David

back to school for writers: David Gale on computers

Welcome to the Back to School for Writers blog series. Every Wednesday until the end of September, a guest poster will share their knowledge and expertise on a specific topic. Today’s guest is David Gale. The eagle-eyed among you might’ve noticed that we share a last name, so I’ll confess up front that he’s my smart and funny husband, who put this post together for me on short notice.

Well, Rabia asked me to help out with her “Back to School for Writers” series. I’m supposed to talk about something I know, so since I’m a programmer, here goes: five things Hollywood (and many writers) often get wrong about computers.

1) A geek with a computer can hack anything.

id4_virus — Not only do aliens have wifi, but they’re susceptible to Mac viruses.

You know the scene: the Good Guys are under attack by the Big Bad, everything seems doomed, and then the Nerd pulls out his laptop, hacks into the Big Bad’s computers and takes it down with a single keystroke. We’ve all seen it happen, most egregiously in Independence Day. And I’m here to tell you: it ain’t gonna happen that way unless the Big Bad is a bumbling, clueless technological neophyte–AKA a Minion, in which case they have no right being the Big Bad in the first place. There are a host of different reasons why this scenario is impossible, but the main one is simple: any computer system that holds the Ultimate Top Secret Plans of Doom will not be connected to the internet. You’re going to have to go to a specific location and pass through several layers of security and encryption just to get a listing of the files you still don’t have access to. There was a flurry of excitement recently when someone suggested that they might hack the Curiosity Mars rover, based on the fact that NASA is able to update the rover’s computers from Earth. But then people realized that, in order to pull this off, they’d need to replicate NASA’s Deep Space Network system in order to broadcast a strong enough signal, in addition to breaking the encryption and figuring out the right commands to send. Not something you do in your spare time.

2. When computers break, there’s smoke and showers of sparks. I swear, the electrical engineers who built the Enterprise’s computers must have been paid with baseball cards*, because those things are held together with spit and bubblegum. The ship gets hit–with the shields still up!–and suddenly every computer panel is sparking like a major French city on Bastille Day. Um, no, that’s not going to happen. When a computer goes belly-up, it’s actually pretty boring: things go black and quiet. It’d take a catastrophic heating-related failure to cause smoke (and even then, at least half the time, you’ll smell something but not see anything), and sparks–or even components melting–are only going to happen when something is pushed way beyond its manufactured specifications. People building battleships design a safety margin in, so things generally peak out at about 80% of the safe zone. Oh, and they also build in redundant fail-overs for the really important stuff, so that even if something goes boom, things keep working.

* Yes, I know there’s no money in the Star Trek universe’s Federation. So clearly they needed to come up with something else.

3. Computers talk like robots.

War Games is one of my all-time favorite movies. If you haven’t seen it yet, go dig up a copy. It’s one of the best “rogue computer nearly wipes out the world” movies ever, hands-down. But, I confess, it has some issues. And I’m not even going to mention the “sequel” that came out a few years ago…(shudder)…er, where was I? Oh, yes, talking computers. See, when Joshua–the computer from War Games–talked, he used a monotonous, robotic-sounding voice. And that’s been par for most major computer systems out there (the ones which have gotten a talking role, at least) for the last thirty years. But even in the early 1980’s, computers could synthesize voice decently. And we’re in 2012 now; everyone’s got GPS units that sound like, well, whatever we want them to. And if a GPS can do that, then my Doomsday Computer to End All can talk to me in a nice, soothing voice as it searches for the missile codes it needs in order to blow everything to little tiny bits. It may not get every inflection right, but it’ll be close.

4. Computers can’t deal with logical fallacies. There’s a Star Trek episode where Kirk destroys an android bent on enslaving humanity by saying that someone who has just confessed to being a liar always lies. The android can’t resolve this paradox–is the liar lying about being a liar?–and breaks down (complete with smoke, but, amazingly enough, no sparks). Unfortunately for Kirk, there’s very little chance that an artificial intelligence strong enough to handle natural language processing (necessary for understanding spoken commands) will not be able to disregard commands that it doesn’t understand. It doesn’t need to establish the truth or fiction of the statement; it just needs to decide to ignore it. And if it’s not capable of ignoring commands, then you can stop it just by, well, commanding it to stop.

5. Computers will eventually become so smart that they decide humanity is not needed.

matrix_battery — Humans apparently generate more energy than they consume. Who knew?

