Killzone 2 Preview

I've got the original game on my PS2 & still haven't finished it yet but I was recently looking on YouTube & came across a preview of Killzone 2 from Gametrailers. It looks like a very good game especially online, sadly I don't currently own a PS3.

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Look Good In Leather

SMV Conversion in Linux

If you want to download & convert YouTube videos to the SMV format in Linux this'll be what you want to do. First of all make sure you've got the correct codecs installed...

sudo apt-get install ffmpeg mencoder mplayer

You can get the Firefox Addon, Download Helper from here & the SMV converter can be downloaded from here.

Creating Bitmap Regions

Are you bored of square looking windows? If so, why not take a look at this project which will show you how to create windows of any shape?

Basic4GL C++ & Functions

Here are some useful links I've found over time regarding the usage of Functions & Pointers in Basic4GL & C++.

• Returning an array in C++ for the Basic4GL Plugin SDK, here.
• Returning a Pointer from a Function in C++, here.
• Returning an Array in the Basic4GL DLL SDK, here.

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Safari 4 Preferences

Recently I came across this blog post which shows Mac users how to customize some of the features in the browser. I'd got the MinGW complier installed, (which installs a copy of strings.exe) so I though that I would search the Windows binary for the same debug information.



You'll find more information on how you can customize Safari here & here.

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NetBeans & JOGL

I've just downloaded the Java SE version of the NetBeans IDE from here & I also downloaded the JOGL plugin from here. The plugin comes with a lot of example programs such as those from the OpenGL redbook & several interesting examples showing you how to embed OpenGL Graphics in a form.

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New Basic4GL Game

A new Basic4GL game has been written by peter from the Basic4GL forum. You can read more about it here or download it from here.

Quake Live: Update

So today I visited the Quake Live site & registered there. After waiting a few minutes I got to create my account & after a little wait I was able to play. It's an excellent experience, just imagine being able to play Quake 3 in your browser. Plus there are a lot of extras such as chat rooms, forum, friend lists, leaderboards, etc.

dEUS: Suds & Soda

Play Quake 3 in your Browser

Within 24 hours this site should be online & you'll be able to play. If it's a success a lot more will be available to play within your web-browser, such as FPS & MMORPG games.

Creating Jar Files in JCreator

Very useful thread can be found here on the JCreator forum, which contains information on how to automate .jar file creation in JCreator.

Safari 4 Beta for PCs

It's available to download from here, it can now render JavaScript 30 times faster than IE7 & 3 times faster than Firefox.

Programming Video Lectures

I found a link to these professional programming videos on the Ubuntu forum, the videos were made in the 1980's by Hewlett-Packard television. I recommend downloading the .divx torrents as they're being seeded & they're smaller in size than the .mpeg files. If you need a torrent downloader, get Utorrent from here.

Share this Post

Beneath each post of this blog you should see an AddThis button. Using it is quite simple, just hover your mouse over the button & select the relevant option.

Programming in Lisp

A lot more people seem to be talking about Lisp nowadays, if you don't know what it is you might want to check out this Wikipedia page & there's a very good tutorial for learning Lisp here.

The easiest way to install a version of Lisp if you're using Windows is to visit the newLisp website here & download a copy. The newLisp IDE requires Java, so you'll need to get a copy of the JRE from here.

JCreator Java IDE

JCreator is a lightweight IDE for Java programming, I used to use it a lot before I got a new computer that was powerful enough to run Eclipse & NetBeans. I've recently started using it again & have found it quite useful; tedious tasks such as creating .jar files & javadoc can easily be automated & it's very fast & responsive. If you're going to download, I would suggest you get the JCreator LE version.

Django Windows Download

If you're wondering what Django is, it's a Web framework which basically makes it easier for you to create Web applications. Installation is remarkable simple even in Windows, first of all you need to make sure that you've got Python installed. I suggest getting version 2.5.4; it may not be the newest version but it's the most compatible. Django is compressed in the .tar.gz format so you'll need something like 7-Zip installed in order to open it. You'll then need to open a Command-Prompt (as an Administrator if you're using Vista), navigate to the directory where you extracted Django to then type the following.

python setup.py install

Google App Engine

I've recently been messing around with the Windows version of the Google App Engine again. I successfully built & ran the helloworld application after I encountered a small error. On this page you are told to enter the following in a Command-Prompt...

google_appengine/dev_appserver.py helloworld/

However after entering it, I recieved the following error...

'google_appengine' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.

This error can be solved simple by omitting the beginning of the earlier command & typing in the following.

dev_appserver.py helloworld/

Free Games at Caiman

If you want to download completely free games made by amateur developers, check out this site. You don't even have to install the games if you don't want to & some of them are really good, like the Mario Kart game which appears to have been written in Dark BASIC.

Webs.com

Looking for some free webspace to create a website with? If you are look here.

Resistance to C++?

