Dr. Bill | The Computer Curmudgeon

Valve will soon be releasing the SteamOS, and Open Source operating system designed to be the center of your home entertainment system and is based on Debian Linux. How cool is this!?

The Open Source SteamOS

“Thousands of games, millions of users. Everything you love about Steam. Available soon as a free operating system designed for the TV and the living room.

Steam is coming to a new operating system. As we’ve been working on bringing Steam to the living room, we’ve come to the conclusion that the environment best suited to delivering value to customers is an operating system built around Steam itself. SteamOS combines the rock-solid architecture of Linux with a gaming experience built for the big screen. It will be available soon as a free stand-alone operating system for living room machines.

Living room & Steam
Finally, you don’t have to give up your favorite games, your online friends, and all the Steam features you love just to play on the big screen. SteamOS, running on any living room machine, will provide access to the best games and user-generated content available.

Fast forward
In SteamOS, we have achieved significant performance increases in graphics processing, and we’re now targeting audio performance and reductions in input latency at the operating system level. Game developers are already taking advantage of these gains as they target SteamOS for their new releases.

Cooperating system
Steam is not a one-way content broadcast channel, it’s a collaborative many-to-many entertainment platform, in which each participant is a multiplier of the experience for everyone else. With SteamOS, “openness” means that the hardware industry can iterate in the living room at a much faster pace than they’ve been able to. Content creators can connect directly to their customers. Users can alter or replace any part of the software or hardware they want. Gamers are empowered to join in the creation of the games they love. SteamOS will continue to evolve, but will remain an environment designed to foster these kinds of innovation.

Four new Steam features focused on the living room. Available soon in both SteamOS and the Steam client.

In-home Streaming
You can play all your Windows and Mac games on your SteamOS machine, too. Just turn on your existing computer and run Steam as you always have – then your SteamOS machine can stream those games over your home network straight to your TV!

Music, TV, Movies
We’re working with many of the media services you know and love. Soon we will begin bringing them online, allowing you to access your favorite music and video with Steam and SteamOS.

Family Sharing
In the past, sharing Steam games with your family members was hard. Now you can share the games you love with the people you love. Family Sharing allows you to take turns playing one another’s games while earning your own Steam achievements and saving your individual game progress to the Steam cloud.

Family Options
The living-room is family territory. That’s great, but you don’t want to see your parents’ games in your library. Soon, families will have more control over what titles get seen by whom, and more features to allow everyone in the house to get the most out of their Steam libraries.”

And, you will be able to download it soon, and install it on your own hardware! Stay tuned!

Google is getting into robotics! How do we feel about that?

Google buys robotics company Boston Dynamics

San Jose Mercury News – “The New York Times is reporting that Google has confirmed its purchase of engineering and robotics company Boston Dynamics.

Boston Dynamics is best known for developing prototype robots for the Pentagon and other high-profile clients that experiment with new types of robotic motion.

Google did not comment to the Times on how much it paid or how the company’s robotic expertise would be used, but they are likely to join in the Internet giant’s existing robotics efforts led by Android founder Andy Rubin.

Here are some of the concept robots that Boston Dynamics has created since its founding in 1992, many times with funding from the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.”

Cross-posted from the Hand Held Hack – Here’s an article on the top picks for current had held gaming systems.

Top picks for handheld gaming devices

KOMO News, Seattle, WA – “If you have a small gamer on your list this holiday season, chances are he wants a portable video-game player. Consumer Reports checked out the offerings from the two main game makers, Sony and Nintendo.

Sony’s handheld device is called the PlayStation Vita, $200. It has better graphics than Nintendo and is a good choice for someone who already has a PlayStation gaming system, as it works as a sidekick to those consoles. So especially with the PlayStation 4, it has remote capabilities, which means that you can play some of your PS 4 titles on your PlayStation Vita.

Nintendo’s lineup is generally better for kids because it offers more kid-friendly games. They include popular series such as Mario Brothers and Legend of Zelda. There are three Nintendo devices available: the 2DS, the 3DS, and the 3DS XL, ranging in price from $150 to $200.

The 3DS and 3DS XL do the exact same thing. They both play the same 3DS games in 3D, and they’re backward compatible with Nintendo’s previous-generation DS games. The only difference is that the 3DS XL is larger than the 3DS.

The 2DS looks a little different but plays all the same games, though not in 3D. Consumer Reports says it’s a great choice for any small gamers on your gift list and, at $150, is the least expensive.

Games for those devices cost about $50 each. It’s possible to get used games for less. Check online at Amazon and eBay. You can also try stores such as GameStop and Best Buy, both of which offer used video games at a discount.”

A new version of WordPress is out. which our blog here is based on. Check it out!

Open Source WordPress 3.8 Released

Internet News – “Blogs and Websites around the world are getting a new look today, thanks to the new WordPress 3.8 release. WordPress is the world’s most widely deployed open-source content management and blog system platform, powering more than 73 million sites today.

The 3.8 release benefits from WordPress’ new rapid development process that debuted with the WordPress 3.7 update that came in October. Among the changes in the 3.7 update was the ability for automatic background updates for security and maintenance fixes. The new 3.8 update, however, is not an automatic update and will require those that self-host WordPress sites to manually click an update button.

The first thing that users will see when they update is a revamped administration interface. WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg wrote in a blog post that the design brings a ‘fresh, new look to the entire admin dashboard.'”

This is awesome! Who would have thought this even a year ago!

Take that, Microsoft!