Inigo Quilez   ::     ::  
1402 blog posts, written between 2008 and 2016. These are mostly short observations, funny thoughts and word playing. Some are embarrasingly corny, some more deep. I keep it here mostly a little time capsule for myself, organized by month:



<
May 2014
>
you gotta be kidding me
2014-05-31
a store i just passed by announces they sell organic mattresses
a hairy question
2014-05-29
when you have this amount of hair in your legs... one of the most hairy question of your day probably is "should i apply soap or shampoo?"
flowerfrog and milkbear
2014-05-27
butterfly, and jellyfish.

seems we run out of animal names and now we are combining food and other animal's names. so biologists, for when you discover a new species of animals, here are some propositions:

flowerfrog and milkbear
stephanie. or maybe not!
2014-05-25
why are so many different ways to write Stephanie? and i'm talking of the american rendition of the name only. double n? f? ph? y in the end? you must be bullshiting me.
i enjoyed a lot
2014-05-23
It's being a while since last time I had time for making a mathematical image. I still don't have the time nor I am able to make it. But I did found a few minutes to spare and took and old mathiamge (#4o in fact) and doodled on top of it, mainly with the geometry, the lighting and the colors. As usual, this runs/moves in realtime, and as usual too, the maths/code are available for few here: https://www.shadertoy.com/view/XdfXDB

It loved getting distracted and letting mind and let it wander freely and randomly for a few minutes. It feelt really, really good. I enjoyed a lot.

life is amazing
2014-05-21
this morning i saw a pregnant woman. in San Francisco!

it's amazing to see life making it through the most hostile of the environments.
acronyms
2014-05-19
ok americans, idk wtf is going on w/ u and acronyms. lol.
i see no good reason
2014-05-17
why do women's bike have a different frame shape than men's?
please please please, make it smaller!
2014-05-15
I think size matters. However, unlike in real life, when programming the smaller the better. Generally. Also, the less branches the better, at least when programming for parallel systems. And also, the more compact and regular, the prettier (but this is my personal opinion only).

Related to this, in the last 6 months I have pointed out / proposed this same optimization to at least five different people. Basically, it seems most people make this same "mistake" over and over again, which is to write this horrifying thing

vec3 color = vec3(0.0);

if (theta < 1.0) {
color.r = 1.0;
color.g = theta;
}
else if (theta < 2.0) {
color.r = 2.0 - theta;
color.g = 1.0;
}
else if (theta < 3.0) {
color.g = 1.0;
color.b = theta - 2.0;
}
else if (theta < 4.0) {
color.g = 4.0 - theta;
color.b = 1.0;
}
else if (theta < 5.0) {
color.r = theta - 4.0;
color.b = 1.0;
}
else {
color.r = 1.0;
color.b = 6.0 - theta;
}
return color;


instead of this equivalent line:

vec3 color = clamp( abs(mod(theta+vec3(0.,4.,2.),6.)-3.)-1., 0., 1. );

i don't
2014-05-13
people in the train that read a book and listen to music in their headphones at the same time - i don't believe you
pluto
2014-05-11
I don't know why people got so shocked to learn that Pluto is not a planet - I always knew it is a dog.
where?
2014-05-09
where exactly does one sign up to become a roller coaster designer/engineer?
one complain a day keeps you healthy
2014-05-07
i complain a lot. but i am a very happy man, don't get me wrong.

i wake up every morning with a smile in my face. well, technically i am grumpy when i wake up, no smiles really, but it's only for a couple of seconds, then i smile. after that i take my shower, i take my breakfast. i take it easy, i take my time. and sometimes, i take a nap too.

however, especially for a happy man, complaining can be fun and good. i actually think one critical comment a day is a healthy exercise to keep yourself in shape.

now, see post below
that repulsive language of the valley
2014-05-05
this morning i was in the train when i noticed an ad for a university (as you know, here students pay to attend university meaning they are customers), that used a language i have been disliking lately. the message and selling point of the ad was that students coming out of this university "love building products".

now, "building products" is part of that common terminology used in the Silicon Valley area, that actually means nothing (to me, that is). in fact, i am pretty sick of hearing people talk abstract, generic, and free of any actual compromise with being concrete or precise. and not only the smoke sellers in the networking events do use this language - on the contrary, everybody, including the makers themselves, have adopted this weird meaningless language, where things like "designing strategies", "building products" and "implementing solutions" are said.

i'm tired of meeting people who want to talk to me for minutes and all i hear are abstract words that mean nothing. at all. really.

or maybe i am too simple.

but in either case, i wonder, what the fuck has happened with the good old language of specific and precise words and terms? is there any economy left based on tangible goods? get companies built anymore with precise goals and problems to tackle? is there anybody left over here who actually makes better shoes, frames beautiful digital paintings, films movies, cooks tasty food, drives cabs, delivers goods faster or fucking programs banking software?

please, people, use concrete words to describe what you do, the beautiful words we all agreed on that together make language, and stop using your "designing strategies", "building products" and "implementing solutions". those make me want to throw up (or puke or vomit, see?, there are words, you pick one).



special nights
2014-05-03
those nights when you cannot tell which day of the week it is, nor you care about asking it to yourself, when you are reading or writing or doing maths or your favorite thing, and the city sleeps in silence and darkness outside, when in your room all you can hear is the silence left in the negative space of the soft piano music in the background, and all you can see is the darkness left in the negative space a candle and some dim xmas lights... those nights of relaxed introversion, suspended in the vacuum of reality and time, those nights are especial
something has been lost
2014-05-01
when sharing porn these days with a friend or partner one simply has to pass a web link in an email or chat client, and then copy and paste it in a browser. aseptic, boring.

in the old days one had to carry a magazine around more or less hidden, keep it for a while and finally give warning about sticky pages and such before delivering to the next friend. dangerous, exciting.

with the new technologies something romantic has definitely been lost about porn sharing...