successor to rome

Countries that have claimed to be, or, have implied themselves to be, successors to the Roman Empire:

Austria (Claimed successor of HRE)
Bulgaria (Claimed rival and successor of the Byzantines)
France (Claimed through Charlemange)
Germany (Implied through HRE successorship and Kaiser title)
Greece (Claimed successor of the Byzantines)
Italy (Mussolini claim)
Romania (Implied through ethnicity claim)
Russia (Claimed successor of the Byzantines)
Serbia (Claimed rival and successor of the Byzantines)
Spain (Implied pretender successorship of the Byzantines)
Turkey (Claimed successor of the Byzantines)
United States (Implied through governmental structure claim)


Teddy's Judgement:

Austria, Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Serbia, and Spain are all too weak, in the modern day, to be the successor of Rome, and, importantly, none of them are very 'Roman' culturally or structurally.

Italy's claims seem to have been an afterthought, and its founding did not see any such claim, thus weakening the claim.

Turkey and Russia are vastly different culturally and politically than Rome ever was. Both their claims are weakened by this and the fact that they both earned the claim at the same time (IE one would need to annex the other for the claim to be more serious)

France and Germany's symbolism, political structure, and culture, can be compared to what existed in Rome, and, if they were the only such claimants, they would probably have the most serious claim, however...

The United States can legitimately, in my opinion, be seen as the successor to the Roman Empire. Not only did it model itself on the Roman Republic explicitly and directly, something all the other claimants failed to do, but its standing in the world for the past 100 or so years matches the way many in the world contemporary to Rome, viewed Rome. IE "Wow! they are the strongest nation in the world, except for maybe China"

So my new computer is 'ready'

The computer I mentioned earlier, is ready.

Robb gave me a Mobo, RAM, a CPU, a heatsink, and a graphics card. I attached the RAM, the CPU Heatsink, and the Graphics card.

I also purchased a new case that can fit all of this, as the one I had could not. I purchased a PSU that can power the monster GPU. Robb sent along a M2 SSD he had, that I plugged in. I also purchased my own SSD, and later, will purchase a HDD. I scavenged a optical drive from one of my dead computers, as well as numerous wires I'd need to connect all these things to one another. I purchased 2 HDMI cables, along with 2 HDMI-to-DVI converters. 15 minutes before I began writing this, I realized I do not need one set, but, that having it, would enable me to easily upgrade to 3 monitors later.

Everything is thus connected and ready. Mobo switches are properly set, PSU is set to 115 volts, and is currently set to the 'off' position.

When I am done writing this, I'm going to unhook one of my monitors from this computer. I'm going to then grab a spare keyboard, and spare mouse I have. I'm going to plug them all into the new computer. I'm then going to plug in the proper power plug to the PSU.

Then I'm going to flip the switch on the PSU.



Let me go off on a tangent for a moment.

There's a problem with all of this.

I'm convinced it wont work.

Oh sure, I'm estimating a good 37% or so chance that it WILL work. And my hope is as follows:

I flip that switch, and the computer does what a lot of em do when that happens, whurs on for a second, then turns off. Then I hit the button on the front of the case. Having correctly connected the case to the mobo, and, the mobo to everything else, the computer purrs to life. It's as slick as ice and fast as a schumacher. It purrs like a kitten, brings me nothing but joy. Installing the OS is easy, simple, and fast, and getting fully back online (including logging into google, discord, facebook, and all the other basics) is just as easy and fast. I'm able to download 4 full video games overnight (things like skyrim, civilization, stellaris, or mass effect) and wake up tomorrow to a fresh new computer just waiting for me to have fun.

Sadly. I doubt that will happen.

See, when I switched to linux, I wanted to make sure the game I was playing at the time, Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIII, would work on linux. Everything said it should. So, I switched. And, it did! It continued to work right up to its final-ever patch. When it broke. Why did it break? unclear.

Also, Minecraft broke. Worked for a bit, then, rip. Middle of a game, stopped working. Minecraft's problem was related, somehow, to "Vulkan". While I may know enough to operate Linux, I'm really not all that sure what that is, but, I do know, that officially, my current/old graphics card can not handle Vulkan.

That didn't stop me from running some stuff that required Vulkan, but it certainly did stop me from running other stuff that required it. My suspicion is that whatever broke RTK13 will be fixed if I can get a better Graphics Card.

...however...

I'm not sure. I'm the most recent person to try to play the game on linux (and write about it on protondb) so it is very possible that the game will, in fact, not work on my new computer.

This, would be a bummer.

Additionally, some of the other games that do not work for me, may continue to not work (properly) on the new computer. Stellaris has an entire megathread about it.

But, I would at least be better off than I am now...

...If the computer works...



See. I may have plugged in something wrong. A lot of those case plugs are tiny. 1 prong thick! My case is also very snug, but very wide, meaning that it was very hard to see what I was doing. Maybe one or more of them went into the wrong slot. I did consult the MoBo manual, but I've been known to make stupid mistakes. That goes as well for everything else I had to plug in. Not to mention that there is still a ton of cords in the case just kind of, hanging there. Clearly this case was designed for a computer made 20 years ago. It fits. But it does not fit well. And I don't have many options for what to do with all this spare cabling. It's quite possible that one or more of them will end up in a place they should not be, and damage, if not destroy, the computer.

