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8PoolByMiniCom2016

Page history last edited by jerry 8 years, 3 months ago

8PoolByMiniCom2016

Introduction/Definition/etc

Android based billiards game available for free download, but not really free to play,

see limitations below, as some gotchas...

8Ball by MiniClip are the real names, once I started waking up and checking facts...

Live and Learn...

Body

Probably available on other platforms as MiniCom MiniClip seems like a big company, at least online,

download was easy from Google Play Store, and almost at once ads, in bright casino like colours,

which says commercial, quickly, at least to me.

AddictionAlerts

Food Porn starts to air soon, and the glamorized and sensationalized portrayal of things seems to start, even after the Golden Globes... Academy Awards, that may be the same thing, People's Choice, and other awards shows are something different. Didn't see Minions up for awards anywhere ala MinionMadness2015 from previous wastes of time...

Some features, you can watch about 30 second ads for free 15 coins, when the server is allowing it, and you get 30 free coins per hour (20 base + 1.2xVIPStatus, currently), so it has an automatic break time built in, to get food, use the bathroom, and basically like T.V., cable, but not as much PBS, which is supposed to be public supported and free, Ad/Commercial free, but has sponsors, usually in the credits time, like foundations etc...

OpenSourceLearningAlternatives?

TkPool, a Tcl/Tk free game on some platforms, back in the day would at least teach you to install the Tcl/Tk

development platform/environment, similar but different than Java... The code for that is probably available, similar to Sugar Desktop environment, ala OneLaptopPerChildoplcorg and it's spinoff SugarLabs.org...

Squeak (SmallTalk Object Oriented, everyThing is an Object, and Methods are like Procedures wrapped in a class data structure, good for large scale and physical simulation (like screen objects, type hierarchy, possibly multiple inheritance, size, speed, location, etc), going Object Oriented after Procedural, is a rite of Passage, like C->C++, PASCAL->Java, Lisp->Flavors/CLOS, Scheme, read, write and interpreter/compiler, etc) and Scratch (Scratch.MIT.edu) and other environments make things like that are more educational, like Pippy to learn Python and play a classic called Pong, or be geeky, find an old OLPC XO-1 that still works, cheaply, as it was supposed to be the $100 computer (caveat is if a country buys one for every child in the nation, which some South American countries probably did...) It also plays in ROM/OpenFirmWare, i.e. faster and has FORTH and Emacs (read kitchen sink) built in...

BackTo8Ball

But 8Ball is a commercial networked game, says requires a network, and does have all sorts of privacy concerns, you might need to be a lawyer to read the privacy policy, IANAL, so YMMV... For 13 and under or so, there are different things and Switzerland (MiniClip HQ) would want to call you, maybe on Skype, IDK, to verify if you are getting account information about your own kid, to verify, see the Policy text...

EvaluationOfGaming?

The value of games, therapeutic, I'm not sure, Video Game Addiction and Gambler's Anonymous certainly exist, but pulling a little or even big person off stuff like video games and chocolate can be dangerous, kind of like coffee and cigarettes, for the drinkers, but Heroin I can See I don't want to be addicted to, but Coffee?

Cigarettes, Leave Me SomeThing! Wheeze, Cough, Black Lung, Cancer, cirrhosis, Wernicke's/Korsakoff's, etc...

But not other physical substances like heroin, crack, meth, etc...

See BikersAndDrunks2015 for more on alcohol (ETOH) addictions...

I might write more about it, later on. I've gotten to level 16,17,18 from weeks, days + hours of playing, but can't really deal with it right now, my hands hurt, from playing too much, something I might have forgot to mention about tablets in Tablets2015 Carpel Tunnel Syndrome doesn't require a keyboard, it's more Repetitive Stress, doing the same thing over and over again, like Rosie the Riveter, but without as many WWn (n=1...x) bombers...

Ads have failed to play, but haven't crashed the game, nor server yet...

Server attacks are probably a licence problem, can't interrupt their systems, part of the licence, like being kicked out of a bar, basically, in real life, under age, obnoxious, not obnoxious enough, might get hurt, not a fern bar person, don't like the colour of that shirt, mustache, women's night, cover charge, bikers' only, we will smoke if we f*($) want to, Who Are You Pencil Neck Geek Physics Type Gunna Do 'Bout It?!?

Smack/Crack/Break/BarFight,,etc...

Idears

Besides the obvious from previous, write your own version, learn some system administration on a machine you own, programming skills in a different language, Tk/Tcl or something else...

