I've done, as I speculate that a lot of people don't know about most of it, even though it might prove useful to their own projects. So, hopefully this article will help a bit in that regard.

I've written about Portacle on a previous occasion, where I talked mostly about the issues I've faced. This time, however, I'm excited to announce that Portacle has finally reached version 1.0. This means that there are no obvious remaining issues that I am aware of. Everything should Just Work™.

I'm not sure how far back it goes exactly, but I think it's been now about a year or more since I started doubting my skills heavily. More heavily than usual. Anything I attempt to do either slips out of my hands and ends up a shoddy mess, and even if it doesn't it feels like a flimsy rehash of something I've already done before. There's no improvement to be seen, no end in sight, no goal reached.

Next Saturday, the 17th of June, there is going to be a live “study session” about Shirakumo's game engine Trial. The intention of this event is to get people acquainted with the internal structure and features of Trial, so that they may work on it by themselves, and thus help improve it in the future.

Right now I'm at Brussels Airport, waiting for my departing flight back to Zürich. The 10th European Lisp Symposium is over, and I got to have my first “real” talk at it. It was, as you might guess, about Radiance and some of the core concepts behind the project. With that, I think it is finally time to announce Radiance's proper release into the wild!

The scorching earth. Forests set ablaze, cities drowned in a fiery inferno. Anna would probably call that an exaggeration, but Monika thought it was a pretty apt description of the weather right now. It was the middle of Summer, and the world wanted everyone to know it. Temperatures were through the roof and drought had set in in a few places. Monika sat in the living room, staring out onto the fields in front of their house. The windows were wide open, but not a single gust of wind blew through them. Monika thought she could hear the hot air simmering under the burning sun, but that might have just been her imagination again. There wasn't really any particular sound, just this strange kind of general noise that lets you know it's summer, permeating through everything.

As announced in my previous post, I've decided to do a write-up that illustrates my adventures in developing Portacle, a cross-platform, portable, installer-less, self-contained Common Lisp development environment.

It's been a good while since I last wrote an entry. I didn't write anything all January for a multitude of reasons, at the forefront being that it was exam season again. That's over with now, fortunately, so I do have some more time on my hands to goof off. Unfortunately though, I only have one more week left of this precious “free” time before university strikes me in the back again. I best use it wisely.

“Haaah,” Monika sighed in relief as she threw herself onto her desk chair. Her contract work was finally complete and sent out. The past few days had been a bit of a rush because of that, the deadlines always looming over her. Now that it was all over with, she had earned herself some peace and quiet. Maybe she could even read a book again for once.

It's been a good while since I last worked on Radiance. Unfortunately I can't claim that this was because Radiance was completely finished, quite far from it to be truthful. However, it has been stable and running well enough that I didn't have to tend to it either. In fact, you're reading this entry on a site served by Radiance right now. Either way, thanks to some nudging by my good friend Janne, I've now returned to it.

Anna leaned back in her chair, shielding her eyes with a hand as she cast them up to the sky. It was a fine day in June, with only wisps of cloud between her and the glare of the sun. Not for the first time, she regretted not having brought any sunglasses with her, odd with her smart pinstripe grey jacket and matching trousers as they might have looked. She’d added a splash of colour with a pink blouse. Denner were an important client, so she’d wanted to make a good impression, as always. But it somehow didn’t seem right for a designer not to have a little something about them.

Monika stared out of the window. The bright light from inside made it practically impossible to make out any distinguishing features in the dark outside. She was close enough to the glass that her breath created a circle of fog every time she breathed. Small pearls of water would form from it and slowly make their way down onto the windowsill. Monika sniffled and then sneezed.

Well, here we are. Here we are again. About three weeks ago another semester of university began for me. Since then I've been feeling a lack of interest and motivation in most things. None of the projects that are open right now seem inviting or exciting to me, and I don't know what to do.

With just about one hour and a half to spare we managed to submit our entry for Ludum Dare 36. Ludum Dare is a regularly occurring, fairly well-known game jam the idea of which is to create a game from scratch in 48 hours by yourself or 72 hours in a team. Given that, unlike last time we tried to participate we actually managed to finish making something that resembles a game, I think it's worth noting what my experience was as well as my general thoughts on game programming in Lisp.

Ring… Ring… Ring… Click!

My first onesie was published on 2013.03.02, and the thousandth was yesterday on 2016.08.15. This means that 3 years, 5 months, and 14 days, or 1263 days in total have passed, and I've drawn ~0.8 drawings every day of those. Not quite the quota I had intended originally, but not all too shabby either, I suppose.

The bike rattled softly as it flew over the pavement downhill. It was early Spring and the weather seemed to be about as perfect as one could imagine. Mostly clear skies with some neat clouds decorating it here and there. Monika relished every second of this and quietly hummed a tune. Her hair fluttered in the cool wind as she descended down the hill towards the town.

As part of yet another yak-shaving quest I've come to write a library that I only now realise I've been missing for a while: an extensible and generic iteration macro.

It's late in the evening and I'm not feeling all too jolly. About an hour ago I was once again frustrated with my drawing attempts as I had failed to produce anything whatsoever in an entire hour. I decided that it was enough. I am broken.

I thought it might be worthwhile to write about what I've been up to in recent times. Especially in terms of software projects it's been rather quiet from my side, and that's mostly because the things I've been working on require a lot of time and effort before I would dare to release them for public use. There's also been a lot of turmoil in my life again, which has disrupted my ability to really push ahead.

The only thing that seemed to be moving at all were the specks of dust in the air. They glistened up as they passed through the rays of light falling down from above. Sometimes it seemed as if the dust had a mind of its own, moving about without any noticeable trace of wind, sometimes suddenly soaring high up into the air, only to coast back down a moment later.

As I'm writing this I'm still in Krakow. Sitting next to me is Till, who joined me for ELS this year. It was a blast, but I'm also really exhausted and my throat is still hurting a bit from talking all the time the past three days. Our flight back to Zürich is in about an hour from now and I have a test to study for on the coming Thursday; I actually would've really liked to stay a bit longer, especially considering there were a few people I would've loved to talk to a bit more. Alas, you can't always get what you want.

It is the middle of the night and I am writing this by candle-light. I'm still very much shaken by shock, but it is imperative that I write this down. It might very well be the last entry I ever get to write– the last trace that is left of me. I am afraid for my life. I don't know who or what is after me, but I have reason to believe that there was an attempt to abduct me. If you are reading this, and I have not finished this entry, please come look for me! With any luck, I might still be alive somewhere!

There is something almost magical about a good, cool shower; as if it not only cleaned your body but also cleansed your mind, washing your troubles down the drain. Monika's head felt light on her shoulders and she was once again able to think clearly. All freshened up, she let herself fall onto her bed and watched the dust glimmer in the air for a moment. With a yank she got back onto her feet and went on to fetch her backpack downstairs. She might as well get started on the homework they had gotten. She placed her things neatly onto the living room table, and then remembered that she still hadn't eaten anything for lunch. A quick sandwich later she was finally ready to get to work.