At least in The Matrix, humanity continued to serve a purpose once the computers had taken over. They didn’t need our brains, but they did need our magical ability to produce electricity from our imaginations. But the main problem I have with that premise isn’t with the boundless energy of humanity (I’ve often wondered if I could eliminate my electric bill by putting my seven-year-old in a giant hamster wheel hooked to a generator); no, my problem is that computers are only as smart as we can make them. Oh, and there’s an entire class of problems that computers can’t solve at all (to be fair, neither can humans, but we can often intuit solutions without needing to do all the hard work). So we can make computers “smart” enough to calculate the value of pi to 5,000,000,000 digits (eventually), which no human will bother doing–but only because we’re smart enough to know how to calculate pi. It’s the same with everything we tell computers to do, even landing on Mars. Sure the computer’s doing the heavy work, but we had to tell it how to do the work in the first place. If we can’t figure out how to do something, we’re not going to be able to build a computer that can figure it out. And that’s the dirty little secret of artificial intelligence–until we can fully understand ourselves, how we think, how emotions work, what intuition and art fundamentally are, we’re not going to be able to create anything that can truly be said to think for itself. And if we ever reach such a hyper-conscious state…well, the intelligences we create will still be childish compared to us.

Oh, and here’s a bonus: if you’re still worried about the Robot Apocalypse, here’s what it will look like.

BIO: David Gale is a programmer by day, but don’t hold that against him. He loves his wife, Rabia, very dearly–even to the point of guest-posting on a moment’s notice. He’s also the creator of WriteTrack, a tool for writers who want to write a large number of words in a small amount of time, but don’t want to do the math to figure out their daily goal. And if you’re really curious/in need of something to put you to sleep, you can visit his blog.

5 webcomics worth following

Hello! This is David, Rabia’s main cheerleader…er, husband. She asked me to put together a guest post, and, well, how could I refuse, right?

Rabia suggested that I discuss webcomics (I’m not sure just what that says about what she thinks I do at work all day…). Which I thought was a pretty good idea. While a lot of webcomics are merely gag-a-day strips, there are a few that strive for something more: they set out to prove that you can tell fun, gripping, emotional stories in graphical form.

Be aware that, since these webcomics have plots, character arcs, and all the other fun goodness you expect from a novel, you really should start from the beginning for each of them. Not doing so would be like starting a novel on page 253…it won’t be as good of a book.

That said, in no particular (ok, alphabetical) order, here are my top five:

Darths and Droids

by the Comic Irregulars (start here)
Unlike all of the others that I’m going to talk about, this comic isn’t hand-drawn. Instead, the authors have decided to build a comic using screenshots from the Star Wars movies, but with fresh dialog. The basic setup is that, instead of George Lucas’s movies, we’re actually watching a group of people playing a science-fiction tabletop RPG. A lot of the…odder…things that happen in the movies are surprisingly well explained when you accept that they’re the product of players’ interactions with a game master.

Girl Genius Online

by Phil and Kaja Foglio (start here)
A steampunk comic set in Victorian-era Europe, Girl Genius follows the adventures of Agatha Heterodyne. Most of the (important) characters are “sparks” (think “mad scientist”, and you’re pretty much right). The artwork is amazing, and I’ve found it to be a delicious balance of adventure and humor. Oh, and the emperor of all cats is a main character. What’s not to love?

Nodwick and PS238

by Aaron Williams (start here and here)
Ok, I may be bending the rules here by grouping two comics into one entry, but they’re by the same artist…and it’s my post…so I’m going to do it. Originally published in Dungeon, a magazine put out by the makers of Dungeons and Dragons, Nodwick follows the adventures of what could be a typical D&D group–a dull-witted warrior and a wizard, neither of whom have qualms about taking slightly less-than-moral shortcuts in pursuit of treasure, a cleric who’s generally oblivious to the antics of the first two…and Nodwick, the group’s henchman. This is not really an adventure story, as humor is often the driving force–one series had the characters singing variations on the Phantom of the Opera songs–but there is a plot line stringing it all together.

PS238 is very different. In a world where superheroes and super-villains are common, what happens to the children? Where can they go to learn about their powers, and grow up into the next generation of super heroes (and villains)? Why, Public School 238, of course! Although still humorous, PS238 is more plot- and character- driven than Nodwick.

Schlock Mercenary

by Howard Taylor (start here)
I believe that this comic has the record for the longest unbroken publication. Since the very first comic in mid 2000, Howard has posted a new strip every single day. No guest strips, no “I’m sick so here’s a stick figure”, no excuses. And he still has time to hang out with Brandon Sanderson, Dan Wells, and Mary Robinette Kowal to make the Writing Excuses podcast that Rabia listens to. I’m in awe.

Oh, yeah, the comic. I’m supposed to talk about that. Er…it’s a sci-fi setting about a band of interstellar mercenaries (Tagon’s Toughs); the titular character, Schlock, is a sergeant on the team. Incidentally, he’s a “carbosilicate amorph”–read, alien with no particular shape. (Ever notice how alien shape-shifters seem to always hang out in humanoid form? Why is that? Schlock, as you can see in the picture, doesn’t muck around with that.) Howard’s gotten much better as an artist since he first started, incidentally. What hasn’t changed is his ability to weave humor, drama, pathos, and adventure seamlessly.