For the commercial 8Ball by MiniClip, tournaments could show the 8 people who started the tournament the others playing, instead of chat like Howard Cosell: "I'm breaking", "Lost the shot", "I had 6 balls", yeah, giggles, most guys only had 2 /OffColourJoke...

For 8 people starting out at 200 coins each, they give out 1200 (1000 winner, give back 200 entry fee as second prize, so house wins 400 coins total, either way...) Cost of doing business, I guess...

Calculate the earnings of the game, cost of coins, time spent, network traffic, money made on ads, etc...

TkPool could use some more programming, much not implemented, but a starting point,

add numbered balls
add solids/ stripes,
see how they roll
adding player names,
scores,
top scores,
not to look like air hockey moving,
add networking for others to play against,
limited chat, etc,

Speeding it up, the shell is provided, (One of the guys is a Ph.D. Comp Sci major, so some things are just learning examples...) but with Tk/Tcl such a high level interpreted language, rewrite in say Lisp/Scheme, C++, SmallTalk/Squeak, and add an AI opponent player, there is a CL Tk interface somehow, and various embedded Lisp, might work that way...

Recoding in other languages, slow Perl Tk, Parrot Tk, compare languages and tools involved, what works? what doesn't? why? What is the jump in graphics experienced in watching 8Ball? Network? local display? other processes in Android? Cheating? What does that cost the player? The server? The credibility of the realism in 8Ball simulation?

Try to compare procedural against object oriented, so lots of things to learn, and debugging time considered learning time, similar to Robot movements...

The physics of ball motion:

Measure the typical ball weight,

What does spin do?

How?

Friction coefficient?

Felt? New felt, old felt, etc...

Compare against tennis? (weight, speed, fuzziness and air flow)

Ping Pong? (weigh, speed, smooth, v. air flow)

Cue tip hit hit PSI (pounds/sq. inch) v. stringed Tennis racket?

Hand ball?

Squash ball?

Solid paddle like Ping Pong, PickleBall?

Botchie (sp?) Balls?

Bowling analogy, departure energy, rolling resistance...

Compare and contrast with Rolling duck pins?

Pin weight?

Juggling pins v. falling pins in 2D, 3D?

Empty plastic ones?

Wood bowling?

Fill empty with different density filler... Water? Sand? Size differences?

Variations in shape?

Differences in the size of the ball?

Type of ball?

Air resistance (tennis, ping pong, etc)?

Against the cushions?

Straight impulse the other way? Loss of energy? Calculated how? Most fully simulate it or just rolling resistance?

90 degree effects?

Describe qualitatively and quantitatively the vectors involved in the 8Ball Cue Ball vectors?

Replace the TkPool cursor with those vectors or something better/ similar...

How is playing without those things, as in real life, you have to visualize it all yourself...

What effect does bifocals/ trifocals/ eye sight have on playing the game(s)?

Could Blind play?

How would you describe the locations?

Motions?

What could blind teach you about billiards? Life?

Is a pool players mental model different at the beginners level and expert level?

How so?

Speed variations of ball movement:

What is shock? And how does it work, specifically?

A lot of above was Socratic Method, is that good for science and just law?

Or leading question(s)?

How much is answerable from Feynman's Lectures on Physics? CalTech undergrad back in 1963 or so, now publicly available, see links below...

Make TkPool available on Android...

What changes are necessary for touchscreen v mouse/keyboard use???

What accessability options are there?

Wheelchair pool in real life?

Just height? And/or a Bridge?

Add improvements above to play on a local network, say through XWindows...

Credit these Idears in anything academic, and even when used for making money (competitive advantage? business intelligence? Raiding?), and put your idears and code back out, for others to improve upon, in GNU/Linux GPL & FDL fashion...

Conclusion

Summary of experience or similar

I play it, but need to cut back, have other more productive things to do, like exercise, self care, including hygiene, shower, clean, eat, brush teeth, get outside, see daylight, stop being such a mushroom, etc...

Of the things possibly/potentially learned by programming environments instead of just playing/running someone else's programs:

FLOSS

Back in the day, you could/needed to type in programs from magazines in order to run more interesting stuff, so you had to learn how to use the environment, instead of just purchasing stuff... Typing and therefore Coding errors could be instructional, as media was scarce, and publishing the code was academic, instead of hidden like patent, trade, and business proprietary. If you owned the machine ,you were good, could use the stuff, not buy more and more, like Insert Credit Card to Continue, (floppy disk logo for booting disk based OS, later hard drive based M$ WinBlows...)

