Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Skyrim Creation Engine


Bethesda have just announced that the Skyrim mod tools, the Creation Kit, will let players upload their mods to Steam’s Workshop service.
Players will be able to choose the mods they want on the Steam Workshops website, even via mobile devices, and they’ll be downloaded and installed automatically the next time you play. More details and the release date below.
The Creation Kit will be out in January, and will apparently be even more versatile than Oblivion’s tools, letting players mess with Radiant Story. 
From  Bethesda Blog-
As of today, it’s been three weeks since we released Skyrim worldwide. We’re simply blown away by the response, from new and old fans, and amazed by the sheer number of people playing the game. It’s been absolutely fantastic hearing your stories, seeing early mods, and watching fan videos (more live music ones please, we love those).

We want to thank everyone reading this for playing our game and supporting all it tries to do. We wouldn’t have this success without you, and we want you to know we’re committed to making your Skyrim experience even better. And not just in the short term, but over the life of the game. Here’s a quick peek at what we’re working on right now:
Creation Kit  — Beginning in January, PC players will be able to download for free the same development tools we used at Bethesda Game Studios to create Skyrim. In tandem with the Creation Kit’s release, we will roll out a new Wiki and videos to help you get started. It also features something we think you’re going to love…
Steam Workshop – We’re excited to share news that we’ve been working closely with Valve to integrate Steam Workshop into the Creation Kit. Using the Workshop, you’ll have free user content with the push of a button. The Creation Kit will bundle your mod and upload it to the Workshop, where everyone can browse, rate, and flag mods for download. You’ll be able to do this from any web device, including your smartphone. Like a live Netflix queue, when you fire up Skyrim, mods you flagged will be automatically downloaded and installed. Everyone here is really excited about the opportunities and possibilities this opens up for our entire community.
Prefer to use existing modding sites? Not a problem. You’ll still be able to upload/share/access Skyrim mods on fan-created mod sites.
Continued Game Updates – This week we released update 1.2 across all platforms, and we’ll be releasing an incremental update next week. We anticipate it will be up on PC first, and then hit PS3 and Xbox 360 later in the week. Among other things, the update will fix issues like magic resistance not calculating properly and the rare, amazing backwards flying dragon. Once the update is released, we’ll share the full release notes.
After the holidays, we’ll continue to release regular updates for the game — through full title updates, as well as incremental “gameplay updates” to fix whatever issues come up along with rebalancing portions of the game for difficulty or exploits. We plan on having a lot of these, not just a few. Overall, you should expect updates to be hitting the PC and Steam earlier and more often, as that’s a process we control. Console updates will follow, as they must be certified and processed by those manufacturers.
We all know this is a huge game, and everyone has a different experience. We’ll continue to do everything we can to make the game better and better for as many people as possible every day. We’ve also realized that with the millions upon millions of people playing Skyrim, we need to treat our updates with greater care. If we get too aggressive trying to fix a minor issue, we run a risk of breaking something larger in a game like this. To be safe, we are prioritizing code side fixes right now over data fixes. Quest and balance issues are usually data, and those will start rolling in a large way with the January updates.
Thanks again for your continued support and patience. We truly have the best fans in the world, and we couldn’t do it without you.
http://www.bethblog.com/2011/12/01/skyrim-what-were-working-on/

Star Wars The Old Republic Beta Part 5

Star Wars The Old Republic Beta Part 4

Star Wars The Old Republic Beta Part 3

Star Wars The Old Republic Beta Part 2

Star Wars The Old Republic Beta Part 1

Friday, December 2, 2011

No overtime pay for IT professionals?


No overtime pay for IT professionals? This better bomb in Congress 


Oct 20, 2011 - Introduced in Senate. This is the original text of the bill as it was written by its sponsor and submitted to the Senate for consideration. This is the latest version of the bill currently available on GovTrack.


S 1747 IS
112th CONGRESS
1st Session
S. 1747


To amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to modify provisions relating to the exemption for computer systems analysts, computer programmers, software engineers, or other similarly skilled workers.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
October 20, 2011


Mrs. HAGAN (for herself, Mr. ISAKSON, Mr. ENZI, and Mr. BENNET) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
A BILL


To amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to modify provisions relating to the exemption for computer systems analysts, computer programmers, software engineers, or other similarly skilled workers.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,


SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ‘Computer Professionals Update Act’ or the ‘CPU Act’.


SEC. 2. AMENDMENT TO THE FAIR LABOR STANDARDS ACT OF 1938.
Section 13(a)(17) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (29 U.S.C. 213(a)(17)) is amended to read as follows:


‘(17) any employee working in a computer or information technology occupation (including, but not limited to, work related to computers, information systems, components, networks, software, hardware, databases, security, internet, intranet, or websites) as an analyst, programmer, engineer, designer, developer, administrator, or other similarly skilled worker, whose primary duty is--


‘(A) the application of systems, network or database analysis techniques and procedures, including consulting with users, to determine or modify hardware, software, network, database, or system functional specifications;


‘(B) the design, development, documentation, analysis, creation, testing, securing, configuration, integration, debugging, modification of computer or information technology, or enabling continuity of systems and applications;


‘(C) directing the work of individuals performing duties described in subparagraph (A) or (B), including training such individuals or leading teams performing such duties; or


‘(D) a combination of duties described in subparagraphs (A), (B), and (C), the performance of which requires the same level of skill;
who is compensated at an hourly rate of not less than $27.63 an hour or who is paid on a salary basis at a salary level as set forth by the Department of Labor in part 541 of title 29, Code of Federal Regulations. An employee described in this paragraph shall be considered an employee in a professional capacity pursuant to paragraph 


http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s112-1747