Using an Original SNES Controller and Cartridge with your PC, PS3, or Dockstar (Retrode Pre-Order glory)
I've mentioned the Retrode before, and if you don't know it's a terrific device by Matthias Hullin which allows you to use your original Super Nintendo and Genesis controllers with anything USB. I set out to use an original SNES controller and original cartridge to play Mario Kart. I ended up doing just that on a couple of interesting platforms, and I'm terrifically pleased with the finished product. Read on for more photos, videos of the PS3 and Retrode working together, and good times.
Why I’m Hip to Android
This is a short tale of frustration. Upon hearing that GemRB had been ported to iOS and Android, I rushed over to download. This is an awesome reimplementation of the Infinity engine used in the Baldur's Gate series of games. This excited me greatly, as Planescape: torment and Baldur's Gate 2 were two of my favorite RPGs ten years ago. My current Android device of choice is rocking a 1024x600 resolution screen (widescreen) and my iPad 2 is rocking a 1024x768 screen. Wanting to play some Baldur's Gate 2, I set about to install and configure it on both devices. The iPad screen resolution matches my old PC's resolution without a widescreen patch, so I set about to install to that first. It turns out you need to install from iTunes, as apple doesn't allow GPL software on the iPad. I set about to install iTunes. After iTunes finishes, it alerts me that I need to delete all the data from the iPad before I can install RubyGM from my laptop. FINE, I proceed to back up all the data and apps from the iPad and sync to my laptop. Finally, it starts to transfer the RubyGM binary over to my iPad2 and... failure. With a generic error code, my time on iPad came to an end. I'm literally at an impasse, short of buying a mac, signing up as a mac developer, installing XCode, and debugging the install process. A complete black box.
I next set about to install this on my Android device. First I installed it from the App store. This worked great. Then I uninstalled it, and installed from the direct download link on their webpage (so I know my friends with unlicensed devices would be covered). It works fine too. Even if it didn't, there are four separate versions posted up for one to try out, and the android SDK works on all platforms.
End of story: You can find my iPad on eBay here.
Apologies for the Site Hiccups!
Apolgoies for the site hiccups everyone, I've almost got it all straightened out. I've switched from godaddy hosting and domain registration to BlueHost. See my previous post for more on that, and stay tuned for even more site updates!
Registrar and Hosting Switch From GoDaddy Plus Shameless Plug For Dropbox Storage
So if you haven't been following the geek news lately, I'll sum it up for you. GoDaddy is a big jerk company that supports SOPA, helped to draft SOPA, and is exempt from SOPA. SOPA is the worst thing to ever happen to the internet, including goatse.cx. It would restrict our freedom of speech and allow pretty much anyone to take down a domain at the drop of a hat (complaint hat). So I encourage everyone to get off of GoDaddy, boycott GoDaddy, and boycott any company that supports SOPA. Oh and apparently the CEO hunts elephants, which I am also against. I found this out while searching for a good anti-GoDaddy image to post up (thanks Boycott GoDaddy Facebook Group!).
It's also therefore unfortunate that GoDaddy has been hosting my site and registering my domains for many years now. I've been pretty happy with their service, but only really because they are so cheap. SO, it's time for me to switch hosts and registrars. I'm on the fence between Bluehost, Dreamhost, or some combination of EC2 instances and namecheap registrar. This will be happening sometime this week.
One of the reasons I stuck with Godaddy was their 'infinite storage' plan, which allowed me unlimited transfers of large files for site traffic (those Z2 images, dockstar hacks, etc). I'm going to try and start hosting up storage on Dropbox, which has good uptime and some interesting features. Unfortunately, the free plan is a bit lacking in storage space (2gb, really?, my GMAIL has 8...). However, every time someone signs up for DropBox with me as a referral we both get an extra 250megs of space. This really adds up after 10 or 20 referrals, so if you want to help support my hacking releases do consider signing up for a free DropBox account with my referral code here. (http://db.tt/r45JYJPw)
Pro Tip – Add your Wii Games To Your Steam List
If you're like me, you ditched your Wii in favor of a pure emulation solution once you realized you could play your legally purchased disks in full 1080p emulated using the Dolphin Wii/GameCube emulator. It's fast as crap, improves the graphics, and is free. Plus the ability to save my disks as .ISO files and play them at my leisure is a time saver. One thing that I've gotten used to on the PC is playing PC games from Steam, and I'm looking forward to their new 10 foot living room view. So I decided to put them together. Turns out it's not that hard. Read on for the mini-tutorial.
Android App – AR Wiki (Augmented Reality Wikipedia)
AR Wiki is an easy to use app designed to allow one to browse Wikipedia while walking. It creates a Wikipedia browser window centered in your Android device, with the rear-facing camera displaying a live feed surround the Wikipedia article. In this way you can browse Wikipedia while you are walking without fear of walking into a tree or a street.
You can buy AR Wiki on the Android Market here. Read more about it on the permalink page here.
RK’s Christmas Quiz
Fellow Z2 hacker and blogger RK is having a Christmas quiz over at his blog. Sounds like there will be some interesting prizes, so if you think you've got the knowledge you should head over and test your mettle.
Easy Inventory Ad Revenue Increases Upon Open Sourcing?
Hi All,
I thought I'd share an anecdote. After open sourcing Easy Inventory a couple of weeks ago, I figured ad views would slowly die out as more folks downloaded the code, forked the project, made improvements etc etc. On the contrary, AdMob impressions for Easy Inventory have more than doubled in the past two weeks. I've always been one to share code as much as possible, but I never would have thought that releasing the code to a project would increase the viewership for the ad-supported version. Will this trend continue long term? Should I open source all my projects? Should I move from SourceForge to Github? Would folks be interested in the source to any of the games I released?
These are interested questions I'll be wrestling with.
A Cure for Dandruff That Will Save You Money
Ok, so I know that body hacking and personal hygiene are not my usual topics of choice, but hear me out. My entire life I've had dandruff, up till a few months ago. That's almost 30 years of dandruff shampoo, medicated shampoo, frequent showers, you name it. Up till a few months ago.
You see, that's when I got into no-poo (wiki link). It's not a constipation product, it's a movement of folks who have stopped using commercial shampoo. So for the past few months, I have washed my hair daily with warm water only. No shampoo, no dandruff shampoo, no conditioner, no medicated shampoo. By all accounts there has been no noticeable change in the appearance or texture of my hair.
Well that's not fully true. I lost the dandruff. Completely. First time in my life I've felt really comfortable wearing black shirts. I don't want to come straight out and say shampoo is a corporate scam designed to keep people purchasing an unnecessary product for the duration of their lives, but if the shoe fits....
Easy Inventory – Now Open Source on Sourceforge!
Yep that's right. I've had a few requests to open source Easy Inventory (the first Android app I ever wrote) since I released it back at the beginning of June. As I've been insanely busy at my new job (converting iPad apps to Android apps), I've not had much time for feature improvements or bug fixes. Seeing how Easy Inventory is currently making me about 3 bucks a month in Adsense revenue, I see no financial harm in converting it to an open source project. It also jives rather well with my socialist tendencies. Plus it's been a while since I threw a project up on SourceForge, and I'd like to see what folks can come up with.
You can download or checkout the source for the project from https://sourceforge.net/p/easyinventory
If you'd like source code write access to the project (please do contribute 
), just request it and it shall be granted by a project administrator (currently only me but hopefully more in the future)