Kon version 1.0.8 release

Another update to the chatterbot! Hooray!

This update will be rather small compared to the last update. Still, I think it's taken a step forward in the right direction on becoming a much smarter bot.

This version fixes the notorious "null message" bug. In previous versions Kon would cause an error to happen (and potentially crash) when someone typed kon: with no text sent to the bot. This version fixes that and Kon will give a random sentence.

As I mentioned in the last post, Kon's Google Brain was broken and has been fixed to work again. It's not any smarter, nor do I intend to try and make it any smarter, but it's at least working again.

This version also starts two different methods to try and increase Kon's intelligence. First up, a grammar fixing function. This function will attempt to fix certain grammatical mistakes such as changing "am you" to "are you." Right now it doesn't fix a whole lot but hopefully in the future it will.

Second, Kon (when using the LB Brain) will now attempt to try and find a "topic" in what people say to him. Why? Because he tries to build his response around the topic that he finds. Note that this only works with the LB Brain and isn't a true topic finder. Right now it's just seeking for uncommon words. This will hopefully improve as time goes on. There's a new admin and user command, !toggleTopic, that will turn this function on and off.

Finally for this update, I noticed that my LB Brain files were getting to be rather massive in size. Knowing how Kon builds random sentences with this brain I thought I'd write a little utility to try and reorganize the brains and hopefully speed Kon up. Thus the "LB Brain Utility" was born. This small 20KB program comes packed with Kon and, for now, sort the brain files so that all the starting sentences are near the top. For example:

START_SENTENCE Isn't that
another line
another line 2
START_SENTENCE another start

will become

START_SENTENCE Isn't that
START_SENTENCE another start
another line
another line 2

If your LB Brain files get rather large (mine was almost 2MB) it is recommended to run this utility at least once a week. Warning: do not run this program while Kon is actively connected to a channel. Disconnect him first THEN run it. Otherwise there's potential to corrupt the brain files.

And that's all for this update. Enjoy.

Download Binaries: Click here
Downlod Source: Click here (and download all the files)

Broken Google Brain

I've become aware that Kon's "Google Brain" is now broken. Apparently something has changed with the way Google returns their results so the current regex pattern is broken. I'm going to fix it and release an update sometime in the near future.


-Edit-
Because I'm not ready to upload the next version just to fix "Google Brain" but still want people to know how to fix it (if they want to use it) I'll post the new regEx pattern here.

Click to expand to full size

Keep in mind all this does is fix it so that it will work again. It doesn't improve the results any, so the brain is still basically useless. I don't forsee me trying to fix that anytime soon.

New Site is Live!

Woohoo! I finished my new design faster than expected. Soooo... my new site design is now up and ready to be viewed by the world!

I'm actually rather proud at how it came out. It may not be the most complex site in the world but it works great for what I need it to.

Everything that was up on the previous site is now on this site. There are a few things that aren't quite done yet, such as the history of my site (a look at my site from 1999 to now) but I can add that at a later date.

GO CHECK IT OUT

New Website Design Coming

I've finally gotten sick and tired of my current website design. So I'm working on a new one. It's going to be a little easier to edit pages down the road if I want to add more pages to a certain category. It's also brighter.

Here's a sample image.



Hopefully this site will be done in a few days.

The Five Gamer Stages of Ninja Gaiden: Production 07

Well, everyone, this is the end for this short little movie. I have finished all I'm going to do with it.

Honestly, I'm disappointed at the final result. And I'd like to go on record and state that I really dislike the post stage of filming. Filming the scenes was interesting and kind of fun, despite having a lot of lighting issues. Thinking up all the various ideas (even if I could never actually get them to work) was also really fun. Editing and trying to add sound/music and get the effects to look right.....not so much fun.

I'm kind of upset that half of the scenes I had in my head didn't make it at all (due to editing problems or just being unable to do it). I'm also rather mad that most of the sound I recorded didn't come out either (most of it came out with a high pitch whine that caused headaches and ear-gouging pain). And after spending so much time on it, and wanting to move onto something else, I had to just finally say "that's it, no more" lest I spend months working on the smallest details.

So what you'll probably see is nothing like what I wanted it to look like. But you know, that's okay. It's been a pretty interesting learning experience and I have a new profound respect for those individuals out there that do this stuff for a living.

Will I do another (better) video in the future? It's possible. I'm itching to do a better video to prove to myself that I CAN do a better video. But it won't be for awhile. This has really burned me out. So who knows when it'll be done or what it'll be about.

And that's really all I have to say about that now. I suggest you go watch it and see for yourselves.

CLICK HERE TO GO WATCH IT ON YOUTUBE

The Five Gamer Stages of Ninja Gaiden: Production 06

Editing in After Effects is really a lot easier than I thought it would be. Despite saying this, however, I have to say that I'm really frustrated with at how hard some things have turned out to be.

A few of the effects have been extremely painless to add to the video. The one in this photo has eaten away several hours of my life and it's still not done. Ah well. I'll get it eventually.

The Five Gamer Stages of Ninja Gaiden: Production 05

Filming has finished! WOOHOO!

I'm quite glad that I managed to finish filming. I'm disappointed with how dark the scenes came out though, even with the addition of extra lighting. I'm not able to fix that at this time, however, so everyone is just going to have to deal with it. Sorry. Even if I were to try and reshoot every scene again, I don't think I could make it any lighter. I've already added as many lights as I could find and it's still really dark.

But since it's not a fancy production meant to rival Hollywood, I'm not going to worry too much about it.

Here's a preview image.



Now I'm off to spend a week in post, trying to do the one major special effect and combine all of this mess together into a movie.