This PDF Ebook is for anyone who wants to learn how to write games for Linux. I assume that you know the basics of working with Linux; if you know enough to start X, open a terminal, copy around, and are up a text editor, you're good to go. I also assume that you have a reasonable grasp of the C programming language. Flip through the book and see if you can decipher the syntax of the examples. We'll go through all of the necessary library calls, so don't worry if you see a bunch of unfamiliar function names, but you should be able to understand the majority of the actual code. No prior experience with multimedia programming is assumed, so don't worry if you've never had the perverse pleasure of hacking a graphics register or shoving a pixel into memory. All in good time!
Although this isn't a reference manual in the traditional sense, chapters 4, 5, 6, and 8 provide reference boxes for most of the API functions we cover. I hope that even experienced multimedia programmers can and something useful here. I will not discuss 3D programming in this book. There are already plenty of excellent books on OpenGL, and only a small bit of OpenGL programming is directly related to Linux. However, I will demonstrate how to use SDL as an efective replacement for the GLUT toolkit; see page 140.
This paper gives a selective review of the literature on monetary policy and real estate prices, including both empirical and theoretical contributions. The literature is rapidly evolving and there is considerable debate, particularly about whether monetary policy should play a role in forestalling dangerous real estate bubbles, even if the monetary authorities can recognize them.
What are the economic foundations of modern knowledge-based firms? In an influential article, Zingales (2000) argues that while modern economies are dominated by human capital intensive knowledge-based firms, economics has only a rudimentary understanding of how these firms operate. One feature of the knowledge-based firm is that it deals with complex problem solving that requires the processing of what economists call “soft” information (see Garicano (2000) and Stein (2002)). A second distinguishing feature is that people are typically the firm’s most valuable asset, as the firm’s value is mainly generated through the application of its employees’ skills and knowledge. Unlike physical assets, individuals can exert discretion as to when and how they want to apply their skills and knowledge. Together, these two features imply that the provision of non-contractible actions is a defining trait of knowledge-based firms.
What determines the provision of non-contractible actions? Building on the seminal paper by Holmström (1979), a large theoretical literature links the provision of non contractible actions to the existence of a moral hazard problem. The main focus of this literature has been the design of optimal contracts (see Hart (2001) and Prendergast (1999) for recent surveys). A related strand of literature considers the role of organizational structure (see Gibbons (1998)). Following these literatures, empirical tests focus largely on how contractual design (e.g., Gaynor et al. (2004) and Lazear (2000)) and organizational structure (e.g., Baker and Hubbard (2003), Garicano and Hubbard (2004)) determine the provision of non-contractible services.
