Reconfigure by Epredator, Ian Hughes Page A

These wrappings always looked a bit odd unwrapped as flattened out they looked like a steam roller has gone over them. Mathematically warped back over the surfaces made the computer rendering of the objects look real. More recent advances had let to PBR, Physical Based Rendering. Rather than painting an object it is actually told that it is made of the colour and of the material that the model is representing. If it is reflective, then tell it how reflective. Roisin gave this a speedy mental once over. In the mesh world of 3D a Join breaks the meshes of two objects at a seam and makes a new object. It melts one into the other. Attach, on the other hand, is simpler. It makes one object move with another, they are separate entities, they have their own properties but if one moves so does the other. The attachment can be mutual, with equal weight or a parent child where the primary object is the ‘boss’. It is standard gaming and virtual world behaviour. She saw no reason for this to be any different. Despite seemingly breaking the laws of physics making things disappear and fly around she had to base something on a model she understood.
    Attach is probably not destructive and Join, well could be a bit more tricky she thought. Roisin typed.
    “Attach Cap Coin -absolute”
    The response did not indicate any problems.
     
    @rayKonfigure
    Attached Cap Coin <0,0,0> <0,0,0> absolute
     
    She had not specified the relative parameters and orientation, but absolute sounded the most interesting to try. She had defaulted everything to 0. She looked at the coin and the cap and there seemed to be no change. They were at rest on the table, observing Newtonian physics. No force had been applied for an equal and opposite reaction. Roisin reached for the coin. She had a small buzz of confusion as her model of the physical world glitched. She had her finger tips gripping the coin but it was as if it was superglued to the desk. She slowly widened her pinched fingers like a prize grabbing crane at a seaside amusement park. She raised her hand and moved it across to the printer cartridge cap. She made contact, gingerly, with her thumb and index finger. Delicately she raised the cap up just a few millimetres. Her hand was shaking, something that transferred to the cap. It felt as light as normal. The 10p coin was now floating the same height above the desk and wobbling in time with the cap and her hand. They were separated by a few centimetres of clear space. She lifted the cap further above the desk. The coin moved in perfect synch. Turning her wrist over the coin orbited in space around the cap. Moving the cap towards her face, but just to the side, she was able to float the coin into focus, and see the Queen’s head smiling across at the cap in her hand. She turned her hand back to its original position. She was mesmerised by the floating coin. It was still obeying some of the laws of physics, but in a very odd way. She released her grip and the cap and coin clattered to the desk. They hit at the same time but made 2 distinct thuds. I guess that’s a parent child attachment then? She proposed to herself.
    She typed again.
    “Detach Coin Cap”
    RC replied.
     
    @rayKonfigure
    Detached Coin Cap
     
    She put her index finger on the coin and gave a little push. Pleasingly it slid away and stopped. Balance had been restored to the Force, thought Roisin. She couldn't help but consider the parental relationship of the cap and the coin. The cap would be able to say to the coin, “I am your Father!"
    She looked at her list. She put a tick next to Attach and Detach. Roisin added that Attach had relative and absolute parameters. She pulled the coin back to its pre-flick position for run number two. She wanted to see what it could tell her about the relationship using Examine.
    She re-typed.
    “Attach Cap Coin -absolute”
    RC reconfirmed.
     
    @rayKonfigure
    Attached Cap Coin <0,0,0> <0,0,0> absolute
     
    Roisin looked at the two objects to her