GNU Free Software seems to have started with Richard M. Stallman, at M.I.T. at the time, contacting someone for code to an expensive Xerox printer, and being refused on Non Disclosure Agreement (N.D.A.) grounds and being taken a back that he could not get the code to modify the software, to say, alert him that printing was done, on a different floor, in the A.I. lab... While publishing their works, ai.mit.edu freely, some were using others works and not sharing that they had developed, kind of like professional courtesy and academic honesty, add in a $100k Lisp Machine like Symbolics, and the money people were going insane, according to some people, if you could understand it, you should be able to modify it, to develop something else... Linux is based on that philosophy, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish grad student, wrote a Unix like micro kernel and published it out when at the time only authors were doing that, and it blossomed. Developing an operating system (some call it Linux/ GNU since GNU tools are included, G.C.C. compiler built it, etc) is almost at the level of space programs as far as man hours, and presumably woman hours too, but if you subtract the time game playing, maybe not so astronomical, /Grin...

See Revolution OS for more information on the Movement...

Skills Possible with FLOSS

Coding is usually detail oriented, start with a high level language and get more skills, go to a lower level language for speed, and control... Used to be BASIC, which was faster to write, and then had to program (poke in) Assembly Language Z80, 8088, 8086, 80186, 286, i386, 486, Pentium, ad nausium... In Motorola land: 68000, 68010, 68020, 68030, ... PowerPC, G3, G4, G5... then back to IntelLand... Other architectures exist, now ARM chipsets, graphics processors, parallelism, networking, etc...

Or Just Installing Stuff/Auth/SummerJobs

System Admin i.e. installing stuff on machines, administering users (add, mod, delete, suspend, etc), quotas, backups (full, incrementals, restores, etc), security (can't say...), etc is usually about authority and power, rules, regulations, etc..

Like asking a parent to use the car... Are you old enough? Done Driver's Education? Passed? Got a license? Got and Paid for Insurance? Have you done your homework? Got good grades? Paying for gas out of your summer job?

Which reminds me, many internships and stuff, you have to think well ahead of time, to plan for stuff, DC Summer Jobs, likely had to put in for a while ahead, similar to college applications, and the MiniMakerFaire in Reston is scheduling tables, probably a deadline soon, or past, 17th? iirc...

GeeksRule2014

Traditionally sales of software, now online, doesn't really happen in person like old brick and mortar stores...

Buy a box, install floppies, later 3.5 inch, probably copy protected, can it be cracked?

Career Odds

Career outlook for gamers, probably like Pro BasketBall , FootBall and/or soccer SuperStars, very few get to the top, nor paid for it, like President, Vice President, Congress, Cabinet positions, S.E.S, etc...

Only 50 or so Presidents yet in the USA, in over the 200+ years of U.S. history... What percentage of the population is that? Over All time of Our Country? More or less than Pro Ball players?

Entertainment only, or Did You Learn Some/Any Thing To Day Johnny Boys and Girls?

Value of Sports and the Arts?

Similar, and / or different?

Compare and contrast...

Discussion

A place for feedback on the page presented

What games do you play?

Are they solitary games?

Card Games like Klondike?

Canfield?

Ever read Hoyle's? Wrote programs from rule books given?

Physical games like Ping Pong with the other side of the board propped up?

and/or PickleBall along a side of a wall?

Are you "Let's Move" ala Michelle Obama motivated?

And/or Oprah's new ads for Weight Watcher's?

Overeaters' Anonymous exists too, and the food is determined by a nutritionist, binge, purge, stomach stapled, start over, if can, daily, or "I Have a Box/Case of Donuts and I'm Not Afraid To Use Them" says the housebound diabetic recluse, too big to leave the house, bigger than the door frame, special beds built, only food delivery, no take out, crane to lift up, according to some intervention type shows, etc...

Writing games is probably more knowledge working and profitable, than just playing them. Game testers probably exist, but finding loopholes/bugs, exploiting them, and/or improving the things, if worth it, not entirely profit motivated like Lost Vegas...

Unfortunately, what happens in 8Ball doesn't stay in 8Ball, at least in the Android version, if you connect to FaceBook and/or Google, maybe other gaming websites, your information is shared, with the company (identity, phone number, full network access, run anything else at the same time? Company$ may know...), and maybe others, read the Privacy Policy, Terms and Conditions, most just opt in EULA (End User License Agreement) like, given no other real choice...

