Got this in an email today from my friend Renee who's in montreal for the summer...
Have my first statistics midterm tonight at 6pm so I'm supposed to be studying but it's so borrrring. and the past papers are easy and I have my cheat sheet done! YAY! umm, that's about it. yup. But I realized that the past papers always have examples where John or Mary work in a widget factory. I was quite distressed at this because I always thought that widgets were little alien forms and if we are truly producing them in a factory, then surely the FBI must be involved - and the FBI has no place in my statistics exam. So I looked it up on the net and here's what I found:
What's a widget? I'm so glad you asked. A widget is a term often used to describe a user interface element that is in the 3D scene. For a landscape scene might need a user control to make the sunrise and brighten up the scene. The user must be given a way of turning the sun on.
Let's look at how to create a simple widget that is a button. Let's also think about buttonness. If we create a world with a cube that we want to function as a button it turns out that there are a whole bunch of things to think about. When should the button cause it's action, when the user moves the cursor over the button? Should it be when the user clicks the mouse while over the button? Should the clicking be a double click? What should be the visual feedback for interacting with the button? Should it change color? Should it change size? If the button turns the sun on how do we turn it back off and when? This darn buttonness turns out to be a tad more complicated than it first seemed.
[Source: "Learning about Widgets with VRML", http://3dgraphics.about.com/library/weekly/aa092000a.htm?iam=eboom_SKD&terms=What+is+a+widget]
Hmm. Buttonness INDEED. It was so CRAZY! I had class yesterday and then I went to run a lot of errands. Was in Grand'n'Toy on Bloor St after checking my P.O. Box at Snowden's Pharmacy (near St. George station) where, by the way, a cute guy works... but anyways, Grand'n'Toy... and my friend from college, Lily walks in!!! I thought she had gone back to Hong Kong and she thought I had gone back too! We know some of the same people back in HK and we started reminiscing... So we hung out yesterday - went shopping and I got two cardigans at Jacob and some underwear at the Bay. yay! Here were my finds for the day:
- Monsieur Felix and Mr Norton cookies... SO GOOD. Even better than Mrs Fields!! They are located at 15 Bloor st East, just across from the Bay... and you can look on their website at Felix and Norton
- Flowers on Avenue Rd, near the Davenport intersection. OH wow... I totally miss Wan Chai flower markets back in Hong Kong where you could get roses for HK$3 a stem (around CAN $.60!!) and we had fresh flowers every week. So I bought some flowers for the apartment - they make me so haaaappy!
- Came back and studied after Melly and I ordered from Sushi Inn. yummy! Talked to Jad in Ottawa, Nadia in Montreal (who isn't coming back this weekend or soon. :() and Parsons in Vancouver. And Happy asked us to see a movie on Friday... I miss my people! Joy and June are in Ottawa for the next few days... aiiiii... oh well. I'm busy too - tomorrow's gonna be one ker-aaaizy day! I have class from 9-noon and then work from 1-8:30... and then Marianne's place to help her move in. I thought summer was supposed to be relaxing!!!!