Slashback: Gnoogle, PlayStation, Assault

Grab a cuppa joe, or whatever you drink at this time of day, and read on for this edition of Slashback, with updates and additional information on the strange (but statistically iffy) dangers of microbiology, Google's contest winner, and Sony's Linux kit for the PS2.

Location, location, location. A lot of people were interested in the Google contest whose winner was announced last week; Dan Egnor creator of that entry, writes "FYI, I've released the code for the winning Google contest entry under the GPL."

You mean they weren't just saying Hi? Anonymous Goodfella writes: "In an update to the Dangers of Being a Microbiologist, the AP [news.com.au] is reporting an attack on a Tennessee state medical examiner who gave evidence to an inquiry into the death of infectious diseases researcher Don Wiley. Coroner O.C. Smith was left tied with barbed wire to an apparent explosive."

Jakob Nielsen says Flash No Longer Evil Allen Varney writes "Given that Flash MX now supports the back button, Unicode, and accessibility, and has introduced p$user interface components, usability guru Jakob Nielsen today updated his famous 'Flash: 99% Bad' rant from October 2000. (Scroll down to see the update, stirringly titled 'Flash Now Improved.') His Nielsen Norman Group has formed a strategic alliance with Macromedia to start educating one million Flash designers in the fundamentals of good design. You did know that Flash .SWF is now an open format, right?"

Step 47: remove blindfold, scream. For those anxiously awaiting (or judiciously pondering) the Linux upgrade kit for the PS2, some words to consider from reader silvaran, who writes: "I just received my Playstation 2 Linux kit in the mail. I was disappointed to find that none of the monitors (3) that I had function properly with it. So I took to following the instructions on a blind install. It's not the most elegant of solutions, but it works. You need a blank memory card to install, but everything else is included in the kit. I'm on my way to a full Linux installation, complete with 100mbit networking, 40-gig HD and a USB keyboard and mouse; also included are full documentation on taking advantage of the PS2 hardware under Linux."

That blind install looks not for the faint of heart -- still, it would be nice if every distro included a simple walk through like that for when a monitor just isn't handy :)

Reader microwerx adds some a few more words of advice and caution: "[T]he PS2 Linux Kit will not read CDRs, so you'll have to use the supplied 10/100 Ethernet Adapter to get stuff in and out of the machine. One very good thing about the PS2 Linux Kit was the documentation regarding the Emotion Engine chip, etc. There's at least 2000+ pages of information regarding how it all works in glorious PDF format. There is also a OpenGL-like library (ps2gl) that supports the hardware. I also understand that SDL also works. Another is the amount of equipment you receive. You get a USB mouse and keyboard, a 10/100MBPS Ethernet Adaptor, A VGA convertor, and a 40Gb Hard drive. And all of this stuff appears to have some future use (you may have to remove Linux to use them nonetheless). So, once again, unless you just want the novelty of having a PS2 Workstation, developing console games, or setting up a small home server, I don't believe that you'll gain too much additional functionality. An overall rating of 3 1/2 stars out of 5 is certainly in order (because after all, it is for game development)."

Comments

Jakob Nielsen Humor

[webword]

The Jakob Nielsen Drinking Game

Driving Over Jakob Nielsen

Hmmm...

[Telecommando]

That blind install still looks easier than the last time I installed Slackware.

Nielsen Norman Group web site UNUSABLE!

[cpeterso]

The Jakob Neilsen story was on ActionScript.com (a Flash news blog) yesterday. Here is a list of the HORRIBLE USABILITY BUGS on the Nielsen Norman Group's own web site. Fortunately (unfortunately for my karma? ;-) these problems were fixed last night.

1) broken graphic at bottom of page
2) click on People, you go to Services
3) click on Services, you go to Publications
4) click on Publications, you go to Events
5) click on Events, you go to About
6) click on Jakob Nielsen, you go to Don Norman's web site
7) click on Donald A. Norman, you go to Ask Tog
8) click on Nielsen Norman Group Members, you go to Events
9) click on User Experience 2001/2002, you go to Services
10) click on Usability Testing and Reviews, you go to Process and Strategy
11) click on Process and Strategy, you go to Seminars
12) click on Contacting, you go to the MM/JN press release on Yahoo

On PS2 Blind Install

[Anonymous Coward]

[DISCLAIMER : I work for sony and anything I say here is just personal stuff for hobbiests and please be warned about any damage to your hardware etc...]

The blind install given above would work, but this is not necessary, if you call us up we'd help you through the setup. The current PS2 installation should work on the majority of the monitors out there, I know the sync is fixed at 60mhz and that was probably the oversight one of us made. But this would work on 95% of all the monitors out there and if your monitor was purchased after 95, this would work perfectly.

For the rest, instead of following the blind install, please e-mail our support or call us, we'd fedex our to those who need it. Please understand that following the directions given on the link on this story might cause damage to your monitor, since all monitors are not alike. (But I've rarely come across such things in recent times).

Also, we have a simple 3d wrapper for Quake that you can download from Bryan's page. Please see his weblog for more details. This wrapper would allow you to patch the existing _SDL_ version of the quake source to make it run on PS2. Enjoy hacking Q1 and PS2.

On the issue of mouse droppings, you need to edit the video configuration and set XV_BUG_PS2FIX on in the Xconfig file. This was an oversight too and is fixed in the lastest pack we have. If your installing a custom distribution you need to do this as well.

