Basecamp Widget for Adobe AIR

So if you’re a regular Basecamp user you probably hate their interface and wish you could change it. Or…you wish there was a cute little widget you can have floating around your desktop, notifying you of new messages and to-dos and such. There is one, but it’s an Apple Dashboard Widget and if you’re a Windows or Linux user you’re out of luck (as always, when it comes to pretty things).

Well, I had the pleasure of speaking to the developer of this awesome app (pictured below) and asked if I got enough “votes” for making a similar AIR app for the rest of us would he do it. And he said, and I quote – “Perhaps “.

So, leave a comment and I’ll point him to this post when we have enough!

You know you want to use this for your projects. Let him know and leave a comment.

UPDATE: If you don’t want to wait for an AIR app for Basecamp, AlertThingie just added this functionality to their new app. It’s not nearly as powerful as the widget above, but if you want a twitter-like feed of Basecamp activities, it’ll do the job.

Pocket Guitar fix for 1.1.4

I finally found a fix (that works!) for Pocket Guitar for 1.1.4 firmware.

1. In the Installer, add the following source: “http://podmap.net/apps”
2. Go to Install -> Toys. There will be 2 Pocket Guitar packages. Doesn’t matter which one you choose. Install.
3. Once it installs, you’ll see a red circle on the Update button, so tap that and update it.

The only problem I found with this method is that even after you update, the update notification doesn’t go away, but the app does work.

via PocketGuitar discussion on Google Code

Places That Suck: Strikz in Frisco

Our Saturday night adventures at Strikz Entertainment Center in Frisco prompted me to create a new category in my blog – Places That Suck – which I hope I won’t have to update very often.

We bowl pretty much every week so we decided to try this place out. At the first glance everything looked fine…until we started bowling. *Dun dun dun* First of all I couldn’t find a ball that would fit. The fact that the size (not to be confused with weight) wasn’t marked on any of the balls didn’t help either. After completely missing a couple of frames I had to get used to the ball that was clearly trying to rip my thumb off.

Later that night we saw one of the clerks carry a broken half of a bowling ball out of one of the lanes. We thought it was funny so we asked if we could have it, so the guy handed it to us (if you follow me on Twitter you probably saw a picture of that ball, or what was left of it). We didn’t think much of it and assumed that someone was just bowling a little too hard, but that was probably a warning.

I noticed that my 6lb ball (that’s the only one that fit me in the whole bowling alley) had a huge crack but figured it would be ok. I was wrong. Shawn who has been bowling with my ball just for fun tried to throw it as the ball broke in half in his hand, making about an inch-long cut in one of his fingers. Ouch.

As if that wasn’t enough, we were told that last call for alcohol was at 12 am, probably because the place closes at 1 am, but still! The guys had a good half of a pitcher they had to finish in about 3 minutes as the guy was watching them drink it.

And to top it all off, the non-stop rap music videos that played ALL NIGHT. They’d throw in an occasional rock song, but I think we heard a total of 4 in 2 hours. The bar was ok but the music selection there wasn’t exceptional either.

The clerks weren’t very nice to us either. One of them threatened to throw us out at least twice. I think he was just used to talking to little kids that swarmed the place and figured he could use the same tone of voice on us as well.

So, to summarize:

Cheap bowling balls
Hole sizes aren’t marked
Terrible music
Last call at 12am
Closes at 1am

Our Alternative

If you live in Frisco but don’t mind driving, Plano Superbowl is a much better alternative. I’ve never seen any cracked bowling balls there and the hole sizes are marked on the balls so it’s much easier to find the right one.

The music is a little bit more diverse in the bowling alley but you can find pretty much anything on the jukebox in the bar.

They are open 24/7, last call is at 2am.

Letter to UTD Facilities

UTD made a nice new parking lot next to the ATEC building (I think it was actually for the new “fishscale” building, but it’s pretty close to ATEC, too) which is great, but to get from this parking lot to the building you have to be Indiana Jones.

At first there was a huge hill separating the parking lot from the building, then UTD – with their infinite wisdom – leveled the hill to create a huge mud pit. It takes forever to go around the thing and I don’t think anyone is crazy enough to go THROUGH the pit.

So, I waited long enough (hoping that they would fix the problem) and finally I found the facilities manager’s email and wrote the following:

To whom it may concern:

Many people who park in Lot P work or have classes in the ATEC building, to get to which from said parking lot they either have to make a detour or walk through a muddy field. The field used to be a hill which was leveled due to one of the ATEC professors breaking his leg while trying to get to class across it. Leveling the hill and turning it into a huge mud pit certainly keeps people from walking across it, but is this how UTD chooses to treat their students and professors?

Why do all the other buildings get nice and neat sidewalks and ATEC and the Art Barn get the red-headed-step-child treatment? I understand that the front of the campus gets the most attention because it’s the most visible part during campus tours, but can’t there be a small sum allocated to fixing the mud pit created in the back of the campus? It is also quite a nuisance to get from the front of the Art Barn to the front of the ATEC building since there isn’t a sidewalk but a huge grassy field, which also becomes quite muddy with just a little bit of rain, but that’s beside the point…

All I ask (and I’m sure most Arts and Humanities students and professors will back me up on this) is for UTD to cement the hideous and useless mud pit so that students and professors may be able to get to their buildings on time and without tracking mud everywhere. It may sadden the mudding community of UTD but life is full of disappointments.

Thank you for your time,
-Vera

MobileChat 2.1 works on 1.1.3

I haven’t seen it on the installer yet, but there is a new version of Mobile Chat that works on 1.1.3. No Google talk though Get it here.