One month with Linux

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 01/11/2009 à 08:54

Adios Windows. That could be another title if you want. Actually, I really wanted to go Linux since a while. I already tried it two years ago, with Ubuntu 7.10. But two years ago, that was too difficult for me to install ; no internet, no drivers, no software, and therefore any personalization possible, so I returned on Vista... for two years !

I just thought of that before receiving my MSDN license of Windows 7, at the beginning of September. Instead of continuing this way, I can also install Ubuntu... and that's what I did ; a dual boot with Microsoft's new OS. And actually, it works pretty well, even if I use at 95% just only one. Yeah, just only one... and that's not Windows. Yes, this time, I adopted the open-source OS. And as I had to deal with C and some of its Unix core functions, I feel very lucky. Actually, that's not that cliche of geek with big glasses in front of his shell every day. Yes, Linux is not that hard.

That just depends of your feeling, but actually I prefer Gnome's interface to Windows'. Clearer windows, smoother caps and fully-customizable desktop. All the effects you apply to your windows, menus and others can be changed at every moment, just by one click (or so). Yes, one month to discover a new user experience. But don't worry, I'm not (yet) a Linux addict. Yeah, in fact there's so many things I don't like ; for example, if you've got a problem, you always have to search on the internet to find answers. Fortunately, there is a dynamic forum where you can ask your questions but we don't need that kind of things on Windows. Moreover, strong problems like the last I have found (impossible to see videos on VLC, or inverted colors in default video player are very hard to remove (that I haven't find yet :p).

But however, my Ubuntu is a great OS. Ubuntu is called a "Linux distribution". Yeah, Ubuntu is Linux, but it is not alone. There are a lot of Linux distributions actually. But Ubuntu's the most known of them, because it's the most user-friendly, for those who started with Windows first (almost everyone then). But don't worry, if you wanna try it, you'll find some of your favorite applications ; Firefox, VLC, Office (OpenOffice), Audacity, etc. Climax : software installation is easier that windows' ! Yeah,really, you just choose the application you want in the menu and Ubuntu install it automatically. You just have to launch it then, and you've got your app in front of you. But as I said, Ubuntu is not always that easy. You just have to be patient, search your problems on the web, and that should be ok ! :o)

If you want to find some informations about Ubuntu, you can check out the official website.

It's all about opportunities

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 31/10/2009 à 01:32

Today I'm happy. Not because he's gone, but because I got an amazing opportunity. I met a video game developer who contacted me through JVnews.fr. After Warner Bros Interactive, that's a small videogame development team who sent me a mail about their new game, which will release soon. And this mail also contained the Skype's nick of the executive producer...

And as I'm so curious, I added him in my contact list. Actually, it's a bit hard to send him messages ; because you know, you're always wondering stupid questions like "Does this question really is interesting ?" or "Why would he help me, he's going to delete me !"... Yeah I'm sure you know these kind of stupid questions, n00bs are always wondering.

Yeah, this evening, I got an astonishing opportunity. I hope it will help me to find my professional way !

But this week also was a great one ; I spent my time playing video games, sleep until 2pm... as I always do. And damn that's so good ! I look forward the next ones, in some weeks. I hope you guys always enjoy this blog, don't hesitate to leave comments, and have a nice day ! :o)

Keep your browser updated !

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 18/10/2009 à 15:00

I thought of it this week, at university. I wanted to see my blog through the old web browsers, and that's not as good as I believed. Actually, everything looks well, except the bottom bar, because only recent browsers supports the "inline-block" value of the "display" property. But that's not why I recommend you to keep your browser updated ; that's just an example among so many others.

Keep your browser updated, means you do a step in favour of the future ; let me explain. When you update your browser, many new properties are available, and web developers can make applications easier. Moreover, new browsers engines tend to be more equivalent, therefore there are less compatibility problems.

But keep your browser updated also means to avoid security issues, that are so recurrent in a browser life.

Moreover, by updating your browser it would offer you a better experience of the web ; often faster than your old version, more standards-friendly, your compatibility is increased. There aren't any good points to keep your oldish web browser. The main problem of the browser update is that people often don't even know that they exist. It's a real problem for developers who have to make web applications which are both compatible with old and newer browser versions. Therefore, it slows significantly the web enhancement.

