Shady Url

I try to keep all of my posts relevant to EvE because there is already enough random content on the internet but I wanted to share something with you that my brother showed me over the weekend.

ShadyUrl is a site similar to tinyurl except that it makes your links, uh, shady.

For instance:

http://www.shadyurl.com/

is now

http://5z8.info/top-ten-vietnam-massacres_l6a1i_autoinstall

It can make for fun with those obsessive co-workers!

My evespace

So, it seems to be becoming a theme for eve bloggers to post some images of their 'workspaces'.

I suppose I should share my own since I happen to have a wonderful wife who allows me to have a whole section of the house for my junk.












A pair of XPS Dell's which I am addicted to. A Dell laptop I use for my work while I mine on the side (plus EvEmon :). And an IBM R31 from back in the day which is perfect for vent/teamspeak and jammin' on Zune. Oh, and my puppy; a white German sheppard named Tundra (my Christmas present).

Tyrannis

Tyrannis has been announced and I plan to save my commenting until more details are released.  Currently the details are pretty sparse, with the main point being that planets will soon play a role in industry in some way.  From what I gather reading the Dev Blog the proccess will not be like moon mining.  It appears that you will be able to install "stuff" on the planet that will make "stuff" for you.  You will also have to maintain this "stuff" making equipment.  I'm not sure if it will be tied to sov. or if it will will be a 0.0/losec only change at this point. 

In a way this sounds really boring, and in a way I'm a bit excited about it.  I'm not quite sure yet.  I would love to be able to "claim" my own planet is some random losec hideaway, or even more so in a WH.  However it remains to be seen just how this will work so I do not know if these are possibilites.

I'm sure more details and discussions are soon to come, so I will be keeping my ear to the ground until then.

Get the Details Here

A Reimagining?

This week I have had some time to play around with blogger as well as actually sit down with a little spare time. Both have been very nice. I am working on an update to the blog that I am very happy with so far.

As I have added to the blog so far it has gotten a bit ugly and I have not really taken the time to keep the 'makeup' fresh, so to speak. Stay tuned for the update this weekend and please excuse me if it looks like a junk heap while I switch over.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Aurelius Federation Launches New Website

We just rolled out our new corporate website over at Aurelius Federation.  I ending up choosing to use blogger with HTML editing instead of a traditional website.  The main reason for this was the price, but I also wanted to allow all of the corporate directors the option of being contributors/admins which is exceptionally easy with blogger.  All I have to do is send them an email via the permissions tab and they can setup a gmail (or use their current one) to manage the site.

By working with the HTML and not using a standard theme I was able to make it look MUCH more like a true website which I am very happy with so far.

If you or your corp/alliance would like something similar I would like to practice a bit more so please contact me, I am sure I can come up with a fair isk price.  If this is something that appeals to you email me at evemeatay@yahoo.com or evemail "Meatay" in game.

Shaping the EvE Blog Pack

CraxyKinux is shaking things up quite a bit on the Blog Pack.  He's cutting the list to a more managable number and removing some of the participants that have drifted off of the grid.  He is also asking for your input in the old members to keep and the new members to add: Evolution of the Eve Blog Pack

Take some time to drop a comment on your favorite bloggers and give me a little push if you don't mind :) (j/k on that part, make up your on minds, but if you do like the blog pack please take some time to help shape it)

How Deep Are Your Safes?

If you have ever been looking to make some REALLY deep safe spots then you should head over to the Weekend Warrior to find the Goonswarm guide to making those extremely deep safes.

I think the discussion of actual mechanics found within is pretty interesting.

Alliance Tourney TV

The eigth Alliance Tournament is on the way and CCP is looking for some potential experts to share their knowledge during the broadcasts.

Read about it in the dev blog and sign up if you think you have what it takes because you could also get a trip to Iceland out of it.

Is This Going to be on the Test?

  CCP Tanis just posted a dev blog concerning the ever increasing efforts to combat lag in New Eden.  It looks like they have quite a bit of new gear in the toolkit which I hope makes their jobs a little easier; although I can't imagine all that data is fun to look at.  One of the really intersting bits is the upgraded test server complete with new and re-written debugging code which should make for improved testing all around.

  I also found it very interesting that the dev team plans to share more information about the testing results.

Information and transparency

One thing that we feel has been a shortcoming in our previous mass-testing exercises thus far is the lack of reports and information being relayed to you, the players of EVE. To remedy this, we will begin publishing the results of each test. Over time, we will add to what is being reported and, hopefully, even get a sub-site on eveonline.com to host the results from all these tests so that anyone can view results from recent tests, as well as historical results.

  While I will probably only glance at the reports every so often I have to say that any increase in information sharing is a welcomed improvement.  One of the only major complaints I have with the CCP team is the occasional lack of information about what is going on inside their world.  With that said, I still feel that CCP is probably one of the best communicators in the game industry and that they put a lot of effort into sharing information with us players.  To me, more is always better.

