Date: Sun, 16th December 2018
It's been a little while coming, but there has been a major upgrade to the story editor. The new editor allows the editing of your adventures as they appear on the screen. You still get to define episodes for your stories, and mark the party's progress through the mire of getting killed... but now we can edit the text of the adventures right there in the viewer.
In terms of usability this upgrade makes the adventure process much easier to follow and read. There are a full set of controls for adding, editing and deleting sections of the adventure. And you can still allocate them to parties.
As you'll probably be running the adventures with the adventure page editor open, you can now insert additional notes into the document to record what the party are up to as they deal with that section. In the old days, this would have been notes in the margin of your paper adventures, but now - it's much more straightforward, and much easier to read afterwards.
Date: Sun, 18th December 2016
Its finally here - the major upgrade to DM tools from Immortal Geek. Now we have a suite of map, story, party and NPC management tools that integrate smoothly and allow you to plan and track your tabletop games, and to help provide map resources to your players.
Coupled with the players tools for diary management and access to character sheets, ImmortalGeek.com now provides a set of tools to enhance the games of players and gamesmasters alike.
What's included:
This is a major upgrade and the map management tools require a modern web browser with HTML5 support, which is most of the major browsers in use today. Sign up today and request DM access. This feature is still available without subscription for the time being.
These tools are in addition to the already available player diary reading and management system which allows users to subscribe for their favourite story updates from the game players.
Date: Thu, 29th September 2016
No, not the polymorph/shape-shifting game mechanic, this is real science. There are materials that change their shape in response to external influences such as changes in temperature, such as memory metals, that have been around for a while. The magazine Nature has just published an article in which some very clever boffins have detailed a way to make materials that will change shape according to programmed rules over time. The fascinating article can be read on the Nature website here.
Programmable temporal shapeshifting is a subject of fantasy that science is attempting to resolve - and this is definitely an interesting subject. Surely it's only a few short steps from here to a real 'Polymorph Any Object'... I really hope the scientists are also working on a version of Dimension Door to get me into work a bit quicker. And a version of Scorching Ray to help me make a cup of tea really quickly.
Date: Sat, 25th April 2015
It's hard to believe, but the Hubble Space Telescope is 25 years old. Many of us remember it being launched into orbit from the space shuttle, then all the problems and repairs needed to sort out the optics. It was an expensive mess at the time, but it'd be hard to find anyone in the science community today that doesn't think it was worth every last dime. As a special event, NASA has released a 25th anniversary image, which you can take a look at here on the ESA Hubble page. Many years ago the plan for the Hubble was very different to today's expectation. It's reached its major milestone, and the outlook for it now is grim.
The original plan was to recover the Hubble telescope using the space shuttle and put it on display in one of NASA's museums. This, of course, is no longer possible. Unless there are any unexpected developments on the space vehicle front, then the current plan is to allow it to break up and return to Earth in pieces, where it would burn up in the atmosphere as it falls. While this is an ignominious end for a piece of space hardware, it's hard to see any other way to safely dispose of it.
While The Hubble has been superseded, it has had a profound impact on modern science. It has been at the forefront some some of the most important recent discoveries about our universe, especially in seeing deeper and further back in time than we'd ever had chance to before, and being part of the discovery of hundreds planets orbiting distant stars.
The technology moves on, but the HST's place in history is secure.
Date: Sat, 29th November 2014
Star Wars is back (or it will be very soon). The Force Awakens, if you didn't already know, is the first film of the new Disney franchise, and it's our duty as geeks to get excited about it. Fortunately the trailer, available on YouTube, makes that really easy.
The worrying presence of Disney over this project is completely allayed by the selection of JJ Abrams as the film's director. Judging by the enticing trailer, this is going to be spectacular, and genuinely true to the look, style and feel of the original three movies. My inner geek is already jumping like a seven year old on Christmas Eve. And it's another year until the film goes on release.
Date: Wed, 29th October 2014
For most of us the signal to upgrade might be that we're falling behind while playing the latest computer games. Or that spreadsheet with our taxes on it takes longer to calculate than making a cup of tea. But how can you tell when that's needed for a commercial or industrial computer?
For the Met Office, it's the same as for us - except that in their case its not having to turn down the graphics detail level that gives the game away. It's the slow addition of improvements to the climate and weather models making existing calculations take longer and longer. Their new upgrade is a whopping £97 million, it's produced by Cray, and is explained a little on here on the BBC's website. This thing would tear up the latest Assassin's Creed or Call of Duty...
