The Brad Hole

Two odd things happened yesterday that are worth noting.

Yesterday morning, I was enjoying my mornings breakfast by drinking a Diet Dr. Pepper and watching an episode of Cheers on the TiVo. An odd thing happened though. As I was taking a sip, I happened to hiccup at the same time, and a bit of Diet Dr. Pepper went up my nose.

If you imagine that this is an unpleasant thing, you'd be right. It's very much like the sensation you get when swimming if you get water up your nose, although with a distinctly non-water odor. Although I was able to blow my nose to clear things out, for the entire rest of the day, and even a little bit this morning, everything smells a little bit like Diet Dr. Pepper. It's not a particularly pleasant smell.

The second strange thing happened close to midnight last night. I was working on fragment shaders in KOTOR on the G5, trying to work out a way to make global fragment shader constants work within the local scope of the text fragment shader API when I heard a loud and continuous tire screeching followed immediately by a bang and a loss of power. It sounded quite loud and very close to home. Turns out it was.

Beth, who wasn't yet asleep, threw on some clothes and rushed outside to put her fledgling EMT skills to the test. Turns out our neighbor had barreled into our neighborhood mostly out of control, careened off the light post and drove her SUV into the transformer and shrubbery that separates our yard from our other neighbor's. It looked very much like she'd parked her car sideways in our neighbor's driveway. In fact, were it not for the transformer block in between our yards, she probably would have easily continued on into our yard and hit my car, which as it stood was just a few feet away from where her car stopped.

This woke most of the neighborhood up, and it was kinda funny to see almost every family on the block out on the street at midnight. Cops were called, the girl hid out in her house, but eventually came back out. According to the cop, she was on the phone with a lawyer when he banged on her door. D'oh! As Beth was leaving this morning, she noted to me over the phone that the skid marks start from the oncoming traffic lane on Ray, the major road outside our intersection. Odds are good the girl was not only drunk, but driving into our neighborhood out of control from the wrong direction! It's a miracle someone wasn't seriously injured.

At first, we figured it'd be quite some time before SRP was able to restore power, given that her car was parked on what remained of the transformer. However, the crew got here at 1:30 am and apparently worked through the night (I sure didn't hear them) to restore power around 6:20 am. It looks like the only real loss here was the girl's car and of course the fact that TiVo didn't record Cheers last night. Oh, the humanity!

Posted by bradman at 06:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

First off, let me state that I have zero insight as to what new products may be coming from Apple. All I know is what I read on rumor sites. :-) With that out of the way, here's what I hope Apple releases. In fact, I'll go so far as to say here is what Apple needs to release.

As some background, let me say that I've been in the market for a low-end desktop Mac for a while now. My needs are simple - I'd like a Mac to run as a light webserver and some other things, as well as be available for low-end game testing. I'd also like for it not to have a monitor included - I've got plenty already, and a switchbox just itching to plug into a new Mac. Trouble is, Apple doesn't make a Mac that services this market. The "best" I could do is get either an eMac (and add the heat, weight and space of a 17" CRT to my desk) or buy an iBook and use it solely as a desktop Mac, leaving the screen open but off. It's not cost effective or space efficient.

The rumors of an iMac redesign are growing before WWDC next week, and I think I've deduced what Apple could do to revolutionize the iMac while servicing the consumer market much more effectively than they have been.

They need an iMac with an optional, detachable LCD screen.

Think about it - if people could buy an iMac without a screen, Apple would be servicing a large audience of consumers who want a new consumer-level desktop Mac but don't want/need a new monitor. By selling that same iMac form factor with an optional LCD monitor add-on (I'm envisioning some kind of snap-on swivel holder doo-dad) they'd service the people who like iMacs and don't want the hassle of having to provide their own monitor. And, sans display, they could provide it at a lower price-point than they're currently doing.

This would require new monitor form factors from Apple, and wouldn't you know it - the rumor mill has been buzzing madly about these recently.

I can't stress enough the importance of a lower-priced consumer-level desktop to the Mac market. There are a large group of computer users out there who use their PCs for very limited tasks - e-mail, internet, music, and games. These are basic home-use tasks, and for these people, a $799 price tag (the current low-end eMac price tag) is overkill. By providing these people with a cheaper and smaller version of the eMac (and calling it a headless iMac to simplify the product line naming), Apple has suddenly tapped into a larger market of consumer users who are price-sensitive and who, if recent reports are accurate, like the Mac but end up going with a PC for price reasons.

