Been a while

My blog posting has dropped proportionally compared with my busy-ness at work. It's a good thing though since I'm doing some interesting stuff and getting a lot done each day that I can feel good about. I also may get the opportunity to build a multitouch table as part of my job, which would rock.

Work continues on Genome. I'm currently focusing on the Song module, beefing up the GUI. The tracker is in good enough shape to start make some simple melodies with but some work needs to be done to make automation of parameters function. It's going to be a long time before everything is ready for public consumption, but I am making steady progress.

I'm gonna try to spend a little time this weekend on touchlib fixing some bugs. I'm pleased to see the multitouch community growing so quickly. The irc channel already has at least a dozen regulars and several dozen people have signed up for the forums on nuigroup.com. New people show up every day. I'm hoping to see some functioning tables soon!

Preliminary OSC support added to touchlib

I checked in the first version of a small demo app built on touchlib that outputs presses using the TUIO and OSC protocols. Pictured on the left is one of the reference apps which responds to the TUIO protocol taking messages from my new OSC app. This allows you to distribute the processing of touch messages and applications across two machines (OSC operates over regular internet cables). It can also run on one machine. This will also let you write multitouch applications in things like Flash (using FLOSC or Flash 9) and Processing - anything that responds to OSC. This should lower the bar for those looking to write some apps. Note: these changes now require you to have the OSCPack files downloaded in order to compile the OSC example app. Also set the OSCPACK_HOME environment variable to the root dir where you have OSCPack installed.

You can download the pre-compiled executable files and associated DLL's here. If you have a working hardware setup (including projector), you'll need to run the configapp.exe to calibrate your stuff first. Those without a full FTIR hardware setup may not get much use out of this. Note: there may be some bugs with the OSC.exe app. I will take a look at fixing these soon.

Get the latest updates from Google Code.

Stuff, Zelda:TP Thoughts

Things have been crazy hectic at my new job. As a result, I've been too stressed out to work on Genome or Touchlib after work. Hopefully things will calm down soon and I'll be able get some stuff done again.

I have been playing a little Zelda: Twilight Princess to calm down a bit. So far it has been a really enjoyable game. I was a little hesitant to buy it after FFXII since I didn't want another game that forces you to play for hours or requires you to cover the same territory over and over again. The last Zelda game (Windwaker) suffered from this problem in that the sailing sections ended up being very time consuming and were pretty boring to me. I'm happy to report that Zelda: TP doesn't suffer from any of those flaws - the level design is very tight and there is little or no need to re-cover old terrain so far. Also, you can save your game wherever you want. The puzzles are clever but not so tough that you can't figure them out on the first or second try. It's a great example of how games should be designed. Your goal is always clear, you receive constant feedback when you do something right, actions that your character can perform are always highlighted on screen, dying is only a temporary set-back (you can restart at the beginning of that room), hints are available if you need them, and it's usually obvious when you need to use a particular tool in your arsenal. Also, the levels themselves act as tutorials for learning how to use your tools when you acquire them - they gradually show you all the different techniques you can execute. It's a far cry from the original Zelda when you had to bomb the fourth rock from the right on a specific map screen (a rock that looks exactly like all the other rocks...). Also, all the items provide different abilities rather than just being stronger versions of the same weapon as most FPS games are. This way the game is always throwing at you fresh variations on the gameplay. Overall, I highly recommend it.