Date: Thu, 23rd October 2014
More tool updates have been applied to the Immortal Geek website today. To give diary writers the opportunity to express themselves more clearly we've rolled out a wiki-like markup extension to the diary editor. The tags are quite straightforward, and are intended to be easy to use. If you have a diary then give them a try and let us know what you think.
The tag descriptions are included at the bottom of the diary article page (they're not applied to diary descriptions, only individual diary entries) and allow you to specify headings, text styles and lists. There is no call for a full-on wiki style markup tag scheme (there are too many things that a wiki can do that we don't support) but this should provide some flexibility in the the way you communicate your heroics to your readers.
Updating the output formatter for diary entries may have had a minor impact on the way your diary entries are presented to readers. We urge all diary writers to check their entries to ensure that they still look as good as originally intended. If they have been affected, then you can edit them safely and use the new markup methods without affecting what you previously wrote.
Date: Thu, 23rd October 2014
Body scanners... who want them eh? Well it turns out that supermarkets are after them. There is a market for scanning their customers, and in the best possible way, according to this article over at Computerworld.
For just a few quid you can have your body scanned, digitised, and then reproduced as a full colour miniature for posterity. Of course, in the world of gaming, this opens up a whole new range of possibilities. At the moment these are 6 inch or 9 inch figures being produced. But what if they were 15 mm figures? You could do away with table top lead, and your character can actually be you.
Well, maybe that won't catch on, but this is likely to be an eye-catching use of technology at your local supermarket soon. I wonder if they store the digital images anywhere after you've been 'printed'?
Date: Sat, 18th October 2014
A new round of site-wide updates have been applied, and there are new features and other tweaks across the website.
The list of changes applied in this update are:
There are more changes about to land very soon too - we've been working hard on some useful DM tools which are nearly ready, and a vastly improved editor mark-up method.
Date: Fri, 28th February 2014
Are you sick of seeing the latest updates to the diaries you read at Immortal Geek passing by without you knowing that they've been updated? Well now we've implemented the ideal solution - you can subscribe to your favourite diaries, and we will then send you an email whenever the diary's author publishes a new entry.
You need to be logged-in to use this feature (as your email address is stored as a part of your account) and you need to have your Immortal Geek email preferences ticked (on the Account Settings page, which appears on the left after you've logged in) because turning this off prevents us sending you any emails other than account servicing ones. Oh, and you can't subscribe to your own diaries... but then, why would you want to - you already know when a new diary entry that you wrote has been posted.
As a diary writer, emails are only sent out when you publish a diary entry (and they'll get sent again if you un-publish a diary entry then publish it again, so all your subscribers will know that the entry is updated).
The button to enable a subscription to the diaries appears on the page where you read it - both on the diary's own list page, and on the individual diary entry reading page. They both operate the same setting, so you should see the effects of subscribing straight away (and the option will change to an un-subscribe option, allowing you to turn off a diary subscription immediately).
Of course, we also have to provide a proper unsubscribe page too, just in case anyone types their email address in wrong and the notices go to the wrong person. Using this page will turn off both your Immortal Geek email preference settings (and you can turn them on individually later if you wish).
Date: Wed, 26th February 2014
Most people cannot answer this questions, its wrapped in the mysteries of science, tied up with the maths of fundamental particles and linked to wave theory. What we could really do with is someone who understands particle physics who can communicate it all to us effectively.
A while ago PhDComics.com tried to do just that. And, because they didn't get it all completely right, and because of a recent chance meeting, they've had another go. Here is the result, and it's the best damn explanation I've ever read about Higgs particles. It's actually understandable and doesn't involve very hard physics. Which is a relief for most of us. Enjoy the article.
Date: Sat, 15th February 2014
If you are a regular visitor you might notice a few changes here especially if you log-in regularly. A site update has just been completed, we've fixed several minor niggles and tidied up a few things. For those not logged in the changes are minimal - this rolled-out version is 0.9.7, and is a stake in the ground for us. We have a target for certain tools to be available for the 1.0.0 update which won't be too far off, but they're not quite ready yet - and we wanted to make sure that the main site is working as expected following our recent move to the new blade server (thanks to our user 'Zoltran' for that, btw.)
The update includes changes in these areas:
While this is a step forward for all our users, we don't think we've done everything perfectly just yet. So if you do find problems then drop an email to 'bugs' at ImmortalGeek.com. You can also use that address if you think a feature could be improved, or if there is a new tool you think would compliment your existing toolset. The more clearly you describe what's happening the more quickly we can resolve any problems.