Homebrew Cray-1a

Personally, I think that is pretty cool.  Makes me want to watch War Games (I not II) all over again.

Maven Tech Talk [Presentation]

At work, I am supposed to be giving a Maven tech talk to a team that is used to using Ant. I went ahead and created the presentation (see link above or embedded below). Most of the material is gleaned from Maven's site and just organized a bit differently. There's no voiceover or anything, it's just a slide-show... but it's there if anyone would like to use it.

Creating iPhone Ringtones on the PC

1. Open iTunes, Edit, Preferences
2. Click on Advanced tab
3. Click on Import subtab
4. Change Import Using to WAV, click OK
5. Right-click on a song and Convert Selection to WAV
6. Open the WAV file in Audacity
7. Select 25 seconds of the song and Export Selection (as WAV)
8. Open iTunes, Edit, Preferences, Advanced, Import - change to Import using AAC, OK
9. Open the newly created song with iTunes
10. Right-click on a song and Convert Selection to AAC
11. In Windows Explorer, rename the .m4a to .m4r
12. Double-click on the .m4r file
13. Sync the iPhone
14. Go into Settings, Sounds, Ringtones - Custom ringtones are at the very top
15. If it was not listed in step 14, Reboot the iPhone then try step 14 again

Make your own OLED

Not quite SVGA quality, but freakin cool nonetheless.

Trying out jMonkeyEngine

So I decided to try out jMonkeyEngine today... I installed it, built it, and... oh wait, tests won't run. Why not? OH, cuz there is only 32-bit versions of LWJGL... Kinda lame, but OK - I'll just download the... what? There is no 64-bit versions of LWJGL? WTF? Ok, fine, I'll build that too.... Oh, it requires JInput to build... Fine, I'll... shit, got to build that too. Does nobody have xp64 built binaries? JInput requires JUtils.jar??? Oh, that's OK, I can build that one.

So here's the steps I have taken so far to unsuccessfully get jME working on my machine. And before you ask, no, I have no 32-bit machines.

Let's get some common directories here so I can shortcut them:
(JUTIL) = C:\development\cvs-devel\jutils
(JINPUT) = C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput
(M$SDK)=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows Server 2003 R2
(VC++)=C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\VC
(LWJGL)=C:\Java\lwjgl-1.1
(JME)=C:\development\cvs-devel\jme

Ok, start off with building (JUTIL) -- simple enough, they have an Ant script

Now, (JINPUT)\README.txt says I have to put a copy of (JUTIL)\bin\jutils.jar into (JINPUT)\coreAPI\lib and (JINPUT)\plugins\DX8\lib. They did forget to mention that their Ant build script doesn't automatically add those to the CLASSPATH, so don't forget to add it manually (I did it at the command line instead of the build script since I wanted to make sure not to screw up their script yet).

Now, (JINPUT) requires installing Visual C++ express edition (I also installed the service pack),
Windows SDK [did the AMD64 one], and the DirectX SDK. I can't tell you how annoyed I am to install a lot of Micro$oft tools in order to build a Java component. VERY annoying. Almost enough to say screw the whole lot of them and move onto something else...

Then, according to this article, I opened VC++, went into Tools | Options, into Projects and Solutions, into VC++ Directories, and added these to the appropriate sections:
Executable files: (M$SDK)\Bin
Include files: (M$SDK)\Include
Library files: (M$SDK)\Lib

Well, I know I am going to have to get 'cl.exe' on the path... so I added (VC++)\bin to my PATH environment variable. While I was at it, I moved DirectX to the end of the PATH cuz I hate when it prepends instead of appends on installation.

Ok, so let's try this again. Open a command prompt (with the new PATH variable), go into (JINPUT), add (JUTIL)\bin\jutils.jar to the CLASSPATH. ant clean. ant.


BUILD FAILED
C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\build.xml:87: The following error occurred while executing this line:
C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\build.xml:63: The following error occurred while executing this line:
C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\windows\build.xml:50: The following error occurred while executing this line:
C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\windows\src\native\build.xml:55: The following error occurred while executing this line:
C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\windows\src\native\build.xml:10: apply returned: 128

Well, hell... what the f*)^ is 'apply returned: 128'? It's probably a return code. Quick check of the build.xml and it looks like it was trying to run 'cl.exe'. Ok, fine. 'cl.exe[ret]'...