So you guys are wondering if you have the latest version of your browser now ? Let's take a look at the main web browsers :

  • Mozilla Firefox, known as one of the best browser to be released. A bit slower than Chrome, Safari or Opera, but it's open-source (Windows, Mac, Linux)
  • Opera Browser, one of the most innovative web browser, which most known one is the inclusion of tabs into the browser instead of multiple windows (Windows, Mac, Linux)
  • Apple Safari, a good web browser by Apple, not available on Linux (yet ?) (Windows, Mac)
  • Google Chrome, the latest web browser to be released (it appeared in 2008), and the fastest in javascript execution (Windows, Linux with Chromium)
  • Internet Explorer, known as the worse web browser to be released, for its standards and security issues, only available on Windows

So check out these websites and compare your version (generally available via the menu "About") with the one which is on your browser website. Download the lastest version if yours is not up-to-date !

The PSP is back

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 16/10/2009 à 12:29

Note : This article would be about Sony's Gran Turismo for PSP but as I dealt more with the PSP itself, it changed. That said, if you feel this article weird, that's because of this sudden change. :o)

I own my PSP since 2004, when I received it for my birthday. My first reaction was "wow !", because I did not really expect that game console ; at this time, I fell in love with Nintendo's fat DS, because I had a GameBoy Advance that I played so much on. That said, the UMD that was given with the PSP Value Pack, with its video clips and music amazed me ; graphic quality, and even the screen looked so good.

Five years later, ths PSP still is the best looking-game console to be released, but there's an obvious lack of games that would make me play it again. That said, things are changing ; since the beginning of this year, Sony really seems to work hard to help his handled console ; Resident Evil, Soul Calibur, Motorstorm, LittleBigPlanet or even the funny Fat Princess are all coming in the next few months.

It feels strange because I played on my PSP in 2004, and now I have to dust it to play with those new games ; because as I said, PSP is still the best portable looking-game console. And on the list, we also can find THE zombie : Gran Turismo.

Can you believe that ? Gran Turismo was first revealed before the PSP launch, but since 2004, nothing. No informations, no screen, no release date... Nothing at all. And when it comes between your hands, as you expected five years ago (or even more), you just realize your hapiness ! 60 frames per second, hundreds vehicles available. Well then, that's not the best Gran Turismo we had to see, but it's still a great experience you should try. I did not try the Ad-hoc mode yet (wireless multiplayer mode), but I'm eager to !

But that's not all ; to boost the PSP, Sony decided to release a new design of it, called the PSP Go. With the original PSP, Sony tried to monopolize its format UMD for small devices ; these UMDs are small DVDs, therefore they need a UMD drive to be launched. As it cost battery, and Sony failed in standardize its strange format, they decided to give it up and they remove it ; that's why you can't find any PSP Go games anymore.

Then you should wonder how can you buy games for you all new PSP Go. It's simple ; you just have to download them, directly (or not) from your console ! (Indeed, you're also able to download them from your PC or your PS3 system). The PSP Go is therefore the first video game console to only offer games by downloading them. Still, for those who still have a "fat" one (that's how they are called in France now), don't forget that you can always go to your retailer ; they'll continue to offer UMDs...

Nintendo has won the race again

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 12/10/2009 à 19:42

Let's take a look at Nintendo's situation today. I'm the first to claim that they failed doing a video game console that could stay in the market for a long period ; non-HD graphics and a so powerless architecture ( quasi the same as the Gamecube was), and this disgusting marketing around WiiFit and the so boring Wii Music, or even with Wii Sports, that has been released in 2006. "Everyone can play video games". That was their favourite slogan at last year's E3.

But in fact, if you look carefully what's going on in this industry, you won't shout everywhere that Nintendo is that casual company. Really, I believe they won this generation again, like they did some years ago with the NES. Hm, it could be difficult to understand, for those who are only refering to numbers, but wait just a second : Wii-mote. This simple word sums up my point of view.

The Wiimote is the trigger element of the new video game fashion. At last year's E3, both Microsoft and Sony revealed to the public some new motion controllers that appear to be the next generation of Wiimote-like systems, motion-sensitive etc. Nintendo already launched its WiiMotion Plus to make his controller more accurate than before, but it's not as amazing as the competitors' ones, which are newer.

However, Nintendo did the first step into the motion-controller area. They did not discover it, but they made it the main controller of a video game console, like they did with the analog stick, or even the cross-pad of the Game and Watch, at the beginning of the 1980s. That's why Nintendo will be recognised as the first video game firm to introduce this revolution on the market.

