Jamer The Programmer

As allot of you may have heard, I have been developing a forum from scratch for a bordam project. Its coming along great. You can now submit threads and replies to threads along with (if you’re an admin of corse) being able to delete and edit threads. Oh yeah! You can also add your own avatar.

I would give you a picture of it, but the content I am using is royalty free (I think) then again, im not sure. Better not risk it. Anyway, Im rather pleased with it. Except one thing. You cant edit replies on threads.

Currently working on putting that in. Then I might even put in a PM system. Then again probably not.

A new post just like I promised.

About a few weeks ago, I got bored… Had Aquamacs open and felt like developing a website… So I thought about it…. Then I thought about it some more. Then I thought up a nice simple design I could come up with. So I made that. Then I wanted a forum. First thing, I thought: “Simple Machines!”…. Then I realised I couldn’t be bothered to theme it. So I started to develop my own which was pretty pleased with. In the end (Not trying to blow my own trumpet…) it turned out looking semi good!

So there it is.

Right now you can sign in and post. You cannot register or edit, delete, lock threads. You cant even PM people. It wont even recognise what user sent a reply to a post yet. But If it does well, I think I might upload it to GitHub.

Back in March (I think) I bought a brand new Xbox 1:

I saw it in my local pawn shop. What caught my eye was the fact that it was boxed and it was only £15… I thought:”Hah, cool a boxed Xbox… Too bad I can’t use it for anything”. Then I remember I tried to softmod my old crystal Xbox when I was 8-9 so I could get Linux working on it. It this point ideas started flooding in about the usage of the Xbox if I where to buy it. So I asked one of the assistents to take it out of the cabinate, I took the top off the box and saw everything was in its wrapping. So instantly I said:”Im buying this”. So forwards 2 hours I completely unboxed the Xbox. Fired it up and it worked fine. At this point I took it up stairs and took it to peaces. Found an old IDE computer I had lying around. Booted into Windows on it and then I downloaded XboxHDM tools and then I grabbed a CDR. Powered up MagicISO and configurated it to burn XboxHDMS iso to the CD. After 3 hours of trail and tribulation of the disk drive refusing to burn for some reason, I went and burnt it on my iMac. I then went back to the IDE PC and slotted the disk in it. Booted into the disk just fine. Took the HDD out of my brand new Xbox and I took the jumper out so it was slave on the IDE PC. Then finally after 5 hours of back and fourth I did it. It copied all the hacks over and it worked perfectly. So, I put the jumper back in the HDD and sloted it back into the Xbox and put it back together.

I turned on the Xbox and it booted into EvoX perfectly. I was thrilled. So, for the next 2 weeks I spent some time putting all sorts of homebrew on it. I have the following on it currently:
Doom 1
XBMC 3.1 (Pure awesomeness for streaming TV and what not)
XDSL
Anyway, 2 days ago I was using it for a media centre along with trying to install an updated copy of Linux. I decided the 8GB HDD that came with it wasn’t enough. I went down stairs and raided my brothers gaming room (Thats where my unused P4 home server is kept. Thanks bro :P) and got the 80GB HDD out of my unused IBM server. Went straight back up stairs and opened up the Xbox and got my IDE PC next to the xbox and got one of the Molex PSU connectors from it and plugged it into the HDD. Then I downloaded Chimps Xbox tools. Launched Chimp and it turns out I had a 1.6 Xbox at this point. So I went onto my PC and telneted it. Awesome! So at this point I fired up the IDE PC and hotswapped the HDD into the Xbox.

2 hours later… Boom! A 80GB Xbox Original.Sweet. So now, I have it as a web server to host the experiments I do and a media centre for when I am away on holiday. Ideal.

I think its safe to say… The best £15 I have ever spent.

No… I’m not dead. Here is what has been happening these past few weeks!

Last week I went on holiday. The week before that I was snowed under. The week before that I made 3 blog posts but only half finished them.

So yeah… Thats where I have been. Its just been busy busy busy! Anyway, enough of that. 2 days ago, I felt exhausted from a holiday we had (We didn’t have the best of times, we fell ill during it). I felt bored but too tired to do anything advanced. So I broke open Aquamacs and made this web site:
Sorry…. I have been having trouble with the uploader…. I’l upload it tomorrow if I remember

I think I’l name this design… Fresh Alpine. Yeah, its random and doesn’t really mean anything. So thats that. It has a half functioning forum too. I might even upload the forums source code for people to use. (hah, like any one would want to use that) but yeah…

Anyway, thats a quick update from me! I will have some more detailed posts later this week (probably)

If you where reading my blog last night you probably saw that I did a post on Cocos2D development promising updates and what not. Sorry, I know this update is a bit late but hey! What you gonna do?

