Author: ryan

  • Freely explore 3D game maps and more – This Geek in Review for 7 Feb 2020

    Freely explore 3D game maps and more – This Geek in Review for 7 Feb 2020

    Playing 3D games are fun, but what if you want to explore the map. Usually, the game doesn’t give you a chance freely explore (Grand Theft Auto not included). But, there is now a genius website Noclip. The interface is a little confusing. To get started, select a game and then a level of the game. The game list viewer still shows, to get rid of it, click the red bar. Now you can freely explore the game using the mouse and WASD keys.

    I’ve already raved about Star Trek: Picard, and now CBS has put the first episode of Picard online for a limited time.

    Before you need to make small talk, be sure to memorize some of these little known but obvious facts.

    One of my favorites:

    Comment
    byu/TikiTC from discussion
    inAskReddit

    From the things we didn’t need department, Snapchat is releasing a Bitmoji TV Show.

    Virtua Racing was one of the first 3D racing games, and Pico-8 is a virtual game console that is used to make games that look 8 bit. Now we have a madman who has created Virtua Racing Demake on the Pico-8 that you can play online.

    Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and China has completed the construction of a 1,000 bed hospital in eight days due to the coronavirus. That number is impressive, but it’s not the fastest they’ve done it.

    Adobe Flash is dead come December, which means there are a ton of online games that will no longer be available. Archivists in Australia have worked to save over 36,000 Flash games that are playable offline. The question that has arises is if the games will still be playable after Flash goes offline. Since I still run my Atari 800XL, I’m sure they will be.

    This past week was February 2nd, 2020, which could be written as 02/02/2020. The date is the same backwards and forward, and the same whether you put the month first (US) or second (Europe). Look how great it is:

  • I finally found a desktop mixer that I liked enough to purchase

    I finally found a desktop mixer that I liked enough to purchase

    In my basement office, I have a desktop computer running Windows, an iPad, and a Mac Mini. I like to watch tv shows or movies on the iPad while I work at the desktop computer. Sometimes I will be working on the Mac. So, I started looking for a mixer I could use to mix the inputs.

    It’s really cool.

    Enter the FIFINE Ultra Low-Noise 4-Channel Line Mixer

    My spending goal was $20, so a lot of mixers were out. That is, until I found the FIFINE Ultra Low-Noise 4-Channel Line Mixer($). It was over my spending goal at $22, and I had to purchase some 3.5mm to 1/4″ jacks ($), so in the end I spent $31.

    Plugging it all in

    I plugged the speakers into the output, and then my main computer into input 1. The plan was to plug the iPad in to input 2 until I got an idea. Since I mounted my iPad above my monitor so I can watch Star Trek, I wanted to use Bluetooth. I had a Bluetooth adapter($) that I had bought to make an older pair of headphones wireless. The adapter wasn’t being used, so I plugged it into input 2 and plugged the USB into the computer to keep it charged. Now I could pair it with my iPad and play sound from the iPad wirelessly.

    Finally, I plugged my Mac Mini into input 3.

    In practice

    It’s pretty cool. I have a hardware dial for each volume, and can mix all three if I want to at the same time. No more plugging/unplugging cables.


    ($) Designates an Amazon affiliate link

  • A whole lot of Apple and more – This Geek in Review for 31 Jan 2020

    A whole lot of Apple and more – This Geek in Review for 31 Jan 2020

    A whole lot of Apple nostalgia for this week. Does Apple announce every major product in January? First up is the 10 year anniversary of the iPad. I have my thoughts from 10 years ago. It’s funny reading stuff that I wrote ten years ago. The iPad was the first (and so far, last) device that I have ever pre-ordered from Apple. I miss the lines that used to form at the Apple store for major releases. The iPad release was huge. There other retrospectives on the iPad for your perusal.

