Cool Stuff – Coder Cowboy

19Oct 2013 by codercowboy

Oh, Google just turned my iPod touch into a free wifi phone

Today I noticed that Google turned my iPod touch into a free wifi phone. That's nice of them. To turn your iOS device into a free wifi phone. Simply create a Google Voice #, and install the Google Voice and Google Hangouts apps on your device. You'll be able to send and receive text messages with the Google Voice app, and read your Google Voice voicemail there too. The Hangouts app will let you make and receive calls to/from real phone #s, and instant-message with your friends. I've used Google Voice for several years. It's great, because it gives you a free phone number that redirects to other numbers. I give people my Google Voice #, and when they call, it automatically rings several personal lines. Further, if I ever…

16Oct 2013 by codercowboy

Cool Stuff: Music & Audio (Part 1)

Cool Stuff, Lists, Music

I recently discovered that I'm the son of an audiophile - suddenly I understand why I was encouraged to buy a decent amplifier/receiver at a very young age, suddenly I appreciate those old dads-college-days/hand-me-down kickass KLH speakers just a little bit more than I always have. I am definitely not an audiophile myself, but music is a huge part of my happiness in life. I'm also a geek, so over the years I've learned a clever thing or two about the hobby of collecting and listening to music, and I'd like to share a bit of what I've learned. Required Reading Before we get into the hardware geekery, I think it's prudent to point you toward a few classic articles and books about the music industry. First up is Steve…

08Oct 2012 by codercowboy

Finally on GitHub, you should be too.

Bash, Cool Stuff, Life and Philosophy

I've finally started migrating/publishing code on GitHub. Coder cowboy git code will be here: https://github.com/codercowboy For starters, I'm migrating old World's Worst Software code there, so I can retire WWS. I highly recommend publishing your own open source code and projects on GitHub or SourceForge, or on a blog or website of your own. You don't need to be a coder to put something great out there (or even on GitHub), sharing your creative efforts with the world is almost always a good idea. Designers can share photoshop templates, writers can store and show their book writing/editing process, source control and sharing your efforts is truly for anyone. When you share your efforts, you are doing the following: you're saving other people time; you're inspiring other people to share their…

06Jul 2012 by codercowboy

Collecting Arcades: My very own NBA Jam machine for $350

Arcade, Cool Stuff, Video Games

I was 12 years old when NBA Jam was released in arcade form. I remember the first time I saw the game at showbiz pizza. It had unbelievable graphics beyond anything else at the time, and amazing forever memorable gameplay. Who can forget the first time they saw someone "On Fire", or heard the snarky announcer's "Boom-shaka-laka!"? I played the game rabidly when I could. Even when I lost, I wanted to jump right back in and play again. The game was an arcade sensation that was the first to have more than a billion dollars in quarters pumped into it. The arcade version in action. NBA Jam came out during the last few years of arcade bliss. Consoles were quickly catching up to and eclipsing the Arcade experience. NBA…

23Mar 2012 by codercowboy

Games Like Pikmin

Cool Stuff, Video Games

Pikmin is the greatest game ever, I think. For those unfamiliar with the game, it's basically a simplified RTS game, with a focus on resource gathering and multi-tasking. That is, the enemies that you encounter are not consistently coming to demolish your home base with constant aggression, instead you take them on at will, taking your time building your army between battles. The basic premise to the game is that you're a spaceman, Olimar, who's crash landed and needs the Pikmin to help him rebuild his spaceship so he can fly home. When Olimar crash lands on the Pikmin planet, 30 pieces of his spaceship are spread across 5 different levels in the Pikmin world. As you play through the game you encounter three different colored Pikmin species: blue, red,…

24Feb 2012 by codercowboy

Cool Stuff: Remote Desktop (VNC, RDP, etc)

Cool Stuff

See that? That's my desktop this afternoon. If you look closely you'll notice that a few of my desktop applications look a little odd. This is my mac mini's OSX desktop, with Windows in the left application window, and another OSX in the right window. The trick here is that those two windows are my two other computers. This is what's called "Remote Desktop", and it's awesome. Remote Desktop is essentially a program for your computer that shares your screen and lets you control the computer from another computer. A few other terms for "Remote Desktop" that you may have heard of are VNC, or RDP. Setting Remote Desktop up on your computer is easy, you'll need to do two things: allow remote control on the computer you want to…