March 2007 Archives

I mentioned in a recent article about playing a game called "Elite".

It's spirit is still alive with one of the original creators - David Braben - still involved with game development and talk about a further version in the series being made.

Read more about it here at the Elite Wiki.

There is also a free version of the original game written for modern machines.

It is called "Oolite" and the wiki page is here" while the 'official' site can be found here.

It will probably prove a little too slow and simple for 'modern' tastes ... but you might want to give it a go ... it is easy to install and uninstall.

Next post - 11th April 2007 - 'After-school sessions for Summer term'

Engadget ran a nice article earlier this month about creating your own Google maps ... with annotations.

The picture on the left is a close-up from this map I did a while ago. It's a very simple one though.

What does not come across clearly is that you need several things before you can create your own Google maps. These are :

• somewhere to host the pages
• a proper web "domain"
• a special key (or ID code) from Google

The key is free but you have to go to the Google Maps API site to apply for one. Without a code that is verifed for your own domain the maps you create won't get displayed.

For example, the key for the "chace-school" site map is .....

ABQIAAAAASexVKZJpKl64fR4F10qlRS9S1vNN62ht0T1WeKX3cTjUUB3RxT4KEJVte3bcvSUQURrUXNOQ6KqeQ

 ..... but is no good to anyone else.

Have fun if you decide to have a go at this - it feels really great when you see your map appear with labels and links too.

Two weeks ago ..... worshipping your PC.

This week ..... take a look here.

This will wake you up.

After getting yourself "banged up" for crashing the aircraft entertainment system (see next week) you might want to improve your keyboarding skills.

Try these.

I posted about other strange input devices here and in June 2004 there's a whole week concerning keyboards - Mon - Tue - Wed - Thu - Fri.

Gizmodo recently chose their favourite 'tech-type' cakes - take a look at them here.

The one shown in the picture on the right might prove to be a hit with Mr Moore and his 'macolytes'.

Many moons ago, my lovely wife and daughter made me a computer-based cake in the shape of a BBC microcomputer - it was to celebrate gaining Elite status.

Sigh.

Another person with too much time on their hands - a nice job though.

Two items for today :

1. humour - "You Know Google Has Gone Too Far When ..."
    
   
2. redesign - more about Joe Critchley's re-vamp ideas (earlier post here)