Re: Virii, Worms, and other Seeds of Evolutionary CHAOS
Folks - lose the blame game attitude and stay friends! I do not have anti-virus on any of my systems, and I have never been hit. (Cause I'm smart with these things.) However, my Parents' PC (where I have been visiting for the past week) DID get slammed by 2 of these beasties. I spent the better part of a day cleaning out the system, repairing and restoring it. This was particularly infuriating to me cause I was using their system to access my email while away. DOZENS of my emails were infected, but Mr. Norton caught them. They apparently opened an infected email from one of their friends / family and unknowingly cut the beasties lose on another system. (not Norton protected). Not everyone is a Cyber-Wiz Dude. System and Server Administrators can not be expected to be 100% foolproof. Having some experience there, I know how tough it is just to keep things running smooth when all is ok! Give 'em a break! Flies and rats do not cause garbage, guns do not cause crime, spoons did not make Rosie fat, and System Administrators do not cause spam and email virii! The fault is 100% with the authors of these toxic codes, and the email spammers. WHEN will enough be enough!? This is costing billions of dollars to an economy struggling to recover, and is especislly irritating to unemployed like me trying to find a constructive job! What needs to be done is this - hunt down and find one of these bastards, and nail him hard! It may be a teenage punk dork with pierced tounge, earrings, tatoos, clothing 10 sizes too big, who can't find a date, but so what! Give him 20 to life and let him get deliverance in the slammer! This is criminal trerrorism and should be dealt with as such. How 'bout a Federal task force, like the "Untouchables" during prohibition? Computer Gurus with an Axe in one hand and an automatic weapon in the other - Raid the spammers' and tear them up! Raid the home of the virus author, smash it all up, drag him away in chains never to see the light of day again! Confiscate all material and financial assets to the State. (Hey Echelon - are you listening? I'm willing to volunteer for this ...)
From: "JackOTradez" <JackOTradez@email.msn.com> To: <fractint@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Tuesday, August 26, 2003 11:54 PM Subject: [Fractint] Re: Virii, Worms, and other Seeds of Evolutionary CHAOS
Not everyone is a Cyber-Wiz Dude.
Flies and rats do not cause garbage, guns do not cause crime, spoons did not make Rosie fat, and System Administrators do not cause spam and email virii!
The fault is 100% with the authors of these toxic codes, and the email spammers. WHEN will enough be enough!? This is costing billions of dollars to an economy struggling to recover, and is especislly irritating to unemployed like me trying to find a constructive job! What needs to be done is this - hunt down and find one of these bastards, and nail him hard! It may be a teenage punk dork with pierced tounge, earrings, tatoos, clothing 10 sizes too big, who can't find a date, but so what! Give him 20 to life and let him get deliverance in the slammer! This is criminal trerrorism and should be dealt with as such.
Mmm... would take a HUGE budget to track down and stop every virus writer on planet Earth, and every nation, on every island, in every corner of the globe. Would be much much better to just come up with software that cannot be abused in this way - email programs that don't open things automatically, operating systems that can't be penetrated by idiotic bugs, etc. Viruses and other malware will continue until it becomes too hard for automatic code to actually inflict damage. (Oh yeah - and that probably involves changes on the part of PC users as well as software developers ;-) Just my opinion - and probably a little OT... so let's leave it at that, eh? ;-) In a half-hearted attempt to turn things back ON topic... anyone out there ever played with non-linear IFS? (I'm currently thinking quadratic... not sure what kinds of transformation it can do though. Will post back if I find anything of merrit.) Thanks. Andrew.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Andrew Coppin" <andrewcoppin@btinternet.com> To: "Fractint and General Fractals Discussion" <fractint@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2003 9:33 AM Subject: Re: [Fractint] Re: Virii, Worms, and other Seeds of EvolutionaryCHAOS <SNIP>
(Oh yeah - and that probably involves changes on the part of PC users as well as software developers ;-)
Yes, it scares me that I'm on the same list as one who brags that he's too smart to need virus protection.
In a half-hearted attempt to turn things back ON topic... anyone out there ever played with non-linear IFS? (I'm currently thinking quadratic... not sure what kinds of transformation it can do though. Will post back if I find anything of merrit.)
I wonder what happened to Morgan Owens, who produced a lot of IFS around the time that the two of you were also discussing Branch Cuts? There were a number of good discussions back then, as I remember, but the fountains of inspiration now seem to have largely dried up. In fact, if it weren't for Albrecht Niekamp's contributions, the list would be a desert broken only by the FOTD's. Wish I were capable of doing something other than download, render and gape in admiration! John W.
In a half-hearted attempt to turn things back ON topic... anyone out there ever played with non-linear IFS? (I'm currently thinking quadratic... not sure what kinds of transformation it can do though. Will post back if I find anything of merrit.)
I wonder what happened to Morgan Owens, who produced a lot of IFS around the time that the two of you were also discussing Branch Cuts?
Branch cuts? Heh - I'm not done with that puppy yet ;-) I did send an increadibly long email about the subject a while back... only to have it bounce back at me [due to a missing letter in the email address]. Ah well...
There were a number of good discussions back then, as I remember, but the fountains of inspiration now seem to have largely dried up. In fact, if it weren't for Albrecht Niekamp's contributions, the list would be a desert broken only by the FOTD's.
