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2021-03-23 Writing chapter 7 of Ghosts of Glory High has become quite an ordeal. When I wrote a plot summary for Ghosts of Glory High in April of 2019, I figured crafting the seventh chapter (titled "A Headache") would be-- well, a headache. In the typical style of the project, I've continued to create massively abstract descriptions of the chapter's events as they unfold. And, the material I have so far is fantastic! It just so happens (due to the chapter's complexity, public setting (there are many people around), appearance of all *major* characters, and strange lighting), it's taking me even longer than usual to write this monstrosity. I dare say Ghosts of Glory High's 7th chapter is the most complicated piece of literature I have ever written! It's even more complex than R.G.K.'s 23rd chapter (where twenty-two different people are randomly murdered). It's more complicated than chapter 16 of my book Don't Go Upstairs-- in which Tiffany plays hide and seek as a young girl, stays overnight at the bottom of a water well during a hail storm, and then wakes up and goes ghost hunting (all in one chapter). But, I mean-- the project will be really great when it's finally finished. I can hardly wait to go through it! And (as the case will be), I'm not going to rush it. And, writing it will take as long as it takes. I am not being paid to write this project. That is its nature. And, that is its design. There is not some fucking dick-head breathing down my neck-- trying to achieve a certain amount of product in a certain amount of time in order to acquire a specific amount of wealth (or whatever arbitrary abstraction said person is carelessly hoping will manifest all by itself). And (when crafting the work of Insanely Witty Stupidity), that is how a Michael-- do. ;) I'm pretty sure I will have this chapter finished some time around the middle of April. I would have never guessed it would take so long to finish writing this project. But now, that's how it's looking to me. When I finally finish, that will leave me three chapters away from finishing Ghosts of Glory High. The last three chapters are nowhere near as complex as this one. They will go more smoothly. I've been working on a strange library (called "clairvoyance") that takes user input. It works using ncurses. But, it also has an acquisition library that collects user input from Linux file descriptors (and other POSIX compliant handles). I'm still actively developing it. I'm about to give the file descriptor library a control mode (accessed using a control key like "control-x"). And, clairvoyance's control mode will allow a user to do things like detach a running process from their system's file descriptors (without terminating the process). The control interface will also allow a user to change the values of environment variables the process is using. :D Eventually, I'll add a curses like interface for Windows systems. Although, I can't stand Windows. And, I really wish people would stop using it. And then, I'm going to write an API for command based input systems. It will have typical interface utilities (like buttons and scrollbars and menus). And (eventually), I plan on implementing a kitchen sink text editor like Emacs. I would like to make it a C interpreter (kinda like how Emacs is a lisp interpreter, but mine will interpret the C programming language). And (naturally), it'll have all kinds of other crazy features and (probably) games. I plan to release the source code for my library and my text editor under a new license developed for Insanely Witty Stupidity. Unlike GNU's general public license (which is a restrictive piece of shit that is not really designed in the spirit of the GNU project), Insanely Witty Stupidity's source code license will be just for source code. A separate script will be needed in order to compile the source code. But, I don't plan on distributing binaries. In my opinion, this is a better way to distribute source code. GNU and the Free Software Foundation's stance has always been that source code should be made forcefully available for precompiled projects. GNU's license is a pretty restrictive piece of legislation in many other ways as well. The license goes far beyond the scope of its supposed purpose. The argument typically made by the Free Software Foundation and the GNU project is that source code should be distributed to users so they can make use of their software. And yet (for some strange reason), the GNU General Public license is supposed to be some type of catch all license that can apply to any project. It is used to license precompiled binaries and everything else under the sun. There is even an online soda recipe (Open Soda) that is released under the conditions of the GNU General Public License. None of this ever made any sense to me. I mean-- I thought the idea was to distribute source code. :\ Since the goal of the GNU project is to disseminate an operating system made of public source code, I thought, "Why not release source code under a license-- for source code?" Crazy idea, I know. My idea is to release uncompiled source code under a license that says "You can't copyright this." And then, give people a script they can use to compile it under a different license for scripts (like Insanely Witty Stupidity's Honest Scripting License). And (at that point), my goal will be fulfilled. I plan to write my own operating system released entirely as source code under a similar license. This would necessitate some sort of manually assembled and linked binary in order to compile the system (if you can imagine such a thing). I have some pretty interesting ideas about implementing an operating system as well as developing standardized terminals for existing systems (so my system can run on top of other systems). But, all of this is well beyond the scope of this article. So, I will leave it at that for now. I'll likely have an update for the Witty News column when I feel like I am ready to share my library and my text editor. |
| Random Fact: Insanely Witty Stupidity hosts a PHP cat command. It can write the contents of Insanely Witty Stupidity's files to a web page. Additional features of the site's cat script are outlined in its man page. |
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