djcev.com

I've recently published the full source for this website. That link leads to a git repo containing all the text data (article content etc.) and graphics plus the various programs used.

The program source code contained in that repo is available under the MIT License unless otherwise indicated. Text on this website (articles, wiki pages, etc.) and original graphics are now licensed under the CC BY 4.0 license unless otherwise indicated.

(Note that most of the graphics aren't my original work - they're photos of cover art, screengrabs from film and TV, preview images sourced from the web, etc. .)

If you think you can use something then go for it. Just, y'know, please credit me when you do.

Window managers and taskbars use WM_CLASS to set resources or change behavior for windows on systems running X Windows. Newer versions of Wine set WM_CLASS to the process name, e.g. "Renoise.exe". According to this commit from 2019 wine-proton sets WM_CLASS to "steam_app_" plus the content of the environment variable "SteamAppId" or "steam_proton" if that env variable is empty. This means that if you use proton without using Steam (like me) then every program you run through Wine will have the same icon.

Fortunately this is very easy to fix. I write wrapper shell scripts for the MS Windows software I use anyway so it's simple enough to set "SteamAppId" to a value for each program (and then specify icons for the now-unique WM_CLASS). A probably unnecessary example:

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#!/bin/sh
export WINEPREFIX="/z/software/Win64/Renoise/"
export SteamAppId="renoise"
cd $WINEPREFIX/drive_c/Renoise
/usr/local/wine-proton/bin/wine Renoise.exe 1>/tmp/rns.out 2>&1 &

I spent some time digging into this a few days ago after installing WindowMaker & being annoyed that I couldn't set icons for the different MS Windows programs I use.

Earlier this month Mixcloud announced a major change to its platform. I can't afford a "Pro" subscription so, if I'm reading that linked post right, I'm faced with a choice: continue to upload after November 2022 and choose a maximum of 10 mixes that will be available or stop uploading after that same deadline and all my mixes currently on Mixcloud will remain accessible. I choose the latter. The shows there now will remain streamable for as long as Mixcloud will host them and I will no longer be publishing new sets to the service after this month.

I've been using Mixcloud because 1. it was free and unlimited and 2. they are licensed to play copyrighted music. I think DJing on the internet is often in a kind of grey area between advocacy and piracy, a problem Mixcloud solved by paying the appropriate fees and royalties. I'm much more interested in advocacy than piracy so I'm grateful for and will miss using Mixcloud. I bear them no ill will, I wish them well, and I hope to see them succeed.

Writing to report that the Harebrained Schemes Shadowrun games (Returns, Dragonfall, and Hong Kong) all run under FreeBSD. I got them working by following the Linux Binary Compatibility chapter of the FreeBSD Handbook (using the CentOS base system linux-c7 as instructed by 10.3) and then installing the linux-nvidia-libs package to support my graphics card. After that I was able to directly execute the Linux binaries downloaded from GOG. (This configuration is, of course, not officially supported by anyone. I got it to work but I can't guarantee that it'll work for anyone else.)

I like these games a lot. They're an interesting combination of tactical combat RPG and '90s Shadowrun novelization. The second one, Dragonfall, is my favorite of the trilogy, I think it has the best balance of those elements. I've had a rare crash or two while playing Dragonfall but otherwise all three games run flawlessly for me.

Cameron Paul Tells All on youtube.com. 1989 DJing & tape editing & remixing VHS instructional video from legendary San Francisco DJ Cameron Paul. I watch it every now and then to see a pro at work. Posting about it today because I watched it again recently.

Records from Cameron Paul's remix service Mixx-It aren't hard to find in the local shops here. I've always loved coming across them, reading the name "Cameron" on a record full of electro and freestyle. The only one I have myself is Mixx-It 23, an awesome 12" of freestyle edits. It can be heard on youtube if you're curious.

Cameron Paul sadly passed away in 2018. RBMA has an excellent article looking back on his life & career and Cameron himself told a lot of his story through social media (including at this old blog). Rest in peace Cameron Paul.

About a month ago I started streaming video games at twitch.tv/andreaen. I split my time there between Quake and other games, currently Arcane Dimensions and Shadowrun Returns. I'm live three or four days a week (never on Wednesday or Thursday). Time of day varies depending on my sleep schedule.

One thing I won't be doing on twitch is streaming DJ sets, at least for the near future. Mixcloud seems like a better place for that anyway.

The name "Andreaen" is, of course, a reference to Andreaen Sand Dunes by Drexciya, my favorite track on Neptune's Lair.

So if you want to hang out, watch some video games, maybe talk about how heavy records are, twitch is a good place for it.

Retrieving the gold key in Mana Vemputin's clocktower. Map by Smilecythe, player is me. Video is clipped from my Twitch stream last night. Not shown is the 10 minutes spent figuring this out & practicing. I love movement puzzles in Quake.

Posting to celebrate another full notebook. #5, photographed and ready to be stored on the shelf.

