These tutorials focus mainly on OpenGL, Win32 programming and the ODE physics engine. OpenGL has moved on to great heights and I don't cover the newest features but cover all of the basic concepts you will need with working example programs.
Working with the Win32 API is a great way to get to the heart of Windows and is just as relevant today as ever before. Whereas ODE has been marginalized as hardware accelerated physics becomes more common.
Games and graphics utilities can be made quickly and easily using game engines like Unity so this and Linux development in general will be the focus of my next tutorials.
To the Children of the Modern Age and Beyond
By Alan Baylis
Only when a particular system is shown to be clearly flawed will the people search for a more perfect system.
I shall give two examples of fundamental flaws in the system generally called democracy and hope that this will help you understand that there are many more. Before I do though, I would like to discuss the current state of democracy itself. This system is heavily influenced by and being consumed by the power of the capitalist system. World wars in which millions lived and died fighting for the right to have a democratically elected representative did so in vain as we now have two party systems throughout every democratic country in the world. These parties are the primary candidates because they have the largest campaign funds and exposure. The campaign funds come primarily from companies and just a few media companies control the amount of exposure, which means the large corporations actually dictate who has a chance of being elected into power. Without a broad choice of representatives to choose from the people are unable to elect anyone who may want to change the current system and we end up with a global dictatorship by default. I am sure no one fought a war for the freedom to be exploited by every company under the sun while being made redundant at the same time. The people who sustain or propagate the capitalist system (by simply believing it to be good) are getting pay rises while their own numbers and job prospects decrease. Eventually so many people will be redundant that it will be self evident that we have a system founded on money and nothing else.
So, did the noble idea of having a democratic choice lead us to a better way of life? My first example to support the negative is the stock market, or gambling for the rich as it could be called. Lets take two hypothetical companies known as company A and company B who both manufacture the same products. Company A has a very good work ethic and pays its employees an above award wage and includes benefits such as superannuation, health and even offers maternity leave. On top of this the workers are given reasonable workloads and even allowed such light distractions as music and chatting while they work. Company B on the other hand is based in a country where the duly elected government has not set an award wage limit. The company employs people so impoverished that they will work for a small percentage of the wage paid to company A employees and unpaid overtime is mandatory. They are expected to work with almost no rest periods or talking and to produce three times the output of Company A. Company B also pays no superannuation and if a person is found to be sick or pregnant then they are fired without notice. Both of these companies have floated themselves on the international stock exchange. Company A is showing a comfortable and sustained return of 10% while company B is showing a return of 20% averaged over the same period. The question is, of these two companies, which company is a potential investor likely to invest in? Given that generally speculators do not research the companies they invest with and simply look at company performance, then the answer is company B. The end result being that companies like company B grow into large corporations which destroy companies like company A and continue the same work practices while influencing the governments of the countries in which they manufacture. The world then becomes dominated by companies with the worst working conditions in countries managed by political leaders who are corrupted with greed.
My second example of a flawed world system may seem trivial at first but has large consequences. I propose that tourism is one of the most damaging human pastimes to affect the ecology and the human condition. In the past there was such a huge gulf between the lifestyles of the rich and the poor that most people were employed to service the rich for pitiful wages as butlers, maids and all manner of servants. With the advent of unions or group bargaining, the wages of the average worker rose to a level that meant that only the very rich could afford to maintain full-time servants. The industrial age was in its prime and the people easily found employment in manufacturing or elsewhere. The industrial age has since gone and been replaced by the technological age which was also a boom time in regards to job prospects for the well educated. However, the push towards minimization and automation has meant that these jobs are now scarce or non-existent. The push now is to hype up the advantages of world tourism, which I see as a return to the days of masters and servants. The names may have changed to tourists and service personnel but the theory is very much the same. In a depressed job market the last vestige of work available to many is to do the bidding of the rich; which strangely is promoted as a good industry to develop and huge amounts of money are spent overseas to attract new tourists. Not only is it degrading to the person who has to clean the toilets for strangers or take any kind of emotional abuse that some drunken tourist may deliver them for fear of losing their job, it is also a major burden on the Earth's resources.
While I can only advise how a person spends their own money, leaving that to their own conscience, I can point out that it is fundamentally wrong for any person to drive to the airport, travel hours by plane and then miles by car in some foreign country, pumping out pollution and waste all the way, only to arrive at some location and marvel at the unspoiled nature of the place. The tourist enjoys taking deep breaths of unusually clean air, a couple of pictures of something rare and after a short stay, fly all the way home again. The cumulative damage to the world environment is huge and we find that the unspoiled areas are quickly disappearing due to tourist amenities and waste, which makes the remaining areas an even more attractive site for new tourist ventures. Soon there will be nowhere worth seeing, let alone traveling to see it firsthand.
To stop these practices it is necessary to change the world system away from the monetary capitalist system that is still partially under the guise of a democratic system. You may be thinking that I have some other earthly system in mind to replace it with, but I know that any human conceived or regulated system is doomed to failure through greed. The only system we should trust to sustain a positive way of life for ALL mankind and the world itself is the system designed by the Creator Himself.
Before those with ears, yet are deaf, stop reading here because I have again introduced the subject of there being a creator of mankind, I would like to point out that mankind has made such large breakthroughs in science, biology, medicine, physics, etc that it is now possible to:
I have only scratched the surface of what mankind is capable of fifty or so years after entering the technological age but I think you can see the pattern. Unlike any other time in history we have evidence that the concept of actually creating a new living species is possible, yet there is still the established view that it is foolish to believe in a creator of the human race.
The Bible points out God's dilemma with his sovereignty over mankind. It cannot be gained by favor or through enforcement. Instead it is left up to ourselves to choose either mans way or that handed down to us from our Father through the Bible. If you are confident that your intellectual reasoning cannot be swayed by what has been officially classified as the mass delusion of sheep herders and fishermen of two thousand years ago then read the Bible. If at the end of the read you find that your opinions have changed then maybe you saw truths that are hidden from modern man.