The Interwebs a World Wide network, and other people, countries, cultures, languages, etc are on the game site, I've seen names in languages I don't know (but recognize the character set, not ANSI/ASCII, Unicode, ...), but there are limited chat capabilities, some people, likely more obnoxious than I, try to interrupt your concentration, with comments (HeHe, Oops, Good Luck, NiceShot when you missed, while 20-30 second? deadline looms, forcing focus off time clock, adjusting angles, distracting...), like real world standing behind where you are trying to point the cue ball and stick, fidgeting, clicking, in a real pool hall... Many bars have pool tables, but for under age/ safety, also consider the teen centre pool games, what protections are available, instead of checking out a pool cue, 16 balls, (cue is white, btw, why you always hitting the White Ball? he says on M.L.K. Jr Day Weekend, or targeting the poor black ball, like cue stick directly on the logo...) and some blue chalk, a triangle frame jig called a "rack" and some pool hall table time, by analogy, you need a machine, tablet, Android and/or iPhone, of certain vintage, WiFi, and approval of parents/host(s), Acceptable Use Policy at School?, ISP, etc and an account if done socially. It will ask you questions (birth date?), you are using a machine connected somehow. While it has a play offline, it is inside the connected part, afaict. Friending people is probably Bad/maybe dangerous?, depending if you hang around in pool halls, or have a protected safe environment to learn (read basement, buy a table, have brothers and even sisters beat the chores/allowance/etc out of you first, keep it (money) in the family, before the leg breakers goons start showing up looking for body parts, bringing ball peen hammers...), more like a community centre/ recreation centre/ school / church/ synagogue/ mosque/ temple, probably have a No Electronics Nor Games Policy, similar to skateboarding and swearing). Safety like going to say an urban centre (read downtown /slum/ghetto/tough neighborhood) and playing basketball with unknown people compared to a high school or college campus, much less country club, so proper use, etiquette, keep from getting the crap beaten out of you, loose all your money, shirt, car, house, boat, pension, etc exist... Free throw equivalent is to scratch in the lower coin games (50, 100, 500, 1000, up to millions? to enter game and then there are tournaments, and/or All In (1000 minimum, then have to Advantage, to two wins in a row), etc), otherwise the opponent gets to move the cue ball around, making their turn easier because less is possibly blocking the pots (Politically, think no Republicans/Dems/Greens/Communists/etc doing negative ads)... Winning is important, you have say 8 balls to try (1-7 solids, 9-15 striped), including the last one the eight (8) ball... Solids or Stripes is determined by which person first sinks a ball deliberately, after the Break (cue to racked set of 15, hard as possible, 8 in the middle, alternate, and not all corners the same Hi/Low), which is like a toss up in basketball, or hockey, or coin toss in a football or similar game, of who starts... Then turn taking to sink balls in pockets, corner or side pockets, some higher level games, you have to call each pocket, not hitting the ball of your type (high or low numbered 8 is the middle number of a triangle), then a side, is a scratch, so opponent gets a turn with moving the cue ball around, easier to try at first...

Scratching on an 8 ball in many face to face games would be a loss...

Low level games (low coins) it is just next person's turn. Miss the shot/pocket, OK, next player...

Scratch, lose the game, coins in the kitty go to the opponent.

A little bit of physics involved on angles, but qualitative, not quantitative, unless you can measure it somehow...

Time of play, number of coins used, percentages of wins, learning involved, and other stuff...

No real referee nor un sportsman/woman like conduct, as no real judges/umpires/ etc...

Coding it might involve threads, display, boundaries, etc... Multiprocessing, etc...

Come to think of it, when was the last time I installed TkPool or whatever it is really called...

Might have to get back to that. Python Physics might not be fast enough for real time simulation, but educational to see... See elsewhere for speed up strategies, of years/decades past...

Feynman's Lectures on Physics it's not... Maybe the Sugar Physics Activity could model a little bit of what is going on: spin, allowed, vectors, force, velocity, angles, friction, bounce, collision avoidance, on up through bot creation, AI, gaming theory, etc... 2D Newtonian physics (can't jump the ball over the flat 2D plane, like in real pool...), nothing up there with modern 3D action adventure, like a lot of violent stuff, I'm only doing boring meditative like stuff (Gnome-Mahjongg, XMahjongg, KShisen, XShisen, PySolFC, XSol, XBill (PG-13 or so?: simulated blood, stopping Gate$ invading networks, with simulated lethal force...), etc), but fell into this particular trap for a bit... Will see if I can climb back out...

