On Tue, 7 Apr 2020 09:08:46 +0100, Timothy Collinson wrote:

>On Mon, 6 Apr 2020 at 23:27, Jeff Zeitlin <xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com>
>wrote:

>> Enough whining. Or whinging, if you speak English, Australian, or New
>> Zealandish instead of North American.

>Here in the UK we can whinge and whine as need be.  And do a lot of both.

Shows how inadequate on-line dictionaries (even Merriam-Webster or Oxford)
are. I wasn't aware that there was a distinction other than
NorthAmerica-vs-RestOfAnglosphere - or are you picking up my bad habits and
just being facetious? :)

>> I certainly won't object if folks want to take some of the load off; the
>> best way to do that is to write, so that I can concentrate on publishing -
>> editing, compositing, setting, et cetera.

>If there's a particular review you need, or something else, I'm willing to
>at least have a look at doing it if that helps.  I quite understand if you
>think you've got quite enough from me thank you very much...  ;-)

Actually, I _could_ use reviews... Looking at my Traveller shelves (and the
pile on the floor in front of same), I see a tonne (metric) of Clement
Sector stuff - practically their entire product line up through
TravellerCON/USA last year, most of which could use reviewing - and if
anyone has the Earth Sector stuff for it, I'd definitely be interested in
that; I see the T5 3-volume boxed set, which represents the latest
fix/reorganization/update of T5, which could use reviewing; I see the
recent Mongoose JTAS boxed set, ditto; the Mongoose Traveller Starter Set
(boxed), ditto; the Pirates of Drinax deluxe boxed set, ditto, since I
believe it's different from/an expansion of the free download version; plus
some non-Traveller stuff that people might find interesting to try to adapt
Traveller to (or adapt to Traveller), such as SHOCK:Social Science Fiction
(I have v1.2), or HUMAN CONTACT (which uses the same system) (both by
Joshua A.C. Newman), or Bleeding Edge, or Elite:Dangerous RPG.

On top of that, the review I'm working on is the FFE Classic CD; some of
the others - like HERO Traveller or GURPS Traveller - would definitely be
worth bringing to folks' attention.

And that's just reviews. I can also always use plants and animals
(Fascinating Flora and Less Dangerous Game), Stuff And Places To Get It (In
A Store Near You, especially Handle With Care, the Promenade, the Gun Shop,
and the Arms Bazaar), and the sort of 'educational' articles represented by
Dan Corrin's _Navigation in Traveller_ or Benedikt Schwarz's _Starport
Familiarization_.

A bit of a digression:

How do people feel about downloading something like NARS2000 or
(preferably) Dyalog APL (both free) to be able to run code that appears in
Traveller by the Byte? I'm reacquainting myself with APL - I'd really
forgotten what a fascinating language it is, and it's gotten a lot better
since the 1960s-era Blue Iron implementations I originally learned on - and
I'm seeing some possibilities for Traveller-related projects. And I do mean
Projects; it turns out that APL can do quite a lot with Not Much [User]
Code.

If I stick with languages that don't require downloads, I'm pretty much
limited to JavaScript running in a browser (since that's the only language
which ships with all of Windows, MacOS, and Linux), which I have come to
hate with a passion, not least because no two browsers seem to use _quite_
the same Document Object Model, or render HTML/CSS _quite_ the same way.
OTOH, with a download, I have pretty much the whole continuum of languages
to work with, and in most cases, I can be sure that the 'experience' will
be consistent across platforms, even if that means running in 'Terminal' on
Mac/Linux and a 'console' window (like CMD or PowerShell) in Windows.

I do intend to make all the code downloadable, but it will also be printed
in the magazine so that if you're sufficiently old-school to have fond
memories of magazines like BYTE, Dr. Dobbs, or COMPUTE!, you'll be able to
type in the code and run it, just like Back Then. :)

(I'd also be interested in hearing - off-list, if you think it'll be too
much 'noise' - what languages people would be most interested in seeing
TbtB code in. I'm not promising to _use_ that language, but I'm interested.
I'd also be quite happy if a programmer type among you were to write an
article and share code; I don't consider TbtB to be my exclusive
playground.)

®Traveller is a registered trademark of
Far Future Enterprises, 1977-2020. Use of
the trademark in this notice and in the
referenced materials is not intended to
infringe or devalue the trademark.

--
Jeff Zeitlin, Editor
Freelance Traveller
    The Electronic Fan-Supported Traveller® Resource
xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com
http://www.freelancetraveller.com

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