The Factory Floor

JDługosz

00:59

Well, another two thousand words. The beginning is quite difficult, and I'm just nibbling away at it.

Geo

@JDługosz What are you trying to do?

JDługosz

@Geo Over-all, write a novel. At the moment, get my original idea to make sense as a plot, and overcome a condition of not revealing the character's names yet.

Geo

@JDługosz Not revealing their names? Doesn't that make it impossible to write about them?

JDługosz

@Geo I have some scenes posted, if you'd care to look and comment. adobe.ly/2xu5qMf

Geo

@JDługosz Oh yeah, I've looked at this stuff from a previous link. The whole "the boy" and "the girl" thing. It does it a unique feel.

JDługosz

01:05

@Geo Did I say it was easy? :) Several chapters have experimental, difficult, ideas. Of the ones I posted, one is meant to be a musical. Another has you infir the actions of the main chars off-stage via a set of still images that are themselves described as word-pictu5res.

@Geo The lack of names is only for the first chapter; a couple scenes.

Geo

@JDługosz Sounds like a nightmare. I respect anyone with ideas. I love to write, but I just can't get good ideas.

JDługosz

It's easy enough to interact in person without using names, but writing about that interaction is more challenging. Not only do the characters not know each other yet, but the limited 3rd POV won't reveal anything the characters don't know.

@Geo Did you look at the things I put up?

Geo

@JDługosz You certainly need some way to refer to people without confusion. If one is a boy and one is a girl, that's good enough. I guess the biggest trick is to give them names later so that the reader understands that it's the same person.

JDługosz

Anyway, I've gotten nearly 59000 words, 108 pages, so far. Some of that is brain-dump not actual prose, but word-count can't tell the difference.

Geo

@JDługosz Not all of it. I've been pretty busy.

JDługosz

01:09

@Geo Right. One of each has a pair of distinct pronouns ready. But two girls and one boy? Can avoid it somewhat by having the POV be one of the girls; then it's "he", "she", and "I".

Geo

@JDługosz There's more to people than whether they are a boy or a girl, though. You could refer to them by other attributes. I guess they don't have jobs, being so young, but if they did you could refer to them as the plumber, the electrician, etc.

JDługosz

I think it needs different techniques in different scenes, too.

@Geo People in swimwear, no indication of life outside their meeting.

@Geo Furthermore, important aspects deliberatly hidden from the other characters: C's eye color, B's wealth.

Geo

@JDługosz But still, they could be tall or short, and have different color hair.

JDługosz

@Geo 'cause, like, I couldn't make it any harder...

Geo

@JDługosz Eye color is important? How peculiar!

JDługosz

01:14

@Geo They do look different. B is tall and light (Fitzpatrick scale II) with dark blonde hair. C is shorter, olive skinned, chestnut hair, and quite curvy.

Geo

@JDługosz It's a classic turn of phrase to refer to people by their hair color. A blonde, a brunette, a redhead, etc.

JDługosz

@Geo Yes. It's not revealed until the following day.

Geo

@JDługosz It all seems so experimental. I can't comprehend why such things would need to be secret.

JDługosz

@Geo If you read Postcards, you'll see the people back at the office have a repeat of the same idea, making it explicit in arguing how to refer to them with temporary labels.

@Geo I posted it here if you want to peek.

JDługosz

02:46

@Geo true, and Blonde and Chestnut match their actual initials B and C.

Shalvenay

03:36

@JDługosz you about?

JDługosz

04:23

@Shalvenay I'm close, now

Shalvenay

ah, nvm :)

(just needed a diamond mod to unfreeze a room, but ya got beat to the punch, no worries m8)

JDługosz

06:32

Hmm, I can't find an xkcd cartoon I remember. There are two found when I search for git and neither is it. This one is someone explaining to call some expert when you need help… you'll have to listen to him talk about distributed graph theory yadda yadda for a while, but then he'll tell you what to type. Anyone know?

Geo

@JDługosz That sounds familiar to me, but I couldn't put a title to it. I guess I can tentatively confirm that it's a real xkcd.

JDługosz

@Geo Normally my google-fu is the envy of people half my age. But I'm coming up blank here, even searching transcripts on explain-xkcd.

Geo

If that doesn't fix it, git.txt contains the phone number of a friend of mine who understands git. Just wait through a few minutes of 'It's really pretty simple, just think of branches as...' and eventually you'll learn the commands that will fix everything.

JDługosz

@Geo Ah... in the mouse-over title! I was going to say "not it" but it popped up when I went to quote.

Geo

@JDługosz Oh, so that's why you couldn't find it. You'd already found it.

Luc H

18:47

for worldbuilding: is there like a place to post your question for suggestions

Mithrandir24601

@LucH I believe that you're looking for the question sandbox

Geo

@Mithrandir24601 That's right! The question sandbox is a wonderful resource and we should all go look, comment, and vote on the questions.

