May 2008
9 posts
March 2008
1 post
Japan’s Banking Crisis In the late...
October 2007
4 posts
Bill Maher on Clarence Thomas →
Since Clarence Thomas has been in the news a lot this week, here’s a profile of Thomas courtesy of Bill Maher. This is from the May 25th, 2007 “New Rules” podcast. Bill Maher notes that Clarence Thomas sat through 68 hours on the bench without asking a single question.
September 2007
10 posts
Running MP3, OGG on Stackless
I haven’t returned to my book training yet (curse this lethargy! :), but I did take some time today to make a backup of my Stackless Python setup on my PSP, and created duplicates to test the OGG and MP3 playback with my title screen exercise. In my last post, I mentioned that I’d gotten the script to run on Stackless initially, and I then tried to integrate MP3 streaming as per...
Converting Integers to Dollars
I’ve been sitting on a copy of Beginning Python by Magnus Lie Hetland for over a year, and despite attractive chapters that allow you to create simple pygames and a p2p file transfer application, I’ve found the book to be rather intimidating for the novice. It really needs exercises to engage the reader, as well as form a logical order to the content’s presentation.
Today, the...
Create a Title Screen in PSP-Python
For the past couple of days, I’ve been feeling a little antsy on Python. I’ve managed to get a good, if basic, script for Lemonade written up, and I really wanted to start learning how to get it on the PSP. Expert programmers will advise that newbies should concentrate first on writing a game for the PC before writing for another platform. That’s good advice; makes perfect sense....
Parting Words
A few more notes about the above exercise:
The random module is not incorporated into PSP Python. Unless one of the PSP-Python developers can port the module to the PSP, I will have to come up with another way to determine probability for my Lemonade game. I wish I knew where to start. (I think I’ll email the developers and see if they can port the module over.)
My PSP script worked...
Downloads
Here’s a list of the Lemonade files that I’ve written so far. Remember, these are incomplete works-in-progress by a Python newbie. :)
Latest text build of Python Lemonade Python Lemonade as of 09-04-07 Python Lemonade as of 09-01-07 Lemonade for PSP Title Screen Script Python Lemonade Title Screen for above exercise
Python Lemonade Update-Sept 4, 2007
I’ve posted the latest alpha of Python Lemonade. Again, it’s still text-based and really, really basic… so basic that it’s pretty easy to amass a fortune by the end of the first week. (Translation: It’s not remotely fun or challenging yet.) As this alpha progresses, I’m going to add in some variability in things like the price per cup or sign, as well as the...
Ben Stein Loves Larry Craig, Calls Cops Stalinists
Ben Stein on CBS Sunday Morning, 09/02/07 (Quicktime, 2.0MB)
Ben Stein goes on CBS SUNDAY MORNING to denigrate the Minneapolis Police, calling them “Stalinists” and “Thugs”. He disses the GOP for throwing Craig overboard, and even compares him favorably to Senator Barney Frank. Two problems with your analogy, Ben. One, Barney Frank opposes legislation that discriminates...
To Do List for Lemonade
Every so often, I’ll scratch ideas here of what to do as I refine Lemonade:
Calculate & determine the price that would be necessary for the customer base to purchase 100% of the lemonade under normal weather circumstances. On days when the weather is hot & humid, customers will pay more for lemonade. But what happens when the weather is cloudy? You would have to slash your selling...
PSPTube Update
An update to an earlier post, where I called the PSPTube Beta application really an alpha at best. As I said before, the program crashed with most FLV’s on my PSP. After running this buggy program so often, my PSP became rather unstable. The Sony bootup screen failed to appear, and I was having trouble with the kernel changing to 3.52 instead of 1.50.
Since then, I had to downgrade my...
Python Lemonade-ALPHA →
I’m still in the nascent stages of learning Python programming, but I’ve been taking what little I know to produce a version of “Lemonade Stand”, a game that I used to play on the Commodore VIC-20. It’s very simplistic, it still has some bugs to work out, it’s text-interface only, it’s all procedural programming rather than object-oriented, and I’m...
August 2007
2 posts
PSP News for the Week
Here’s the latest in the homebrew scene for the PSP, along with my opinions & impressions:
Worms 2 Demo Underwhelms: The second game I ever bought for the PSP was the first Worms game. I’ve had a love affair with the violent little squirmers since they first appeared on the Gameboy Advance. Yesterday, Ocean released a one level demo of the latest Worms game for the PSP....
R.I.P. Tommy Makem (1932-2007) →
A very sad day for fans of the Irish trubadour. He was scheduled to play at Milwaukee’s Irish Fest two weeks from today. Now it’ll feel more like a wake.
July 2007
15 posts
Critic lectures Cheney; Get Arrested for "Assault" →
This is not the America I grew up in.
Death Comes on Little Cat Feet →
Note to CNN: Calm Down! It's Not Terrorism!
Last week, an underground pipe in Manhattan blew, killing one and injuring several. The next morning on CNN’s “American Morning”, John Roberts said the following, which left me dumbstruck:
“Mayor Bloomberg was quick to call the steam pipe explosion in midtown Manhattan a case of infrastructure failure. But still, could the city’s fragile and aging infrastructure be...
June 2007
6 posts
MSNBC's Dan Abrahms Beating Off the Press
Since MSNBC caved in to “Slick Alvin” Sharpton by firing Don Imus, MSNBC has been in a state of flux. They rolled in a lazy susan of AM hosts to take Imus’ place. While no official announcement has been made, it looks like Joe Scarborough has scored Imus’ timeslot, and virtually abandoned his 8pm Scarborough Country program. Of late, MSNBC general manager Dan Abrahms has...
DIGG: Only 4% of Americans are virgins
OK, I’ve had this rant in my head for a few months since I read about a Bush initiative at the Dept of Health & Human Services, but I’ve never had a chance to actually vent my spleen till today, when this story appeared on Digg.com:
‘Virgins rare, drug use common’
JUST four per cent of US adults are virgins, but a fifth have tried hard drugs such as cocaine and crack,...
Fanjita discovers PSP Exploit for FW 3.50
All hail Fanjita & co for producing the Illuminati exploit for PSP. This Youtube video demonstrates how someone can create a buffer overrun error in a PSP running the latest firmware (3.50 as of this writing).
All you need is a UMD copy of Lumines and a download of the “Illuminati” exploit. (See link below.) Currently, the only homebrew is a simple “Hello World”...
Age comes to Doctor Who #5
I just stumbled upon a British programme called “On Distant Shores”. Seems to follow the mold of shows about Britons moving to quiet, quirky Irish villages. (Think “Ballykissangel”.) Looks like the episode I saw was the last of the series.
Anyway, I noticed Peter Davison in the credits. It’s funny because I was thinking about him briefly this week. Some know him for...
Weirdest Dental Appointment So Far
The title of this blog, “Eating While Sleeping”, comes from an experience I had last Friday. I was scheduled to have a couple of teeth capped, but I did not trust that the dentist would administer sufficient anaesthesia to knock me out. (I had a bad experience with my last capping.)
Long story short: The doc administered enough drugs to knock out a horse (their words, not mine), and...
Stackless Python port for Sony PSP →
Carlos Eduardo from Brazil is continuing the work on a Python interpreter for the PSP. I’m not sure what a Stackless port is, but this is the first PSP/Python work I’ve seen in over a year.
That reminds me… I should finish Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner someday. I’d love to make a homebrew Domino Man for the PSP. My only concern is that I don’t think...