edit: Added dual stick configuration to advmame.rc
Hey all,
Here is a working config for the XGaming X-Arcade Tankstick! The base of this comes from the very helpful site: http://www.raspberry.cat/20130203/pimame-i-x-arcade/
The first step is to edit /etc/rc.local and include this line before “exit 0”: Continue reading
Hey All,
Not much to write about this week. Halfway through the Python for Kids book, will be writing a full review once I get through it all. My graduate course is ramping up, but I’m still loving it. Working out the kinks on the Tankstick, like the fact that when I tried to play SF2 with my fiancee, the second player buttons wouldn’t register in game…whoops! Now onto the meat of the post!
If you have never been to Seeedstudio.com, you really should take a look. They are an open hardware manufacturer If you have an idea, and can make a prototype, they can probably mass produce it for you. They are currently selling preorders for a Nano Quadcopter.
At work, we have a couple of the $20 RC Helicopters that we play around with whenever we need to take a break. We always wanted to get a quadcopter for the office, but most of the time, they are very expensive, too big, and not a full kit. The size being the biggest factor. This new quadcopter comes with everything you need, is open source, inexpensive, and best of all, fits in your hand!
One has already been ordered by my coworkers, and should arrive in April. I’m excited to play with this thing (and hopefully not break a wing on my first attempt!)
Have a great weekend!
-Shea
Hey All,
Today I’m pleased to introduce a partner site of mine. Sheacob.com is a collaborative blog between myself and my friend + coworker Jacob Bates. Jacob is a coder, photographer, embedded electronics enthusiast, and an all around good guy.
We have been working together on some projects for the past year, and are finally making a place to debut them. I hope you look forward to some of our creations.
With that said, here is something we made for the Raspberry Pi community (natch!):
PIP (http://pip.sheacob.com)
We got tired of having to hook up a screen to the Raspberry Pi, or go into our router, just to find out its IP address, so we decided to write this simple script. Basically, your Pi sends its local IP address to the site every time it boots, then you visit http://pip.sheacob.com site on your main computer to view it.
You can install it from our site or with this command:
wget http://pip.sheacob.com/pipinstall.py && chmod +x pipinstall.py && sudo ./pipinstall.py
We aren’t storing any personal information, it’s just the WAN address that your computer sends when you visit any website (like whatismyip.com) and the internal IP address of your Raspberry Pi.
Once installed, all you have to do is goto http://pip.sheacob.com to display the IP your Raspberry Pi has.
We hope you enjoy it and it helps out some people. Let us know if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions!
-Shea Silverman & Jacob Bates
Hey all,
My new Tankstick arrived today, courtesy of XGaming.com. They have asked me to test it and get it running on the Raspberry Pi. I only had a couple minutes to play with it, but I made a little unboxing video for everyone:
Size comparison of the Pi versus a Tankstick:
This thing has some heft to it! With the few minutes I got to use it, I notice why some users of the Raspberry Pi are having difficulties making it work right. It’s nothing wrong with the device, but with the way some of the software interprets the inputs. I have a couple of hunches and ideas on how to fix it, which I hope to get to within the next week.
PiMAME 0.5 is also coming along nicely. I’m reverting back to the 0.3 stack and just adding some minor modifications. That should be released on Friday.
-Shea
Hey all,
I have the latest AdvanceMENU, AdvanceMESS, and AdvanceMAME versions compiled and turned into .debs for your installing pleasure.
sudo dpkg --force-overwrite -i advancemame_1.2-1_armhf.debsudo dpkg --force-overwrite -i advancemenu_2.6-1_armhf.debsudo dpkg --force-overwrite -i advancemess_0.102.0.1-1_armhf.debThe reason dpkg requires force install is because the Advance* projects compile a lot of the same helper binaries, like advj and advc. When dpkg tries to install the next package, it sees it has already installed something with the same name, and freaks out.
Doing a force install tells it to overwrite and continue, making everything work. I don’t recommend using force install for everyday installs, but I know it works for these.
I was very surprised when I was contacted by X Gaming this week. They are sending me one of their really cool looking X Arcade tank sticks to test out with the Raspberry Pi and various emulators. A couple people have posted on the Raspberry Pi forums and on my blog asking if this stick works, so hopefully I will have an answer for everyone very soon.
I’m looking forward to everyone’s feedback on the new .deb files. Let me know if something is messed up, doesn’t install for you, or is just wonky. Also let me know if it does work, because that’s good to hear as well 🙂
Have a great weekend!
-Shea
Happy Holidays Everyone!
I wish everyone a happy and a healthy.
To celebrate the holidays I am proud to present the release of PiMAME 0.3
Features:
To access the web front end just type the IP address that is displayed in AdvMENU into your web browser. You should be presented with a screen similar to this:
From there you can upload and access PiMAME’s file system. Make sure you upload your files into the ROMs directory and then restart AdvMENU.
Enjoy!
If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions please feel to let me know!
-Shea
Hey all,
I’ve been getting tons of feedback about PiMAME. Thank you for all the comments and suggestions. There have been a few issues/questions that have popped up, hopefully the tips below helps you out.
Here is a quick fix for the AdvanceMENU sound issue:
Adding games:
Your game files should go in the /home/pi/roms/ directory. I cannot help you find games for MAME.
Stopping AdvanceMENU from starting at bootup:
If you want AdvanceMENU to not start at bootup edit /home/pi/.profile and remove advmenu from the bottom of the script.
Logging In:
The username and password are the default Raspbian ones.
Hey all,
For the past week I’ve been getting hit by HORRIBLE blog spam. If anyone needs to know where to buy fake rolex watches and purses, I have about 400 comments in my spam folder that I can send you.
I used a simple math captcha, which had worked for almost 6 months, but it seems they got past that. I’ve activated Akismet for now. If you comment on any of my posts and they do not appear after a couple days, please email me or message me on Twitter or Facebook or send up smoke signals. I’m not intentionally ignoring anyone!
-Shea
Happy Friday everyone!
I just got back from seeing Wreck-It Ralph and here’s my verdict: Go see it right now. Not only was it a great story, it was a great homage to the entire gaming industry.
Today I also got an iPad Mini. I have an iPhone 4S and love it. At work I use an iPad 3 and have found it to be too big and bulky. This iPad Mini is amazing. It’s light, has a great screen, and fits my hand(s) perfectly. I’m even typing this whole post on the mini right now. So far it’s totally worth it.
I got AdvanceMESS compiled with sound but I have yet to test it. I have an issue where check install doesn’t like installing both mame and mess because they have some of the same executables (advcfg, etc.). If anyone knows much about Debian package creation I would love some help and advice.
Have a great weekend!
UPDATE: Debs with Sound now available here
Hey All,
It’s been a long time coming. Between work, prototyping, other complications I present the AdvanceMAME Debian package.
I was able to get past the issue with AdvanceMAME compiling on Raspbian. It’s the sh2 processor for the Saturn, so I had to disable that. After that, it compiles.
I have the src code up on github if anyone wants to check out the changes I had to make.
Github: https://github.com/ssilverm/AdvanceMAME_RaspberryPi
Debs: http://sheasilverman.com/rpi/raspbian/debs/advancemame_0.106.1-1_armhf.deb http://sheasilverman.com/rpi/raspbian/debs/advancemame-raspberrypi_1-1_armhf.deb (with sound)
To install:
Also, another goodie… My deskcade project is coming along incredibly well! I just got in these 18mm Sanwa buttons. They are awesome.
I hope everyone enjoys. Let me know if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions!
-Shea