Tag Archives: friday

Mar 14

Friday Post: Book Stats

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Hey All,

Happy Friday!  I got an email this morning from Packt giving me the stats for my book sales from October to December of 2013.  I’m happy to report that I have sold over 200 copies.  Thank you all so much!

This weekend I will be doing a last minute presentation of PiMAME with FamiLAB at the Orlando Science Center.  I will then be preparing for PyCon in Montreal, where I will be doing a poster session on how PiMAME was built in Python.  I will also be attending Instructurecon in Utah and speaking about LTIs and how we program and implement them at UCF.   It’s going to be a fun two months of traveling 🙂

I have gotten some great feedback on PiMAME 0.8, and I am going to be working on some fixes this weekend (these are my two low hanging fruit goals to complete):

  • Tankstick / Numpad support
  • Configurable Buttons through config.yaml

Have a good weekend all!

Nov 15

Friday Post: More PiMAME Menu stuff.

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Hey all,

Happy Friday!

I am beyond stressed.  I think I’m buying a house next friday.  If all goes according to plan.  Knock on wood, everything will go right.

Anyways,  I have put up some new github repos for PiMAME.  It’s regarding PiMAME 0.8, and it’s for the new web frontend and the pimame menu / launcher.  They are no where near ready for use, but if you would like to help with the programming, feel free to fork the repo and send a pull request.

https://github.com/ssilverm/pimame-menu
https://github.com/ssilverm/pimame-web-frontend

Have a good weekend everyone!

-Shea

Oct 18

Friday Post: Pokemon X and Y

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Hey All,

No PiMAME news this week.  Still working on new stuff 🙂

This has been a hectic week.  Two weddings and Halloween Horror Nights.  Plus a ton of pages that were written for my classes.  Woo!

Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Orlando was great this year.  K and I have been going ever since we first started dating, and it’s where I proposed to her two years ago.  It’s an awesome tradition for us.  Last year they tried some new things like having moving scare zones, which didn’t end up working well.  This year however, they went back to scare zones and based it on The Walking Dead.  It was a lot of fun.

Pokemon X and Y

I haven’t played Pokemon since Red and Blue came out.  I was addicted to the series.  I have always loved Pokemon, but the later games just didn’t have the same feel to it.  On a whim I bought X and I feel like i’m a kid again.   Not only is the game fun, but the online features are great.  Being able to battle and trade Pokemon with people all over the world is so much fun.

Add me as a friend, my friend code is: 3823 – 8512 – 0415

As an aside, I want to thank the community surrounding PiMAME.  All the members on the forums that are helping each other, showing off their builds, doing awesome stuff with the software, you all make this project awesome.  Thank you.

-Shea

May 31

Friday Post: Writing is Exhausting!

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Hey All,

Writing is exhausting, and tough, and mentally taxing.  I love it, but wow, this is a new experience   I don’t really have any updates for this week.  I know Nick_Tones is anxiously awaiting more PiMAME stuff.  I’m sorry I don’t have anything this week.

There was an askreddit thread earlier this week about what do people do with thier Raspberry Pi?  There are some amazing projects in there.  I really want to try doing a Raspberry Pi weather balloon launch with the University. I also posted PiMAME to the thread and I got an additional 1700 visits.  That blew my mind.

I’m going to leave you with this, Patrick Stewart being awesome:

Have a good weekend!

-Shea

Apr 26

Friday Post: Mausberry Circuits Raspberry Pi Power Switch

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Hey All,

First of all I am happy to say that I aced my course this semester.  Woo!  It’s weird having free time again.  Going to be really focusing on PiMAME.  Onto the cool stuff…

So, I got my Mausberry Circuits Raspberry Pi Power Switch in the mail this week.  I linked to the Kickstarter for this previously and I’m really happy it was funded.  The device is tiny, but feels well soldered and sturdy.  My only complaint is that the headers cables for the GPIO pins are on the top of the board, as opposed to the bottom, making it harder to put in a project box or in a DeskCade.

The device itself works flawlessly.  You install the script, connect the GPIO pins, and then hit the switch.  The script tells the Pi to power down, and after it’s completely halted, the power is cut.  It also includes a hard reset button in case the Pi is completely frozen / crashed.

maus1

It’s $22 with shipping, and you can order one at mausberrycircuits.com

Have an awesome weekend everyone.

