Minecraft Guide Re-populate Village in Minecraft Multiplayer

A number of people have had problems with their minecraft villagers dying out, including myself.  I once had to restart a minecraft game because of this.  I spent an aweful lot of time in the mines collecting resources, when I surfaced, the village was all quiet.

This particular solution is for minecraft multi-player and would require you to have access to the server properties file.

First thing first.  Open the file called server.properties with a text editor like Notepad. This file should be in your server folder or directory.  Change the setting for "gamemode" from 0 to 1. Save then restart your server.

If you login with an existing profile that you have used before in survival mode, you won't be able to access the creative mode inventory.  When you press E, you will see your old inventory instead.  So, what you need to do is login in with another profile (or username).

Once in, press E to pop the creative mode inventory. Under the Miscellaneous tab, select the Spawn Village egg and spawn away!

Once you're satisfied, change the gamemode setting again from 1 to 0 in your server.properties file, restart your server and login with your old profile/username.

Problem solved. Hope this helps. Enjoy.

Thoughts on the Elaborations Made by Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut DLC

The release of Mass Effect 3's Extended Cut DLC gave fans a little more insight into what happened after we made our choices. In addition, it is also giving us a fourth 'choice' (which I ranted pitifully about on this post).

Here are my thoughts on the endings. WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!!!



Ending One: Destroyed the Reapers

This was my choice on my second play-through. And I gotta tell you, I am very satisfied with it. Before the Extended Cut, this choice destroys the reapers but also the mass relays, effectively cutting off intergalactic travel and leaving everyone stuck in the cluster they are in.

In the Extended Cut, as it turns out, destroying the reapers will not destroy the mass relays completely.  It only severely damages them.  Considering we built a crucible in under a year based on extinct alien tech, fixing the mass relays will be child's play. Between Tali, EDI and Kasumi, they'll have it back in operation in no time!  There is also the chance that Shepard might be alive! Keep the hope alive people!


Ending Two: Synthesis

Ayayay!  This was my choice on my first play-through.  Always been on the fence with it. Not sure I made the right choice. After watching the new cut scenes, yeah, regret. Big regret. The scenes tell us that, with the synthesis and everybody being part-machine, part organic, we live happily ever after. The reapers, just moments ago enemy, are now our friends and are helping us pick up the pieces of what's left. EDI, in particular, as the one who narrates this scene, feels she is finally alive for the first time.

Well, I am happy for EDI. But does the word dystopia ring a bell? Repression and control under the guise of being utopian? Yeah. For all we know, just another reaper plot.  After all, aren't reapers just 'ascended' organics, preserved in that form?


Ending Three: Control

The only thing I like about this ending is the fact that I know exactly what happened to Shepard. That is not to say that I liked what happened to her.  It does not make it any less disturbing either. Here, Shepard becomes a reaper. I don't care what other implications there may be. She's machine, she's the queen of the reapers, she is a reaper.  She said she will watch over the galaxy. Fight those who jeopardize the many.

But as we all know, the majority is not always on the right. And Really? Trust a machine to make moral judgements on what is right and wrong? One entity making all the calls - there is a word for such a setup - Autocracy! Accompanied by totalitarianism. Not a pretty thought.


Ending Four: Refuse to Choose

As I have mentioned in another post, the fourth choice gives Shepard the choice not to choose.  And that's how you use the a word three times in one sentence. This refusal does nothing but delay the inevitable another 50,000 years while dooming us all in the process. Crap is the only word I have for it. The only credit I can give to this option is...I liked Shepard's speech.


And here ends my rambling. Enjoy the game folks! It's gonna be awhile before the next DLC.

Mass Effect 3 Extended Cut: Fourth Option is Crap!

With the release of Mass Effect 3 Extended Cut DLC, Bioware introduced a fourth option to our choices of ending. This option is...wait for it...refusal of the three other options! So now we can choose whether to control the reapers, synthesize, destroy them...OR! refuse and let the cycle come to an end with all of us wiped out without a trace.  Well, not competely without a trace.  In the cutscenes that followed, Liara's box survives and is discovered by the races of the future. 

Now assuming they didn't suffer the same setbacks we did, (that is, Liara's box can actually be understood by the future organics (no cryptic Prothean beacons) and they do not have the same skepticism and bureaucracy we did (which they most likely do), they will have a crucible ready by the time the reapers come and beat the crap out of thems. Except! Their future leader(s) will most likely be presented with the same options as Shepard has.

So, in a nutshell, not making a choice is nothing more than delaying the inevitable while we all die! Might as well just end it now! Don't like the reapers? Blow them up! No problem!

CSS background-image Property Works on Gmail!

Campaign Monitor reported back in February, 2012 that Google Mail (not the Android App) now supports background-image CSS property.  However, some people are still having trouble making it work, including yours truly, in a recent project.

Here is one solution on how to make it work flawlessly.