There's a significant advantage to having a cheap low-end consumer Mac for games, and I touched on this in a previous post. The current Mac low-end is considerably lower than on the PC. Mac users take pride in keeping their Macs for 4 years, but the average Mac of 4 years ago is woefully underpowered for even a modest game that comes out nowadays. The current product lineup and pricing structure makes it awkward to upgrade: the eMac with it's 17" CRT is a big beast, an iMac at $1299 is too expensive for a casual home computer nowadays. The Mac low-end needs to be dropped enough to encourage these people to upgrade (or buy into the Mac for the first time), and fast. There are no downsides to this approach that I can see, other than losing a misplaced feeling of being a member of a smaller "elitist" group of Mac users. That's something the Mac community can gladly do without, however.

But that's just my opinion - I could be wrong. :-)

Posted by bradman at 02:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (17)

I realize now that my "graphic warning" in yesterday's entry was a bit late - I meant it as a joke to shield readers from descriptions of me half-naked in Darth Maul boxer shorts. Unfortunately, I was way too tired when I wrote that and put the warning after the fact. ;-)

Anyway, Airborne returned this morning and dropped off Beth's laptop. We put a signed waiver on the front door as an extra precaution, and that seems to have done the trick. By the time I got to the door (which was maybe 10 seconds after it rang), the lady was already in her truck.

And that may be the last piece of the mystery. If it was a lady yesterday, she could very well have been startled to see a half-naked man running after her truck. In retrospect, I would've gunned it if I were her.

Beth's PowerBook seems all better now - the white spots are definitely gone. One minor issue did crop up, but some googling online reveals that it's fairly common. Apparently they install a new latch mechanism on the lid, and as a result, you have to press it firmly closed for it to fall asleep. The first several times I closed the laptop, it didn't fall asleep, so I was dreading returning it. A firm press on the latch does the trick. It's not worth the additional hassle (yet) to return it. We'll see how Beth reacts. :-)

Posted by bradman at 05:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Last week, we decided the time was finally right to send Beth's PowerBook in for repair. She has a 15" Aluminum PowerBook from last October that has the fairly common "white spot" problem. Obviously, it wasn't a big deal, but she's approaching the end of the 1-year warranty, so the sooner the better.

I called AppleCare last week - my first time ever dealing with them. Their phone system is semi-automated, and it asks you to speak the name of the product you'd like service on. I said "PowerBook G4", it said "OK!" and then disconnected me. I called back and did the same thing, and this time the disembodied voice said "OK! Connecting you with someone who can help with that" and then I got a message about being on hold for approximately 8 minutes. I figured I'd use the time to pull up the serial number of the PowerBook as well as a good webpage like the one I linked above about the problem just in case.

My hold time wasn't 8 minutes - no sir. It was closer to 15 seconds. I figured this was good, but the gentleman I started speaking with wanted to have nothing to do with me because I hadn't purchased AppleCare. When I told him I had the common "white spot" problem with the 15" PowerBooks from last October, he plainly said he had no idea what I was talking about, and that whatever it was, it certainly wasn't common. So I pleaded to him that the problem I have is, in fact, covered under warranty and Apple's very own support pages insist I call AppleCare about it. After giving him the URL and the article number, he still insisted on taking a credit card number from me to charge me a $49 fee, noting that I'd be refunded this fee if, in fact, he determined that I had this problem of which he was perhaps the only person in the world still unaware.

This attitude really put me off, but I figured the only way to move forward was to give in. As soon as I offered my credit card, however, he decided that just this one time he'd make an exception and do this for free. Gee, thanks.

All in all, it wasn't a bad experience, despite what my attitude above might indicate. I did have to argue with the guy for a minute or two, but once he saw the light, it went really smoothly. In fact, the very next day we had an empty box sitting on our door in which we were to place the PowerBook and send back to Apple on their dime via Airborne Express (now DHL). It was a pretty slick setup. Honestly, I've never seen a more well-designed "return box".

So this past Monday, Beth's baby left for Apple around 4:30 pm.

The AppleCare phone guy gave us a URL where we could check the progress. On Tuesday, it noted that they had received the laptop at 10:30, started work at 10:45, and finished work around 11:45. It shipped later that afternoon. Pretty speedy!

On Wednesday morning, the guy came to drop off the laptop, well under 48 hours after it'd left here. My thoughts of the phone incident were long-gone. How could you not like service like this?

I happened to be talking to Beth on the phone (and wearing no more than a pair of Star Wars Darth Maul boxers) when the delivery person rang the doorbell. I get a fair amount of packages here at home, and the FedEx guy, UPS guy and USPS guys all leave the packages on the porch, behind a planter, signature or no. I've talked to them about this, and it's a happy arrangement. Initially I didn't think twice about answering the door, since Airborne left the original shipping box on the doorstep the week before. While talking to Beth, I decided to fetch the PowerBook with her still on the phone to check it out, but after the delivery guy had cleared the area so as to not expose him/her to my nakedness. Can you guess what happened next?