This application has failed to start because mspdb80.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem.

Well, hell... Ok, screw that. Start|All Programs|Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition|Visual Studio Tools|Visual Studio 2005 Command Prompt. update classpath, clean and ant.

compile_dir:
[echo] C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\common\src\native
[apply] util.c
[apply] c:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\common\src\native\util.h(44) : fatal error C1083: Cannot open include file: 'Basetsd.h': No such file or directory

GDMF.

Ok, fine. That file is in 'C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows Server 2003 R2\Include'... Hmmm... Put those 3 variables from before in PATH, LIB and INCLUDE.... Now PATH was obvious, but LIB and INCLUDE didn't already exist, so I hope it will be smart enough to look there. Otherwise, I might have to update the build file.

compile_dir:
[echo] C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\wintab\src\native
[echo] wintab: C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\wintab\src\native\${env.WINTAB_DIR}
[apply] net_java_games_input_WinTabContext.c
[apply] C:\development\cvs-devel\jinput\plugins\wintab\src\native\net_java_games_input_WinTabContext.c(6) : fatal error C1083: Cannot open include file: 'wintab.h': No such file or directory

Where the hell is that file? Screw it, I am done for today. I think it is time for breakfast or chai or.... game or something....

What steps are left?

Figure out how to get (JINPUT) built. Copy it's output into (LWJGL). Build (LWJGL) and copy its output into (JME)... Try the demos.

If anyone has prebuilt binaries for XP64, I am more than happy to uninstall all the C++ crap. I'd much rather not have any copies of Micro$oft Visual C++ on my machine.

Of course, if these components were built into the JDK, there would be no need to go through all this hassle to get a freaking Java program working. I *really* hate relying on a C++ build environment to run a Java program. Very bad plan.

Peep Smores

Dino made her first YouTube Video.

Lego Computer Case

This is just friggin cool. A computer case built out of Legos!

DIY Rubix Cube - Archaeology Style

Grapes just got a lot cooler

Hacked Gadgets

Found yet another site that many of you will like.

DIY Projects

Who wouldn't like their own CO2 laser?

Personally, I would love to do 3D scanning... in this case, with a webcam :)

Now this is kewl. Self-parking Legos :)

Create your Dream Kitchen

Build your own Robotic Hand

A whole bunch of laser stuff, including building a $10 N2 laser. Or maybe you would rather draw with them.

Build your own HD projector (part: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7)

This magazine can help you generate power at home.

How about some touchpanels? If you are going to completely automate your house (or turn all your walls into touchpanels) might be economical to figure out how to do it yourself.

A 3-level chessboard.

High-speed photography... some example pics included.

Now this is really kinda kewl... How about a Custom Lego Set?

Or maybe your own cell phone? (more here)

Or maybe you would like to build your own cat tree/perch?

Or you can be creative and come up with a design of your very own using eMachineShop, Pad2Pad, SparkFun Electronics or other similar sites.

DIY Projects

How-To: Build your own HD projector

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4
• Part 5
• Part 6

Your own HMD

Make your own Cintiq (think Dino's monitor)

$5 EEPROM Programmer

News from the Net

Woot! Jack Thompson busted

Well, the Patent Office evidentally did us all a favor yet again... Evidentally IBM owns the concept of online commerce

Pharaoh's Dentists have been found by thieves

Do you write Mac apps? Then maybe this contest is for you

Possible misconceptions about life on Mars?

Wow, look how secure the new credit cards are... just... wow

Info on Google's Hiring Process

Internet Black Hole has an interesting ring to it, eh?

Copies of Diebold Source

Wikipedia $100 million dream?

HP scandals continue. Maybe it is just for publicity - bad though it may be?

Looks like there's reasons to not live in Germany

Going out for a drink? Expect to get fingerprinted - at least in England

Bush yet again wants to be associated with the Beast (or mark thereof)

Google may loose some supporters as YouTube helps pursue copyright violators

One of the better Dell Reviews

OOohh. Did they say "12 SATA connections"???

A new type of Trojan hits the streets. This one uses an anti-virus engine to remove rival virii

You've probably noticed the huge rush by everyone to break records recently. Well, the ozone layer is no different

DIY Biometrics

Animatronic Clothing???

Boy Scouts align themselves with Satan

Now here's a game for Jamie and Jake

I guess DARPA has decided that we mere mortals solve their problems too easily

Good thing I quit using Opera... Wouldn't want it reporting those pr0n sites I visit

Sarah	Freakin' boy scouts.........Definately not having my kid in that!!! Posted by Sarah on Mon Oct 23 07:45:00 PDT 2006
Sylkwyrm	I got a merit badge for you Boy Scouts!   Posted by Sylkwyrm on Tue Oct 24 09:35:00 PDT 2006
Sylkwyrm	Jack Thompson in contempt? C'mon! He should be arrested for mennacing! Posted by Sylkwyrm on Tue Oct 24 09:33:00 PDT 2006

News from the Net

Changes in Earth's orbit responsible for mammal extinctions?

Need a hug? Wear a vest

Your employee asking for a bigger monitor? Well, it's in your best interest to give it to them

Radioactive escargo

Like to play games? Why not make a living at it?

China Unblocks Wikipedia. Wonder if the government knew about it, or if a hacker took matters into their own hands

Ok, so you don't care about getting an official rating on your game... Doesn't matter. The a*hole Jack Thompson caused Take Two Interactive to be ordered to turn a copy of their new game over to the courts within 24 hours

I've been wondering why I haven't heard anything from Transmeta lately. They are now suing Intel for Patent Infringement

Ok, I am only reporting this because of the name. Portland 1.0 released

New copy protection may prevent playing your DVDs on your home entertainment system -- especially if using DIY home entertainment equipment

100Mbps DSL? I want it!

Forget free speech... Post complaints online about bad service and get sued for $11.3 million

Remember every time you buy something and plug it into your computer, it complains that the drivers aren't signed - but you install them anyways, cuz otherwise your new kewl hardware won't work... well, Windows Vista evidentally will prevent unsigned drivers, thus... forget installing that printer or mp3 player or...

Silver

100Mbps DSL would be fabulous, and you know we could come up with uses for it, but the ISP's would probably charge an arm and a leg for it. where is my damn FIOS.... I want my fiber, I WANT MY FIBER...      and why did Portland 1.0 have to be tools? why couldn't someone create a game.. think about a Sims expansion with the downtown area of portland, you could get a job at Nike and get free shoes...    Posted by Silver on Thu Oct 12 03:14:00 PDT 2006

Silver

OOO, or a new game like the sims for specific cities, and think of the advertising possibilities, shoe companies allowing custom designs that can be sold online, car companies like Scion where you can customize your ride and then order it through the game. what's that game called, Second life or something? the ideas are endless there. now that I consider it, it's probably been done. oh well... snif...   Posted by Silver on Thu Oct 12 03:16:00 PDT 2006

News from the Net

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DIY from the Net

Remember those OLED keyboards that aren't quite available yet? Well, someone made one from an Apple keyboard.

News from the Net

Looks like Hollywood horror flicks may have to make some adjustments to remain 'believable'. Tables saws may soon require skin-sensing technology

What do the banner ads on your screen right now and your old bicycle have in common? They both can be obtained via live auctions

Well, it appears that Google made a huge mistake today... After working so hard to make Google a household word, they are now suing people for using it as a verb

It appears M$ has given up on preventing hackers from accessing their XBox... M$ will start enabling user-created games

An insider look at a real life XSS attack

What happens when the RIAA tries to sue dead people? They give you 60 days to grieve before they go after their children.  Why does the RIAA remind me of the Inquisition?

I think the best way to approach this link is to provide a couple key quotes that caught my attention....

• win some of a (at present) 50,000 Euro purse
• Hutter Prize for Lossless Compression of Human Knowledge
• after any set of observations the optimal move by an AI is find the smallest program that predicts those observations and then assume its environment is controlled by that program
• Think of it as Ockham's Razor on steroids

If that's enough to wet your appetite, read on...

DIY Random Number Generator - using household items and radioactive decay

Well, you know about people getting busted for posting songs... and recently for posting the lyrics... and now for posting guitar tablature... Maybe the RIAA just wants music to die -- cuz you sure aren't allowed to learn it...

Got some excess Uranium laying around that you want cleaned up? Well, grab some of your friendly bacteria to do the job for you

Well, we have finally been told why the UK and US staged the plane-bombing plot... To make you like national wiretapping. Well, there's a shocker.

