A is for Application, B is for BeagleBoard, C is for Crikey this is a bit tenuous! Pic_Index is an application developed by John Williams to generate a thumbnail index for a set of JPEG files, in HTML format – ideal for use as gallery pages on websites, CD ROMs, or anywhere else the user might wish to store the images and resulting HTML. During April, it emerged during a discussion on the usenet group comp.sys.acorn.misc that Pic_Index didn’t work on the BeagleBoard.
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MoreKeys updated
All we need now is more fingers. Or not, since this solves that problem. Towards the end of March, Rick Murray released a new application designed to make it easier to enter ‘extended’ characters, those not normally found on a standard keyboard – solving the problem of having to remember which key combination or sequence will produce which characters, or having to switch to using the mouse to use an alternative input method, such as the Chars application. That application was MoreKeys, which allows the user to define a selection…
Read MoreDavid Pilling address change
RIP PO Box 22. After 25 years of service, David Pilling – developer of Spark, Ovation Pro, and much more, has announced that he is no longer operating the PO Box for postal communications, such as purchasing his software using a cheque. On what David describes as “the very light cone of software development” upgrades to all his software can be found on his website, along with the ability to purchase using a credit card, and support is provided by email.
Read MoreDigitalCD and TimPlayer updates
Music to my ears. Back in April, André Timmermans announced new versions of DigitalCD and TimPlayer on the RISC OS Open forum. DigitalCD is a desktop music player for all versions of RISC OS from 3.1 on, providing control panels for any CD drives connected to the computer, and any internet radio and music file playlists – with a very wide variety of supported music formats, from the more obvious MP3, Flac and Ogg Vorbis, through to many ‘tracker’ formats.
Read MoreLcheck updated
Not yet able to predict next week’s numbers. Kevin Wells has released a new version of his lottery syndicate checking application, Lcheck. Written to work for the UK National Lottery, Thunderball and Euro Millions draws, Lcheck will compare your syndicate numbers to see if they match the numbers from those draws, bringing any lines that do to your attention.
Read MoreBBFlash updated
BBFlash… Aa-aah… It saved every ROM image! BBFlash is an application designed to write all of the files needed to boot a BeagleBoard or BeagleBoard-xM to a suitable memory card – a micro SD, micro SDSC, SD, SDHC or MMC. It allows you to use a FAT formatted card, with no need to reformat it or reduce its capacity, as well as to rewrite the files – for instance when there is an update – with no need to remove the card from the slot on the board.
Read MoreMonopolyCal – a Monopoly calculator
Removing the monetary monotony. And all the moaning. I like playing Monopoly – but I don’t like messing around with the money, and the inevitable problems it causes. I find that some people become impatient and carry on with their turns while other players are still sorting out a property purchase, a rent payment, or whatever; the main hold up usually being to count out the money, struggling to find the right notes, and so on. And if the impatient player’s move leads to another transaction, and the next player…
Read MoreFFmpeg, FFplay, DRenderer updated
Updates that are a bit like buses. Except more frequent. So not like buses at all, then. New versions of FFmpeg and FFplay have been made available by Christopher Martin, bringing them up to version 1.22, along with another update to the Digital Renderer (DRenderer) module, bringing it to version 0.56 (beta release 6). FFmpeg is a versatile, open-source, multi-platform video and audio converter, described on its home site as “the leading multimedia framework, able to decode, encode, transcode, mux, demux, stream, filter and play pretty much anything that humans…
Read MorePlayIt 1.73 plays more
PlayIt is a tool for playing sound samples, which is used by a number of RISC OS applications, including DigitalCD. Originally written by Rick Hudson, recent updates have been made available by Christopher Martin, who has just released version 1.73. This version is able to recognise more Replay/ARMovie files that contain audio formats that it supports, in addition to which it also includes a RISC OS 4 fast service handler, along with a slight improvement in its overall performance. Christopher recommends that all users upgrade to this version. Offering thanks…
Read MoreFFmpeg and FFmplay performance improvements
New versions of FFmpeg and FFplay have been made available by Christopher Martin, bringing them up to version 1.21, along with another update to the Digital Renderer (DRenderer) module, bringing it to version 0.55. FFmpeg is a versatile, open-source, multi-platform video and audio converter, described on its home site as “the leading multimedia framework, able to decode, encode, transcode, mux, demux, stream, filter and play pretty much anything that humans and machines have created.” FFmpeg makes it possible to process a large number of movie formats for which there are…
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