Posts filed under 'Apple'
Mention “Lode Runner” to any veteran computer user and chances are they’ll not only be familiar with it, but they’ll have fond memories of playing it. It’s been remade so many times and for so many platforms over the years that many younger gamers are probably familiar with it as well. It was after the topic came up with a friend and fellow computer veteran earlier today that I became determined to find a version of the game I could run on my Mac. While there are one or more Lode Runner-like shareware games for Mac OS X, it became clear to me after a bit of searching that if I wanted the original Lode Runner, I was going to have to run it under emulation.
The world of emulators on the Mac is very diverse. I had a lot of choices available to me of which version of Lode Runner I wanted to run, on which computing platform and using which emulator. I ended up choosing the original Lode Runner game running on the Apple II, and rather than using a traditional emulator, I decided to go with one that came packaged as a Dashboard widget, that way I could quickly jump into a game of Lode Runner no matter what I was in the middle of doing, and just as quickly put it away when I’ve had my fill. Following these step by step instructions, you’ll be able to get your Lode Runner on too.
- Download the AppleIIGo Dashboard widget from the developer’s website and then click “Install” and “Keep” when Mac OS X prompts you asking if you want to download and install the widget.
- Download the Apple IIe ROM image from here. Extract using Stuffit Expander.
- Download Lode Runner for the Apple II from here and unzip it.
- Call up Dashboard, and click the bottom right hand corner of the AppleIIGo widget where the little “i” is.
- On the backside of the AppleIIGo widget, click the “Disks” button, followed by the “ROMs” button. Two Finder windows will open. Click the “Done” button to flip the widget over.
- Drag the file APPLE2E.ROM file that you unstuffed in step 2 to the Finder window named “ROMs”.
- Drag the file named loderunner.dsk that you downloaded and unzipped in step 3 to the Finder window named “Disks”.
- Call up Dashboard again and click on the little “i” to bring up the AppleIIGo settings again.
- Select “loderunner.dsk” from the “Disk Drive 1:” popup menu, and then click the “Restart” button.
- Play Lode Runner.
Here are the controls:
| Action |
Key |
| Up, Down, Left, Right |
I, K, J, L |
| Dig left, Dig right |
U, O |
| Stop moving |
Space |
| Switch to keyboard controls |
Ctrl-K |
| Switch to joystick controls |
Ctrl-J |
| Suicide |
Ctrl-A |
| End game |
Ctrl-R |
| Pause game |
Esc or Stop or Ctrl-M |
| View High Scores |
Return |
A more complete list of controls and commands are available here, including editing commands for creating/modifying your own levels.
Hit any key to start a game. Collect all the barrels until the exit ladder appears, then climb up the ladder to move onto the next level, all while avoiding the bad guys chasing you. Remember that bad guys will pick up barrels they walk over, which they will drop sometimes on their own or when they fall into one of the holes you’ve dug.
The only two caveats with playing Lode Runner like this is that there is no sound (the AppleIIGo emulator doesn’t support sound), and the screen can be a bit small. Those shouldn’t really get in the way of some good old school fun though, since the sound isn’t important to gameplay, and the graphics are simple enough that you shouldn’t have a problem seeing all the detail you need. Of course, you can theoretically play any Apple II game using the AppleIIGo Dashboard widget. If you successfully get any other classics running, tell our readers about it in the comments!
Have fun, and let me know what level you manage to reach. So far, I’m up to level 5.
March 3rd, 2008
OK, here’s a hint I think a lot of you Windows switchers are going to love, and I’m sure more than a few long time Mac users will appreciate as well. I love Safari. I think it’s the best web browser out there. My primary Mac is a MacBook Pro that I use in a dual monitor setup at home, connected to a 24″ widescreen monitor, and on it’s own when at work or on the road. I use Safari all the time, no matter where I’m at, and one thing that can be annoying is having to manually move/resize my Safari window whenever I switch between single and dual monitor set up. Since Safari is always running, this is something I have to deal with at least twice a day.
