My Last Post on This Domain

OK guys,

I think that it is time for me to publish the last post on this blog using WordPress as a domain. As you probably already know, GitHub is my favorite company and I have decided to switch my blog to a completely new domain.

I have published a couple of posts exclusively on the new domain and backed up every post from this domain to my new address (with one exception, but I’m working on it). I feel confident now to make the switch and I started to feel really comfortable using GitHub + Jekyll as a blogging platform, so I’ve decided to drop by and say good bye to my old domain.

From now on, you can follow me on r3bl.github.io. Be sure to use the http version of the site because https version is currently not properly implemented in the code. If you run into some issue while browsing the site or you miss a feature that I had implemented on this domain, feel free to report it here.

As always, you’re more than welcome to contact me anytime on aleksandar.todorovic@mail.ru. I hope that you’ll continue to read me on my new address.

Sincerely,
Aleksandar Todorović

[Office 365 Giveaway] Winners announced!

A few days back I published this article where I created a small giveaway, two Office 365 licenses for two of the best short stories I get.

Now, it’s time for me to declare winners. Both of the winners are from reddit’s PC Master Race subreddit and both of them had written some great short stories about Gaben’s road to success! The winners are: /u/Stannis_ and /u/hobbit9797. Thanks to everyone for their participation! This post will be updated once I get in contact with winners with a screenshot as a proof that this contest was not a scam in any way.

In the end of the post, I’m sharing the stories in their original form.

A story from /u/Stannis_:

Many years ago, before the days of the Steam, there lived a peasant, his daily routine was to come home from school, play CoD and have intercourse with mothers around the world, then one day while watching some video about the Xbox one announcement he spotted something on the side bar, slowly his cursor moved to the right like a lion hunting its prey, it hovered over the title, “how to build a gaming PC”, he seldom viewed anything about PC’s, with wonders flowing through his mind he pressed on the LMB.

He was amazed, the idea of being able to play Skyrim in 1920×1080 at 60fps, it seemed like something of a myth, the idea of playing a game in such a glorious fashion, his jaw dropped and almost shattered his keyboard, he saw the links appear across the screen, the purchase took place a week later, each part coming in one by one, he pieced the machine together like the assembly of a car, each part falling into place, the case was shut, the power button pushed, the operating system installed and the journey of a better gaming experience had begun.

Praise GabeN, and thanks for the giveaway.

A story from /u/hobbit9797:

On the beach, where one wave was sucking a single shingle, I met a man. He told me about his life. He once had an idea. He wanted to create a system on which mankind could play for eternity and he had a dream…

“I saw a landscape beautiful and untouched. There was a beach with single waves hitting the shingles on the shore and three birds are flying in a white sky. I heard the sound of a trombone and masses of men came down from the sky and rose from the ground. They were clothed in robes green and blue and black. In a time that felt likey minutes they constructed entire cities and factory halls and office buildings.
The beach perished and instead of birds there were black blocks of plastic and metal in a dark grey sky. When the mey finished their construction, they began to fight over which block was the best. Which block had the most ‘features’. Which block looked best.

The men soon disappeared one after another but the black blocks stood firm with flashing red lights coming out from them. Then I heard a second trombone and a deep and strong voice said: ‘Let it be new!’. The blocks crumbled and became shingles again. The sky cleared up and was white first and then blue. Birds came flying from the ocean and filled the sky with their sound. It was good.”

Scared by his dream he decided to live alone on the beach. He dreamt about one day when his idea of a perfect gaming system finally comes alive. But whenever he tried to build with electronics, the static discharge destroyed his works. And he kept being a mad man dreaming about black cases, television and game discs…

Somewhere else another man had the same dream. But unlike the first man he was gifted. He created the one system to rule the all. A system that is as complex as easy to work with. A system that could shatter the black dream blocks by its pure existenc. This system was his personal computer…

 

Get Office 365 License For Free! [A Little Contest]

So, even though I’m a regular Linux user, I use Microsoft’s software whenever I need them. I’ve bought an Office 365 Home Plus license in July of this year. So, what did I get with it? I got five Home subscriptions, each one with a licensed Office suite, 1 TB of OneDrive space and some premium Skype minutes (I can’t remember how many exactly). The license expires in July, but I will renew it as soon as it expires.

After using this license for a couple of months now, I still have two licenses laying around without an owner and I’ve decided to share it with you guys for free! The only requirement for this contest is that you have Windows 7 or newer installed on your PC because the older versions are not supported with this version of Office suite.

Now considering that probably more than two people are interested in getting it, I’ve decided to create a little contest. All you have to do is to write some short story and send it to me. I don’t have any specific theme that I want you to write about, you can write about anything you want to, but I will prefer the topics that I’m interested in than those that I am not.

Those topics include anything related to open source, hacking, Linux, PC Master Race, NSA spying, artificial intelligence, social engineering or human psychology. You can write your story in any language I know: English, Bosnian, Serbian or Croatian.

I want to know something about you. I want to hear your story and learn something from your experience and I’m ready to give you $80 worth software just to hear your story.

You can send your stories to my email address (aleksandar.todorovic@mail.ru), just put [Office Contest] in the beginning of the email subject. I will select two stories that I like the most and share the license with them. I will probably publish the winning stories on my blog with the explanation on why I chose them. The contest ends on November the 5th. The winners will be announced on November the 6th.

Here’s a picture as a proof that I have two licenses available right now (excuse my poor GIMP knowledge):