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I'll try to get them... 
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The original was a radio series (which was / is available on CD: Amazon[^] - I have a copy), and then spawned books (most of which disagreed with each other at some point), and finally a film (which was OK, but as is the way of these things not as good as the original) DNA described the process of getting the film made as "like trying to grill a steak by having a succession of people coming into the room and breathing on it".
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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Most films suffer from that effect, but in that case I can understand it must be really difficult to port... 
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Ahem, you forgot the TV series. That came out between the books and the film.
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I did - and it had some very good moments! 
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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It disappointed me that they finished when they did. Mind you, considering how the different media diverged at that point, it's possibly just as well that they didn't.
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The BBC website is still available, though no longer updated, at HHGTG[^]
The Guide is available here: H2G2[^]
=========================================================
I'm an optoholic - my glass is always half full of vodka.
=========================================================
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I remember reading the books as a kid when I was about 15 years old and loving them. Very funny and clever. It was a very sad day when Douglas Adams (the author of the books) passed away. Richard Dawkins read a eulogy at his funeral, as they were very close friends.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare
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I watched the series on TVOntario (public television in Ontario, Canada) produced by the BBC.
Then, I read the books; the series peaked my interest - the books I absolutely enjoyed.
When the movie came out, my wife asked me to go to "The Phantom of the Opera" movie with her; I did, and I somewhat enjoyed it. She then agreed to go to "The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" with me. Neither of us particularly enjoyed it. Having read the books, I understand what they were attempting; she was, and still is, lost in attempting that.
It is like trying to watch and truly enjoy the movie, "Dune" without having read the book - a lot is lost in translation.
Tim
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As my final working day for 2014 comes to a close, I figured now is as good a time as any to wish everyone a Happy New Year!! Have a safe and prosperous 2015!!
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Happy New Year to you and everyone else on CP. Have an enjoyable New Year and hope 2015 brings prosperity and happiness to everyone 
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare
Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
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Wish you a very Happy and Prosperous New Year!!!Hope 2015 will be a very successful year!!!
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Happy New Year. Here's hoping that 2015 is better than 2014.
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Why, by giving them free stuff of course. Today I received goodies from Intel celebrating the first year they are awarding developers with the award of Intel Software Innovator. 'Twas very nice to receive my mug, t-shirt, certificate, etc. Congratulations to CP's own @Abhishek-Nandy for also receiving this award.
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Congrats, Pete! Well deserved! 
/ravi
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Cheers Ravi. Working with Intel has been a blast.
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Really ? I feel Intel is massively behind in software. I mean the whole RealSense thing is total crap (just look at the SDK, not to speak of the HW side, which has been outsourced and is also far behind the competition). The Intel XDK is very buggy and only lives from the individual components, which are not build from Intel.
I won't go into more special categories such as compilers or the Xeon Phi ecosystem. For me doing software with Intel has been a disaster and I am much happier without their software products.
I have a feeling that they bought you  , but I am happy that you got some goodies from them!
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I will have to disagree on the RealSense. I have spent a lot of time working with the SDK and I find it to be very good. I wouldn't be wasting my time with a technology if I didn't think it had potential.
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I am really surprised. I guess you never created something with the Kinect (either for the Xbox or for Windows). It is actually far superior.
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I have, but the but there are big issues with the Kinect. For instance, it's an external peripheral - and a hefty one at that. The RealSense camera will be internal in Ultrabooks. It's also targeting Android devices as well. On top of that, there's the ability to print to 3D devices directly - that's pretty compelling. Overall, I find the RealSense SDK to be very simple to use - I recently demonstrated to people how to identify the emotions a user was feeling in a dozen lines of code. How about handling swipe and zoom gestures? Again, a dozen lines of code. Want to add more gestures? Very simple.
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Pete O'Hanlon wrote: Overall, I find the RealSense SDK to be very simple to use - I recently demonstrated to people how to identify the emotions a user was feeling in a dozen lines of code. How about handling swipe and zoom gestures? Again, a dozen lines of code. Want to add more gestures? Very simple.
Looking forward to the articles on CP that will guide us into this wonderland, Pete.
Congratulations on your award !
cheers, Bill
«A man will be imprisoned in a room with a door that's unlocked and opens inwards ... as long as it does not occur to him to pull rather than push» Wittgenstein
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They will be accompanying an OS framework I'm writing to allow people to simplify even from that level. Using it will enable you to break it down to this:
Application
.Uses(RealSense.Emotion)
.On(Emotion.Happiness, emotion=>HandleHappiness(emotion))
.Uses(RealSense.Gesture)
.On(Gesture.SwipeLeft, swipe=>OnGesture(swipe))
.On(Gesture.SwipeRight, swipe=>OnGesture(swipe))
.On(Gesture.ZoomIn, zoom=>OnZoom(zoom));
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The SDK does not make much sense (pun intended) and where you find it excelling I find it limiting.
We created, e.g., a 3D scanner with the RealSense SDK. It was a pure mess. The precision of the camera and the abilities of the SDK have been in the way. In the end we had to use the most primitive API possible and directly smooth over everything. Still, the result was not very pretty. With the Kinect it is easily possible as the Kinect Fusion implementation demonstrates. Going beyond simple gestures is a pain. If you just use the built-in gestures then I agree with you - its alright. But is that really what I want as a developer? I hardly think so. Otherwise the last ~15 years in software engineering are just useless. Who needs extensibility?!
I still don't know what should be the use-case of a near-field camera in an Ultrabook. When I am sitting in front of the device I will definitely not use it. The Kinect is much better in almost every area. But I can see that they bought you where I had to refuse  . Glad at least one developer I know likes the SDK.
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Actually, I find the remark that they bought me highly offensive. This award from Intel was just created this year - I've been working with the RealSense SDK for the last couple of years, back from when it was the Perceptual Computing SDK.
You and I have different opinions about the SDK and that's fine, but that's down to the way we like to interact - while I can do things very easily with the RealSense SDK, I also like the fact that I can go a lot deeper and achieve a much finer degree of control. I really like the fact that it's also multi-platform, and doesn't just tie me into a Microsoft world.
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