Normally, if an email contains images, Gmail prompts the user if he or she would like to display the images included in the document. However, this prompt does not appear if the image is attached via background-image only.  I do not know whether it is a bug or intentionally done so by Google, but from what I can tell, the prompt to display images appears to be triggered by the presence of an < IMG > tag in the code. 

So, the solution is to use < IMG > tag. If you don't intend to use any image other than the background, just use one that will not ruin you layout such as the ever reliable 1 pixel x 1 pixel transparent spacer.gif which you can download from Wikipedia here.

And while we are on the subject, according to Wikipedia's entry, David Siegel's 1996 book Creating Killer Web Sites was allegedly the first to publish the Spacer GIF technique. According to Siegel, he invented the trick in his living room. For those of us who have been around before CSS came along, pretty nostalgic huh? :D

Hope this helps. Later.

Find a Village in Minecraft 1.2.5 or Spawn Next to a Village

Just yesterday I was surfing the Minecraft Wiki page and found a table of world seeds that will let you spawn next to or near a village for version 1.2.5.  But today, the page no longer contained the table. Luckily, I saved it to my hard drive.

This is how it works. First, create a New World, name it whatever you want.  Then click on the 'More World Options...'.  On the 'Seed for the World Generator' input box, copy and paste any of the seeds on the table below. Click 'done', then 'Create New World'. That's it!

Not all of the world seeds spawn you near a village though. Mind the notes.  Again, remember, this is for version 1.2.5. I'm not sure if they'd be accurate on other versions.

Have fun!

List of village seeds for Minecraft 1.2.5:

Seed	Notes	Contains
0953845	Spawn virtually right next to the village. The forges' chest includes 3 apples, a suit of iron armor, and an iron sword.	1 House, 1 Church, 1 Forge, 1 Tavern, and 1 Farm.
19375193047		1 Church, 1 Forge, 2 Libraries.
1672184498917379323		3 Small huts, 2 Houses, 1 Forge, and 3 Farms.
6636		3 Small huts, 1 Church, 2 Libraries, and 1 Farm.
73323		1 Small hut, 1 Church, 2 Libraries, and 2 Farms.
9721508		6 Small huts, 2 Houses, 1 Library, 2 Taverns, and 6 Farms.
CrazyStorm	Very close to the spawn point. Village generates in a desert.	9 Small huts, 2 Houses, 1 Church, 1 Library, 1 Tavern, and 5 Farms.
CREEPERCRAFT!!		6 Small huts, 2 Libraries, 8 Farms.
derpishnoobs	Very few flaws, good for builders!	6 Small huts, 2 Houses, 2 Taverns, 4 Farms.
Derse	Village to left, edge of desert	9 Small huts, 3 Houses, 1 Church, 1 Forge, 1 Library, 1 Tavern, 5 Farms.
Dovakhiin		1 House, 1 Forge, 2 Libraries, 1 Tavern, and 1 Farm.
gimmeapoo	Village generates in a lake.	5 Small huts, 1 Forge, 1 Tavern, and 8 Farms.
gimmeavillage		7 Small huts, 1 Church, and 7 Farms.
Hazzer12308Gaming	Move forward toward the sugar canes and then look over the hill. farm glitch that makes one of the farms higher than the other half but looks cool because it makes a waterfall into the lower half	8 Small huts, 1 Church, 1 Forge, 2 Libraries, 1 Tavern, 12 Farms.
IwoJima	To the right of the spawn point.	7 Small huts, 1 House, 1 Church, 1 Library, 1 Tavern, and 9 Farms.
lostlostlost		7 Small huts, 1 House, 1 Church, 1 Forge, 2 Taverns, and 4 Farms.
kedengkedeng		5 Small huts, 1 Church, 1 Forge, 2 Libraries, 1 Tavern, and 3 Farms.
Lars	Spawn point is in the village.	4 Small huts, 1 Church, 1 Forge, and 5 Farms.
Old Spice	Very close to spawn point. Generated in a lake.	7 Small huts, 2 Houses, 1 Church, 1 Forge, 1 Library, 2 Taverns, 5 Farms.
umbrella		4 Small huts, 3 Houses, 1 Churches, 1 Library, and 6 Farms.
water world		5 Small huts, 3 Houses, 1 Library, 2 Tavern, 7 Farms.
2825280577084530380	Spawn on top of a NPC house.	3 Small huts, 4 House 1 Church, 1 Forge. 6 Farms.
rolling stones	Right of spawn point. Generated on beach.	1 House, 1 Library, 1 farm.
Desert	Village is to the way forward and right of spawn. In the desert.	4 Small huts, 2 Houses, 1 Church, 1 Library, 2 Taverns, 3 Farms.
cincodemayo	Small Desert Town at x:-1250, z:820, Big Plains Town -1914, 708, Underground Mines -1761, 573, Underground Mines -1186, 651, Well -1270, 647, Well 747,841

Source: Minecraft Wiki