Want to use your Nokia phone as a mouse? Well, now you can

Ever wonder what kind of information Amazon keeps about you? Well, Amazon has applied for a patent to create an online customer database which would allegedly contain 'massive amounts of intimate information about its millions of shoppers, including their religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity and income.'

Well, you remember Illinois trying to ban violent videogames? Well, the State of Illinois now has to pay half-million dollars in attorney fees for trying to pass an unconstitutional law

If you were a fan of the Jetsons, you'll like this new robot

Wow. So, you pay a bazillion dollars for the first Blu-ray drives, only to find that they won't play blu-ray movies. What a friggin scam

World's fastest kayak floats OVER the water

Well, this was unexpected... The DVD-CCA is planning on making changes to allow home users to legally burn purchased movie downloads

A contagious form of cancer was found in dogs

WILL POWER!	The robot thing is pretty cool, although I would have liked to see more on the videos.... Posted by WILL POWER! on Mon Aug 14 02:25:00 PDT 2006

News from the Net

Department of Homeland Security tells you to patch Windows now -- and if you don't?

New "terrorists plots" emerge so that airlines can stop you from carrying things like laptops, toothpaste or suntan lotion onboard

If you use Ruby on Rails, upgrade now before they release the Major Security Hole details

NASA apparently has lost the original tapes of the first moon walk and the five other Apollo landings.  If skeptics didn't have enough ammunition before, now those tapes can't be examined like you would for Proof Paranormal investigations

Predicting eruptions by listening to them as music

So you remember Microsoft's new Windows Genuine Advantage program was accidentally screwing up legitimate copies of windows? Well, it appears it is also unable to detect pirated copies

Intel open sources their graphic drivers

New technology allows for 3D disection of fossilized embryos

Some of you have worked fast food before. How would you feel if your manager was a computer, literally?

NVIDIA officially endorses DIY Quad-SLI

If you are into Python, you might like Yahoo's new Python Dev Center

The article says that 40% of WoW players are addicted -- but I suffer those symptoms and have not been playing any MMOs for almost a year -- and never played WoW

Malachi	Oh even better! Even though they think they caught the supposed Al'Queda member that was leading the attack, they are still banning beverages on planes now. F'ing scare tactics. Posted by Malachi on Wed Aug 09 23:04:00 PDT 2006
WILL POWER!	Yep.  Moon landing = bullshit. Posted by WILL POWER! on Thu Aug 10 04:45:00 PDT 2006

News from the Net

The open source gaming device GP2X-F100 has not only released the source to the firmware and the manual, but now also a sdk.

Physicists are creating ball lightning

If you would like to use Windows Vista (I know I don't), beta 2 is available for download

It appears that some dinosaurs found in 1998 aren't children afterall, but dwarf dinosaurs

Vampire LARPers get some credibility today, after a federal judge ordered two lawyers to play rock/paper/scissors to settle disputes

Did you know that Windows call M$ everyday?

A Hacker was arrested for reselling someone else's VoIP.

Ultrawideband can now go through walls. If they really do replace A/V cables with it like they suggest, this could work really well for DIY PVRs and wireless "security" cameras.

One step closer to making human organs, they have now grown 3D human cells.

Seagate announces a hybrid hard drive... no, it doesn't use fuel cells, hydrogen or solar power -- it combines flash memory with the normal hard drive

The news just reported (have it on in the background) that Road Rage is caused by a psychotic disorder called "intermittent explosive disorder". I think that's bullshit. It's caused by asshole drivers cutting me off, not paying attention, swerving across lanes, making me take too long, or just plain pissing me off ;)

There's an article talking about how DRM is anti-Democratic

Sylkwyrm

You can't expect me to believe that two layers managed to play a game of rock, paper, sissors with no questions asked? Have you ever seen two players form different games try to do rock paper sissors? "Its 1,2,3 then shoot not 1,2 then shoot on three!" "Your suposed to hide your hand behind your back before you shoot!" "Papper doesn't blow away against bomb it gets blown up!"   Posted by Sylkwyrm on Thu Jun 08 04:07:00 PDT 2006

Malachi

And don't forget "You can't use bomb! Bomb wasn't one of our options" Judge is like, "I'll allow it" Posted by Malachi on Thu Jun 08 04:11:00 PDT 2006

BBC NEWS | Technology | Vietnam medic makes DIY endoscope

Awesome. Check out the 'Technology Novice' section.