I have since then moved to a  Windows 8 PC with some form of touch input device, be it tablet or phone. Once I decided upon that I was left with another problem, do I duplicate what’s happening on screen on the device for easier viewing or do I create a complementary app that doesn’t constantly interfere with the main display, namely for the scenario involving multiple viewers but only one user.

After further going through more scenarios I think that a hybrid system of some direct duplicate display along with non-interfering  interactions would be best. Now just to start the hard part and it get it up and running. Also I am not calling this a “Smart TV”, it to me is going to be just my TV.

1. Sláinte.com: Website to upload photos from St. Patricks Day 2012

2. HoldMeThrillMeKiss.Me/KillMe: Website dedicated to an awesome tune.

That’s all. Both are very simple websites with just a specific idea behind them. Though doing those two sites I gathered and tested newer ideas for other sites I want to develop. Still have 14 other domains to use so I’ll get cracking soon.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

^^I might be tone deaf, but damn I can sure as shit knock those tones out^^

After a bit more rummaging, and helpful tweet from Mark Pettersson(@konop), I finally found what I was looking for. wavforge is a nice little api for generating WAV tones within PHP. Developed by sk89q, it looks like exactly like what I was wanting to make myself. I just installed the scripts and here’s the example at play [TONE]. It takes a little while to load, so just sit back and wait. Time to now read through the code and learn how and why things are done and then time to do it for myself. Fun fun fun.

Anyways, this post is all about nothing besides doing what blogging does best, waste one readers time. \(^_^)/

It all started when I started my new job and just realized that there was no reason for me to use paper for anything. I’ve got a computer, just take notes. I’ve got a phone, just take notes. As I said already, it’s been very easy. The only problem I’ve come across is that on my phone I was using some note application and it had no easy way to transfer the stuff to my PC or internet location so I switched to using the Google Docs app.

This new way of life, per se, has come up against some opposition in the form of a new coworker who just has the mantra that he like’s always having something physical to read, at hand, and not on the screen. I can see where he’s coming from but with his desk just piling up with papers, notes, etc I don’t see how he can find anything beyond what ever he just put down.

To let you know, there have actually been 2 instances where I have used paper in the last 4 months.

1. Post-it note: This has become a tradition of mine, to draw a smiley face on a post-it note where I work. It always just makes me smile so I had to.
2. Drawing paper: A new thing I have started with The Creative Van podcast is having the guests/speakers/talkers/friends draw whilst talking about what ever. I feel this helps new people to podcasting to forget about their voice being recorded and also it’s fun to see what they come up with. I do plan to give the drawings away or something at some stage but for now I don’t know. All I know is that I don’t want a single sheet of the paper I bought to be wasted. All art is good art.

My next challenge will be moving my life onto one without a rubbish bin. This will be a hard one as I will have to think about what packaging any product I buy uses and find the best solution. (I already recycle just over half of what I use)

Wait what? Episode Three?? No, no, no. Not that Episode Three, though it’s 10 times better than that will ever be. :p

This time round I have Jake Birkett (@GreyAlien) and Alex Vostrov (@AlexVostrov) talking all about being Indie developers. These guys are definitely the ones in the know. Between them they have about 40 years game development experience give or take. They’re also the brains behind Full Indie. (Don’t forget to join and get involved)

Jake talks about how becoming indie has changed him and his family, how he’s the better for it and speaks his mind about “asshole” developers.

Alex talks about his recent release, Infested Planet, and about how he HAD to get the game as a point to himself.

Now get listening!!

Again, don’t forget to subscribe on iTunes if you wish.

Episode Two Link

The Creative Van Episode Two is finally here. After months of hard work, NDAs and contract signings and some government intervention it’s finally out on general release.

This time around I got the non stop, action hero of gaming, Chevy Ray Johnston (@ChevyRay). He talks all about himself, what he does and the many games he’s created so far and they people he’s worked with. Does he give all the juiciest gossip from the indie game development scene? You’ll just have to listen to find out.

He also talks about his recently released game, Fat Wizard. Which he developed with Matt Thorson (@MattThorson) and not to forgot the awesome voice acting provided by Evan Balster.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes of you so happen to use that.

I’ve been using Google+ for a few days now thanks to @edenfire_Paul (who also introduced me to Twitter). It’s good and bad. Bad namely because, for the same reason as all other Google products, I can’t change my primary email address. Since I was invited by a close friend, he invited me with my older email address but I still receive those emails into my newer account and so now my Google+ account is associated with old me.

