The Escapist had a post about the new SMU Guildhall website, so I went and checked it out. They have some cool videos for the projects that the students are working on. My “little” brother, who is in Cohort 7 and will finish in March, was on the team who did this game. He did a few of the character models, animations, and several of the different objects in the game. I got a chance to play it a while back and it was pretty fun. I’m extremely jealous of him, but very proud at the same time. I’m not sure how much information I can share, but he recently finished an internship at [an undisclosed studio] and did some art assets for [an undisclosed game]. Very cool, indeed. He’s working on his final project already, which sounds like a Ghostbusters-esque puzzle game using HL2. It’ll be a blast to go to his exhibition in March and be able to play it.
Oy…allergies just fired up a…
Oy…allergies just fired up and I’m sneezing like mad…might need to head home a little early to take some Benadryl
So what’s up with me? Well, busy at work, busy at home. We’re wrapping up a large enhancement run (we’re calling it v3.0) at work. Testing, debugging, adding last minute enhancements, etc. At home, the kiddo keeps us pretty active (crawling, standing, picking up carpet things and subsequently sticking them in her mouth, etc). She’s usually in bed by 9pm, which leaves about an hour every evening to do anything before the body and brain start to shut down for the day. The weekends are filled with kiddo, projects, cleaning, relaxing, and/or family. With the holidays coming up, things will be a bit more busy, I’m sure. Once spring rolls around again, it should be about time to relax…
Here’s a good example of a game that fits the device. From the people who made Guitar Hero, you set up a playlist of your own music and “play” each song by clicking or scrolling with the wheel. This is the kind of game that makes perfect sense to be on the iPod. I haven’t played it, but I’m tempted to drop the $5 for it. Why can’t they do the same thing for Guitar Hero? Allow you to play your own songs…I guess that would hurt the exclusive music contracts they have.
I was researching how to make a Windows Mobile Today page plug-in/item and came across a sample from Microsoft. It just shows the amount of storage/program memory that is currently in use. I’d been wanting something like this anyway, so I thought I’d bend it to my will. See the link below for the installation CAB file:
http://steve.madrogue.com/index.php/memory-today-item/
There are a few things I still want to do to it, but the small tweaks I made were good enough for version 1.0. It’s nice and tiny (14k) and doesn’t consume much of the precious memory that it displays to you. Future versions will consolidate some of the vertical space, reduce font/icon sizes, and maybe add some color and/or more configuration options. For now, let me know what you think.
The idea that sparked this research was a desire to have a Today page item that was nothing but a space to draw in. We were browsing the used DVDs at Blockbuster the other day and I saw a B-movie that I wanted to check on (Battlespace). I had to turn on my phone, open the Start menu, select the Notes application, then start a New note just to jot down the name of the movie. I hope to make a Today page item that just lets me jot a few quick notes with the stylus. My initial thoughts are that it will also be able to clear the screen, save notes as an image file, and open the files quick and easy. Since there’s no easy, low-resource method for creating Today page items in C#, I’ll probably have to revert back to my C/C++ roots for a little bit. The movie, by the way, is on the Netflix list now. Horrible reviews, but figured I’d give it a shot.
The wife’s new MacBook should be arriving soon, and she asked me what she should download and things she should do with her new Mac. I thought I’d share the list with the interwebs:
Software to download:
Adium X - IM client (AIM, Yahoo, MSN, GTalk, etc)
http://www.adiumx.com/
Firefox - Browser (also get these extensions: Google toolbar, Greasemonkey, Colorful tabs, Add Bookmark Here, Adblock Plus)
http://mozilla.org/firefox/
Quicksilver - Command-line tool (does lots of cool things…mainly used to launch applications instead of digging thru Apps folder or putting them on the Dock)
http://blacktree.meadgroup.com/quicksilver
Growl - Pop-up notifications from several applications
http://growl.info/
TextWrangler - Better text editor
http://www.barebones.com/products/textwrangler/download.shtml
Unarchiver - Better Zip/Unzip tool
http://wakaba.c3.cx/s/apps/unarchiver.html
VLC media player - Best option for movie files (if Quicksilver won’t run it, VLC probably will)
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/download-macosx.html
GeekTool - Overlays stuff on your desktop. You probably won’t ever need this, but I use it to display this month’s calendar, a larger clock, and the latest weather radar image.
http://projects.tynsoe.org/en/geektool/download.php
AppDelete - Use this to uninstall applications (and all of the preferences)
http://reggie.ashworth.googlepages.com/appdelete
MagiCal - Menu bar date/calendar/time replacement (I use it to show current date and fuzzy time “ten to two”)
http://www.charcoaldesign.co.uk/magical
Things to do:
Enter all of your contacts into AddressBook with email, phone numbers, addresses, IM usernames, and photos (Adium and Mail use the heck out of this)
Sync your phone to AddressBook/iCal using iSync and a USB cable (or Mark/Space Missing Sync, in the case of Windows Mobile phones)
Set up Mail to get your email
Set up iTunes to sync your iPod
Create a Downloads folder in your home directory, tell Firefox to save all files to that folder
Set up Quicksilver to open with Ctrl-Spacebar
Set up touchpad so that tapping it doesn’t perform a left click. It’s too easy to tap it while typing, so if I want to click, I use the button.
Things to read:
Remap Home/End Keys
20 useful Mac downloads
Beginner’s Guide To Quicksilver
Things to know:
OS X is not Windows, but once you get used to how OS X works, you’ll fly through it
Dock is like the Windows taskbar and Start menu put together
Finder is like Windows Explorer (but way too simplified)
You won’t need to right-click very much (but it’s done by holding two fingers on the touchpad and clicking)
Scrolling with the touchpad is done with two fingers
Control Panel is System Preferences
Task Manager is Activity Monitor
Minimize works like you think
Maximize doesn’t work like you think…instead of taking the whole screen, it figures out how it can get larger without disturbing other windows
Close doesn’t work like you think…instead of closing the application, it closes the window…to quit the application, press Command-Q (or go to its menu and select Quit)
Menu is shared for all applications
Command key (open apple) works like the Ctrl key on Windows (Command-C/X/V for Copy/Cut/Paste)
Alt/Option key is rarely used in day-to-day operation
Ctrl key is rare used in day-to-day operation
Command-Arrow key will do page up/down and home/end
Command-Spacebar opens Spotlight to search for files, etc
Always download the Intel or Universal Binary version of software
As a side note, I’ve been very happy with my Mac. It’s much more portable than my last powerhouse laptop. It does everything I need it to do (including my work in Windows). There are some very slick features and it is very pleasing to the eye. I still hate Finder and have a few issues with Apple’s level of hand-holding for some functions, but it satisfies my “alternate OS” fever for the time being. The price is the largest barrier for new adoption.
