Published by PT_ on December 29, 2018 at 10:09:44 AM CST | Discuss this article (2)

First of all, sorry for the long delay in writing this news item; like many people December was filled with events and parties, but eventually here it is! November was quite a busy months, with lots of projects being worked on. Let's not wait you longer, so here's the fascinating list with projects being developed in November!

• A Forth Interpreter/Compiler for the TI-84+: siraben has been working on a Forth interpreter and compiler for the TI-84+. Forth is a low-level language, easy to type, which will be compiled to assembly, giving the user power to do memory management, drawing pixels or sending sound over the USB port. Check out this nifty program and give siraben some feedback on his program!
  
• DIY Smart Mirror: Our admin Alex has started a new DIY project, creating a Smart Mirror. This is a normal mirror but with advanced features, such as showing the weather or telling you the news headlines, while you're busy with tying your tie. Despite some problems setting up a Raspberry Pi, he managed to install the needed software. Check out the topic for some more information, or ask the author about his future plans!
  
• Don't Touch The White Tiles CE: BasicTH has ported the popular game Don't Touch The White Tiles to the newest TI calculator, using ICE. He managed to get some basic gameplay working, opening the way to other gameplay styles and more features. Take a look at the topic to see what's done so far!
  
• DOOM for the TI-84 CE: andymwat has ported the classical game DooM to the TI-84+CE, this time written in C. The current version includes rendering of the main items (wall, sprite, weapon), basic movement and collisions, and a bunch more. See the topic and his Github for more information, as well as an impressive screenshot, which gives you an impression what the game looks like.
  
• EnchWood (RougueLike, TI-84+CE) (paused): beckadamtheinventor started working on a new game, called EnchWood. This is a roguelike game, written in ICE, using a small palette, resulting in highly compressed sprites. Currently there's not much information to tell, so check out the topic and ask the author how the project's going and what other features he wants to implement!
  
• Grammer 2- The App: Xeda112358 has released a new version of Grammer 2, a new language for the monochrome calcs. She has been working on fixing a few bugs and implementing new features to this old project, yielding in an update. If you're interested in using a custom language for your monochrome calculator, while you always wanted games with impressive screens or animations, take a look at this new update!
  
• HD picture viewer [ICE] [TI-84 Plus CE]: TheLastMillennial has finally released a beta of his newest ICE program, called HD picture viewer! This nifty programs lets you display image in full resolution right on your calculator, using the best palette available. Whether you want to impress your friends with photos you shot at a holiday or viewing your a picture of your crush fullscreen, try out this program and don't hesitate to give the author feedback!
  
• ICEPad: Past month, Calcuon has been working on ICEPad, another text editor, but this time written in ICE (as the name suggests). The GUI looks pretty simple and clean, such that you have enough space for actually writing notes. The program is in progress, showing off nifty features, so take a look at the topic for more information and a few screenshots!
  
• Mahjong CE: commandblockguy started working on porting the classic game Mahjong to the TI-84+CE, a tile-based game. The author posted the first screenshot, showing off what is currently done, and it already looks promising. See the topic for more information about this project!
  
• Poetic - Programming for Poets: JWinslow23 has been working on Poetic, a "brainf*** derivative where commands are decided by the lengths of words". This nifty programs allows you to write poetry in Poetic! Explore this program and try out the examples!
  
• Skyrim CE Textures: kg583 was busy with improving the textures of Skyrim CE. Please check out the topic and provide some constructive feedback!
  
• Text Dungeon Progress!: [PixelPerfect] has implemented fighting in his game, Text Dungeon. Besides that, he has finished all the other enemies, which you can see in the screenshots he provided. Take a look at the topic to see what's done so far!
  
• TI84+CE USB interfacing: Mainly MateoConLechuga and jacobly are together continuing working on USB libraries, which many people are waiting for. These libraries can be used for multiplayer games, or providing external memory for the calculator. Even though it's still in progress, it looks quite promising, and we're looking forward what the result will be!
  
• ticesnd: USB Audio library for TI-84+ CE: Meanwhile, JackMacWindows worked very hard to improve his USB Audio library, which is a library used to play songs using your calculator, connected to an Arduino/Raspberry Pi with speakers; currently it supports multi-channel audio support. Go write some songs and impress your friends!
  
• Tiny Arcade Modifications: ckosmic bought a few Tiny Arcade machines lately, which he modified it a bit to suit his needs, for example putting more games on it. In his topic he posted a bunch of photos, which all looks really nice, so visit this topic and encourage the author to post more information about this all.
  
• Xenon Development thread | ICE Shell: Alvajoy123 continued improving Xenon, another shell written in ICE. He is very close to a beta-release, and the to-do-list looks promising. He stated that he needed help, so go check out the topic and see what you can do to help the author realizing his program!

And that's it, folks! As already said, it's quite a list, which will keep you busy for quite some time. Visit each topic, read more about all projects, ask for more information and look at the fascinating screenshots some members posted! We'd love to see how these projects are being developed in the future! Also vote in the poll what you think is the best completed project of Novemer.

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Published by KermMartian on December 26, 2018 at 1:09:11 PM CST | Discuss this article (1)

Best wishes for a happy, peaceful Christmas and holiday season from the Cemetech staff to all of you and your family and friends! No matter what you celebrate (or don't), we hope this is a moment to take a break to enjoy time with your friends and family, think about your successes and learn from your mistakes, and look forward to the next year. As you may have seem from recent news, we want to make sure that even in the midst of your busy lives you're able to do some programming, so even if it has been a while, grab your computer or calculator and create something!