-Shea

Mar 08

Friday Post: Everyone Here Rocks!

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Hey All,

What a week.  I’ve been working on a presentation for the University, finally showed it off, got a ton of good jobs and awesome work.  Feels like a weight was lifted.  I don’t know if we will move forward with the idea, but it’s been fun so far.

Next week I will be at PyCon in California.  I went last year and it was amazing, and this year’s talks look great.  I’m excited.

I’ve gotten tons of feedback about PiMAME 0.6b2, and I feel like it’s going in a great direction.  If it wasn’t for all you giving me tons of feedback, this project wouldn’t be even 10% as good.  Thank you.

41qHs4pmvyL._SS400_

On an exciting note, a book I have been a technical editor/reviewer on has made it to the printers and is available to buy at Amazon.  It’s called the “Raspberry Pi Networking Cookbook”.  It’s really humbling to have my name in print, and I honestly wouldn’t have been given these opportunities without everyone’s support.  That’s why my part of the dedication is to the community.  Here’s to you!

The FIRST Robotics regional competition in Orlando has been going on this week.  I was a member of Team 108 (Go SigmaC@TS!) back in high school.  FIRST is what really pushed me into the field I’m in now, and it’s always an awesome sight seeing hundreds of students working on robots, getting excited about competition, but most importantly, making friends with others from around the world.  It’s not about winning, it’s about working together.

So wooo!  So glad it’s the weekend.  Time to sleep until Monday!

-Shea

Mar 01

Friday Post: PiMAME 0.6 Beta

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Beta2 is now up!

You guys rock!  I know about the slowness.  Working on a Beta2 right now!

Sorry for the late post, I have been waiting on the new image to upload to my web host.

Hey All!

Today is the 1 year anniversary of the Raspberry Pi’s launch. I’m really proud of the community and environment that has sprung up surrounding this wonderful device.

I am very happy to be releasing a beta for PiMAME 0.6.

Screen Shot 2013-03-01 at 9.28.02 PM

Release Notes:

  1. Support for the XArcade Tankstick.
  2. New menu at start to choose options before launching emulation.
  3. PIP (the Pi IP service) is available to install (but off by default).
  4. New admin options in the web frontend to Reboot and Shutdown your Pi.
  5. Smaller image should now install on most 2GB cards (with some room to spare).

I realize this isn’t a monumental release, but it’s a leap forward on the foundation. I have a lot of ideas and a lot of improvements I want to include. As I make these improvements, I’m going to release more and more. You all have been awesome at pointing me in the direction you wish PiMAME to go. Thank you! I’m eager to hear your feedback on this version.

Get PiMAME 0.6 Beta2 now!

-Shea

Feb 01

Friday Post: Nano Quadcopter

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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

Jan 25

Friday Post: Little Boards

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Hey all,

I’ve been anxiously awaiting some voltage regulator boards I ordered from eBay for the past 2 weeks.  It seems they all came from China and all got here within a day or two of each other.  It’s kinda neat to see how each came packaged differently, through different mail systems, but yet all arrived safely on the other side of the planet.

Photo Jan 25, 9 41 31 PM

 

Photo Jan 25, 9 41 58 PM

 

My DigiSpark mini Arduino board came in as well.  This was a kickstarter based project from DigiStump that puts a whole Arduino with USB connector into a 1 square inch of space.

Photo Jan 25, 9 42 29 PM

It seems that the PiMAME 0.5 beta release is going well.  I advise everyone running it to expand the filesystem before uploading any games.  To do this, exit out of AdvMENU, then type sudo raspi-config on the command line.  Press enter and run the Expand Filesystem tool so you will have the usable space of your SD Card.  PiMAME was built to run on a 2GB SD Card, but only has 8MB of usable space be default.

Have a good weekend!

-Shea

 

Dec 07

Friday Post: Sadness

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Hey all,

This past week has been very hard.  My cousins lost their Step-Father last weekend, and my best friend lost her Dad on Tuesday.

I am at a loss for words for this weeks post.

To anyone else in this kind of situation, just remember that it’s OK to feel how you feel.

-Shea