It ate my 2-3 star review, (pop up prompting, nay nagging me, to say nice things about the game, reading other installers' comments is enlightening), originally more detailed than this, but more concise, with a Server Error, but that could be the open WiFi and man/woman in the middle attacks... Big Brother / Little Brother (Cory Doctorow) exists, and might be watching You... Casino Security Systems anyone?

How many others in the world to do 50k players on one type of board/table?

That is when it seems to slow down, internet slow = you lose a turn, never got my turn, "Not Fair", "I Want My Chips Back!", "Take My F*^$(King Ball(s), and Go Home!", /StompsOff, hrmmmph...

/StormsOut

Sulks back in Sometime, Sober, cash in hand and Wants To Play!

/DramaFictional

Sore Losers and Winners of all Shapes, Sizes, Colours, Religions, Nationalities, Ages, Abilities, DisAbilities, etc...

License

Creative Commons Share and Share Alike, Non Commercial, Non Derivative, for the whole site's contents unless otherwise explicitly stated

Page History

20160122 Jerry

check typing, get rid of red underlined by retyping some words, thinking some bad characters got in, but center-> centre, and other English color -> colour, and more problems, Americanize the dictionary?
re segment a little
update to current level
consider popping out FLOSS into another page, as more of that than the commercial game, and misleading title?
still need:
game description/ experience in a separate section,
Tiers
Tournaments
fix battery on MBP so can play more TkPool and dev, but non removeable and costs $... SMC reset didn't do it...

20160120 Jerry

more additions,
some segmenting ideas, as it goes free flow, and might not return to original topic
FLOSS, Free Software Foundation, history, culture, RevOS, etc
some more mess
was going to add about spinning to find a match, endlessly bug,
ad types AdColony,
cannot lock screen, ad stops,
give ad examples, mostly software ads for other apps, but kill shot, and Mature Audience stuff,
while a good clean game of pool alone without getting into Casinos, predatory financial stuff,
and other non clean fun type high risks, of addictions, etc...
could move long discussion blurbs to a substantive part
need to add an ad section on commercialization, with examples of types of ads, parental guidance, seeing shoot em up screens, blood flying graphics, etc, MA?
workarounds?
cost benefits: loss of net bandwidth on ads to avoid paying for coins, 15 per megabyte of 30 seconds ad downloading, cached? retry? volume icon? trackers/tracers on ads, where web browser can block for privacy like Ghostery, AdBlockerPlus, etc...

20160117 JerrySpaceIdea

more changes, some rewording,typos,
adding some sections headers,
looked up some FLOSS game links
etc

20160116 Jerry Sandbox

Adding stuff, not necessarily making it clearer...
Might want to mention that Ad Volume Control starts changing, seemingly randomly turning up/on volume, so you might want to use headphones and put under pillow, when playing at night around others, or when the internet isn't busy, depends on yours and other's sleep schedule(s), baby asleep? 'Rents say no More Damn Games, until your grades are UP! Off Detention/ Grounding/ Work Release/etc...
Whatever, Dude/Dudetttes, it's just a Game...
Yeah, SuperBowl, is Just a Game,
What's the Spread?
Hint, you don't want to know
Don't Get Hooked
Do As I Say,
Not As I Do...
Next!

20160114 Jerry

Jerry created this page to put more publicly what I found on a game online, just to piss of more than just local hunter ala DearBedBugs2013 , DearSideBarEtAl , DearTwentySomethings2013 , and even BambisOutToGetMeAndSnakesInTheStore2011 and RainDeerAndBambiForBreakfast2015 ...
I'm all right, just seasonal, lots of rain, then very cold with a M.L.K., Jr. Holiday coming up ala FreedomRiders2014 ...
For Profit can be killers, while not for profit are supposed to be caring...
MiniClip not MiniCom a serial line communications program from back in the day, I probably never even used much...

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8PoolByMiniCom2016

Introduction/Definition/etc

Body

AddictionAlerts

OpenSourceLearningAlternatives?

BackTo8Ball

EvaluationOfGaming?

Idears

Links

Billiards Pool 8 Ball

Generic Gaming

MiniClip

Open Source Alternatives

TkPool

SugarLabs.org

Comedians

Sugar Like

DebIan

Programming

Tk/Tcl

Squeak

Scratch

Other FLOSS Games

XBill

Physics

Addictions, Syndromes, Etc

BarFly Film

Conclusion

FLOSS

Skills Possible with FLOSS

Or Just Installing Stuff/Auth/SummerJobs

Career Odds

Discussion

License

Page History

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8PoolByMiniCom2016

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