  The testing team still needs our involvement if we want to improve EvE but they will be making it a little easier on us by moving testing closer to prime time whenever possible.  They are also inviting Alliances to join up together whichshould help improve the numbers.  If you would like to stay up to date on planned testing the dev team has created a new in-game mailing list "Mass Testing Info", so don't forget to join up.
 
 
Dev Blog: http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=728
Also, don't forget to join "Mass Testing Info" (mailing list) and hop on the test server when you can.


 
Getting on the test server
 Evolopedia guide to connecting to Singularity Start here, this contains everything you need to know about getting on to singularity.

Once you connect to the test server you will need to be in the test server chat channel "Singularity"

If you have trouble there are some additional rescources on the forum, start here: Singularity Post (some of this may be a bit out of date)

Getting The Beat Down

  I just got caught warping late by a pretty substantial -A- and UK fleet.


http://auf.griefwatch.net/index.php?p=details&kill=1835


  The lesson here?  Warp out more quickly when everyone else leaves the gate.  Also, avoid fleets with Ga'Len in them because the wondering druid will get you...

CrazyKinux's Blog Roll

It looks like I've made it onto CrazyKinux's blog roll over at http://www.crazykinux.com/2008/04/eve-online-blogroll-lovefest.html

That's pretty exciting and I hope I can continue to keep people entertained while they're bored at work (looking at you Gat).

Head on over to CrazyKinux's blog to find tons of good content including the Blog Banter articles and the blogroll along side CK's own posts.

~Note~ I have updated the links to include the CK's Blog Roll and my own blog feed to include almost all of the content in it.

Breaking Up Is Hard to Do

I was pointed to an interesting update on the Goon situation by a corpmate:

http://www.kugutsumen.com/content.php?39-goonswarm-breaking-news-update

It looks like either the Goons end comes via a of a taste of their own medicine, or a series of serious blunders have lead to collapse and PR damage control.  Either way nothing could be a more fitting end for Goonswarm.  I know they will return in a new form, just like BOB did, but not without some goon-tears along the way.  With the changes in Dominion making the large power blocks so vunerable, this year promises to be full of unrest in 0.0 politics.

It is more than a little poetic that Goonfleet will end alongside Band Of Brothers.  These two names have left their marks across the history of EvE and probably won't return as the powers they once were, but they have ended with Hollywood style.

Welcome to the Lag

  CCP Atlas just posted an interesting DevBlog concerning the degradation in fleet fight lag following Dominion.  The good news is that you aren't all crazy and the CCP team does know that Dominion has broken something in the hamster cage.  The bad news, at least in my opinion, is that the primary focus seems to be on keeping the node up and running during the fight.  While the Devs are working on both issues it appears they are more concerned with node stability than directly confronting lag.  I believe that both are serious issues but with node stability affecting all parties eqaully and lag often giving the upper hand to the first party to land in a system I feel that it should be the primary focus.  In any event; I am glad that the complete and utter pounding we took in D-GTMI gave the Devs so much data to analyze, considering that the lag so heavily affected that fight.

  On a related note CCP Atlas did share some tips for operating in high-lag environments. The major point he stresses is PATIENCE which is very important when your client is responding slowly.  Beyond that the guys in Fatal Ascension have been sharing their tips since the D-G fight and I thought I would post some of the tips on preemptively combatting lag that my CEO shared here:

The Client

  Can't See Can't Fight

  It is absolutely imperative you setup your client properly before a capital battle. You may be using a NASA supercomputer in some basement in a government complex in Florida, but that still does not mean you are going to have the bandwidth to function in a capital engagement with hundreds and hundreds of ships on the grid at one time.

• Turn off ALL effects.
• Turn down ALL graphics.
• Zoom out!
• Close unnecessary channels.
• Do NOT play in windowed mode.

The Overview
 Holy Brackets Batman

  You can easily find yourself lagged out for thirty seconds if you so much as flip over to a new tab in your overview that has all brackets showing in space. In addition to that, without a proper overview setup, you'll play hell even finding the primary target regardless of whether it has been broadcast or not. 

• Turn off ALL brackets on ALL tabs.
• ONLY reds and neutrals on your primary tab.
• Create the following overview settings:

•  Planets, Stations, Sun, Control Towers, No Ships
•  Only carriers
•  Only dreadnoughts
•  Only battleships
•  Only interdictors and heavy interdictors
•  Only super capitals

 ~Mendolus (AU-F CEO)

Edit: Manasi chipped in a few good ones which I can't believe I overlooked:

1) remove the timer animations from the HUD


2) ungroup your guns

Aside from turning off auto repeat the next most important thing to remember is to ungroup those guns.

Where are all the Goons?

  In the news this morning we have a bit of a breaking story.  It seems that Goonswarm has broken up in the dark hours of the night.  Of course we will all have to stay tuned to see as the true details of this come out.

  I am going to be watching the political fallout of this because it is going to be very interesting.  With the null sec regions of New Eden already burning fallowing the sovereignty changes in Dominion, this only adds fuel to the fire.  Will the former Band Of Brothers return to prominence in the region, or will some other power be able to beat them back?  I suppose we will all have to stay tuned.

http://www.eveonline.com/news.asp?a=single&nid=3683&tid=7