Free barack obama hobbies software for linux

Harvs Hamshack Hack is a remaster of the KNOPPIX distro for Amateur Radio Operators (Hams).

This project is directed primarily at Amateur Radio enthusiasts (Hams) who have no prior experience with LINUX. Hopefully, experienced LINUX users (perhaps, even a "guru" or two) will give it a spin and offer corrections and suggestions for improvement ... in fact, they are obligated to do so!

The CD contains a complete LINUX-Knoppix operating system and enough software to accomplish the usual tasks we all perform daily from our homes ... web browsing, email, letter writing, etc.

In addition, there is a huge library of programs for our Amateur Radio hobby.

The Hamshack Hack is a "Live CD". As a "Live CD" system, no installation to your machines hard drive is necessary. The whole package will run off the CD by building a "ram disk" in your machines memory. As soon as you re-boot your machine, the LINUX system vaporizes and youll be back with whatever system is installed on your hard drive.

To obtain your very own copy of the "the Hack", you must download the "hamshack.iso" image file and then, using your favorite CD burner (I use K3B on Linux, or Nero on Windows), burn the image to a CD. Pick the "Burn CD Image" option, else youll end up with just another copy of the .iso file. Then, when the smoke clears, youll boot your machine with this new CD.

FlatFrag is a multiplayer action shooter game. With its deathmatch fights it strives to be an entertaining arcade-style experience.
The game is played from a birds eye view and contains some 3D effects in order to make it not seem too flat. Currently only the game mode deathmatch is available, but others will probably be developed in the future.
The game has been built from scratch, though a few important libraries were used in the process. For example, OpenGL is used for fast 3D graphics and SDL provides the game with many cross-platform functions.
It is developed by a single person as a hobby project, but it is released under the terms of the GPL (GNU General Public License), which makes it Open Source software. So everybody is able to get the sourcecode and do his own changes to the project.
Main features:
- Cross-platform support currently for Linux and Microsoft Windows (planned: Mac OS X, BSD, though you can try it anywhere with the provided sourcecode)
- 3D graphics using OpenGL -- the game is played from a birds eye view, but the individual tiles are 3D cubes
- 3D sound using OpenAL -- 2D would probably be more appropriate
- SDL is used for cross-platform input, networking and window creation
- Multiplayer network games with up to 32 players (actually there is no fixed limit set yet)
- Support for Lua-scripted modifications (more like planned, but the console already expects Lua code as input)
- File types: Ogg Vorbis used for sound compression, PNG used for image compression
- Advanced particle system
- Dynamic lighting
- Bots
- Ridable cars and usable stationary guns
- 14 different weapons (some of them very unconventional)
- In-game map editor
- Game modes: deathmatch (more planned)
- Dedicated game server
- A server list function, which fetches a list of servers. You can also see the list of servers here.
- Completely free software -- free as in speech and free as in beer -- Licensed under the GPL

Palace is a nifty visualization plugin for XMMS. Palace plugin works by reading the Fourier frequency analysis given by XMMS, and activating particular pins on the parallel port based on the frequency analysis and configuration options.
Palace is based on the XPLSISNJASP software project. For examples of hardware useful with Palace, see Discolitez or e-mail me at the e-mail address in the README file from the latest Palace version.
What will Palace become?
Palace is currently an XMMS plugin to control a light show connected to the parallel port. The eventual goal of palace is to provide a generic device control infrastructure for hobby (and possibly commercial) use. Over time Palace will be transitioned to a fully modular design, so that clients (applications trying to control something) and servers (libraries that act as an interface to an actual device) will be able to interact through a generic plug-in interface.
Palaces first goal is to become an XMMS parallel port light show plugin at least as good as the DiscoLitez (http://www.discolitez.com/) light show plugin for WinAmp, and then evolve into a full-fledged control system.
Possible server plugins would include:
- DMX-512 output to control professional lighting equipment
- Laser/stepper motor
- Parallel port
- Generic DAC
Possible client plugins would include:
- XMMS visualization plugin
- Security system control software
- Other automation software

Acme::OneHundredNotOut is a raise of the bat, a tip of the hat.

I have just released my 100th module to CPAN, the first time that anyone has reached that target. As some of you may know, I am getting ready to go back to college and reinvent myself from being a programmer into being a missionary. I dont forsee that many more Perl modules coming out of this.

Of course, this doesnt mean that Im going to abjure usage of Perl forever; any time theres a computer and something I need automated, out will come the Swiss Army Chainsaw and the job will get done. In fact, we recently needed to manipulate some text from a mission handbook to translate it into Japanese, and Perl was there handling and collating all that.