Assuming I've plugged in all the cables right, I could have destroyed the MoBo. I put the CPU in myself, along with the heat sync, and graphics card. It's quite possible that at some point in the past 6 months I managed to damage one or more of them.

And all of that assumes that the electrical power the machine would need to suck out of my old and poorly-wired electrical sockets won't flip the breaker.

Even if it does work, I will need to re-organize my entire desk to somehow make it fit.




So I have a computer that probably can't play the game I want, probably will flip the breaker, probably will not even start, and probably will catch on fire the instant I flip the PSU on. Or. At least. That's what I've somehow managed to convince myself. It's why I'm not rushing to finish the computer, and it took this long.



Regardless.

Today seems like an excellent day to try the new computer. So. If everything goes to plan, that's exactly what I'll be doing as soon as I finish this post.

Twitch streaming & lack of quality options

NEW UPDATED VERSION: http://pellakensblog.blogspot.com/2021/04/lack-of-quality-options-when-twitch.html

Hello streamer! You are reading this because I (or someone else) has linked you to this post. You've started a stream that has no quality options!

What are quality options? 
On any stream you watch, at least on desktop (I don't use mobile) you can click the little gear icon. In that menu is a "Quality" option. If you have no quality options, the only options available will be your native streaming rate, and "auto"

What is encoding and transcoding related to this?
Words describing the same thing - quality options.

What does it mean if someone says I don't have quality options?
That they'd like to use these options, but you do not have them.

Why don't I have them?
You are not a twitch partner. Non-partners only get quality options "sometimes"

When do I get them?
Whenever, based on a random chance, based on how busy twitch is. This is why, if you start at a specific time of the day, you will often have, or, often not have, the options.

How can I get them if I do not have them?
You can re-start your stream. This re-rolls the random chance. Many times, a single restart will generate the options, sometimes it make take many restarts (20 or more) pending on how busy twitch is, and how lucky you are with your random chance.

What can I do if I can't make them appear?
Viewers use these because their internet connection is simply not fast enough to watch your stream at the bitrate at which you are streaming. Many guides suggest streaming at a bitrate of 6000. Sadly, many of the "old standard" internet connections - which were considered fast a decade ago - can not handle 6000 bits. Many people in rural areas are therefore stuck on slower connections. If you do not get quality options, and, do no change the bitrate you are outputting, they will be unable to watch your stream. To change your broadcast bitrate, you will need to change the settings in your broadcaster program (OBS, xsplit, streamlabs, etc)

What rate should I set it at?
Sadly, I can not answer this. There will always be people with connections too slow to handle whatever you are streaming at. Setting it at 4000 or 3500 seems to enable most people to watch.

What about my stream quality?
Sadly, you are going to have to make a choice. There are those who will not watch streams that are below 1080P at 60fps. and there are those who do not have an internet connection able to receive that much data. If you are unwilling to restart your stream until you get quality options, You'll have to decide which group you are going to exclude.

theme; Rebirth

so.

https://local.theonion.com/global-pandemic-that-has-killed-thousands-giving-woman-1842528634

today was supposed to be the follow up to this:

https://pellakensblog.blogspot.com/2020/03/i-tweeted-this-but-it-will-become.html

but I'm not going to do it.

There will be major life-changing things I'm doing, but, given the context of the world situation, all you will get is the name of the theme which is Rebirth.

that is all.

crisis energy

Crises give me energy. I don't know why. I think it has something to do with the fact that I dig into data to make sure what I'm doing is right; and knowing I'm doing the right, thing, I feel good and empowered.

I'm starting to feel that now.

"Doing it right" - Streaming video games

This might sound odd or weird, but, this is one of the more emotional posts I've ever written.

Let me take you back to the 90s. Lets say 1996 or so. I lived in Summerside PEI, and I was growing up.

Every friday we'd go to the rental store, and I'd rent a game to play. I'd play them all weekend and return them on Sunday.

Some of these games were RPGs. I quite enjoyed them. I loved the story, the music, and the exploration. I loved experiencing a new world.

Of course, being rented, I never had the time to ever complete one of these games. Even if I could, in sum, have played all the various parts of the game, none of those runs were 100% mine.





Now let me take you back to about 2008 or so.

I learned about emulators. I also had a very boring job working overnight. As a result, I ended up re-playing all those old games and beating them. It really felt like I was re-living my old life, but, doing it right this time. Going back over how I grew up and correcting mistakes I'd make. It was very cathartic.

However.

I had a walkthrough open for each. I made heavy use of safe states. I basically cheated my way to victory through shortcuts.

I have played those old games since. here and there. Never for more than a few hours.





It's now been so long that as much time has elapsed between my re-playing of those games and my original playing of them in the 90s.

It's time to do it again. This time, truly doing it right.

I've actually been planning this for a while and have been waiting for my new computer to be up and running, with my new internet connection, to stream it all on twitch.

The problem is, that will take time, a lot of time. And I'm ready now.




As such I'm announcing that I'm going to start doing this. At least part time. In my discord.

The last time I did this it was extremely emotional and I don't count it as a small coincidence that I stopped suffering from major depression at exactly that time.

Lets see if we can't make this time just as helpful to my mental state.

I tweeted this, but it will become increasingly important, so I'm putting it here too

so I decided a bit ago to do that whole @cortexpodcast theme thing. Officially we start in April, with an annual (april-to-april) theme, as well as a seasonal theme; but the theme for march, I've decided, is "Embarkation"