Geek Goodies » Software

Can’t solve a Rubik’s Cube, there’s an app for that.

admin — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 12:39:14 +0000

Eric Faller has released Cube Cheater on to the app store, which will allow you to look quite genious. All you have to do is take a picture of your cubes current state and then the magic Kociemba algorithm goes to action on solving your cube. According to the developer, “Cube Finder finds optimal or near optimal solutoins in only a few seconds. Even a really mixed-up cube only takes around 20 turns to solve, vs. hundreds with a human algorithm.” But wait, there’s more!

If you have a solved cube you can input any patteren you like and Cube Finder will help you reach it. All you have to do is input the patteren with the color pallate method of input, and solve in reverse. I just find it amazing the range of apps on the app store, now I can finally solve a Rubik’s Cube, you can too!

Get Cube Cheater

[ via Cult of Mac ]

Microsoft announces Windows 7 Beta

admin — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 16:43:32 +0000

Steve Ballmer has announced the availability of the Windows 7 Beta at his CES keynote. Ballmer: “The beta version of Windows 7, Microsoft’s next-generation PC operating system, can be downloaded today by MSDN, TechBeta and TechNet customers. Consumers who want to test-drive the beta will be able to download it beginning January 9 at http://www.microsoft.com/windows7.”

Ballmer was even ready to say: “We are on track to deliver the best version of Windows ever. We’re putting in all the right ingredients — simplicity, reliability, and speed — and working hard to get it right, and to get it ready.”

So, tommorrow is the 9th of January. Happy downloading.

And if you give it a shot leave us a note about what you think.

Update:

Microsoft has decided to lift the 2.5 million download limit. After the Windows 7 Beta download went live it did not take very long to choke up the servers, this lift shoul help everyone interested grab a copy of Windows 7, for now.

NVIDIA shows off GeForce 3D Vision

admin — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 13:48:26 +0000

Look for something to drive your new Samsung monitor or 120Hz 3D HDTV? Enter NVIDIA’s GeForce 3D Vision package, loaded up with powered 3D glasses (no red / blue silliness here, charged via USB) and an IR emitter to keep everything synced between the display and your glasses. Left 4 Dead, WoW: WotLK and several other games are already compatible with more expected to come soon. CES had a quick demo and didn’t notice any of the headaches sometimes associated with stereocopic 3D, but at $399 for the display and $199 for this set when it’s available in the next few days, we’re not sure how close we want to get to those zombies, but WoW fans may see things differently. [via Engadget]

iLife ‘09 bustin out at Macworld

admin — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 20:02:57 +0000

Well, Schiller delivers mediocrity.

It wasn’t all that bad, just disappointing that there were no minis. But hey whatever. iLife ‘09 brings it’s shiny face to the event and with some slick new features.

iPhoto - “Faces” and “Places” were added two pretty cool features that recognize people in photos and the places they were taken, respectively.
First up Faces. It would appear that once you tag an individual once iPhoto will hunt through and attempt to make more matches of that person in other photos and you simply approve or deny the suggestions. Pretty slick.
And Places. iPhoto now recognizes geotagging info from newer cameras and some cellphones(the iPhone anyone?) and sorts the pictures based on location. You can also tag them manually if your camera does not.
Flickr and Facebook support were added as well.

iMovie - ‘09 includes some new features and enhancements, animated maps and auto stabilization for that shaky footage you constantly capture. Drag-and-drop editing, which allows you to place a clip between others, is a really nice feature. You can also move audio from one clip onto another. There are also some other neat effects like x-ray, old-film and cartoon as well as some pretty well done dynamic themes.

Garage Band - Hands down the coolest feature of the entire bundle has to be the “Learn to Play” and “Artist Lessons” feature here.
HD videos display lessons on how to play instruments for now just guitar and piano but I am sure more are to come. Artist lessons show you how to play popular songs and give some back story for the song as well and come from some pretty good artists so far, John Fogerty, Sting, that guy from “Fall Out Boy”. It all looks pretty cool.

So that is it for iLife ‘09. Some pretty good updates and hopefuly a version of iMovie everyone can use.