    One comment that I read about the iPad has really stuck with me. It was the last big device announced by Steve Jobs, and the commentator mentioned it’s the product that has suffered the most from the lack of Steve Jobs. The iPad has not come close to reaching its potential. Apple is pushing the keyboard attachment for most iPads, making the iPad look more like a Surface Tablet or laptop than a futuristic device. I’m all for reading articles on using the iPad for productivity, but the number of hoops one has to jump through does not bode well for getting work done. There are a number of features that Apple needs to add:

    • Multiple user support
    • Copy individual text from any app. There have been a number of times I’ve wanted to copy some text, but there isn’t away to do it
    • The ability to have a multiple item clipboard. Once you can store several items at a time in a clipboard, it’s hard to go back.

    Also, 36 years ago this month Steve Jobs unveiled the first Macintosh. I don’t remember the announcement or hearing much about the Macintosh, I was too busy playing on my uncle’s Color Computer. Christmas of 1984 is when I got my Atari 800XL. Most people nowadays remember the Super Bowl ad:

    It is also the twentieth anniversary of Internet Explorer 5 for the Mac. What was amazing about IE5 is that it was anchored in technologies that were bleeding edge at the time, such as cascading style sheets. The public beta of OS X hadn’t been released yet, but Microsoft really nailed some of the features of the first OS X’s Aqua interface.

    For those still rocking an old Mac, you may have noticed that you can’t set the year to 2020. Well, there is a control panel that will help you with that. This affected me on my Macintosh SE/30 running System 7.1. The operating system supports later dates, it’s just that the default date control panel won’t let you set a year past 2019.

    The stop motion skills are strong with this one

    I can’t wait to stay in an Atari hotel. I’m hoping they install a 2600 in every room.

    If you’re going to go, then go out in a blaze of glory. The Mount Vesuvius eruption was so hot, one man’s brain turned to glass..

    And the next time you are entertaining, how about throwing up your own vj

  • Star Trek: Picard – Engage

    Star Trek: Picard – Engage

    I hope when I’m his age I look as regal.

    Last week CBS All-Access premiered the first episode of Star Trek: Picard. This series is notable for bringing back Jean Luc Picard, who is now semi-retired and running a winery. Some bad things have happened, causing Picard to resign from Star Fleet.

    I’m not going to say a whole lot yet. There are a number of questions from the first episode that I’m sure are going to be answered throughout the season. What I’m most excited about is the fact we finally have a new Star Trek property that is moving forward. We haven’t had that since Star Trek Voyager ended its run almost 20 years ago. Everything Star Trek since then as taken place in the past.

    Anyway, the first episode of Picard gets the spousal seal of approval, which is a pretty high bar to reach. We’ll see how well it does as the series continues. Also, if you get a chance, watch the Short Trek Children of Mars. It references a very important event in Picard, so you may want to not watch it until after you watch the first episode of Picard.

  • Tremors, emojis, and more – This Geek in Review for Jan 24, 2020

    Tremors, emojis, and more – This Geek in Review for Jan 24, 2020

    I didn’t get a chance to see it in the theaters, but I did watch it a lot on VHS. This year celebrates the 30th anniversary of Tremors. If you’ve never seen it, then as soon as you’re done reading this, go watch it. Tremors is currently available on Netflix. I should know, we watched it last Sunday night.

    Some people think I obsess about weird things, but I never thought about examining the physicality of whether the scissors emoji would actually work or not.

    What better way to kill time in an airport then playing videogames on one of the airport monitors.

    Popular tractors for sale are the newest tractors, but tractors that are 40 years old. Farmers are used to being able to repair their equipment, but the big tractor companies such as John Deere are making that increasingly difficult. Most repairs and modifications require a licensed mechanic at $150 per hour.

    Speed running is the act of playing through a video game as fast as possible. These usually don’t require much physical exertion, that is, until Nintendo released their Fitness Ring game for the switch. There are now people pushing themselves for over 24 hours at an attempt to finish the game as quickly as possible.

