Simple Gamer

iPhone 1.1.4 Jailbreak
by Shabbir on Tuesday, 25th March 2008

So I finally went ahead and upgraded my iPhone. I was previously on the 1.1.2 firmware, which was stable. After the infamous 1.1.3 was released, I decided to stick to my previous version since all I heard was incompatibility issues, bugs and problems for jailbreak users, despite the firmware being jailbroken very quickly.

Firstly, a quick explanation of what jailbreaking is: The iPhone comes locked to Apple's set of applications. Currently, there is no official way for users to install or even create their own apps (SDK is upcoming, more on that in a bit). Of course, this is a major downside considering the capability of the iPhone, so jailbreaking it allows you to install third party apps. Currently there are already hundreds of different apps available. Of course, this somewhat voids the warranty, but it's not much of a problem since you can restore your phone when going in for repair, and then just jailbreak it again when you get home!

So going from 1.1.2 to 1.1.4 gives me a lot of updates, since I missed out on 1.1.3 and certainly feels stable since 1.1.4 was primarily supposed to be for bug fixes. So let's run through the main changes that I've seen from that jump, which mainly includes stuff from 1.1.3:

- The icons on the home screen can be rearranged in whatever way you want, also allowing for multiple pages which was previously available if you had tons of apps from Installer. There were also some other third party apps that allowed this, but now it's officially available.

- You can make a shortcut from a website and put it right on to the home screen. A nice feature to have these shortcuts right on the home screen instead of having to open up Safari, the internet browser, before accessing them.

- Google Maps now has the 'Locate Me' feature, which was available via a third party app, appropriately named Locate Me. This one is definitely more accurate though and gives a more exact location than it's third party counterpart.

- The keyboard now apparently supports multi-touch, although I personally haven't really needed this. Update: Tried it out with the shift and works very well, just like holding the shift key down on a normal keyboard and then typing for capital letters.

- You can send text messages to multiple users now, which is mind-boggling as to why it wasn't included right from the beginning. This was previously available from the third party app SMSD and iSMS.

So overall it's an update playing catch-up, besides the whole adding website shortcuts to the home screen. The home screen could also be updated and changed from third party apps as well, but it's nice having all this by default.

I'm thoroughly looking forward to Apple's SDK, reportedly due to be released this June. The possibilities seem awesome, especially gaming-wise which was previously lacking on the iPhone. I'm really just hoping that somehow this stuff will be jailbroken, since it will be on a new firmware version. Here's the video of Steve Jobs introducing the SDK:

So the SDK allows people to create their own programs for the iPhone. Apple however have full control over what is released, since it must go through a new application called the App Store, where you buy these programs. This is really a great feature since a lot of software developers, large and small teams, are going to jump into this and create all sorts of programs aimed at a range of consumers such as individuals to business. I'm really looking to the possibilities, and particularly the gaming side of things to come! There are more videos on YouTube showcasing what has already been made for the iPhone using the SDK.

XBox Live Demos
by Shabbir on Sunday, 23rd March 2008

So I've been playing a little bit of video games for once - first time my XBox 360 has been turned on in about 3 months! The only reason I in fact turned it on was in hope that the demo for Condemned 2: Bloodshot would be released, but no luck for us European gamers. More on Condemned a bit later, but first let me give a little update as to the other games I sparsely tried out before getting back to uni work.

A little while ago some of you XBox Live users will recall a horrendous downtime over the Christmas period. The apology from Microsoft was given in the form of a free XBox Live Arcade game called Undertow. So at the time, I downloaded it - I mean it was free so why not. The game is actually a fun little game, where you are a soldier in a combat swimsuit fighting underwater for control points to wear down the opponents score (?), I think! Nothing special, but I appreciate the effort put into the game considering their is voice acting and a story somewhere in there too!

Next was Virtua Tennis 3. This has been out for ages, and I even downloaded it ages ago when I first got my 360, but never played it much. Now I played it quite a few times today, and well, it's extremely easy if you play as Federer. In fact, so easy that it's not even fun. It is a relaxing game to play though and can take away a little stress.

There's also Forza 2, which is a good racing game but not for me. You see, I'm the impatient type, and prefer to dive into some serious action with Burnout! I've played Burnout Paradise and that's an awesome game, but not quite on my shopping list yet.

