I play Tetris

Time for something a little different.

I grew up in the first generation of computer gamers and I will always play games.  It is an source of entertainment that I enjoy and I always make time for it.

For some strange reason the game that I have played the most in the past 6 months is Tetris!!

Originally designed and released by Alexey Pajitnov in Russia way back in 1985, this little game is so deep that it seems to get better with age and  becomes more enjoyable the more you play it.

6 Months ago I started playing Tetris on the Nintendo DS just because it was there.  I played it for an hour here and there, but I just kept coming back to it.  I completed all available modes and kept finding ways to improve my game and new challenges to take on. I then decided to give the PSP version a go and found that it was a much more serious implementation with a much better feel and provided me with a bunch of stats that allowed me to measure my progress.

After taking my game as far as I could on these 2 platforms I decided to explore what else the world of Tetris had to offer me.  I started out exploring Tetris on facebook which then led me to find Tetrisfriends.com .

Tetris adapts really well to a multiplayer game and there are quite a number of variants that have been well developed for competitive play.  I soon found my competitive juices flowing as I worked my way through the ranks on Tetrisfriends.  Playing Tetris this way allowed me to find new goals and again forced me to improve my game.

After a month or so on Tetrisfriends I once again started looking for more avenues to find top Tetris competition. I discovered 2 very interesting sources where the best Tetris players in the world go to ply their trade.

1. TOJ or Tetris online Japan is a fantastic implemtation of multi and single player Tetris.  The main issue for us English only speakers is that the website is Japanese only.  There are however a few guides around that help you work out how to create and account and get into game.  Once in game its still the same Tetris. 
2. Tetris Live which is currently in Beta on Tetrisfriends.com seems to be where a lot of the best English speaking Tetris players are gaming at the moment.  Although its still in Beta it is a great implementation and personally I have not  had any problems with it, apart from a bit of lag here and there.  I am really enjoying the competition and can see I still have a lot of improving to do to be able to compete at the highest levels of Tetris competition. I could not see Tetris Live advertised anywhere, however if you goto THIS link you can sign up and join in the fun.

Am I crazy for playing such a simple game when there are a world of great games out there?  Possibly, but for whatever reason Tetris is entertaining me at the moment.

I lied, not all of my data is in the cloud

So a slight oversight on my part, in my last post I explained how all of my data now lives in the cloud.  Well then what the hell do I have on my 2TB Nas?

Late last year I decided to get a NAS.  I had always toyed with the idea, however I could never justify buying one.   After doing a good bit of research I decided to get a ReadyNAS from Netgear. Netgear purchased ReadyNas a couple of years ago and from the outside looking in, it seems they have let ReadyNas continue to run as a separate entity.

The model I chose was the ReadyNas NV+ . It has 4 hot swappable SATA drive slots and supports most big hard drives available on the market today.  I got myself 2 x 2TB drives to start with and set them up in the default config.

All in all my experince with the ReadyNas NV+ has been great, I had some minor dramas getting the media streaming services to work, however some quick trouble shooting soon resolved that for me.

Enough about the ReadyNAS.

Why do I need a NAS?

Well I cannot see myself sending 2 terabytes of data to the cloud anytime soon and even if I did, the bandwidth access to the data would not be sufficient.

What data do I store on it?

The trigger point for me to invest in a nas came when I started converting all my DVD's into MKV using Make MKV and storing them onto hard drive to avoid my kids destroying the discs. This trend continued as I then moved all my Wii games to disk and then onto making images of all the kids PC games. This has resulted in a large amount of data which is semi important and needs to be always available on my network.

The end solution has been fantastic, the kids can easily choose what they want to watch or play and I never have to cringe when I see them open a DVD drive or throw a CD around the room.

All of my data in the Cloud

When I say, "all of my data in the cloud" I really do mean this.The main way I achieve this is via Dropbox.

Dropbox serves as a sink that catches all of my data, so even if the data does not yet live natively in the cloud, with the use of Dropbox I can ensure "All" of my data is stored in the cloud an available from all of my computers with the exception of my Android (WTB Android client for Dropbox!!).   This allows me to use traditional desktop applications whilst still ensuring all my data is always available and in sync, even if I am using a public access terminal.

An interesting trend that I am seeing as I continue on this journey into the cloud is that more and more of my data is leaving my Dropbox folder as I take on further services and functionality becomes available in the cloud. First I moved all of my email archives from the past 10 years away from Outlook PST's and into Gmail, then it was my documents into Google Apps, then my photo's into Picasa and I was recently reading that Apple are working on a cloud service for iTunes that will result in all my MP3's heading that way (Apples Secret Cloud Strategy).

As it stands today, I am using around 80% of my 50gigs of Dropbox storage, refer picture below.  The way things are going I will not be surprised to see this under 5gig and maybe one day I will uninstall Dropbox? A concerning thought for Dropbox shareholders no doubt (Dropbox raises 7.5 Million).

Now that Google has enabled any file type to be uploaded to Google Apps, will this see an even quicker demise of Dropbox?

 I personally find the Dropbox service to be fantastic and it can see it will be a part of my toolkit for sometime to come as I delve deeper into the cloud.

Living in the Cloud

In December of 2009 I started following a thread of information that made me change the way I work.  I decided to make the move to store all of my data in the cloud and use cloud services to work with that data.  It has been an interesting journey to say the least and I am reaping the benefits on many fronts.

I'm yet to open Microsoft Office this year, which is a huge change for me give the amount of time I have spent in this suite of application over the last decade.

I am really enjoying the mobility and access to my data and services wherever I go. The peace of mind that comes from knowing that my data is safe and secure and I don't care if my laptop is stolen or my hard drive crashes is great.

There have been many benefits both expected and not from this venture and I will list them as I blog my experience throughout the year.