I have also been using the Google+ Android app since then as well. It has been great for easily posting updates, uploading photos and just generally keeping in touch. Good and all, until I noticed something very strange today. I was messing around with the status/link/update section of the home page and noticed the small icon for photos. I clicked this thinking I could use photos I’ve previously uploaded to use in newer posts. Yes the uploads were there, but also photos I took with the normal camera application during my house hunting walk yesterday. These I obviously didn’t upload, or want to upload to Google+ as they were just for reference for me. I don’t know when they were uploaded but since I was popping in and out of the application it could have been anytime. This is honestly the first thing I really do not like about Google+. Privacy FTL.

Last Tuesday (June 21st) I went to an unknown to me place called The Waldorf Hotel for the HTML5 Summer DevFest. Was an awesome web talks and beers day and really got me excited about all things web related. I’ve said that before about the #WPIEBCVan talk but this is exactly what I needed. I was in a slump and after going to other talks, conferences and meet ups I was beginning that the good ones really are hard to find, but no I was wrong, this was awesome.

The day was kicked off by a nice intro by John Bristowe (@jbristowe) really just showing how awesome HTML5 is and can be by constantly reciting his link blog, which to be honest I do look for inspiration, make awesome web. Next up was Brian LeRoux (@brianleroux) of PhoneGap fame (or infamy). TBH honest I can’t really remember the details of what he talked about beyond the extremely meme slides. It was just really cool hearing him talk and chatting with him afterwards about what they have to do for PhoneGap to give people an great application/service.

^^(@jbristowe and @brianleroux doing html5 DJ)^^

The rest of the day kind of went by in a haze but the rest of the speakers were Boris Smus (@borismus) talking about mobile web and touch events, Brian Fling (@fling) talking about how mathematical, psychological and just pure iteration design is. Brian Flings talk really did help me think about design from a far different perspective. Then there was Tom Dale (@tomdale) talking about SproutCore, and finally there was Thomas Lewis(@TommyLee) who made me admit it, publicly, that I do use <tables> far more than I should even though I know they should be left back in the 90s with <marquee> and <blink>. He actually went on about an IE development in the form of CSS grids which definitely perked up my ears.

Massive thanks to John Bristowe (@jbristowe), Boris Mann (@bmann) and the Vancouver HTML5 Meetup Group (@HTML5Vancouver) for putting the event on and I am well looking forward to the next one.

Over the weekend of June 17th I finally partook in my first game jam. I’ve helped out a many a Global Game Jam but finally thought that yeah sure my game coding skills are very lackluster and normalized databases don’t make for good gameplay but when I head Full Indie was holding it’s first ever game jam I just knew I had to give it a go.

I honestly had no idea what I could put my skills to and had a creeping feeling that I’d be useless to any team, have to learn something completely new in 48 hours or a bit of both. This feeling was calmed a little bit when I was at an IGDA Vancouver meet up at Radical Entertainment the Tuesday before and met James Karg (@Twisted_majic) who was also taking part in the Full Indie game jam and we batted around some ideas about Twitter. On D-Day we got talking again and with the inclusion of Cody Labossiere (@codylabossiere) we started to hammer out any ideas that came into our heads. (I had met Cody previously at another Full Indie meet up).

The main theme given to us was “Spawning”. This was due to it being Fathers Day on the Sunday and all fathers have spawn little mini thems. As you can  see from the photo above we just went with any idea relating to spawning we could think of, even Kevin Bacon got mentioned. Once some core themes were out there we started on any game idea we could think of, these ranged from god games to fertilization. We kept trying to think of better core concepts but it just wasn’t happening, once bacon was mentioned earlier pizza was soon planted in our heads and this made our stomachs growl like nothing else so we decided on a small break and some food.

Once we had pizza half stuffed in our faces we knew we were missing something ….. beer. So a quick trip back to the jam via a liquor store we were sorted. We kind of all agreed to drop all the half ideas we had and just do something with Twitter. Only a half full of half “maybe …” sentences later and we came up with a word battle fighting game. #Fighter was born. (that’s not the final name. actually it’s not even a working name, I just thought of it now).

The premise of the game is to sign up easily using your Twitter account and then challenge friends using keyword hash tags and then just do battle using Twitter, somewhat, normally using predefined hashtags as battle commands. This is all record by our server and then determines the winner. A simple conceptual idea I had for explaining it, Pokemon but through Twitter, and less animal cruelty. It is a rather simplistic core concept but we all had very busy weekend plans besides the game jam, which involved drinking, and so the game never got to a working state. I do apologize for  this as it was my coding skills that weren’t able to deliver in a short time frame. Though I do believe that with only an hour or two of work I can get it working in some form. I really just need to set some time aside for it.

The Full Indie game jam was a brilliant experience and I cannot wait for the next one to come up. Hopefully then I will not have so many beers and other plans on the weekend and actually come out with a working prototype. Until next time #KAPOW!!!! Also photo credit and beer cheers to Chevy Ray Johnston (@ChevyRay)