Warning - graphic descriptions ahead.

I opened the door, and the delivery person was nowhere to be seen. However, they'd left a flyer saying they'd try again Thursday morning. Oh, the humanity! Thinking fast, I dashed to the bedroom, startled the cats out of their skins, grabbed a pair of shorts, hopped into them on my way back to the door, ran out the front door with the flyer and waved at the Airborne truck, which was now backing into our driveway to turn around. At this point, I was no more than 6 feet away from the truck. It was the closest I'd come.

He/she didn't see me as I continued to shout, wave my hands and run after him/her, all while barefoot (but at least wearing boxers *and* a pair of shorts), down the street. I really can't imagine how he/she could have missed a half-naked screaming man following them down half a block, but he/she did. Him/her can burn in hell. As a side note, while walking back into the house, through the wet grass, I noticed our neighbor across the street, an asian lady, was leaving for work. I wonder what she thinks about me now.

I need some kind of batpole, where I can slide down in a few seconds and be completely dressed at the end.

Posted by bradman at 02:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Originally, I wasn't planning on going to WWDC this year. I'd been to the past 4, and to be honest, it's a case of diminishing returns as far as technical information goes - it was very useful the first two years, but the last two I've noticed that there's not a ton of new information for me to pick up, at least as far as Mac gaming goes. Apple also has a crazy tendency to schedule the game forums I'm most interested in on Friday, and I end up missing them. The main selling points for me at WWDC are the keynote and meeting up again with the "regulars" in Mac gaming who I don't see very often. There are a lot of nice perks - usually a free laptop bag, a ton of free food, and last year, a free iSight. Of course by "free" I mean included with the $1599 registration fee. ;-)

Anyway, it turns out that I am in fact going to WWDC again this year, from Sunday through early Wednesday. I'll catch the keynote on Monday, pray for a free Airport Express ;-) and then head out on Wednesday. Glenda and Mark will be representing Aspyr for the week, so even though I'll miss a lot of relevant sessions by leaving on Wednesday, they'll be in attendance to catch them.

Related to that, I'm in desperate need of a new Mac. My DP/800 really isn't cutting it any more. I've got a loaner G5 right now for the next 3 weeks, but I was pinning my hopes on new 3GHz Macs being announced at WWDC as an upgrade. Turns out Jobs' promise of "3GHz in a year" from last year's WWDC was off, and as of today, my waiting has left me in a bit of a bind seeing as how the newest G5 is 2.5 GHz. In the world of software development, and in particular games, MHz matters so this is a bit of a blow. I suppose had I known we'd be looking at 2.5 GHz Macs today, I probably would have bit the bullet long ago and just got the 2GHz G5 when they were announced last year. C'est la vie.

I'm hoping we'll hear more about 10.4 ("Tiger"). I suspect we'll see some new 64-bit features for G5s as well as the usual interface improvements. I'd love to hear that the Finder is getting a long-needed overhaul - the Panther "rewrite" really didn't add much other than those annoying metal windows and some performance improvements.

I'd love to hear that Cocoa has seen a lot of optimization as well. AppKit has always seemed to be kind of pokey to me, and it's clear that a poorly written Cocoa app can end up being a real dog. Hopefully Apple can work some magic behind the scenes to help this situation.

Finally, I'm hoping for some exciting news about Xcode. I'd love to hear that it's become faster and more feature-complete (relative to CodeWarrior). As it stands now, I find editing text in Xcode to be a little pokey, and it has a tendency to crash. CodeWarrior isn't perfect in this regard either, but for my day-to-day bread and butter, CW still seems to have a more responsive UI and a faster compiler even though it's not MP-aware. I'm fairly sure the Xcode elves have been hard at work, so I'm pretty confident we'll see some exciting stuff from them.

Posted by bradman at 06:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (19)

I had someone ask me the other day about a Jedi Academy SDK for the Mac. We didn't include one on the CD because we were on a real tight schedule, but I took a few hours this evening to whip one up. You can grab the Mac SDK here.

It builds .bundle DLLs and requires XCode. Some rudimentary instructions are in the archive. The one gotcha is that Jedi Academy MP looks for the .bundle file last of all, so you have to make sure any existing DLLs (e.g. ui.dll) are renamed or removed. The release DLLs can be found in the "base" folder and/or the Resources directory of the Jedi Academy MP application package itself, depending on which Mac version you are using.

The response to previous Mac Quake 3 SDKs has been underwhelming to put it lightly, but maybe the one or two people who are interested will care. :-)

Posted by bradman at 09:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (41)