Red's Box

So I was flipping through the oft read pages of Maximum PC the other day and noticed a fantastic step by step guide to setting up a streaming server to host your music. Essentially you take your desktop (or home server) and stream your music using Xampp and Netjukebox. I also threw in a little DynDNS as recommended in the article, but that is just icing on the cake.

Check it out, I highly recommend it. This will make listening to music at work while I'm "intently focused on my tasks" all that much easier. Thanks MaxPC!

On other music related news I recently picked up the Kings of Leon album Only by the Night at the Amazon.com MP3 store and it is fantastic. I highly recommend.

Hey, it is now. Oh, you'll also find it listed under Wired's top phone for 2008, above the iPhone.

I'm just saying, after only a couple of days with my new Nokia E71 phone I'm wondering how I ever survived without it. Amazing, truly.

I'll have to say, we just reorganized the office and having my 22" monitor sit flush with the wall is frigg'n fantastic. What's with these monitor bases. The screen is 1" thick yet the base for this guy is a stupid 8" circle? Lame, yay for old things looking new.

Apparently Microsoft has acquired Caligari (makers of gameSpace and it's free Light version) and in order to promote their Live Earth modeling they have released trueSpace 7.6 (the most recent version) absolutely FREE. Don't be stupid, go download this immediately.

Seriously, you shouldn't be reading this anymore, and don't stop to look up some porn on the way.

Go now.

Now.

Now.

Enjoy.

I'm simply ANNOUNCING that I plan to add a running list of applications and utilities that I frequently use myself and would like to share. It is simply too late to get started on all this right now, but hopefully I will have something soon!

In the mean time, enjoy some pictures of fireworks!

As proven by many awesome things such as The Daily Show, taking things out of context rocks. Don't believe me? Take this picture for example:

I came to the realization today that Picasa is quite possibly fantastic. You might ask, Why? And you might end up getting an answer like, Batch Edit, export, online integration and sharing, fantastic organization options, easy to use, snappy, and free. If you are still asking why, I would kindly like to as you to press the magic Alt-F4 buttons and never return. No, seriously.

You can take a look at my public galleries for an example of the online portion, but for the client side go grab Picasa2 from Google now, you won't be disappointed.

Space Shuttle Endeavour screamed into the night sky, on the STS-123 (1J/A) mission at 2:28 a.m. EDT, March 11. A record 16-day mission to the International Space Station and deliver the first section of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA) Kibo laboratory and the Canadian Space Agency's (CSA) two-armed robotic system, Dextre (SPDM).

We watched the launch from the Banana River viewing area, and got some pretty cool shots of both the Saturn V/Apollo facility and the launch, of course! Check them out.

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MMORPG.com has posted some comparison screenshots showcasing the differences between DirectX9 and DirectX10 Definitely worth checking out, especially if you are a big fan of the game and on the fence about DX10. Hit up the full article here and click this posts title for the pictures.

DirectX9 Images


DirectX10 Images

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Seems almost a strange comparison -- the n800 not being a phone and all -- but downloadsquad.com has thrown together a video showcasing the n800 and compared it to the iPhone in functionality. Check it out.

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I was asked a couple of days ago to list some of my favorite apps that I use for the 770 and I figure I would go ahead and throw some out there. Also take note that some of these are apps I intend to try out and do not necessarily have any experience with.


Media Converter - Allows you to convert videos (on a PC/Linux/OSX desktop) for playback on the IT.
Clock App - A nice clock app that allows you to display a full screen clock... neat.
Video Player Streams - A few video streams that work with the new Video Center
Ultima IV - One of the best RPGs of all time
MPlayer - This version of MPlayer is for use on the OS2007HE.
KMPlayer (replace MPlayer) - An MPlayer alternative, if you can not get it to work.
Kagu - Another media player for the 770 (2007HE)
AirCrack - Detailed walkthrough on how to use AirCrack to crack WEP passwords... awesome!
Flash 9 - Several methods for installing Flash 9 for the HE.
YouTube Scripts - Several methods for viewing YouTube videos on the tablet.

I use several other programs on my own tablet. All of which can be installed from the repositories listed here.

GPE-PIM Suite (calendar, contacts, etc)
Ermining (syncs GPE PIM with Google Calendar)
Canola (media player)
Minimo (Altenative browser)
Maemopad+ (treed sketch/type pad)
WhiteStork Dictionary (multilingual dictionary)
Maemo Mapper (mapping program)

I have been giving the new OS2007 Hacker Edition a try for the 770 and overall I must say I am impressed. The entire thing seems to work as it should and I have yet to have any serious issues.

I am having difficulty trying to get a few certain videos to play, but that is unsurprising given their format and size. I intend to re-encode these and try again.

Otherwise the difference between the two OSes (2006 & 2007) are pretty remarkable. It makes me wonder what kind of experience is being missed with the N800 device over the 770.

I definitely like the changes and since the vast majority of the functionality was retained with the move (especially my critical programs like GPE Calendar, Erminig, etc) I see no reason to migrate back to OS2006.

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A new version of the Internet Tablet OS 2007 Hacker Edition for the Nokia 770 is now available for download. This version updates the platform software to the level of the Internet Tablet OS 2007 edition feature upgrade, to the possible extent. We are still working on improving it, but we have covered the basics.

This is not an end-user ready release and it is not officially supported by Nokia.

Main improvements
All the user space libraries have been updated, as well as all the applications. We expect application portability across the Internet Tablet OS 2007 and the Hacker Edition as long as the code is not compiled specifically for OMAP2. Some applications might suffer hardware limitations as well.

Bugs fixed:
File manager can handle files properly.
Certifications work with browser.
Media Player
Still bugs but it works quite well.

Same limitations as in IT OS 2006 because of the same osso-media engine.
libSDL sound
Device information (N800 to 770 hacker)
Device locking and starting with or without power supply.

Known issues
Unfortunately it hasn't been possible to provide the new third party software, due to licensing constraints:
Skype client support
Adobe Flash browser plugin

This version of the Hacker Edition is still using the Internet Tablet OS 2006 initfs, so the kernel and device drivers are the old ones. DSP related components are also the same due to licensing and hardware constraints. There is no support for larger memory cards. The Mozilla based browser is not included in this release, and the current version for the official Internet Tablet OS 2006 has some conflicts with dependencies. However, it shouldn't be difficult to build new packages specific for this Hacker Edition and then install the Mozilla engine manually.

Also:
Internet calls are not very reliable.
Occasionally the boot process is interrupted due to issues with DSME, metalayer-crawler and related components.
Bluetooth connect or to be connected to/as file storage.

What's next
We are continuing the work on the Hacker Edition with the following goals:
Update to maemo 4.0 Chinook
Mozilla based engine
Further bug fixes

We are also populating the bug tracker in the Garage project with the bugs carried from the IT OS 2006 (many of them now fixed). Issues with the Hacker Edition should be reported there and not in bugs.maemo.org. Suggestions to improve this project are welcome as well.

Interesting move for AMD, definitely something to keep your eye on.

AMD Bets on Tri-Core Chips as Quad-Core Market Lags
By Bryan Gardiner 09.18.07 10:30 AM
When your larger competitor outguns you financially and can crank out powerful products at blinding speed, you work with the strengths you have. In Advanced Micro Devices' case, that's architecture.