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  DASHR - Dynamically Animated Skinned Heightfield Rendering Short video for now - I might do a longer one later? https://youtu.be/-Su9YrcazRk But there's ALL the details in the paper, and you can always Use The Source, Luke for the really deep info. https://github.com/tomforsyth1000/DASHR

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  Thinking about zero-cost abstractions. Thinking about how I found a bit of C# code that did: array = new_item + array; ...and realising a few things: 1. Knowing this is bad is instinctive. Didn't even need to think about it. 2. The person who wrote this has no idea why this is worse than "array = array+ new_item" 3. Nothing in the language would guide them towards this knowledge. 4. This is probably rampant in all the other bits of code I don't see. 5. Z...

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  LTTP, but just started watching We Are Lady Parts. It's going to offend lots of people for lots of reasons - don't let any Americans watch it, they'll lose their shit. I love it so far! If you saw Polite Society - same writer/director - Nida Manzoor.

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  Most heinous rhyme you secretly admire:

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  (apologies if you already read this rant on Bluesky) I am so tired of people who can't code telling me about how AI helps them code to 1% of the ability of a professional, which sure is 10x for them. It's like me telling people that the invention of music theory will make actual musicians obsolete because now I, too, can write chords that sound OK.

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  Deciding on Pico-8 vs Tic-80 for teaching tweenagers to code. They're very similar systems - either is fine. I think Pico-8's 128-pixel-wide screen is too small for coding on. Tic-80s is 240 which is nearly twice as wide. Yes, you can use an external text editor for both, but I think that's a distraction for people starting out. Tic-80 has slightly better graphics - two layers, more colours. But I don't think that matters for the kids learning. Otherwise very s...

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  English is so malleable. My wife and I were discussing our cat, who is easily miffed. She is normally quite gruntled, but she is sensitive to miffages such as being moved, and then even if the place she was moved to has high gruntleage (e.g. a lovely sunbeam), she will remain in a high-miff state and disenflounce. Even if she is then regruntled by e.g. being stroked, she still does not link the event to the increased gruntlement because of the mifficatious event that interrupted.

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  If someone says they have one of these cars, would you know what they mean well enough to point at it in a pub car park? (tick all that apply, and see second part of quiz below)

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  Well, I had fun two years: https://blog.recroom.com/posts/2025/8/25/rec-room-update-august-2025

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  It is spooky how much @rygorous and I agree on so many many things. So in lieu of me making a video of my ramblings, watch his instead. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBhT7nbWpMg

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  Was watching a bunch of ST and Amiga games that we would today call "First Person Shooters". The graphics are simple, but acceptable, and usually around 10fps. The surprising thing is that almost none of them use the mouse - they're all keyboard or joystick controls. And these aren't DOS ports - they were all first on either ST or Amiga. I guess we just never thought of it? Even years later, Doom's mouse controls were pretty funky, and lots of people d...

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  OK, the "high five Wikipedia photo" thing is kinda cute. Well done. https://www.inverse.com/input/culture/wikipedia-high-five-too-slow-photos-mystery-couple-solved

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  Anyone know a simple source-level Windows+DX11 app with all the boring message pump etc stuff done. Bonus points for a simple 3D scene with flyable camera. I have a rendering idea I want to try out, but all my standard 3D rendering harnesses are OLD, or already have a chonky game inside them.

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  Lots of friends with sore wrists - endemic for coders. I'm not a doctor, but anecdataly lifting heavy things and putting them down again is really good for this. This is very counterintuitive - most recommend rest. But rest is not a long-term solution.

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  It's funny that algo folks still like to talk about linked lists. But these days we avoid them like the plague because they thrash caches and prefetchers. In the 16-bit era, we didn't have either of those things, so linked lists made a decent amount of sense. But it's been 30 years! Re-evaluate!

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  What's your favourite static web page builder? Something that takes some form of markup language and splits out some HTML. Nothing fancy, I just really really need to get my (read-only) web page/blog updated. Currently using https://pandoc.org/ which is great, just wondering if there's other options.

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  @gwynnion Same with bloody TVs. Just show the picture I feed you! Stop being smart - I have an actual computer for that. Just... show... the... thing.

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  Revision 2026 PC demos. It's long, but don't be afraid to use that fast-forward button, and remember they're sorted roughly by quality, so make sure you at least watch the last few! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw4W9V57SKs

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  This is stunning. Well done. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59NORGNnWlQ

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  This weekend, Subnautica is free to play, and it and the full-sized sequel Below Zero are both 75% off to buy. If you have not tried these you absolutely should - I recently replayed them both and they're still so good. https://store.steampowered.com/app/264710/Subnautica/

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  Recent discussion about the perils of doors in gamedev reminded me of a bug caused by a door in a game you may have heard of called "Half Life 2". Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin.