Warzone 2100: A Real-Time Strategy game

For those who are wondering whether there is a free game (legally) which is 3D based, Real-Time Strategy (RTS) and feels like Command & Conquer series, well wonder no more... welcome to Warzone 2100!!!

Introduction

Warzone 2100 is a real-time strategy game, originally developed by Pumpkin Studios and published by Eidos Interactive, now developed by the Warzone 2100 Project. Compared to other real-time strategy games, it has a greater focus on artillery, radar, and counter-battery technologies, more frequent in-game cinematic updates as game play progresses, a massive research tree, as well as a vehicle design system.

Story

In the late 21st century, NASDA (the North American Strategic Defense Agency) developed and deployed a massive missile defense system, including a network of nuclear-equipped satellites and ground-based launch sites. However, during a routine maintenance check, something went terribly wrong...

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Multiplayer

Outside of the story, Warzone 2100 only has a single faction. This limits some of the variety that can be expected from real-time strategy games, although the single faction is very complex. Essentially, Warzone 2100 plays much like Earth 2150 with 3D units and terrain, customizable vehicles, a lack of traditional infantry, use of "research" to acquire new technologies, and the differentiation of vehicles types.

Compared to other RTS's, Warzone 2100 has:

• A unit design system that lets players choose bodies, propulsions, and weapons.
• A greater emphasis on sensors and radar: Basic sensors detect units and can co-ordinate ground attacks. Counter-battery (CB) sensors detect enemy artillery batteries and coordinate artillery strikes against enemy artillery. VTOL sensors and VTOL CB sensors coordinate VTOL attacks. Radar detectors detect enemy sensors.
• A greater emphasis on artillery: With the assistance of sensors, late game artillery can fire from huge distances.
• A massive technology tree, with small incremental advancements over existing technologies being required for later technologies.

Do Not Buy Stolen Playbook!!!

Do not go and buy cheap Playbook after this!!! (Even though I won't be buying any of those anyway.... :P)

Times are just not good for RIM’s BlackBerry Playbook. First, they make the Canadian-based company lose quite a lot of money and now this.

A “well-orchestrated” heist, as the Police describes it, has taken place in Indiana. A semi-truck fully loaded with BlackBerry Playbook tablets has been stolen, while the driver was taking a refreshing break.

And the result? A total of 5,200 gone missing with a reported wholesale value of $1.7 million. That hurts.

The Police and FBI say this wasn’t just any robbery, but a professional heist that took only 13 minutes to pull off. The authorities are looking into a bunch of evidences, including a video surveillance footage, fingerprints and DNA recovery samples in hopes to solve the case faster.

And if you are tempted to get your hands on a stolen Playbook, hoping for a cheaper deal, don’t be. A RIM spokeswoman has said that all tablets have been blocked from downloading any updates from RIM and on top of that all the serial numbers have been entered into the US national law enforcement database.

Android nears 50% mark in the US, comScore reports

Another success story for Android Devices... share it from GSMArena.com

comScore has just published their new report on the US smartphone market and it turns out that there are no dramatic changes to be witnessed. Android continued to be the fastest growing mobile platform around and even the launch of the iPhone 4S wasn't enough for iOS to match its growth.

In the three months ending on November 30, 46.9% of the smartphone users in the US had a Google OS device. That's 3.1 percent points higher than the Android market share for the previous three months.

iOS came in a fairly distant second - Apple's proprietary platform gained 1.4 percent point and had a market share of 28.7%. RIM's struggles continue as BlackBerry OS lost further 3.1 percent points and now only powers 16.6% of the US smartphones.

Symbian and Microsoft didn't have a particularly good time in the market either, the two platforms dropping 0.5 and 0.3 percent points of their respective market shares.

Top Mobile OEMs 3 Month Avg. Ending Nov. 2011 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Aug. 2011
	Share (%) of Mobile Subscribers
	Aug-11	Nov-11	Point Change
Total Mobile Subscribers	100.0%	100.0%	N/A
Samsung	25.3%	25.6%	0.3
LG	21.0%	20.5%	-0.5
Motorola	14.0%	13.7%	-0.3
Apple	9.8%	11.2%	1.4
RIM	7.1%	6.5%	-0.6

But for all the success that Android is having, the second part of the comScore report shows that Apple is the single company to register the biggest growth in the past three months. The Cupertino-based company now owns 11.4% of the cell phone market (that includes smartphones and featuresphones) and is breathing down Motorola's neck for the third spot.

At the top Samsung extended its lead over the second placed LG and now accounts for more than a quarter of all mobile devices sold in the US.

Top Smartphone Platforms 3 Month Avg. Ending Nov. 2011 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Aug. 2011
	Share (%) of Smartphone Subscribers
	Aug-11	Nov-11	Point Change
Total Smartphone Subscribers	100.0%	100.0%	N/A
Google	43.8%	46.9%	3.1
Apple	27.3%	28.7%	1.4
RIM	19.7%	16.6%	-3.1
Microsoft	5.7%	5.2%	-0.5
Symbian	1.8%	1.5%	-0.3

LG 84 Inch TV Going For CES 2012!!!

Another wonderful article from my friends at Lowyat.Net regarding the huge 84 inch LG Ultra-Definition TV (yup... you didn't misread it or I didn't mistype it, it's not mere HD but it is UD now!!!)

 

LG recently unveiled its world largest 55-inch OLED HDTV set to be available in the middle of next year and if you think you’re impressed by that, the company has yet again announced another bigger and better TV – the 84” Ultra Definition (3840 x 2160) TV which they will be bringing to CES 2012 in Las Vegas next month. It will be packed with LG’s industry-leading 3D technology and Smart TV functions with UD display technology to bring new ground in immersive 3D home entertainment – of course, with a 84” display, it’s almost like you’re in there!

“LG is pushing the limits of home entertainment innovation with this 3D UD TV. We are bringing together all our Smart TV and 3D knowledge in the 3D UD TV in order to demonstrate to the CES audience that LG is committed to being the world’s leading brand for immersive home entertainment in 2012 and beyond.” – Havis Kwon, President and CEO of LG Electronics Home Entertainment Company.

If you think current HD TV are so clear they make you slightly dizzy, especially 3D HD TV, the 3D UD TV will be even clearer with its superb picture quality with 8 million pixels, four times the resolution clarity of current Full HD TV panels.

Hit the break to find out more about the 84” UD TV from LG.

Combined with LG's Slim and Narrow Bezel Design, the 3D UD TV provides the most convincing 3D viewing experience currently available outside of a movie theater. What's more, 3D Depth Control allows users to customize their viewing experience by controlling the 3D effect while 3D Sound Zooming provides users with 3D sound that rivals the output of all but the best home theater systems.

Via the superior display panel, users can access LG's Smart TV ecosystem, which comprises over 1,200 apps and gives users access to a growing range of premium content services such as the 3D Zone where viewers can select from a wealth of 3D movies. The imbedded 2D to 3D conversion engine expands the availability of 3D content to limitless levels. Users can easily browse and navigate the Smart TV ecosystem using LG's new, ergonomically-designed Magic Remote which now recognizes four different types of command input: Voice Recognition, Wheel, Magic Gesture and Point.

GetJar - Appsolutely Everything for Nokia, BlackBerry, Android, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, LG, Palm.

Just when through an awesome site for Android which gives away free-paid-apps (you got what I mean)??? That's right!!! Free for paid-apps... well not all of them... but some of them (many cool ones too). Here it goes:

GetJar is the world¹s largest free app store with over 2 billion downloads to date. The company distributes more than 350,000 mobile applications for Android and 395,000 developers have registered with GetJar to distribute their apps. In 2011, GetJar was named as one of the ‘Ones To Watch’ by GigaOM Europe. GetJar is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices in Seattle, the UK and Lithuania.

How to detect Visitor IP Address In PHP???

After a controversial incident, I have decided to look for IP address of my website's visitor. And what you know, there it is, a simple and short PHP script to do just that!!! Here it is:

// Example use of getenv() 
$ip = getenv('REMOTE_ADDR');

// Or simply use a Superglobal ($_SERVER or $_ENV)
 $ip = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];

Autodesk Infrastructure Map Server 2012 is out!!!

This version is said to replace the infamous Autodesk Mapguide Enterprise. Let's explore what the "Infrastructure" version has to offer!!!

Mapping Software for Sharing CAD, GIS & Asset Data

Autodesk® Infrastructure Map Server software is web-based mapping software that helps AEC professionals publish and share CAD, GIS, and other infrastructure asset information quickly and cost-effectively via the Internet. Easy to use and deploy, the software includes templates that enable users to quickly deliver information from AutoCAD® Map 3D software to the web.

• Mobile viewer extension—Use Infrastructure Map Server with popular touch-screen devices
• GeoREST extension—Repurpose existing server and Feature Data Objects (FDO) data using a RESTful web services protocol
• WMS & WFS publishing—Simplify the publishing process with an OGC WMS & WFS publishing interface
• Additional consumer map layers—Create context-rich maps
• QuickPlot functionality—Quickly choose the area, rotation, resolution, map decorations, and paper size prior to plotting
• Pre-caching of base layer tiles—Generate and populate tile caches
• Stylization user interface—Create rich cartographic maps

Linux Mint 12 “Lisa” released!

Finally the long awaited GNOME 3 Ubuntu Variant aKa Linux Mint is out!!!

Linux Mint 12 “Lisa”

New features at a glance:

• Gnome 3 and MGSE
• MATE
• Artwork improvements
• Search engines

For a complete overview and to see screenshots of the new features, visit: “What’s new in Linux Mint 12“.
Important info and release notes:
The Release Notes are an important source of information. Here are some of the topics they cover:

• Tips and Tricks
  • Information about DuckDuckGo
  • Switch to a single top panel
  • Switch to a black panel, menu and window list
  • Quickly preview files without opening them
  • Restart Gnome Shell when needed
  • Debug Gnome Shell (for developers or to troubleshoot)
  • Run Gnome Shell in Virtualbox (for testers and reviewers)
  • Install MATE from the CD edition
  • Workaround for a disappearing MATE panel
  • Workaround for 100% CPU usage in MATE
• MATE
• mint4win
• Moonlight
• Upstream issues

System requirements:

• x86 processor (Linux Mint 64-bit requires a 64-bit processor. Linux Mint 32-bit works on both 32-bit and 64-bit processors).
• 512 MB RAM (1GB recommended for a comfortable usage).
• 5 GB of disk space
• Graphics card capable of 800×600 resolution
• CD/DVD drive or USB port

Upgrade instructions:

• To upgrade from a previous version of Linux Mint follow these instructions.
• To upgrade from Linux Mint 12 RC, simply apply any level 1 and 2 updates (if any), as well as level 3 “mate” and “caja” updates available in the Update Manager.

Windows Tablet PC - Nav 7

Even though there were quite a number of previous Windows based tablets exists, but the Nav 7 came at the time where legendary mobile OSes which are IOS and Android at their very prime. So how far the Nav 7 can go head-to-head with the other two, we just have to wait and see. (But I must admit that the specs for a mere tablet is quite high on this one). Good job Nav 7, I mean good luck, or both!!! :P

Operating System	Windows 7 Home Premium, Professional or Ultimate (32-bit, OEM installed)
Processor	1.6GHz Intel ATOM Z530
Storage	16, 32 or 64GB 1.8" Solid State HDD
Memory	1 or 2GB DDR2 SDRAM
Screen	1024x600 7.0" Capacitive Multi-Touch LCD
Wireless	WiFi 802.11n and Bluetooth 2.1 (included) Sierra Wireless 3G Broadband (optional)
Expansion Ports	2x USB 2.0, 1x SIM, 1x LAN, Audio in/out
Webcam	1.3-MegaPixel Front-side
Audio	2x Integrated Speakers
Battery	Swappable 2-Core 2700mAh Li-Ion
Power	12V/2A Output, 100-240V Input
Weight	1.25 lbs (590g)
Dimensions	7.9" W x 4.8" W x 0.75" D
Accelerometer	Integrated
Touchpad	Integrated