Weregeek

by Alina Pete (start here)
This one is a little hard to describe. Set in a modern setting, the comic follows a group of five friends who regularly get together to play games, including Shadowrun, Vampire: the Masquerade, or Dungeons and Dragons. There’s an over-arching plotline about how geeks can perform amazing feats when “geeking out” about something, and a sinister group of hunters trying to eliminate geeks because of this, but for me the fun really comes from when the gang starts playing. The comic follows the characters into the games, allowing us to see very different sides of all of the characters.

Conclusion

Ok, those are my top five(ish). What are your favorites?

NaNo, from the Finish Line

Ok, David again with an update. As you can see from the nifty picture on the left over there, I actually made it across the finish line, clocking in at 50,307 words on Saturday, November 28th. Yep, two days early. And Rabia wants me to write up another post with my thoughts, now that I’ve actually finished (the month, not the novel; that’s still only about half done). So here we go.

Probably the most important thing I realized through this month, without which I don’t think I would have been able to make it: Don’t sweat the stuff. Normally, you hear people saying not to sweat the small stuff, or whatever, but really, it goes deeper than that. When you’re trying to do something like write a first draft of a novel (regardless of how much time you’re giving yourself), don’t worry about any of the details, whether they’re small or freakin’ huge. On the last night, I found that I need to go back and change what happens in the beginning of the novel to start all the action, but that’s ok. I put a note in to get to it during re-write, and went on. Is it a significant change? Well, yeah, it will be. But should it stop me from keeping the story moving forward? Heck no.

On a similar note, always remember that everything’s negotiable. Just because you’ve written it doesn’t make it canon (until you’re published, at least, and perhaps not even then; I’ve seen several books where glaring errors were fixed in a second or third printing).This is an important point for me, because I tend to focus on the details, and could spend an entire evening trying to get a few perfect. Especially names. Names are not easy for me, and I’d love to take tons of time to come up with great names. But whenever I found myself falling into that trap, I reminded myself of one amazing fact: Frodo Baggins was originally written as Bingo. Seriously.

Another point: make a reference that you can access and update quickly and easily. For some, that’s scribbling things down in a notebook, but I find that gets disorganized very quickly (or else I spend too much time trying to decide how much space to leave for lists of characters; see above). For my NaNo novel, I created an excel spreadsheet to track characters, places, and horses (yes, they’re that important); I later added another sheet when I decided I needed it. A word document would also work. It doesn’t need to be fancy; here’s a sample of what I’ve got:

First Name	Last Name	Residence	Role	Alt. Name	Notes
Arnor	Jardin	Stonehaven	Assistant horse farmer	Arnor Gerin/Jalell Thorsa	MC. Please don’t forget him. Born 817 AA.
Lirelai		Lesser Forestal			Riell’s second sister, tended Arnor after Tam’s accident.

As you can see, it’s got holes in it, and I’m ok with that. Its role is to help me keep track of what I’ve already talked about, without having to scan through everything I’ve written so far. I found it to be amazingly helpful.

This next point is something that everyone says in relation to NaNo, but it’s true, and holds for a lot of other stuff as well: make yourself write, even when you don’t feel like it. Even if you’re convinced that what you’re going to be putting down on the page is going to suck. It might. But it might also turn out to include some really good ideas. If you let yourself slack off too long, it’s really easy to let it become a habit. I haven’t worked on Storm Rider since Saturday; I’m going to be back at it tomorrow. (Rabia, hold me accountable on that!)

And speaking of Rabia: as I said in my previous post, having a good sounding board is an amazing tool. I’d talk to Rabia about what was happening in my story, and she’d ask questions, some of which I couldn’t answer…but which I was generally able to answer by the next day. And some of her random suggestions (such as having the main character hit someone in the head with a rock) found their way into the story, though not always in the form she’d suggested (in this case, a different person got struck).

Finally, I always thought it was really weird when Rabia would talk about (or quote other writers saying things like) characters doing or saying unexpected things. I mean, it’s your story; surely you’re not writing anything you haven’t come up with. But then I found strange things happening in my story. Conversations that I had planned out would develop very different undertones as I wrote them, revealing (to me!) aspects of the characters’ relationships with each other that I’d never even considered. Or I’d be writing exposition (everything’s fair in a first draft, including pages of exposition!), and strange, new details would work their way in, and I’d have to stop to consider how the new details could impact the rest of the story. Rabia was very amused whenever I stopped to stare at my fingers in amazement at what had just appeared from them. But the weirdest part for me was that whenever this happened–whenever my subconscious slipped extra details onto the page–I liked it. I mean, it was much, much better than anything I had planned. Weird, cool, freaky, and amazing all at the same time.

So, I’ve survived the insane month-long challenge of NaNo, and now have about half of a novel written; I’m giving myself until the end of January to get the rough draft done. What bouts of insanity have you allowed yourself recently?

Admin: Woohoo! I’m so excited about David’s win and pleased to see him finally following in my literary footsteps (hee!). Thanks for sharing about your experience.