But 100 modules is a convenient place to stop and take stock, and I hope that those of you who have benefitted from my modules, programs or writing about Perl will forgive me a certain spot of self-indulgence as I look back over my CPAN career, especially since I feel that the diversity of modules that Ive produced is a good indication of the diversity of what can be done with Perl.

Lets begin, then, with some humble beginnings, and then catch up on recent history.
The Embarrassing Past

Contrary to popular belief, I was not always a CPAN author. I started writing modules in 1998, immediately after reading the first edition of the Perl Cookbook - yes, you can blame Nat and Tom for all this. The first module that I released was Tie::DiscoveryHash, since Id just learnt about tied hashes. As with many of my modules, it was an integral part of another software project which I actually never finished, and now cant find.

The first module that I ever wrote (but, by a curious quirk of fate, precisely the fiftieth module I released) was called String::Tokeniser, which is still a reasonably handy way of getting an iterator over tokenising a string. (Someone recently released String::Tokenizer, which makes me laugh.) This too was for an abortive project, webperl, an application of Don Knuths WEB system of structured documentation to Perl. However, given the code quality of these two modules, its perhaps just as well that the projects never saw the light of day.

There are a few other modules Id rather like to forget, too. Devel::Pointer was a sick joke that went badly wrong - it allowed people to use pointers in Perl. Some people failed to notice that referring to memory locations directly in an extremely high-level language was a dangerous and silly thing to do, and actually used the damned thing, and I started getting requests for support for it. Then at some point in 2001, when I should really have known better, I developed an interest in Microsofts .NET and the C# language, which I still think is pretty neat; but I decided it might be a good idea to translate the Mono projects tokenizer and parser into Perl, ending up with C::Sharp. I never got around to doing the parser part, or indeed anything else with it, and so it died a lonely death in a dark corner of CPAN. GTK::HandyClist was my foray into programming graphical applications, which started and ended there.

Bundle::SDK::SIMON was actually the slides from a talk on my top ten favourite CPAN modules - except that this changes so quickly over time, it doesnt really make much sense any more.

Finally, Array::FileReader was an attempt to optimize a file access process. Unfortunately, my "optimization" ended up introducing more overheads than the naive solution. It all goes to show. Since then, Mark-Jason Dominus, another huge influence in the development of my CPAN career, has written Tie::File, which not only has a better name but is actually efficient too.

The Internals Phase

1999-2000 were disastrous years for me personally but magnificent years Perl-sonally. Stuck in a boring job and a tiny flat in the middle of Tokyo, I had plenty of time to get stuck into more Perl development. I felt that getting involved with perl5-porters would be a good way of gettting to know more about Perl, and so I needed a hobby horse - an issue of Perls development that I cared about. Since I was in Japan and working a lot with non-Latin text, Unicode support seemed a good thing to work on, and so Unicode::Decompose appeared, while I fixed up a substantial part of the post-5.6 core Unicode support.

Id recommend this way to anyone who wants to get more involved in the Perl community, although I was very lucky in terms of who else happened to be around at the time: Gurusamy Sarathy was extremely gracious in helping me turn my fledgling C code into something fit for the Perl core, and he also helped me understand the perl5-porters etiquette (yes, there was some at the time) and what makes a good patch, while Jarkko Hietaniemi was always good for suggestions of interesting things for keen people to work on. Seriously, get involved. If I can do it, anyone can.
Anyway, this fixation with understanding the Perl 5 internals, and especially the Perl 5 compiler, (due to yet another of my Perl influences, the great Malcolm Beattie) led to quite a torrent of modules, from ByteCache, an implementation of just-in-time compilation for Perl modules, through B::Flags and B::Tree to help visualising the Perl op tree, to uninit, B::Generate, optimizer and B::Utils for modifying it.

Perl About The House

Now we abandon chronological order somewhat and take a look at the various areas in which Ive used Perl. One of these areas has been the automation of everyday life: checking my bank balance with Finance::Bank::LloydsTSB (the first Perl module to interface to personal internet banking, no less) and my phone bill with a release of Tony Bowdens Data::BT::PhoneBill.

Finance::Bank::LloydsTSB was meant to go with Finance::QIF, my Quicken file parser, to produce another now-abandoned idea, a Perl finances manager. It seemed that Im only capable of producing modules, not full standalone applications - or at least, it seemed that way until I produced Bryar, my blogging software, based on the concepts from Rael Dornfests blosxom and beginning my adventures with Andy Wardleys Template Toolkit. Bryar also tuned me in to the Model-View-Controller framework idea, of which more later.

