Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2018 September 29

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September 29

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Transparent PNG images in MS Paint

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In Microsoft Paint, how do I make a PNG that has a transparent background? In addition to the transparent background, there will be two foreground colours, used to draw a shape that is to be outlined in black and filled in white.

In the "Colors" menu, the "Edit colors..." option allows me to set colours using either hue/saturation/luminance (these are not compatible with the HSL values described here), or decimal RGB values, but there is no option to set the opacity/alpha value. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:36, 29 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Does this help? Ruslik_Zero 20:57, 29 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]
No: as the last person to comment there noted, it makes a white background, not transparent. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:56, 3 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Microsoft has always been notorious for the crippled support for transparency in PNG. I haven't followed the issue for a number of years now, but your question suggests to me that there hasn't been much improvement. Switching to other software seems the way to go. I would recommend the Gimp (free and good) or Photoshop (expensive and good), but there are more options. Jahoe (talk) 10:24, 5 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
One more option that I often use myself: create the image as SVG and convert it to PNG. Jahoe (talk) 10:31, 5 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
As I understand it, you can use (free) ImageMagick to add an alpha channel to PNGs. A small warning: After having spend a day with Apple Preview and ImageMagick trying to remove the background from Jacques Herbrand's head, I found out that there apparently is no way to do that for real black-and-white PNGs (as opposed to colour PNGs that just only use B&W). My workaround was to add a red box, then exporting it as a colour image, and then extracting the head... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 10:56, 5 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

How close are we to Full immersion/ deep dive vr?

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WIll it happen within out lifetimes?

By uisng nervegear, nanobots, mind uploading, Neuralink maybe?

And if we get full dive vr will it be limited to gaming?

Or is it just all fantasy? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.241.172.251 (talk) 23:14, 29 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

See the top of the page: We don't answer requests for predictions. Including predicting the length of your life. --76.69.47.223 (talk) 02:33, 1 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
If you want to see the latest in full-immersion VR, look at the porn industry. That is where VR technology shows up first. For example, I was tasked with developing VR first-person shooters and VR surgery training simulations in 1994. All of the equipment, from the VR helmet to pressure-resistant gloves, was purchased from porn hardware producers because they had the most advanced hardware. In the gaming market, VR helmets weren't even using LCD screens and the pressure-resistant gloves only applied pressure to your index finger. Nowhere else. Now, they like to use the word "haptic." But, it is the same gear and for the latest experience you have to go to porn. You can currently get a 3-D VR helmet with 3-D sound and full-body (yes - FULL body) haptic suit with accompanying "entertainment" media. For video games, we're still using cheaper helmets (or your phone in a cardboard box) and one or two twiddle sticks. 216.59.42.36 (talk) 18:23, 2 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]