For the longest time I got around this by using an AppleScript, which I placed inside my ~/Library/Scripts/Applications/Safari/ folder (where “~” represents my home folder). Then whenever I’d switch monitor setups, I’d simply run that script from within Safari via the AppleScript menu on the top right side of the menubar. The AppleScript menu can be enabled using AppleScript Utility located in the /Applications/AppleScript/ folder. For those interested, this is the script I used:
tell application "Safari"
set the properties of front window to {bounds:{1, 23, 1200, 1194}}
end tell
You can copy and past that code into Script Editor and save as a script with an appropriate name like “Set Window Size - External Display”. Just substitute your own values inside the curly brackets. The values correspond with x,y screen coordinates measured in pixels from the top-left edge of the screen, and indicate the location of the top left and bottom right corners of the window. In this case, my script told Safari to set the top left corner of the front window to 1 pixel from the left and 23 pixels down (to accomodate the menu bar), and the bottom right corner to 1200 pixels from the left and 1194 pixels down.
This script has worked well for me for several years, but it wasn’t quite as convenient as I would have liked since it required me to navigate and click on the Script menu, then click on the script I wanted to run. Being the lazy computer user I am, I’ve longed for a solution that would take one less click and would be even easier to activate. Then one day, I came across a useful hint in the ehmac.com forums about this simple javascript that you could save as a bookmark that would make Safari’s window full-screen:
javascript:self.moveTo(0,0);self.resizeTo(screen.availWidth,screen.availHeight);
This was in response to a Windows switcher who really missed a simple way to make his browser window go full screen like Windows does when you click the maximize window. Thought it was pretty handy, so I added it to my Safari Bookmarks bar and called it “Full Screen” and left it there untouched for several weeks. Turns out I never want my Safari window to fill my screen since my displays are all fairly large and wide.
I guess today I had an epiphany. Lightning had just struck my brain (that had to hurt)*. If a Javascript can set my window full-size, then it should be able to set the window to any arbitrary size. Looking at the full screen javascript, it was ridiculously obvious how to modify it to fit my needs. Simply substitute the desired width and height in the resizeTo section like so:
javascript:self.moveTo(0,0);self.resizeTo(1200,1170);
You could even specify a custom window position by changing the x,y coordinates in the moveTo section if you wish.
This in itself is quite brilliant, but still a bit inelegant having bookmarks named “Full Screen” and “Big Monitor” taking up all that space on your Bookmark bar. So I came up with some nice simple bookmark names that visually represented what I wanted to accomplish in a way that would look a bit like an icon, and take a minimal amount of space on my bookmark bar, as seen in the image to the right. So from left to right, I have |-| to resize the Safari window for my small display, |+| to resize the window for my large display and |‹ ›| to resize the window full screen.
This is how they appear in my Bookmarks window:
Just to clarify, the “|” character is achieved by pressing shift+\, and the ‹ › characters are created by pressing shift+option+3 and shift+option+4 separated by a space on a Mac. These symbols are smaller than the standard less than and greater than symbols “< >” and make for a nicer looking icon in my opinion. I was also trying to make all three “icons” appear as similar in size as possible for consistency sake and to strengthen the illusion that they are icons. What you name your bookmarks doesn’t make any difference to how they work, so be creative if my choices don’t fit your likes or needs. If you think you’ve improved on my names, let me know in the comments!
Having one-click access to these controls directly within the window is not only more convenient, but also more intuitive. It may not seem like a huge improvement over my previous AppleScript solution, but when you do the same operation multiple times a day, every day of your life, all those clicks really add up. Sometimes, it’s the little things that make all the difference.
February 29th, 2008
Hey there fellow Canadians! Do you have an unlocked iPhone operating on a Canadian GSM network? If the answer is yes, then stand proud as you’re a member of an elite group of people who are willing to stop at nothing to talk, text, surf, work and play on the best mobile phone out there! So what better way to show others you’re proud to be part of this distinguished group but to plaster the Canadian flag across your screen for all the world (or just passers-by) to see!