    I didn’t get to play with model rockets much when I was growing up, but I still new the name Estes. Model rocket pioneer, Vern Estes, celebrates his 90th birthday.

    I’m always on the look out for a good, monospaced programming font, and JetBrains Mono is my current favorite.

    We have to wait for the next season of the Mandalorian, but the internet will provide Mandalorian content in the mean time:

  • Working on my FREd Talk for #OETC20

    Working on my FREd Talk for #OETC20

    Come see me take the stage on February 11th at the Ohio Educational Technology Conference!

    The Art of Why
    2:15 PM – 3:15 PM
    A211

    If you’re not there I’m going to wonder why.

  • There is nothing wrong with Post-Its (well, except for one thing)

    There is nothing wrong with Post-Its (well, except for one thing)

    Do you need to remember the key sequence to do a task? Put it on a Post-It. Almost every program you use on your computer, whether it be a desktop or laptop, has keyboard shortcuts. These allow you to quickly accomplish a task, without taking your hands off of the keyboard. Keyboard shortcuts usually comprise a modifier key and another key. The most common modifier keys comprise the Shift, Control, and Alt key. On a Mac, the Command key (the one beside the keyboard that has what looks like a pretzel on it) replaces the Control key and the Option key replaces the Alt key. A modifier key is one that does nothing on its own. Holding or pressing the control key does nothing by itself. To use a shortcut, you hold down the modifier key and then press the shortcut key.

    You may already be using some shortcuts (C is the Control key, or the Command key on a Mac):

    • C-c – Copying selected text to the clipboard
    • C-x – Cut selected text to the clipboard
    • C-v – Paste the clipboard contents into the current application

    Here are some for the operating system:

    • C-tab – Switch between Applications

    For a browser:

    • C-l – Jump to the URL field, highlight the content. You can then start typing a new address
    • C-t – Create a new tab
    • C-PgUp/C-PgDown – Switch between tabs

    To find out more shortcuts, look at the help for the application. To help you remember the shortcuts, feel free to write the shortcuts on to post-its. Just don’t write your passwords down!

  • Y2K20 problem, Apple Computer, Airwolf and more – This Geek in Review for January 17, 2020

    Y2K20 problem, Apple Computer, Airwolf and more – This Geek in Review for January 17, 2020

    For those that can remember, January 1st, 2000 was the year that was going to crash computers, airplanes, and start World War III. The problem was that a lot of programs assumed 19 as the first two digits of the year. By using this assumption, programmers could save two bytes. Nowadays, two bytes is a rounding error with storage and memory, but in the 70s and 80s, every byte counted. To correct the issue, the good programmers switched the storage to 4 bytes, allowing the entire year to be stored. Unfortunately, there were some programmers that decided they had a better fix. Their fix was to assume that years 21-99 were in the 20th century, and 00-20 were in the 21st. The problem is that these programs are still running, and will think that next year is 1921.

    In 2000, Steve Jobs had only been back to Apple for 2 years and had already struck gold with the iMac. His next act was OS X, which he demoed 20 years ago. OS X is now called macOS, and every Mac, iPhone, and iPad uses it as their operating system.

    Speaking of the Mac at Apple, there is only one remaining usage of the word “Macintosh”.

    Here is the office setup that I need.

    The 80s were all about vehicles. Whether it was the General Lee, Kitt, the F15 in Top Gun, the top secret jet in Firefox, or the A-Team’s van, a lot of TV shows and movies had some cool vehicle. Not to be outdone, there was also helicopters. In a fight, who would win, Airwolf or Blue Thunder?

    The Sega Megadrive (Genesis for the US) can be used to create a pretty cool synthesizer:

    Did you know that there are secret codes that you can use to find movies and movies and TV Shows on Netflix?

    Do you have a lot of CDs you’d like to rip? And, do you have some Lego bricks? Maybe they could help you shuffle through the disks: