Someone’s imagination August 20, 2007

Isn’t that video interesting? =P Someone’s imagination of a game on the iPhone.. This video itself acts like a prototype for someone’s idea~ =D

I’ve been thinking for my prototype I’ll either use index cards or a storyboard? But then I can also make html pages for my application, and a flash of the game? Is a flash and html pages a high-fidelity or low-fidelity prototype? =X Im abit confused about the different prototypes seeing how I missed out last friday’s lecture >__<;; My bad, i know but i slept in and well.. I promise it wont happen again! Anyways I did read through the lecture slides to try and keep up.

Instant messaging on the iPhone August 16, 2007

Okay so i’ve finally done some proper research about the instant messaging for the iPhone.

“Meebo Brings Instant Messaging on the iPhone
One of the major iPhone flaws is the lack of a native instant messaging client. But thanks to Meebo, iPhone users can now chat using an iPhone friendly interface. Simply browse to Meebo.com with your iPhone and you will automatically be directed to the iPhone-formatted site.”
From http://www.iphonefreak.com/2007/08/meebo-brings-in.html

Click here to go meebo.com. I just tried logging in with my msn account. Its so strange XD

“JiveTalk™ for iPhone® 0.8.3 (alpha) Now Available!
JiveTalk™ for iPhone brings the desktop Instant Messaging experience to your iPhone. With JiveTalk™, you get a complete IM solution with real-time connectivity to all of your IM buddies.”
From http://www.beejive.com/iphone/

From http://www.flickim.com/

Other websites that provide instant messaging applications include: http://www.astra.im/iphone/, http://iphone.mundu.com and http://www.skypeforiphone.com.

So yeah, instant messaging is definitely and permanently scrapped off XD!

EDIT: Check this youtube~ Sooo it says the iPhone already has a sms chat application on it.

A day in life with Lucy + her iPhone August 15, 2007

Hmm I’ve tried to search about mulitplayer tetris on the iPhone and I can’t seem to find anything…

“Any word of multiplayer games on iPhone?
Yeah, you would think. But for whatever reason, Apple has never been serious about games. The most I expect to find available for the iPhone in the first several months is some very light casual gaming, like another tired port of Bejewled or the like.

Unless they actually open up development to a broader audience… then the market will take them there.”

“Exactly! 3rd party developers are already in the mix on iPod games. That coupled with the endless game control possibilities with the iPhone (anywhere on the screen with multiple fingers, multiple sensors, and tall or wide screens) it seems like it’s inevitable”
From http://www.everythingiphone.com/forum/windows-pc-and-iphone/any-word-of-multiplayer-games-on-iphone-726.html

“EA Mobile has announced a new multiplayer mobile game version of Tetris, although for the moment it’s only available in North America.

The game will feature several multiplayer modes, which all work over the network. You’ll be able to play against your friends or random opponents, and it won’t matter if you’re on different mobile operators.”
From http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/Mobile/Tetris+Multiplayer/news.asp?c=2610

Im abit confused about EA Mobile, does their game work for the iPhone? Either way they don’t have my fake currency system, avatar pixel head + items/bombs or make use of the sensors in the iPhone > _> So I can’t seem to find an application the same as mine? =S

Anyways in today’s lecture slides there was an activity section: Write a scenario for how someone would interact with your iPhone application. Tell a short story about how someone would use your application in their everyday life.

Interesting, this looks fun? =D

My scenario
Lucy walked slowly up her road, towards Canterbury station. ‘Stupid steep-ass road‘, she thought to herself as she used her hand to block the sunlight from her tiny eyes. Once she reached the station she walked into the newsagency to buy a red bull. After buying a ticket she made her way down the stairs to her platform. ‘Hmmmm 2 minutes left’, she thought groggily (<- haha is that a word?).
Once the train had arrived, and Lucy had sat down, she found herself staring blankly at the guy’s head infront of her. He had thin hair so that his scalp was visible. There was dandruff practically eveyrwhere in his hair. Getting bored of watching his head and dandruff, Lucy pulled out her iPhone and opened the Internet Browser and went to the (NAME OF MY GAME HERE) website. She logged in her account and looked through the game rooms until she found Patrick’s account in game room 11254. She entered the game room and began to play against him.

As the block slowly came down the centre of the screen Lucy rotated her iPhone 90 degrees so that it was falling on the left side of the screen. Suddenly her iPhone started vibrating in her hands, and her tetris screen was filled with some wonky blocked lines. Lucy then heard patrick’s voice, ’sucked in, hahahaa’ She quickly tried to get rid of 3 lines of blocks so that she can create a bomb and bomb him back. Once she made four bombs, she used her finger to drag the bomb icons (one by one) from her bomb inventory onto Patrick’s tetris screen. ‘Take that!’ She smiled to herself and then looked out her window. ‘OH CRAP ITS REDFERN!!! Get off the train Patrick!’ Lucy quickly got off the train and skimmed through the crowd of people infront. Soon enough she recognised the tall figure (of Patrick, lol) and walked quickly towards him.

Hahaha, an everyday life situation for a uni student aye? hmmm..

Javascripts August 12, 2007

“The base for this code was taken from this site: http://code.gosu.pl/dl/JsTetris/demo/JsTetris.html
Code was written by: Cezary Tomczak
The guy made an amazing code base to work off of. Arguably one of the best use of Javascript classes I’ve seen implemented. They should use this stuff to teach from. I did not have to modify the base code at all to make these modifcations. Just had to change some CSS, change some initialization variables and add in some buttons to call some class events that he had already instantiated.”
From http://www.yucs.org/~snamd/iphone/

So this person, Noam Davidovics (above) took codes from this tetris. These both are so similar, i think they’re practically the same to the tetris game i found yesterday. If you click the highscore button it says ‘Note: these scores are kept in cookies, they are only visible to your computer, other players that visit this page see their own scores.’ Well that just sucks? How come facebook allows us to see our logged in account, etc? So this is whats happening, for my tetris application I need an online database and connect it to some javascript codings? Is what im saying even right? XD (must ask sister about it later). Sounds hard, I’ve always wanted to make my own online database site where people can have their own accounts, etc..

Moving on, I also found this..

“That’s when I realized that such a thing would not be possible on the iPhone and that just seemed silly. Oh, that’s right somebody just needs to do an AJAXy Tetris web application that doesn’t use Java or Flash… Ok, so somebody has already done that and maybe it will play nice on the iPhone. But you get my point. The limitations of not being able to install software on a device that is supposedly running a full blown operating system (OSX) is just ridiculous.”
From http://fupeg.blogspot.com/2007/06/tetris-and-iphone.html

Someone complaining that the iPhone should allow the user to install software applications. Hmmm im abit confused about the ‘AJAXy Tetris web application that doesn’t use Java or Flash’? That text was a link which led to here (another tetris game). This ones slightly different to the other tetris applications because it actually stores high scores?

Blah!!! I shall view the page source of those sites later and have a look at their java codes . _ .’

EDIT: Okay, my sister, being her usual mean self, wouldn’t really answer my questions ._. but shes telling me its not javascripts but rather java applets? And saying she doesn’t know blahlbah, but im pretty sure she did some java stuff (she’s in last year of software engineering). BLAH T_ T!

Tetris on the iPhone August 11, 2007

“iPhone Tetris
The classic Tetris game, now for your iPhone! From the people who brought you iphonesudoku.com and iphone-solitaire.com!
To Use Click Here: iPhone Tetris”
From http://iphoneapplicationlist.com/2007/08/05/iphone-tetris/

The link leads to http://iphone-tetris.com/. I just tried playing it and went on for quite abit XD. It’s just a simple tetris game i guess, and it can store your highscores in the cookies, but they’re only visible to your own iPhone. I clicked the ‘more games’ option and it leads to a menu of other games such as sudoku and solitare.

I also started exploring that http://iphoneapplicationlist.com site. Wow, they even have a facebook for the iPhone, click here. Interesting how they used tabs? Maybe I could do something like that:

- Game rooms: A tab for the list of rooms for tetris games, from there you choose a room you want to go into and verse other players.
- Inventory: Items for your avatar can be displayed here? You can also edit your avatar here (change items).
- Avatar shop: Items you can buy for your pixel avatar head using fake money earned through the game (will explain below).
- Highscores: The top 50 people for that week can be displayed here (updated every saturday?) Their usernames will become well known? xD And also get rewarded with a limited edition item for their avatar? One that is not available at the avatar shop.
- In progress: How about having profiles like facebook? x__x just simple stuff like your avatar pixel, your highest score so far, name, age and where you live (country wise)?

Instead of tabs going horizontally, i’ll make them go vertically?

Oooh and I haven’t properly explained the fake currency idea. Most online korean games i’ve played have em =] I’ve been thinking, coins can randomly come out during the game (in the middle of a block), and if you clear a row with a coin in it, you keep it? >_> each coin is worth 5 fake money and this fake money can be used to buy items for your avatar.

Hmm I wonder if there is a tetris game like this already =S I sure hope not. I must research.

Web 2.0 and the Apple iPhone July 29, 2007

Okay so Web 2.0 is a phrase that refers to a second generation of online communities such as social networking websites, instant messaging and wikis. The contents of websites have changed and enhanced such that they serve web applications to end users, also allowing more interaction between the end users. There are many examples of social networking websites, such as youtube, facebook and myspace (btw those links are to the profiles of my accounts on each website).

The video was found from a CBS youtube channel. So the iPhone has the iPod, internet and phone. Its a device that doesn’t have any buttons but ’simply uses a touch screen’. Looking at the video, I think the interesting things, about the iPhone, that struck me was how you can scroll and zoom in with your fingers (by moving two fingers apart) and also that the sensors can detect if you turn the iPhone horizontally. These features sound efficient and user-friendly to me.