I did some searching and couldn’t find a Canadian flag wallpaper anywhere on the web, so I decided to take matters (and PhotoShop) into my own hands and create one. I figured I’m probably not the only one who has wanted to do this, so I’m making my simple creation available for others to download and enjoy.
So how do you get it on your iPhone? Just right-click (or ctrl+click) the image on the left and choose “Save linked file” (or whatever the equivalent is on your browser/OS of choice) or click the image to open the full size version in a new window and drag it to your Desktop. Then add it to iPhoto and put it in a Photo Album that you have set to sync with your iPhone in iTunes and sync your iPhone to transfer it over. On the iPhone, open Settings–>Wallpaper and choose the image from the appropriate photo album and voila! Windows users, just do the equivalent steps for Windows using your photo organization/sync method of choice.
More advanced users may choose to copy the file directly to the iPhone’s wallpaper folder using scp or sftp. If you fall into this category, then you already know what you’re doing, so you don’t need me to spell it out for you.
Enjoy!
P.S. If you’re wondering how I got the screenshot of the iPhone lock screen, I followed this hint from ZDNet.
February 8th, 2008
[Update 1] Good news for those who have been waiting for an unlock solution for iPhones that ship with firmware 1.1.2 or 1.1.3 out of the box. An iPhone hacker named George Hotz (a.k.a. geohot) has just posted an unlock solution for you.
Details and instructions are a little technical though, so unless you understand everything that he says in his blog post, you might want to hold off until someone posts an easy to follow tutorial and we have more reports from people who have done it successfully. Reading through the comments on geohot’s blog post, someone posted this link to one page in a very long thread on the Hackint0sh forums which explains things step by step, but please note that I haven’t tried this myself. I cannot vouch for the quality of the unlock or the accuracy of the tutorials, so proceed at your own risk.
Most users will want to hold off until someone packages this unlock into a simple one-button iPhone application. I’ll post an update once I’ve seen one.
Update 1 - 2/8/2008, 2:12 pm: A reported success story was posted in
this ehmac.ca thread. They did a pretty good job of documenting the steps they used, so for those brave souls who want to try it, hope this helps!
February 8th, 2008
[Update 5] AppleInsider’s report today on a new Rogers wireless $20 unlimited on-device browsing package called the $20 Communicate Value Pack got me super excited about finally having a data plan worthy of my iPhone:
Canadian wireless carrier Rogers Communications, often criticized for its exorbitant data rates, has just introduced a $20 per month unlimited data plan that could knock out one more barrier to an official iPhone launch in Canada.
The Toronto, Ontario-based carrier said customers could start adopting the new plan, dubbed the $20 Communicate Value Pack, beginning today. In addition to unlimited on-device mobile browsing, it also offers 2500 standard outgoing text messages, 1000 outgoing picture or video messages, call display and voicemail.
I immediately called Rogers to find out more about the package and sign up if it was true. I was connected with a sales rep who seemed adamant that the unlimited browsing was limited to a 3 month promotion period, afterwhich it was limited to 5MB of data. So I jumped on Rogers website and found the plan listed exactly as AppleInsider had reported here and here. I took the following screenshots, just to prove it, in case the website changes:
I pointed this out to the customer service rep, and she seemed to disagree on what the website actually said, continuing to argue that the unlimited browsing was for the promotion period only, no matter how hard I tried to convince her that the website didn’t mention that at all. So I asked to speak with a supervisor. After a good five minutes on hold, the supervisor finally came on and after she was sure where I was coming from, she put me on hold for another five to ten minutes before coming back, apologized sincerely and explained that it was an error on the Rogers.com website. The plan is only a 5MB data plan, with unlimited browsing for only the first 3 months. Apparently I raised a serious shitstorm over at Rogers HQ, because she said they were working to have the error corrected on the website, and thanked me for bringing it to their attention.