And even though the Wii seems to be weakened by last PS3 and Xbox price-cuts, and their obvious graphics superiority, Nintendo has already done its job ; move the industry, making more ways to play video games. In this case, they have won the race again.

Uncharted 2 - Among Thieves : is it this good ?

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 11/10/2009 à 01:39

When I talk about video games, I don't often speak about those bloody FPS or TPS, or more generally war games that I can't bear. With that in mind, you should wonder why I'm gonna talk about Uncharted 2 Among Thieves, which is exactly that kind of game. Hm, if I was honest, I could tell you that I enjoyed like it but as I'm not, well, this game sucks.. Ahem !

More seriously, and first of all, the graphics are really amazing. Textures and lights effects looks so good that a kind of photorealism sometimes appears. The focus effect also looks great, when you target some enemy with one of your gun, the 3D perspective is perfectly rendered on the screen, with an amazing depth of field for a console game. Besides, many reviews tell that it's the best looking game from the actual generation of video game consoles, and I can believe them, simply according to the multi-player part, already available on the PlayStation Store in a beta version. The first one ever was an great looking game, but the second has simply no equivalent yet on consoles.

I never mastered any TPS or FPS since this game ; and finally, that's not as difficult as I thought ! Anyway, the controls are quite simple to use and even if they are a bit heavy, they feel good after some hours playing. And it is so funny ! I couldn't stop it just some minutes ago. But I had to tell you about it, so obviously... :p

To sum up the Uncharted's main ways, I could say it's a mix between the Tomb Raider series and the recent Gears of War on Xbox. Tomb Raider for jungle and adventure, and Gears of War for the Gunfight/TPS factors. Nothing as bloody as the second one, but really a great soup which is well mixed.

The current Wikipedia page can help you to figure out what this game is more precisely about, or the official website.

Cutenews : It's not that blog manager

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 10/10/2009 à 15:48

Cutenews is a PHP news manager created some years ago, and it feels so old today. Since 2005, I use this news manager for Pokémon Espace and I can tell you it is very poorly programmed ; deprecated HTML tags used, any respect for W3C standards, and so disgusting PHP system, including the very deprecated « register_globals » supported everywhere. So many security issues, so painfully hacks we always must write to do that or that thing, Cutenews has really any strength point today.

So, you might tell me "Why are you still using this news manager ?"... Simplicity, that's all ; I haven't got enough time to program a complete PHP news manager, and well, with all the changes I did into the code itself, it works without any particular problem.

Well, if you want to get your own news manager for your website, I'll recommend you to avoid Cutenews, except if you know well PHP and have a lot of time to work on. At the end, I think if I already knew how to make a news manager in 2005, I would have spent less time programming it than choosing Cutenews, as I unfortunately did.

Oh, I forgot again... Would you guess how this blog was made ? With Cutenews, obviously... and in two or three hours only... I suppose I got used to it... :p

This is it : My english blog is live

Ancre vers l'article Billet publié le 10/10/2009 à 00:58

I finally did it. Actually, I really wanted to make this blog since a while. New design, less functionalities and more entries, that are the main ideas. Well, I think you already noticed the major change on it ; the articles will now be written in English, and well, that will be my English, so if you guys are quite used to read English articles, maybe you will think I'm writing some weird things. Indeed, I've got some problems with English times and prepositions.

Well I hope this blog will help me to improve my English level and motivates me to make more entries here by explaining my point of view of some things happening in my life (or so).

So, let's take a look at the new design of this blog. As you can see, it's a bit purer than the old one ; I tried to make something very simple, without any picture. As you can see, we can do quite a clear design without Photoshop's advices. Oh well, you may come on the comments shouting that I added some pictures in the bottom bar, but well that is a old one I just inserted here to show you some of my favourite websites (so generic as you can see) and things like that. First realised to imitate Facebook's, this bar finally came here, and it's like that. You'll get used to it !

And, for those who also wonder why I changed the colors again, that's just because the blue gets me bored. And green is a fashion color, isn't it ? :p Why not ? Well, I know you guys are not many, but I hope you'll enjoy this new blog, and I'll try to make some interesting things for you. Don't hesitate and leave your comments now, that's free ! :o)

Oh, I forgot ; you can always check my old articles clicking this link. I prefered to keep those old articles, it can be useful for some time on the fireside.