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It's funny you say that as I've always saw that as the Catch-22 of the .NET framework and why Java doesn't see as much widespread use on client systems. A major point of the .NET framework was precisely that it was a clean-slate, well designed system that could run on many platforms. In effect, .NET framework (like Java) became the platform and the major task to consider for the client was whether they could reasonably run that platform on the various hardware they had, be it a low-power (cpu and battery life) netbook or smartphone or a high end server.

You know that C#/.NET (as well as Java) run on some pretty tightly constrained hardware platforms, right?

I recall that I saw a hardware add-on for the PalmPilot back in 1999 that did this.

Oh yeah. I think I found it ... or one of them: Palm Tilt Sensor. I remember a lot more freeware apps than are available on that page, there being more than one of them seems quite likely.

Elite. Ahh, now there's an amazing blast from the past!

My first exposure to Elite was on an Apple ][ and then on a C-64, and I simply couldn't get enough.

Later, when I got hooked on PalmOS devices, there came an excellent knockoff called Void which, though not perfect and sometimes hard to navigate on a Palm, provided hours of Elite-like fun. It also appears that Elite was actually written for the Palm by a third-party developer, but disagreements about distribution by the original Elite developers caused the project to be canceled.

Java is already fragmented. The result of open sourcing Java will actually be consolidation, i.e. killing of competing VMs. And a huge open source test suite will greatly benefit all surviving JVMs, which is a good thing.

How can you not see this?

Javas problem is not that it might get fragmented, the problem is that it IS fragmented. Do something about it! Let Java free!

This is really cool from a UI perspective, but not entirely new. A couple years ago people were doing interesting things with tilt sensors for Palm devices. Also see: Nintendo's new WarioWare game for GameBoy advance, which has a rotational sensor built-in to the cartridge. Also, Sony has done research in this area as well.

~jeff

• Running astrophysics experiments
  
• Whale tagging
  
• Logging for robots
  
• Programming a rocket camera controller
  
• Interfacing with LEGO RCX bricks
  

There's a library for the dongle, a hack to 'map' tilt motions to the hard scroll keys, and a pretty cool game called Mulg (which works even without the sensor).

There's a library for the dongle, a hack to 'map' tilt motions to the hard scroll keys, and a pretty cool game called Mulg (which works even without the sensor).

Take a look at here where they have a "build your own solution" for tilting Palms

Well, I don't know about patenting, but there's been hardware and software to do tilt sensing on a Palm for a while. Sure, it's not exactly common, but it's out there. There's even a game or two that use it.

I don't think a patent is likely as there would be (homemade) prior art.

So now i have been dicussing the release of this remake for more than a year with both original copyright holders (ian bell and david braben). In fear of not getting the maximum output from this, they both have expressed their demands on how they want the release to be done. Unfortunately, their different demands just cannot be fullfilled at the same time. The result: They can't agree on a licence and there probably won't be a legal elite remake.

What i've learned from this: Some classic games may be lost forever and a living fan base isn't everthing that's needed to keep a game alive. Emulation can't prevent the number of legal copies of a game to decrease and some of the games may in fact just disappear.

someone beat you to it years ago..

here

and here's the game ...

Done this with my Palm pilot for over 5 years now... Sheesh, nice to see companies inventing things that students did back in the 90's...

someone beat you to it years ago..

here

and here's the game ...

Done this with my Palm pilot for over 5 years now... Sheesh, nice to see companies inventing things that students did back in the 90's...

To the original project. I have some samples of the latest model 2G and 10G accelerators from Analog Devices, the ADXL202JE and ADXL210JE respectively. They are in a smaller package now, which means they should fit in there even better, but I haven't yet got the surface mount caps that I need to implement the hack inside my Palm Pro with 2MB upgrade. Still, it's on my list.

• Universal Remote Control - Check.
  
• Logging accelerometer - Gotcha.
  
• Direct blog link... - I'm sure something wouldn't be TOO hard to work out. Worst comes to worst, modify Stepcounter to log to a memo, then use some brain dead scripting via 'memos'(pilot-link) to pick it out at hotsync.
  
  (/giggling)

Several years ago, Till Harbaum added a tilt sensor to his Palm Pilot. Then he wrote Mulg, which is kinda like Marble Madness; if you have the sensor, you can play by tilting the Palm to roll the marble around.

This is STILL the all-time best Palm HW hack I've ever seen.

Several years ago, Till Harbaum added a tilt sensor to his Palm Pilot. Then he wrote Mulg, which is kinda like Marble Madness; if you have the sensor, you can play by tilting the Palm to roll the marble around.

This is STILL the all-time best Palm HW hack I've ever seen.

Not all computers are desktop PCs. Have you ever heard of Palm Pilots? These things are slow! I searched some time to find a decent integer square root routine to calculate object distances in my elite for palmos game. I would have loved such a book ...