Yeah, I know what you mean... Now that I have my address book fixed, I intend to throw a little more math at the list - from time to time. You never know, I may even come up with images worth sharing! ;-)
Wish I were capable of doing something other than download, render and gape in admiration!
Oh, I know that feeling too... I doubt I'll *ever* figure out how to make good colour maps... Thanks. Andrew.
Andrew, - anyone out there ever played with non-linear IFS? Flame fractals are IFS fractals with non-linear transforms. See http://flam3.com/ for Scott Draves' flames, http://www.apophysis.org/ for Mark Townsend's implementation, and of course there's the KPT FraxFlame plugin if you want to pay money. Damien M. Jones \\ dmj@fractalus.com \\ Fractalus Galleries & Info: \\ http://www.fractalus.com/
Andrew,
- anyone out there ever played with non-linear IFS?
Flame fractals are IFS fractals with non-linear transforms. See http://flam3.com/ for Scott Draves' flames, http://www.apophysis.org/ for Mark Townsend's implementation, and of course there's the KPT FraxFlame plugin if you want to pay money.
Damien M. Jones \\ dmj@fractalus.com \\ Fractalus Galleries & Info: \\ http://www.fractalus.com/
Thanks for this. I vaguely remember visiting the first website some time back [before I understood how IFS works]. From what I can gather from the mathematical description, each function in the system is a simple linear map, optionally with a non-linear transformation applied afterwards. ("spherical", "sinusoidal", etc.) I suppose this would make it intuitively easier to understand what the various parameters are actually doing... Suppose I use the transformation f(x, y) = (Ax^2 + Bxy + Cx + Dy + E, Fy^2 + Gxy + Hx + Iy + J). If A=B=F=G=0 then we have an ordinary linear transformation determined by C, D, E, H, I, J. (Specifically, the vector (x, y) multiplied by the matrix ((C D) (H I)) and then adding the vector (E J)... unless I got my numbers the wrong way round!) Using the linear case, adjusting C and I controls the scaling factor, E and J control the translation, and by fiddling with C, D, H and I all at once you can do rotation. But what - geometrically - do the remaining parameters do? The main factor about linear functions is that the scaling factor is constant over the whole plane, the translation distance is constant over the whole plane, the rotation angle is constant over the whole plane, etc. I would imagine that with a quadratic map, at least one of these things could be made to vary over the plane... Thanks. Andrew. PS. The composition of two linear functions is a linear function. Is this true of heigher polynomials?
Andrew Coppin wrote:
f(x, y) = (Ax^2 + Bxy + Cx + Dy + E, Fy^2 + Gxy + Hx + Iy + J).
Aren't there terms missing for a full quadratic expression? f(x, y) = (Ax^2 + By^2 + Cxy + Dx + Ey + F, Gx^2 + Hy^2 + Ixy + Jx + Ky + L). Just nitpicking... Gerald
Andrew Coppin wrote:
f(x, y) = (Ax^2 + Bxy + Cx + Dy + E, Fy^2 + Gxy + Hx + Iy + J).
Aren't there terms missing for a full quadratic expression?
f(x, y) = (Ax^2 + By^2 + Cxy + Dx + Ey + F, Gx^2 + Hy^2 + Ixy + Jx + Ky + L).
Just nitpicking...
Gerald
Quite right... it seems I can't count now! ("~) Thanks. Andrew.
Hi Damien,
Andrew,
- anyone out there ever played with non-linear IFS?
Flame fractals are IFS fractals with non-linear transforms. See http://flam3.com/ for Scott Draves' flames, http://www.apophysis.org/ for Mark Townsend's implementation, and of course there's the KPT FraxFlame plugin if you want to pay money.
those fractal flames are best looking ifs I have ever seen! "The Gimp" has a nice build-in plugin for free. They hide away all the parameters and modify the parameters by 'mutation': a central preview image is surrounded by 8 images generated from slightly modified/mutated parameter sets ... that would be a nice feature for fractint, too. :) -- Michael Weitzel ... all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy ...
those fractal flames are best looking ifs I have ever seen! "The Gimp" has a nice build-in plugin for free. They hide away all the parameters and modify the parameters by 'mutation': a central preview image is surrounded by 8 images generated from slightly modified/mutated parameter sets ... that would be a nice feature for fractint, too. :)
Mutation can be fun... It also allows one to create images using impossible combinations that a human would never delibarately pick. On the other hand, I also like to be able to play with the numbers directly ;-) Thanks. Andrew. [Last time I ran "The Gimp", it was a little limp... I couldn't get the thing to do anything! What actually *is* that software for anyway???]
Damien M. Jones wrote:
Flame fractals are IFS fractals with non-linear transforms. See http://flam3.com/ for Scott Draves' flames, http://www.apophysis.org/ for Mark Townsend's implementation, and of course there's the KPT FraxFlame plugin if you want to pay money.
Not to forget Michael Sargent's Win32 implementation at http://www.uvm.edu/~msargent/main.htm (Has some other nice programs there, too.) Gerald
participants (6)
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Andrew Coppin -
Damien M. Jones -
Gerald K. Dobiasovsky -
JackOTradez -
John Wilson -
Michael Weitzel