Microsoft Goofs it

Having spent time working with the Wiimote as a software developer for a research institution, and realizing just how great a tool it is for presentations, I had been anticipating a similar tool from Microsoft. One that I could use for applications such as a great presentation mouse replacement, and a remote tracking device for medical modeling. Now that I have seen what project Natal from Microsoft is, I have to say that while it is cool, I am disappointed.

Microsoft claims that the Wiimote is only a transitional step to what they think is the next best thing [1] IE project Natal.

I say they jumped over a critical step.

Not all situations will be conducive to the natal device. There will be some situations where a hand held pointer like the Wiimote will work better.

For example: if you are using the natal device in front of an audience and the camera also picks up the audience, how efficient (fast) will the natal device be at filtering out the movements of the people behind you? If you are using a Wiimote the Wiimote will not get confused in this situation and thus not lose precious computing cycles filtering unwanted data. Beyond that, I think the Natal device is really cool. I just want my cake while I eat it.

Now if only we could get Nintendo to allow us easy simple access to the Wiimote via a PC by providing us with a decent standardized device driver like Microsoft does, instead of having to rely on a Rube Goldberg non-standard Bluetooth protocol connection process that does not always work.

Or maybe some other third party can do it for us. Hey Logitech!

Copyright 2009 William T. Richards

The Adventures of Rich and GC: Pissing Contest!

At one point during our deployment while we were patrolling the perimeter of KKMC, GC relayed a story he had read in a book. The book was about the French foreign legion and one man’s adventures there in. Anyhow, the guy in the book spent about a chapter explaining what the biggest time wasters were, while out on a mission. The number one waster of time was apparently, taking a piss. The guy said if you went to take a piss and if the process took you less than two minutes, you were wasting your time, and you were better off trying to hold your piss for as long as possible so you could spend your time doing something else.
So what does a soldier with “lots” of newly freed up time on his hands do while out on patrol? Well if he is anything like the platoon I was in, he and his buds start a pissing contest. And anything as "fun" as this was, requires an agreed upon set of rules, just like the ones we created. Now hopefully after 18 years, I can remember the rules we operated under:

The 1991 first ever 372 Mp CO, 4th platoon’s pissing contest rules.
:1. Contestants must produce a steady continuous stream.
:2. The stream must be witnessed by someone who is timing the stream.
:3. The individual who can produce the longest timed interval of an unbroken stream has bragging rights.

Well, I am proud to say that I did manage a time of about three minutes, GC got 3 and a half, but Rat (Ronald A. Thrasher) managed an astounding time of 4 minutes and 35 seconds. Rat managed this feat by drinking water all night long and holding it until he could stand it no more. However, several of us still thought we could break the record and most of us in the platoon were obsessed with timing ourselves.
Then, one day in the town of Khafji, near the Kuwaiti border, Joe and I witnessed an event that had us absolutely stunned. As we stopped to eat launch and monitor vehicle traffic passing through the town a family of camels also stopped at a nearby median to eat some grass. Then the baby of the family, this little camel that was not much bigger than Joe or myself, started to pee.

And pee…

And pee…

After about a minute Joe and I stopped talking and just sat there mesmerized as this little camel continued to pee…

Two minuets…

Four minuets…

Six minutes…

I can’t remember the exact amount of time that that little camel managed to produce a continuous stream, but I believe the time exceeded 8 minutes and was approaching 9 minutes before he broke his stream. And after breaking his stream he continued on for a long time after that. Stunned, Joe and I looked at each other, amazed at how long that little camel managed. We passed the word on to the others in the platoon and well, several months of collective obsession and pass time had come to an end.

Copyright 2009 William T. Richards