Needless to say, I was quite disappointed, but pleasantly surprised when she then offered to credit my current $10/10MB data plan AND give me unlimited data for the next 6 months. I guess I couldn’t argue with that deal. I would have rather been able to pay $20/month for unlimited data forever, but 6 months of unlimited data for free is a pretty good consolation prize. I guess I was so pleasantly surprised because for once Rogers actually offered to try and make me happy without me having to get mad or threaten to cancel my service. If I’m really lucky, Rogers will actually start offering an unlimited data plan for $20/month by the time my 6 month freebie expires. 
If any of you actually manage to get the $20 plan as was advertised above, or a sweet payout like I got, please post your experience in the comments below or discuss it in the Art Of Geek forums!
Update 1 - 2/6/2008, 2:35 pm: Well, if the plan posting on Rogers website is a mistake, they’re taking their sweet ass time correcting it. I’m starting to doubt the information provided by the rogers reps I spoke to, but I would caution anyone adding this plan to their iPhone to be extra careful that you have them confirm that it will work with an iPhone, and make a note of the person’s name and the date and time of your call to Rogers in case they try to bill you additional charges. The fine print listed on the first page I link to above states the following:
* Plan includes unlimited on-device mobile browsing only. Plan is available on select phones only (PDAs such as Blackberry or Windows Mobile devices, PC cards and non-Rogers certified devices are not eligible). Data usage incurred on ineligible devices, incurred while tethering (using device as wireless modem for laptop) or incurred using non-Rogers (3rd party) applications downloaded to your device will be subject to pay-per-use charges of 5 cents/KB.
That sounds a lot like Rogers might very well be able to get out of honoring the “unlimited on-device browsing” for iPhone customers by claiming that it’s not one of the ’select phones’, or is classified as a PDA, or is ‘a non-Rogers certified’ device. I have to say though, if they do want to play hardball, they’re going to have a bit of a legal issue if their customer service reps aren’t explaining this to customers and the fine print is missing from the 2nd link I posted detailing what’s included in the plan.
Update 2 - 2/11/2008, 4:05 pm: The news has finally been picked up by the mainstream media. CBC.ca posted this article earlier today:
Rogers ‘unlimited’ cellphone plans draw fire.
Update 3 - 2/11/2008, 4:25 pm: Ars Technica is covering the story as well:
Rogers Unlimited data plan not so unlimited after all. Do you think if they get enough bad publicity over this that they might do something about it? Yeah, I know, wishful thinking. This is Rogers we’re talking about…
Update 4 - 2/12/2008, 6:20 pm: The Register, a little late to the party, has also picked up this story:
Rogers wraps ‘unlimited’ mobile browsing in small print
Update 5 - 3/7/2008, 1:30 pm: Well, I just got screwed. Just got my Rogers bill, and they have switched me to the $20 Communicate Value Pack, even though I had explicitly told them I didn’t want my plan to change. Now I’m being told they can’t put things back the way they were because the $10 Mobile Internet Plan no longer exists. They still can’t give me a straight answer about the iPhone and the $20 Communicate Value Pack or $7 Unlimited on-device mobile browsing. So in 6 months when my unlimited data runs out, I’m probably going to have to either take a cut in data usage, or start paying more than I used to, maybe even for less data than I was getting before. The Data representative told me they only have $30/8MB or $60/30MB plans available now. This is progress?!?
February 5th, 2008
News broke late Thursday night on TUAW that a 1.1.3 jailbreak solution for Windows had been released to the public by Nate True, a former iPhone dev team member who went rogue. About five hours later, they reported that a Mac solution had been released by Nate.
This most recent jailbreak solution is probably the easiest yet, although there’s good reason for that: it requires that your iPhone be running either firmware 1.1.1 or 1.1.2, and already be jailbroken with Installer.app already installed. Regardless, I highly recommend that you read the appropriate article for your OS of choice, as well as all the user comments before undertaking it yourself. Could save you from making a big mistake.
I took the plunge yesterday. Continue reading for all the details!
Continue Reading January 26th, 2008
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