Anyway, here is what happened last night. I started to learn with Cocos2D and got along really well. I started drawing graphics for the example projects I was making. Once I had done all the art work, I slapped it all into the game and it was looking amazing. So I started to personalise it. Give it a name and more art. Now it has turned into a potential game. I’m not going to give any one any ideas on this game at all, until I am finished or at-least in beta stages.

Anyway, right now I’m currently working on AI as the title suggests. Im programming some enemies… Because there is nothing more boring then walking around a blank map with nothing to avoid. So right now, I am writing some code for enemies which is getting along pretty well. If I get far enough into making enemies today, I will post a video giving you a guided tour of it.

Right, lets talk investments now.

I have been saving for an unknown item since November for my business. Upon the latest Linux distributions not supporting my VAIO’s GPU, I have decided to trade it in (along with getting rid of a few more items I need to sell, wont bring me in much at all, but every little helps right?) and save a long time (About another couple months) for a new (meaning second hand ) Macbook Pro as my iPhone development skills have flourished unexpectedly. I will be using my Macbook for now until I have enough cash for a 2010 15 one later on this year. Although my Macbook is faulty, I think it will get me through a couple more months until I have enough cash.

Ok, so OpenGL didn’t go as planned last night as I got too tired to really do anything. Today I feel in a different mood. I feel in the mood for some Cocos2D again. I get pretty good at it, but then I usually forget about it. So anyway, you may remember way back in Dec 2011 that I did some of these Cocos2D posts.So, I am going to continue them. My ridicules goal is to make a shooter with it if I get skilled enough.

This project will continue throughout this week. Dead line is in 3 days so i better get cracking. Your probably wondering why I have a 3 day dead line….. If I have a 3 day dead line, that should in theory force me to complete the project and stay inspired for it…… That should work… I hope. Anyway, thats what the plan is. So lets get started!

Inspiration…. Something I am struggling with right now. I feel like coding, really do. But dont know what to code, dont know what I feel in the mood for, and what I could develop if I felt in the mood for it. I think I would like some game development. But in what language? C++? C#? Open GL in OBJ C? Im spoilt for choice!

I think I will do some OpenGL! I fancy doing some more. But in C++. But not under Windows as I dont really have the tools setup for using it under windows. Although I could use boot camp…..

Just downloading Eclipse as we speak. So, while we are waiting for the download to complete, lets talk about the plans for this. This is going to be a simple game based on Java and (doy!) OpenGL. Why have I choosen to code it under OpenGL for? Good question the reason being is because I want it to be multiplatform. No one should be left out because of their OS choice. What ever happened to freedom of choice? Plus, Its easy to develop over different platforms.

I have no artwork for the game yet because I dont know how long it will take me to get a grip on the basics of LWGJL. If it does start to take off, I will start a blog about it discussing the possibilities. This would be terrific if this where to happen. I would love something of mine to take off for once. I will keep trying and trying, I will not stop until I do it. Seriously. Im not stopping.

Why am I downloading Eclipse if I already have it installed? Because its broken I’m afraid. So Im going to reinstall it. Then once that is done, I will be reading the documentation of LWJGL. That should give me a good idea on how to code in it. If it does not I will buy a book. So yes.

Anyway, remember that iPhone project with the barcharts I keep on mentioning? Well, thanks to Google not allowing their super awesome bar charts to be used offline, I am stuck for now, so I am shelving it. I will code in the other aspects of the app and put in the bar charts once I have learnt Open GL my self and can actually make my own!

Right. Thats bout it for now, I will post a part 2 when I am ready and I will give you full documentation on how this is going. I will start doing more detailed documentaries on all of this soon.

I felt the urge to code my self a OpenGL application all of a sudden. So I fired up Netbeans and was about to make a new LWJGL application…. Then I thought, I am probably better off to do this properly under C/C++ so I can get a better grasp of Open GL, so I did, launched Xcode and cracked open the Apple OSX Developer Library and started reading. 15 Minuets later, I coded this:

I know right? Incredible graphics. The shading, everything… Amazing. Just look at it! Might even beat Crysis! Ok, so its obvious that there is room for improvement, but this is my first 15 minuets of proper OpenGL programming. So, yeah.

Anyway, I’l more updates on my OpenGL skills as they come.