This one contains show notes for MTT and personal notes covering 2020/09 thru 2022/07. Ran out of ballpoint pens halfway through, switched back to mechanical pencil. The pages alternate between mix notes and a diary, a log of daily events.

Always happy to fill a notebook.

hangtime3-df[mdf.cpm] at youtube.com. Quake 3 Defrag map hangtime3-df completed with CPM physics in 08:18:296 by aNnh. Video by power_of_heavy_metal. Map by, of course, NaturalSpringWater. Music featured in the video is the track Archetype by Sciama.

The video includes flashing lights and first-person gameplay that might cause motion sickness. (The hangtime maps are particularly disorienting I find).

Saw this last night & had to link it. A new video from power_of_heavy_metal is reason enough to celebrate, but hangtime3? Done flawlessly by aNnh? Incredible.

So back in the late '90s there used to be a site called mp3.com, a place where musicians released low-bitrate mp3s of original tracks. There was a drum & bass producer I liked a lot there by the name of Red Orc. I got to wondering yesterday: where'd Red Orc go, what'd they end up doing?

Discogs.com tells me that Red Orc is Andrew Smith AKA Professor Smith AKA Jackie's Army. This appears to be the same Andrew Smith that founded XLR8R magazine. Discogs lists three releases by Red Orc in 1998 after which Smith released a series of very interesting minimalist dubby electro EPs on the San Francisco label Voltage Music (all of which are now available on bandcamp).

The one Red Orc track I can remember clearly is Plus Two, a dark sketchy 170 BPM amen workout. I wasn't able to find any Red Orc for download on the web; digging through old burned CDs I found Plus Two and four other tracks, all in 128kbps mp3 format. Plus Two's metadata says it's from a 1999 album called "Red Orc in the Palace of Funk"; I'd very much like to hear that album someday.

Posting today to recommend The Ear & Drum, DJ and drum & bass historian Wozowski's excellent mix blog. I'm a fan of his atmospheric, deep, and intelligent DnB mixes, but there's a lot more on his site, and it's all top quality. I've picked up quite a few releases over the years after hearing them in a Woz mix.

A couple of my favorites from their back catalog:

• Certifiable, Ear & Drum Session 27, Certificate 18 mix
• The Depths, Ear & Drum Session 102
• Fricken Genius, Jungletrain Session 127, all T.Power mix
• and the Dogs On Acid Jungle Competition Mix.

As I write this the latest mix on the site is Ear & Drum Session 229 Killah Deep, which features a bunch of releases from Omni Music, who re-released a couple tracks I played on my own show this week.

In short: great drum & bass mixes, give 'em a listen.

Battle Girl: The Living Dead In Tokyo Bay, 1991, directed by Kazuo 'Gaira' Komizu. Low budget direct-to-video sci-fi zombie movie starring pro wrestler Cutie Suzuki. Nightmare logic and slow, hazy vibes. Cosmo Amphetamine. Punk arms dealers in their tricked out bus. A dirigible broadcasts a message.

I watched what I assume is an unauthorized upload on youtube (with ENG subs) on a warm afternoon. Was a good (and sleepy) time. Would love to find a DVD copy some day.

Good Luck Battle Girl.

Edit: Synapse Films released the movie on DVD in North America; it appears there are still copies for sale, so this goes on my list of things to buy.

Eko Eko Azarak III: Misa The Dark Angel, 1998, directed by Katsuhito Ueno. A body in the morgue with a strange message leads Kuroi Misa (played by Hinako Saeki) to a school drama club where the students are rehearsing Wizard In Phantom World, a suspicious play.

Of the four of these that I've seen this one is the most fun, probably because Misa gets to use her powers for most of the movie. I imagine this must be closer to the comic. It's pretty uneven, it shifts gears between slow plot & character business, witch magic, and The Evil Dead, but I kinda liked that.

This is a follow-up to the 1997 TV series (and I've read it was possibly meant as the third season). English subtitles are available for only the first few episodes of that series, from what I can tell; I might watch it anyway (unsubbed) because I really enjoyed this movie.

Quick photo taken after mixing 262. Pictured on the top row is one Stanton SCS.4DJ and one Raspberry Pi 400 computer with a small screen. Pictured on the bottom row is one Technics SL-1210MK5 turntable, one Ecler Nuo 4 mixer, and one Denon DN-S5000 CDJ (covered by an old shirt).

Looks like it's time to clean again.

Good night, DeFrag [.df] at youtube.com. New (90 minute!) Quake 3 Defrag compilation video from power_of_heavy_metal. I'm a month late to this, I thought there wouldn't be any more long-form compilations from power_of. Very happy to find it today.

Content warning for flashing lights, first-person gameplay that might cause motion sickness, and edgy graphics. Steer clear if any of those things bother you.

Love the runs of nood-stoned (at 47:46) and biotrix-castle (at 56:19) in this as I've been playing those maps lately. The whole video is great though, watched it in one sitting this afternoon.