In search of robot vacuums

The .NET Micro Framework book is coming along OK. And I've managed, by means of some clever wangling, to get myself permission to buy a robot vacuum cleaner as part of the job.

The reasoning is that we need something to control with our Micro Framework device, and the Roomba vacuums from Irobot look fun. And you can control them via a serial port. So I've been digging up references and making plans. Should be fun.

PS3 Download Content Works

So it was up with the lark (in a manner of speaking) and onto the PS3 to see if the games had arrived.  And they had. And they all work well.

Tekken is Tekken, looking much better now than it did in San Francisco. For the price it is very good value. It is obviously not a next-gen game, there are some graphical issues which mark it as a kind of PS2.5 release, but for the price it is darned fine value and should satisfy my need for a fighting game until something less demanding than Virtua Fighter comes along.

Flow is weird. You guide a strange creature around by tipping the gamepad in the desired direction. You eat food, you get bigger and other things try to eat you. Quite mesmeric for a while, but with an attention span like mine I'm not sure it will get a lot of play. Then again, for less than the price of a packet of cigarettes it is OK.

Lemmings is a blast of old school fun. I played this one a lot on the Amiga, and was worried that the absence of the mouse would make it tricky. However, the game has been slightly altered for gamepad navigation and I must admit it works well. And they still make that nice sound when they die.

Home Shopping with Sony

After the excitement of the last couple of days it is back to real life with a trip up town. One of my favourite shops (sort of) used to be Dixons, which was one of the few remaining purveyors of gadgety type stuff in the teeming metropolis with is Hull city centre. However, that has now changed to "Currys Digital", which seems to have resulted in a huge influx of white goods. I'm not impressed. If I want to look at washing machines I'll go into our kitchen. And the gadget potential of a fridge freezer is somewhat limited in my opinion. The result of this was that I spent nothing. Number one son actually spent more than me. This might be a record.

Fortunately, those awfully nice Sony people have found a way of relieving me of funds even when I'm sitting in front of the telly. Using my shiny (but irritatingly dust attractive) PS3 I can go to the Sony Store and purchase games and stuff. So, for fifteen quid I got Flow, Tekken and Lemmings. They are all set to download overnight, I'll let you know what they are like tomorrow.

Imagine Cup UK Final

So, after getting up bright and early we headed onto the coach for the trip to Reading and our moment of truth...

"Team Pizza" with their bag. Seems about the right size.....

Ready for the off

Photo Op

The Seedlings shaping up

Is this a secret weapon?

Team Roundtrack

The "Pizza Eaters" doing some product placement

Team "404 File not Found" and their poster

Kevin from Microsoft gets things going

It was great to see James and Tom again. They were in last year's team and I went with them to Delhi for the world final. They now work for Content Master and had been given leave to come and tell us about the experience.

James in full flow

Tom watching....

..is this what Tom is thinking?

Nibbles

The food was good, and they just kept delivering it.

Halfway through the day the top three teams were selected to give their presentations. Sadly my team, "The Irresponsible Pizza Eaters", were not in the top three, but kudos to them for quality and commitment. You rocked.

Team "404 File not found" were selected for special commendation and "The Seedlings", another Hull team, were one of the three finalists. So, at this stage in the competition we had one commended and one in the top three. Not bad.

The Seedlings, preparing for the off

The pitch.

After the presentations and considerable deliberation the judges revealed the winner. None of this drum rolls and long pauses rubbish. Just a simple slide:

Hull Wins!

The Seedlings had prevailed. Huge congratulations to James Alexander, Michelle Goddard, Matthew Steel and Matthew Steeples. And also to their mentor from Black Marble, Rob Hogg. They all get to go to Seoul later this year to take on the world.

Flying the flag

That makes 3 out of the 5 Microsoft Imagine Cup UK Software Design Challenge competitions have been won by teams from Hull. Go us!

There are some more pictures on my Flickr site.

Quizmasters

After a very smooth journey down the Reading the Hull team bus arrived at the hotel. There is a tradition that on the eve of the Imagine Cup finals Microsoft run a quiz for all the teams as part of the entertainments. So, after a Korean-themed meal we all sat down and had our brains stretched.

We had to draw pictures of each other. I think he caught my best side.

I think Tom knows the answer. But is it the right question?

One of the tables we beat...

One of the other tables we beat....

Branded Chocolate....

As last year, I had taken the rather cunning precaution of choosing the table with all the clever people on, and so we just managed to run out joint winners. The prize, a couple of Cube People, will keep me amused for a while.

Tomorrow the fun really starts, when the gloves come off and we all compete to find the UK Imagine Cup winners.