Now back to Condemned. The first Condemned, dubbed Criminal Origins came out back in 2005 sometime around the release of the XBox 360. I downloaded the demo of that since the latest one has not been released yet. The game is a gruesome survival horror full of junkies high on who-knows-what running around like loonies. You're an FBI agent solving some murder mysteries and by chance, you're always in dark areas full of these junkies. The demo is pretty short but gives a good taster of the dark habitats of junkies in general, as well as some of the more stomach-quenching mysterious stuff.

I'm really looking forward to Condemned 2: Bloodshot for some reason. I think it may have something to do with the fact that I enjoyed Bioshock immensely - mainly due to the atmosphere and environment it dropped you into. I'm hoping to get a similar feel of that from Condemned 2, but with even more melee combat using all sorts of pipes, wrenches, crowbars, axes and of course, your trusty fists. Just to note, this is the first time I've actually looked forward to a game since Bioshock...

So besides those short demos, uni work has been dominating my free time as usual. Despite that, I took a little time to tweak some features of the website behind the scenes, mainly just for my own benefit and to try out some coding stuff. All have been successful and the back end is officially on version 2.0!

*Wipes dust off URL*
by Shabbir on Friday, 21st March 2008

Yeah, that was needed. It seemed that my website was getting a little filthy, so I decided I'd clean it up a bit. Sorted out some links, updated the archives, changed some coding, blah blah and decided to write something too!

You can thank my good friend Franz over at shedali. His constant interest in web technologies and all things computing inspired me to actually do something with my website, especially considering that I had forgotten it existed... Yeah, not great!

So let's actually give an update of what's been going on. The main reason that the website has been effectively inactive is because of university. There's a ton of work to do, lots of large projects and so on, so I really don't get much free time. Whatever "free" time that does end up coming usually goes into uni related stuff anyway, so it never ends up being free time.

Besides the uni work, I bought a new laptop, the Asus Eee PC. These machines are fantastic and now I don't bother carrying my MacBook around, the Eee PC does all I need it to in Advanced Mode and provides a lot of freedom thanks to the Linux OS (Xandros distribution). It only cost £250 and I can do my programming on it, it has built-in WiFi so internet and e-mail access is available too.

I've also gone and tweaked up the software a bit, so I've got stuff like a Super Nintendo emulator (shush...), Skype with video conferencing (the Eee has a built-in webcam), gFTP so I can update websites. It comes with useful programs like OpenOffice, a free version of Microsoft Office that does everything MS Office does.

The list goes on really; GIMP (graphics editing), Wireshark (network monitoring, used at uni), comes with media players, a few games, Firefox and Thunderbird (at least the 4GB version). Currently there are two main SKUs, the 2GB model which does not have a webcam and does not come with a mail client. The 4GB model does have a webcam and comes with a mail client (Thunderbird).

The hardware of the Eee PC, considering how tiny it is, is respectable. It has a 900MHz processor with 512MB RAM and a 4GB SSD. SSD is Solid State Drive, the idea being that there are no moving parts so even if you drop the laptop, the hard drive should remain intact and you should be able to retrieve your data. Port-wise there is an ethernet port, three USB 2.0 ports, an SD/MMC card slot and a VGA out. There is also a standard 3.5mm earphone and microphone jacks.

The charger compliments the Eee very well, it's small and doesn't have that bulky part in the middle like most laptop chargers. It's very much like a mobile phone charger. The battery lasts up to about 3 hours without WiFi turned on, and I'd say about 2-2.5 hours with it turned off - which is just the same as a normal laptop, unless you use a MacBook like myself.

It's a great deal, portability should be the only reason why one would want to purchase this laptop. It has replaced my MacBook as the device I carry around, however by no means has it replaced the functionality. At home, I mostly use my MacBook, however since I have a TV on my desk with a VGA input, I plug in my Eee and make use of higher resolutions - so I may end up using my Eee as almost my primary machine!

I would in no way recommend that everyone goes and does this, but it's great for that machine you want to carry with you to uni or work and is cheap too. The system specs are fine since it's not Windows, so the software runs fine!