Another project I briefly played with was a personal robot, using the Sphinx/Festival speech handling and recognition modules from Cepstral and Kevin Lenzo. I didnt have X10, so I couldnt shout "lights" into the air in a wonderfully scifi way, but I could shout "mail" and have a summary of my inbox read to me, "news" to get the latest BBC news headlines, and "time" to hear the time. Of course, getting computers to tell the time nicely takes a little bit of work. I dont like "Its eleven oh-three pee em", since thats not what someone would say if you asked them the time. I wanted my robot to say "Its just after eleven", and thats what Time::Human does. Shame about the localisation.

Large projects usually already have some type of mechanism for build numbering, because keeping track of which build is the latest can be very important information. However, even small hobby projects can benefit from a self-maintaining build numbering system.
BuildNumber project is a utility to add auto-incrementing build numbers to C and C++ projects. BuildNumber will create and maintain a single header file called buildnumber.h for your project which you can #include to access the current build number. BuildNumber is written in pure C for maximum portability, but the binary can also be used with C++ projects, and the source should compile with almost any C/C++ compiler.
The entire contents of a sample buildnumber.h are displayed below:
/* Generated by BuildNumber version 0.8 */
#ifndef BUILD_NUMBER_H_
#define BUILD_NUMBER_H_
#define BUILDNUMBER 53
#define BUILDNUMBER_STR "53"
#endif /* BUILD_NUMBER_H_ */
Every time you rebuild your project, BuildNumber will automatically update this file for you: set it up once, and it just works. You can compile individual files (to confirm syntax, etc) without incrementing the build number, because it only updates when you actually build or make your project.
Main features:
- Written in pure C for maximum portability
- Simple concept, simple solution, simple code
- Works seemlessly in C and C++ projects
- Sets up in minutes, then its entirely automated
- Works with virtually every C/C++ compiler on virtually every system
- BSD License for maximum freedom, even in commercial projects

Module::Install::Philosophy Perl module contains the concepts behind Module::Install.

SYNOPSIS

This document describes the personal philosophy behind the creation of CPAN::MakeMaker (the predecessor of Module::Install). The views expressed here belong to Brian Ingerson; if they are not of interest to you, you can safely ignore this document.

The above is obviously a mutation of the monumental speech by great Martin Luther King (http://web66.coled.umn.edu/new/MLK/MLK.html). While the contexts are vastly different, I feel that there are some serious parallelisms.
The CPAN has become a place that is not free of injustice. This situation has arisen not out of directed oppression, but from a failure of our community to keep its tools sharp. It is the culmination of many small decisions made in the name of practicality. This is a sad state for an institution that was created to allow all interested people to contribute equally to the best of their ability.

This assertion is rooted in my personal experience as an author. When I created my first Perl module, Inline.pm, I knew that I had done something important. But how was I to make a dent in vast Perl community?

As a complete unknown in the Perl community, my voice did not travel far. I repeatedly tried to get even an acknowledgment from the gurus familiar with XS. No success. I resorted to sending messages with ridiculous subjects to modules@perl.org. (http://www.xray.mpe.mpg.de/mailing-lists/modules/2000-08/msg00078.html) No response. Through sheer determination and shameless self-promotion I eventually got the word out, and I hope the world is a slightly better place for it.
Since then, Inline has won awards and I have had the privilege to meet almost all of Perls finest. But I still remember the pain of starting out, and want to help invite more people into this wonderful world.

One thing I have learned from experience is that the Perl community (and throw in the Python and Ruby people as well) is a small drop in the vast ocean of programming. Its a giant pot of Java out there; and a sea of C. Perl may not be the biggest fish, but with some care and cunning we could become a much bigger school.

These are the current problems that I see with CPAN and the core modules:

New Modules dont help Older Perls
If I were to guess what percent of all Perl5 installations were at the current release level (5.8.0 in October 2002) I would say 3-5%. That may even be generous. Id say that over 40% of installations might still be at 5.005 or earlier.
The biggest problem with adding a module to the core is that it only helps a small subset of Perl users for a long long time. Worse yet, a good module author will still probably avoid using the core additions as prerequisites, because they want their new module to work as well on 5.005 as on 5.8.
CPAN::MakeMaker should be able to help in this regard. For example, instead of putting Inline.pm into the core for 5.9, I can now effectively get it into the core for every version of Perl that Inline supports.
Author Exclusiveness
Not just anybody can get a module into the core. It seems you have to know people in high places. If I were a brilliant new talent with a great new module, it would have a harder time getting the ear of the pumpking, then if I were, say, Damian Conway. In fact, I probably wouldnt even know where to start.
Reduced Competition
One comment Ive heard from some very good Perl programmers is "Everything important has already been done". Their feeling is that even though a module is suboptimal, it would be a waste of time to write a competing module. Who would use it instead of the one already in the core?
When I write a competing module, I know that I have to make it at least twice as good as the existing one to even get noticed. Thats not a bad thing, but should everybody be forced into that situation?
For example, lets say that you have created a really useful CGI script. Lets also say that it makes use of your own CGI::Special module, because CGI.pm doesnt meet your needs. Even though your script might be generally useful and worth sharing, the fact that it requires a non-standard module can only negatively affect its acceptance. Trying to get general acceptance for the superior CGI::Special module will be harder still.
Core modules are assumed by the general public to be "Best of Breed". While this may be true for some modules at some point in time, it keeps talented people from attempting to "breed" something better.
Core Bloat
Every time we add a module to the core it gets bigger and bigger. And we cant ever remove modules from the core, once theyve been added.
If I had my druthers, wed remove all modules from the core that werent necessary for either running Perl or installing modules. Of course, wed need to set things up so that installing modules was so easy, that it could be done on the fly if necessary. Is this easily accomplishable? Nope. Is it impossible? Nope. We have the best language in the world to help us do it!
Maintenance Bitrot
Believe it or not, Perl authors can sometimes acquire a "Life Beyond Perl". They get families or new hobbies or even hit by a bus. (This would be a "Death Beyond Perl".) The fact is, that once somebody writes a piece of code and shares it with the world, they are expected to maintain it for all time.
That is being generous. There are others that think that once their module has become popular or made it into the core, they dont need to keep fixing and improving it. I have personally been guilty of this sin.
And then theres the Damian Conway Effect. This plagues the exceptional authors who are so innovative and prolific they simply dont have time to maintain everything they have written.

I initially formalized these opinions at the YAPC (Yet Another Perl Conference) in June 2001. Since then I have been trying to think of technological solutions to fix these social problems.

One idea was dubbed NAPC. NAPC is CPAN backwards. It is a large system of precompiled modules that can be installed on the fly, with the goal of reducing the number of modules in the core. NAPC hasnt got started yet. Id still like to do it someday, but its a big problem with a lot of issues.

CPAN::MakeMaker (and now Module::Install) on the other hand, is simple and ultimately flexible. It should work with all of the existing CPAN processes without requiring any changes from them. And new features can be continuously added. Even though it doesnt scratch all of my philosophical CPAN itches, its a good start.

WWW::Scraper::Google scrapes www.Google.com.

Caveat Kleptor

Please note that using the Google Scraper module (may) be a violation of Googles "Terms of Service", of which your humble author has been repeatedly reminded. The TOS is not as easy to locate as some of these correspondents have suggested (without a smile), but you can find the TOS at http://www.google.com/terms_of_service.html

Briefly, the relevant part is the "No Automated Querying" section. Its a kind of "do as I say, not as I do" dictum. Your author has tried to divine exactly what it means. On the surface its pretty clear, but if you follow the thread you will realize that it doesnt lead to a place any of us want to be. However, Google Incs desire is clear enough. They do not want to be *abused* for the exclusive benefit of someone else.

Scraper is not a tool well suited for this kind of abuse. It is designed to be generally configurable and, as such, it is not particularly efficient. It obeys the "robot.txt" rules published by the web-server. It would require some effort on a users part to cirumvent this feature. The Google.pm does not do a "meta-search" on Google. Even if your humble author removed Google.pm from the Scraper suite, it would be trivially easy for someone to build a Google module for Scraper (their format is very simple compared to others).

I believe that Google Inc. understands a little interloping (in moderation) is beneficial to all. I should note that Google Inc. has not notified your author of any concern on their part. This has been done by third parties who, for whatever reasons of their own, feel it necessary to interject themselves in others disputes, even when no such dispute exists.

Keep in mind that this is Googles livelihood. Should your use of Scraper be your hobby, or even part of your livelihood, remember it never helps to hit someone where they live. They will defend themselves to the death (even if that death is yours).
Scraper is a handy little tool for getting to stuff you cant get to otherwise. Lets keep it that way!

Intruder Alert is an arcade maze game.

Intruder Alert is a free top-down 2D maze arcade game written in FreePascal using the SDL library for multimedia output.

Its a hobby project and was inspired by 80s classics like wolfenstein 2d and alien breed.