Just wanted you guys to know this blog is now deprecated, and we have moved everything over to http://thinklime.net/blog

Hopefully we will see you there soon.

-Bryan

http://www.guerrillamail.com/

http://www.roomorama.com/

Recently I found an open source alternative to iTunes remote that is media center independent, although it can only remotely control Linux or Unix boxes (developer instructions for windows compilation of the music server are available: http://mpd.wikia.com/wiki/Windows_Compatibility). The software is called MPoD (http://www.katoemba.net/makesnosenseatall/mpod/), is freely distributed through the app store, and has basically all the functionality of the iTunes remote working with a server side program called media player daemon (mpd: www.musicpd.org). Screenshots are available at this last link to show the resemblance. The notable differences are that you need to know the ip address of the computer you’re connecting to (more on this later) and the password for your “music player daemon” in order to connect to your computer, similar to the randomly generated pin for connecting to iTunes via the iTunes remote. The advantage of the password method is that the password is preset, meaning (assuming you have the correct ip address) you can initialize a connection to your media player daemon from you iphone/ipod without ever interacting with your computer.

If you’re as lazy as me, then you’re not going to bother setting up a static IP with your *nix box or want to stand up from wherever you are to go to your computer and check it’s ip address. A workaround I’ve found is to use a hacked ipod/iphone (if you’re running linux I’m going to assume you’ve hacked your iphone/ipod already) with nmap and a terminal program installed (both available through cydia). The music player daemon should be configured to run at startup (either by configuring your run levels or using something like gnome sessions to have it start up at login), and will run on port 6600 by default. The following command will return the ip to the computer running MPD in this default case:

nmap 192.168.1.1-254 -p6600

Just remember to change ‘192.168.1′ to whatever your subnet is.

MPD’s configuration settings are explained and contained in the file /etc/mpd.conf. An configuration tutorial for gentoo (but one that should work for many other distributions as well) is available here: http://www.gentoo-wiki.info/MPD. If you want you can also configure this remote to control your master computer volumn (the iTunes remote controls the internal iTunes volume only), which could be useful when watching a movie or something off hulu at more than arms reach from your computer (say you have a large monitor). If you’re running alsa, which is the case for most linux distributions these days, you can also set the following parameters in the /etc/mpd.conf file to gain master volume control through MPoD:
mixer_type “alsa”
mixer_device “default”
mixer_control “Master”
Apparently MPoD is also compatible with MythTV.

If you end up using this drop by and leave us a message telling us and any future readers what you think.

Here are some of the many things you can do with Google voice:

• Set up different voicemail greetings for different people
• Set up spam filters for blocking certain calls
• Set up different call forwarding options based on the time of day
• Visual Voicemail: transcribes voicemails left on your account so you can see a text version
• Listen to voicemails while they are being left
• Sends you an email whenever you receive an SMS or voicemail to account of your choice

In addition, Google Voice allows very very cheap international calling through its interface, and the ability to send SMS. Plus, you can add a cool link to your blog so that people can click-to-call you (see right sidebar).

If you are interested in receiving an invite, I’ll see what I can do, just post a comment here with your info.

EDIT: Here’s a screenshot of the homepage to tantalize those without invites

Google Voice Screenshot