Interesting thread here on the Ubuntu Forum about resistance to the C++ programming language.

World of Warcraft Tips

I discovered WowHobbs on YouTube last year when I was looking for Warcraft videos. He's got a blog here where you can find more advice on how to do well when playing Warcraft. You can watch his newest video below.

New thinBasic Version

Read more about thinBasic v1.7.7.0 here & download from here.

Unreal Championship: Deathmatch

Useful Programming Tools

The following tools should be very interesting for anyone involved in the technical side of computing.

• Resource Hacker, download here.
• XN Resource Editor, download here.
• PEiD, download here.
• Dependency Walker, download here.
• Sysinternals Windows Utilities, here.
  

Street Fighter IV Released

Apparently Street Fighter IV has been released & it looks very good, I might get it for my Xbox 360.

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Nintendo DSi Released Soon

The new version of the Nintendo DS is going to be released on the 3rd April 2009. It will be available in 2 colours (Black & White) & has 2 cameras built-in, you'll also be able to use it as an .mp3 player & Internet browser.

Linux NZB Downloader

If you're looking for an NZB downloader for Linux, I suggest doing the following...

Open a terminal & type the following...

sudo apt-get install hellanzb

This will install the downloader but you'll probably also want a GUI so visit this site & download the version for your distro.

If you just want an ordinary newsreader type the following in a terminal...

sudo apt-get install liferea

TNA Impact: 02.19.09

• Part 1: Watch here
• Part 2: Watch here
• Part 3: Watch here
• Part 4: Watch here
• Part 5: Watch here
• Part 6: Watch here
  

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OpenGL in Visual Basic & C#

For a few years now, I've been messing around with OpenGL in C#. I knew it was possible to use OpenGL in Visual Basic 6 but I wasn't sure if it could be used in the new .NET version. However after finding the example programs at this site, I've discovered that using OpenGL in VB is extremely simple to do. I've also found an easier way to use OpenGL in C# programs based on the tutorial on this webpage.

If you're interested in using OpenGL in Visual Basic or C#, here are some useful links.

• Microsoft Express Editions of C# & VB, here.
• Tao OpenGL Framework, download here.
  

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Visual Basic 10

Recently I discovered this post over at Channel 9 where you can see a video of Visual Basic 10 in action. I recommend you download the high-quality WMV video from here as it will show you the code being entered into the IDE. Apparently Microsoft have added a lot of new features to VBX from other languages such as Python & Lisp. I'll list some of the new features here...

• Auto-Properties
• Multiline Lambdas
• Statement Lambdas
• Collection Initializers
• Array Literals
• Implicit Line Continuation
• Generic Variance

Greyscale Conversion

Here are a few useful links which describe in detail how to convert a colour image to a greyscale image.

• Conversion routine on Lodes site here.
• Routine on the FreeBASIC forum here.
• How the Gimp converts colour to greyscale here.
• Routine on the Basic4GL forum here.
  

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OOP Criticism

With all the talking about Object Oriented Programming nowadays you might be thinking that it's the best way to write your programs but you should check out some of the links at this webpage for criticism of OOP.

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Flash for Ubuntu

I first started using Linux in 2006 & I've never managed to get Flash working 100% correctly. However, recently I came across this article on the Ubuntu wiki. After reading it, I closed Firefox & opened the Synaptics Package Manager, I completely removed flashplugin-nonfree & installed adobe-flashplugin. Now Flash works as well as it does in Windows.

Brutus2D v1.8.7

Has just been released, it's completely free & can be downloaded from here, read more on the forum here.

COD: WaW Map Pack 1

Today I recieved an email from the Call of Duty HQ, which contains details of a new map pack which is due for release in March. More information can be found here. (It looks like I'm going to have to buy a larger Hard drive for my Xbox)

Guardians of the Past

Nice site here which aims to compile information & screenshots on every Atari game that was ever released, it's a bit like Hall of Light for the Amiga.

Retroaction Issue 01

Is available to download from here as either a .zip or .pdf file.

If you're having difficulty downloading it from the original site you can get the .pdf from here too.

Python File Association

If you need to check that the Python File Extensions are registered correctly in Windows, just open a console as an Administrator & type what you see in the image.

New Java Version released

A new version of Java has been released & can be downloaded from here. As I occasionally write programs in Java I downloaded the JDK 6 Update 12 version.

New Xbox 360 Games

A few weeks ago I brought some new games for my Xbox 360, the games were GTA IV, CoD: World at War & Tomb Raider Underworld. I got GTA IV & CoD: World at War from GAME & because they were Preowned I got them at a slightly cheaper price.

Google Earth Update

A new version of Google Earth has been released & can be downloaded from here. I also recommend that you download & install the browser plug-in which should be available from the same site.

Lack of recent updates

I've been unable to make updates to my blog for almost two weeks due to the fact that my laptop power supply completely failed.

I eventually travelled to a local Maplin store & brought one of these.