Mithrandir24601

@Geo I have a feeling this is supposed to be sarcastic, but 1. It's still the weekend and 2. You've actually got a ton of comments

Geo

19:03

@Mithrandir24601 The total amount of comments doesn't mean anything. I sure hope people don't stop commenting on a question just because they see it's already accumulated many comments. That would be disastrous! Sandbox questions need fresh comments to keep coming in order to keep improving.

Questions could graduate from the sandbox much more quickly if we could just get a greater flow of traffic through the page. More comments, more votes, more progress.

@Mithrandir24601 An active sandbox question keeps changing, and comments that are older than the most recent changes aren't much use anymore. If we only count relevant comments, my sandbox question has no comments at all.

Mithrandir24601

@Geo There does become a point when there's either nothing more to say, the question has reached a point where it's WB-worthy, or the OP hasn't actually fixed the question at all, so people may stop bothering to try. Also, please remember that we all do this because we want to - no-one has any obligation to help. People help because they want to, so it takes time, especially at the weekend

Luc H

requiring 5 rep to post there isn't a good way to keep the site clean mhh

Secespitus

6

Q: Should the rep requirement for Meta be lowered to 1?

Currently, brand new (1 rep) users cannot use the sandbox because that privilege is unlocked at 5 rep. However, if we want to change it, a Community Manager can change it. This has already been done for another site (PPCG) for exactly the same reason (the sandbox). According to the relevant meta...

Geo

@LucH Wow. That's really troublesome!

Luc H

it should since the people with rep know how to make a good post

but new people like me are open for suggestions

Geo

19:11

@Mithrandir24601 I'm not trying to strong-arm anyone into helping out with the sandbox. I'm trying to spread awareness.

7

Q: Lessons in writing Questions

There are other posts on offering advice for writing questions, such as this list of suggestions. This post is different: it will give detailed lessons worked out on complete texts, showing before and after versions. Ideally, they will be based on real examples, not made up might-have-been exam...

discussion questions asking-questions

Bellerophon

Yes. Finally managed to make a human hand in blender.

And solved my problem of some faces in models going black instead of grey.

Geo

@Bellerophon Hands can be tricky. Also, arm twisting is terrible.

Bellerophon

Hands are so hard. Why can't humans have pincers or something?

Geo

@Mithrandir24601 Imagine what would happen if people generally took offense when people ask for help with their sandbox questions. That would be a disaster for the sandbox.

Mithrandir24601

@Geo There's nothing wrong with asking for help (and it's definitely good to help spread awareness). It's just that we had a user a while back that (there's no other way to put this) spammed everyone, constantly asking for help and it did get annoying, which is why I'm a little touchy about this (sorry)

Geo

19:31

@Mithrandir24601 Yeah, it's a real worry trying to figure out how to politely ask for help in the sandbox without becoming a pest. It's a delicate game of coaxing rather than pushing.

Geo

19:41

I do my best to try to help the other questions in the sandbox, but some of them are really hard cases. The pregnancy one and the electrified computer monitor one especially are so confusing, it's hard to see how to help them.

Shalvenay

21:56

hey there @Mithrandir24601

Mithrandir24601

@Shalvenay Rytsas! How're things? I've just read the post "Babbling incoherently in response to an undergrad’s question, the grad student is alarmed to watch the class write everything down." Golden :)

Shalvenay

hahaha, xD and things are alright here, just went on a bit of open-house-touring for funsies :) as to you?

say...I wonder what my starfarer could demo that'd impress a Maester the most...xD

Mithrandir24601

@Shalvenay A bit of what must be fresher's flu :/

Shalvenay

@Mithrandir24601 aww :/

Mithrandir24601

@Shalvenay I'll hopefully be fine in a day or two though

Shalvenay

22:03

yeah, get well soon man

Mithrandir24601

I mean, I've got work to do that has to be done in a couple of days - I can't be ill! :P

Shalvenay

so...I wonder what technological demonstration would impress a Maester the most...xD

Mithrandir24601

Or rather, lots of reading...

@Shalvenay rockets!

Shalvenay

ooh, that'd be a good one. I was thinking fusion + nuclear transmutation would be a good one as well

Mithrandir24601

@Shalvenay Ooooooh, yes. Definitely

Actual alchemy

Shalvenay

22:05

yah, the challenge is coming with a nuclear reaction that'd yield a nicely visible change in the product

perhaps taking a copper foil and bombarding it with neutrons would be good? you'd get nickel and zinc, unless you used pure copper-66 (which yields pure zinc-66 upon activation)

yeah, copper-66 foil would be the best target for neutron activation transmutation I reckon

Mithrandir24601

@Shalvenay If you say so... I no nothing of chemistry, except that it's a thing and it at least sometimes involves doing things with atoms...

Shalvenay

well, copper-65 I mean

but yeah

Mithrandir24601

I would say that I'd have a go at learning some chemistry, but I really won't

JDługosz

23:44

Nobody here?

Shalvenay

kinda

JDługosz

@Bellerophon Try this: dlugosz.com/POV/another_world.html

@Geo Mesh models manipulated by Poser know correct kenethetics. You can pull by the hand and the body is lifted one joint at a time just like a real doll would be. That was twenty years ago! It should not be difficult (or expensive) now.

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