Return to Raspberry Pi

A couple years ago I bought a Raspberry Pi – the B+ Model. Unlike Arduino, which I made a number of hobby projects with, I only really used the Pi as a normal Linux computer. Its specs are fairly modest with ½ GB of RAM and an ARMv6 processor – and this ARMv6 CPU really limited which Linux distros could be installed on the microSD card that functioned as storage for the system.

I ended up installing Pidora, a flavor of Fedora Linux using the Xfce desktop that runs on ARMv6 processors (Xfce is actually my favorite desktop, regardless of the system – followed by Gnome, then followed by Unity on Gnome).

After running some console commands and browsing some of the software that was installed, I ended up just playing a game of chess, which I lost… and then I disconnected the Raspberry Pi, perhaps for another good while.

Guitar Pedals – MXR Distortion +

One of the reasons I bought a Jackson electric guitar as my first guitar, many years ago, was because that’s what Randy Rhoads of Ozzy Osbourne played (though he played a variation on the Flying V body shape – cool but a little too extreme for me). The MXR Distortion + was just as key in the tone and nature of his sound.

This MXR pedal is not very high-distortion, like many modern distortion and overdrive pedals. But the tone is sweet and smooth, and remarkably articulate; it’s an optimal pedal for shredding, providing just enough bite to carry the gentle fuzzy base tone through the mix.

The pedal is a nice sunny yellow, with a stomp switch and two knobs: “Output” and “Distortion”. Generally, I keep the distortion knob ¾ up or higher, and the output from 12 o’clock to 2 o’clock. If you really crank up the output close to max it gets a bit fuzzier as the sound breaks up. I much prefer the definition provided by moderate output volume settings.

This is easily my favorite guitar pedal, and it’s built to last with MXR’s durable metal design.

Windows 10 & Old Games

I’m a fan of a number of old computer games that were released for older versions of Windows. Not too long ago I upgraded all three of my PCs to Windows 10: one from Windows 7 and two from Windows 8.1. Overall I like the new OS, with a few exceptions; most notably compatibility with some of my favorite old games.

On Windows 7 I had a game that no longer works (Street Fighter IV). That didn’t work on Windows 8 and it doesn’t work on Windows 10 – at least I have a copy for Xbox 360. But on upgrading to Windows 10 one of my favorite older games stopped working on all three of my PCs – the game was “MechWarrior 4: Vengeance” from the year 2000. And quite possibly my favorite PC game, “Total Annihilation: Kingdoms” from 1999, worked on only two of the three upgraded PCs.

Overall I like Windows 10 – but if you play older PC games, proceed with caution!

Retro Game Review – “Dr. Mario” for NES

Game Title: Dr. Mario
Game System: NES

Rating
Graphics: 8 / 10
Gameplay: 8 / 10
Replay Value: 9 / 10
Difficulty: Varies by level from simple to more or less impossible

Bright, colorful graphics, 8-bit looping soundtracks that never seem to get old, and addictive gameplay – Dr. Mario has all the elements of a great NES game.

Let’s start with the familiar comparison to Tetris that all similar puzzle games undergo: yes, rotatable items falling from the top of the screen must be matched up in certain ways to score points and proceed through the game. In the case of Dr Mario, the point is not to eliminate falling block shapes – rather, the falling “pills” are used to neutralize and remove viruses – colorful, squirming humanoid creatures. When any four pill halves and/or viruses of the same color are matched together, they’re eliminated and the player scores points. Even four pill halves can eliminate each other, without any viruses being affected.

Generally it’s easier to match four vertically, as the pills can always be stacked up vertically – but once in awhile a horizontal match occurs and adds some variety. When four are matched, any pill pieces that are no longer “anchored” on a stack of items fall down and settle on whatever is below them.

You lose the game if the falling pills reach the top of the “bottle”-shaped container that the gameplay takes place in, obstructing further pill pieces from falling into the playing field.

The first few levels are good for learning the rules and strategy of the game, but the midrange of the levels are the most fun. The most difficult parts of each level are the start and finish: the start because there isn’t much room from the top viruses to the top of the playing field, and the finish because lots of pill pieces can build up and accumulate on various corners, as well as the wrong color pills ending up on differently colored viruses.

While higher levels have more viruses, there is a certain advantage to having more viruses of similar colors next to each other – making it easier to match multiple viruses while using fewer pill pieces.

There are a few nice graphical touches, including a magnifying lens that shows close-ups of the viruses as they’re being defeated, and Mario on the other side of the screen, tossing each pill into the playing field. You can see which pill is up next at any time, as Mario holds onto it for a bit before tossing it into the bottle.

Overall, a great game that is, in my opinion, better than Tetris, and a great deal of fun.

ReSharper Ultimate – Amazing!

I recently installed a demo/trial of ReSharper Ultimate – and it’s phenomenal.  In just a few hours I was able to apply hundreds of small tweaks and adjustments, improving the quality and readability of my code.  It’s almost like having an expert coder sitting next to you, giving tips and insight into the functions and classes.

Another great tool in the Ultimate package is dotCover – a much better test runner than what Visual Studio typically has with NUnit, my unit-testing framework of choice.

Thanks to JetBrains for creating such an amazing tool!  This is Visual Studio the way it should be.

Check it out at:

https://www.jetbrains.com/dotnet/