On debian, we tried to get their installer to work, but the maintaniners have been very rude to our questions and that's the reason why we don't have an intro to debian installation. If there are any debian power users who installs base fine, please send us an e-mail with the steps taken.

Appercate your patience and goodwill.

Wil
Linux for ever ;)

Re:Good price for all this stuff?

[fwitness]

Yep it is. I got my kit last Wednesday. However, it is only available from the sony website for $200 plus shipping. To be official, what you get is

2 PS2 Linux DVDs
1 40GB Hard Drive
1 10/100 Ethernet Adaptor
1 Sony Black USB Keyboard with 1 USB Port
1 Sony Black USB 3 Button Mouse
1 VGA Cable only for use with SYNC-ON-GREEN capable monitors

1400 pgs of manuals in PDF form. These are assembly language manuals for the EE (emotion engine) core of the playstation. You get no printed versions of these, only install documentation)

Remember, you have to add $25 to the cost for an extra memory card, as it will be formatted to contain your linux kernel.

And I used the 'Blind-Install' with absolutely no problems. You simply must be a little careful. Hope this helps.

Re:Dead researchers.

[Angry Toad]

Sorry everyone, I don't normally reply to my own posts, but after thinking about it for a bit I realized it would be irresponsible to have included a link to a crazy site like Vreeland's without also including a link to a sane analysis of why he is in fact a nutter.

Here is a careful, balanced, and thoughtful examination of The 9-11 X-Files

Use a real OS!

[SIGFPE]

it would be nice if every distro included a simple walk through like that for when a monitor just isn't handy :)

Actually, OpenBSD has one on the CD liner with a printout of what you would be able to see if you had a monitor attached!

Dissappointments with the PS2 Linux Kit

[CMiYC]

So far I have to say I am probably on the disappointed side of the scale. First of all, there is a lack of quaility help with the kit. Why? Because, for example, www.playstation2-linux.com has been overrun by people who can't read. When purchasing the kit they failed to notice the pre-req's which said "SOG Monitor Required" and "a basic understanding of the Linux operating system." While this wouldn't be a large problem, it is making it hard to get support when you have a real issue. It seems everyday someone posts "I can't believe my montior doesn't work" or "Can I run Windows games on the PS2?" or someone posts "Why don't CDRs work?" Apparently none of these people know what a FAQ is.

Right now I am sitting without a kit, but I'll get to that in a second.

I pre-ordered my kit on March 7th. I received an email which I assumed to be the confirmation. In my email header it said: " Your PlayStation.com Order #711699 has been d." I even took a cursory look at the message and it looked just like a receipt from any other online store. What I failed to do was read the actual message. It was in fact telling me my credit card (for no apparent reason) was declined. I admit I should have read the message more closely, but it would have been nice if an actual confirmation didn't look exactly the same. I realized this error on May 25th.

After finally receiving my kit I eagerly ripped everything open and got my PS2 hooked up. Having done my homework, I was very happy to see it talk nicely to my SOG compatible monitor. I even commented "wow, this is a really nice quality keyboard." So I threw in my Linux Disc 2 DVD since, again, I failed to read. This time it was pure excitement to blame. Disc 2 had placed in the disc holder on top, with Disc 1 below it. This was highly intitive.

The install was going normally. After the RTE loads it looks just like a RedHat install. I got all the way up to the point of partitioning my hard drive. Being that I've been using Linux for longer than I can remember, I defaulted by selecting fdisk. After I was done I hit 'w' to write my table, and nothing happened. In fact the PS2 locked up. I couldn't believe it. So I rebooted. I very quickly found that the keyboard had failed, as it would no longer respond. Neither my Desktop (Mandrake) or my laptop (Win2k) would recognize it as a USB device. Of course this happened at 8:55pm. 5 minutes before all of the electronic stores in town closed.

So the next morning I went to Fry's and bought a $20 USB keyboard. I came home and got Linux installed. Again this concept of reading got to me. The final dialog says something that reads like: "Press Enter, Put Disc 1 in, and reboot." So I did. I was greated to a hard drive FSCKing itself, a corrupted modules.conf, and an ethernet adapter that wouldn't init. So I re-installed. This time I read the screen more carefully. Apparently it is intiutively obvious that you are to wait 2-3 minutes while the system shuts down. It would have been nice if they let you see the shutdown progress (or told you to wait.) (I know I ragged people for not reading when they bought the kit, but I am willing to admit I should have read all of the above more carefully.)

Finally my machine is up and running. I even have XMMS complied and installed. So I hook it up to my stereo, connect to it remotely, and mount a NFS share. I'm ready to listen to MP3s on my surround sound system for the first time ever. I launch XMMS and my PS2, again, freezes. After rebooting I am told I can't login because the system has lost power and is rebooting. Uh huh. So I login at the console and do a proper reboot. This time XMMS loaded without a hitch. It played exactly 1 mp3 and locked up again. This time I realized that it was not the PS2 locking up, but the network adapter. This is becoming a known problem at the aforementioned website.

Finally, my last woe in this whole story. In order to replace my USB keyboard (BTW, all of the components come in their own retail boxes) I must return the entire kit. Yes, playstation.com is incapable of only replacing 1 component. They instead, insisit, I ship back the entire kit (at my cost) to get a keyboard replaced. How nice.

If the network adapter issue isn't solved in the next 30 days, then I am going to sadly return the kit, as so far, it hasn't been worth $200.