Like last year, we wanted to give you a small TI-BASIC program to inspire your holiday. Here's a simple program for the TI-84 Plus CE and TI-84 Plus C Silver Edition that will draw ornaments on your graphscreen (and politely restore your graphscreen when you press any key). If you want to load this onto your own calculator, you can type it out by hand (see the attached Discuss link for the source code), or if you click the SourceCoder 3 share link below, you can download the .8xp file. Happy holidays!

The Program
ORNAMENT in TI-BASIC in SourceCoder



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Published by KermMartian on December 8, 2018 at 7:55:08 AM CST | Discuss this article (6)

It's that time once more: like last year, and the year before, and for time immemorial, ever-prominent community site ticalc.org has opened their Program of the Year competition. Program of the Year, or PotY, allows ticalc.org users to vote on their favorites of all the programs featured in ticalc.org news articles from December 1st of the previous year to November 30th of the current year. Voting takes place in one-week increments, starting with TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus programs, and moving through TI-84 Plus CE/TI-84 Plus C Silver Edition, TI-89/TI-92, TI-Nspire, and computer programs. In past years, there were categories for the TI-82, the TI-85/TI-86, and others, but sadly, we no longer have enough programs in each of those categories for a vote.

This year, ticalc.org news editor Xavier "critor" Andréani has spent November catching up on various interesting projects from this year and past years, filling the pipeline of PotY candidates. Like the past years, you can vote by signing in with your ticalc.org account and vote for your favorite program in the poll at the frontpage. You have 7 days to vote, then a new poll will begin. Please, please take a minute to go learn about the programs and go vote! As Travis "tev" Evans pointed out, if no one votes, there can be no winner. Best of luck to all the authors, congrats for the great projects, and may the best program win.

More Information
ticalc.org 2018 PotY Launch

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Published by _iPhoenix_ on November 28, 2018 at 6:43:07 PM CST | Discuss this article (3)

Now that school is ramping up for many of us and everyone is back to their calculators, we have a lot of fantastic projects to showcase! Interestingly, a surprisingly large percentage of projects this month were not for calculators. From impressive USB interfacing tools to really cool graphics programs and websites, here are your projects of the month for October 2018.

• Agenda CE [ICE]: SM84CE made lots of progress on his project this month! He has planned his user interfaces out, and recieved help on some crucial features of his program. Go show SM84CE some love and support!
  
• Skyrim CE: kg583's project "Skyrim CE" is a very cool TI-BASIC port of Skyrim! He has some really cool screenshots, and plans to have over six hundred levels! You can find the screenshots and information in the thread, and we wish him luck!
  
• Arduino Stabilized/Guided Rockets: theprogrammingcube made great progress on his project this month! He has worked on sketching out some simple parts in CAD, worked on circuitry, and finalized the hardware. Check out the topic to see it for yourself!
  
• BOSshell: beckadamtheinventor's project "BOSshell" received several improvements recently. He added some cool features including some nice GUI work! It looks like beckadamtheinventor is making some progress!
  
• FreeVox: From Midnightas, FreeVox is a really cool voxel engine written in Lua. It has a lot of potential, with room for extensive modding. You can find more information in the thread.
  
• HD picture viewer: TheLastMillennial has been working hard adding improvements to his project, a high-definition picture viewer for the CE. He showed off some stunning demos, and has some awesome menus working. Check out the thread to see it for yourself!
  
• Homemade Arduino-Based Drone: Cemetech user Nik is creating a super cool Arduino-based drone. He's very thoroughly documented his process, and the topic is a very interesting read. The thread features a multitude of graphs, photos, and diagrams. It looks like Nik has made a lot of progress!
  
• Languish: JWinslow23 has created a sweet esoteric programming language! This time, the esolang is a derivative of the ETA programming language. He's created a very cool website for it. We'd love to see more from this project, and be sure to check out the thread
  
• Mateo Makes a Website: MateoConLechuga has created a fantastic website! He made a very interesting and well-designed blog page. We can't wait to read his blog posts!
  
• Michael2_3B's Website: Michael2_3B has created a cool website for himself! He's still working on the basics of learning the languages involved, but he has a really good starting design to work with. You can find more information in the thread.
  
• Text Dungeon Progress!: [PixelPerfect] made some progress on his project this month! He added shops and it all looks very, very cool. It looks like [PixelPerfect] is making lots of progress!
  
• TI-Boy CE Progress Thread: calc84maniac made some progress on his project this month! He made some small UI improvements and fixed a couple bugs. You can find more information in the thread.
  
• TI84+CE USB interfacing: From MateoConLechuga, TI84+CE USB interfacing is a really cool project that allows for programmatic usage of the USB port. He created a driver for it, and it seems that more programs will be able to use this fantastic tool. Congratulations to Mateo for all of his hard work!
  
• ticesnd: USB Audio library for TI-84+ CE: From JackMacWindows, ticesnd is a multichannel audio interface. It allows programmers and users to listen to (albeit simple) songs using their calculator and a bit of circuitry. Go check the thread out!
  
• Village: _iPhoenix_ made some progress on his project this month! He added trains and reworked his code to add more features. Check out the thread to see it for yourself!
  
• Warper: This month, Cemetech user 123outerme worked hard on his "Sci-Fi Beat-em-Up"! He's not fully content with the rendering techniques used in his previous games, so he's rewriting his engine and making a really cool game while he's at it. Check the thread out!
  

And that's a wrap! With so many projects being started, very few projects are actually being finished, but don't let that discourage you from voting in the polls for your favorite completed project of the month!

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