It's just occurred to me that while I uploaded a new version of my PngConv tool the other day, I completely forgot to mention it here. Hehe. So, newness in PngConv v0.0.2 is:

+ Allow definition of a colour as mask. Overrides use of Alpha channel if specified.
+ Allow inversion of image data as well as mask. Default was White = On.
- Shuffled around a loop to remove some duplicate code and make things a little more manageable.
+ Added "-odb=" option to provide alternate leading text on output.

Richard Tarjan, he of the ZX Hardware page, has written to tell me that he's been working on some information about ZX Games since the "demise" of the machine as a popular gaming platform. When I say "demise", I mean of course when Your Sinclair faded out leading people to stop paying attention to ZX games. But they should have paid attention as Richard points out with his article on ZX Games After '93. You can think of the article as a follow-on from the ZX Book I've previously mentioned. There's a fair bit of information there, covering games from the ex-Soviet Union, UK, Czech Republic, etc. Worth a read.
Also, while I have "games" in my head, I'll mention that Wierd Science Software are working on a game that they hope to release in time for Christmas. Yay.

The funny thing about emulator developers lately is that they tend to release an awful lot of beta versions. The latest one is from MikeW of EightyOne fame. He's just uploaded a new beta of his emulator (EightyOne), called... EightyOne 0.43b. Recent changes include support for Piters' 16-bit IDE interface (support for his 8-bit IDE was already implemented), addition of +D/Disciple (read-only), and even some preliminary QL emulation (I almost bought one on Ebay the other day, but it went for more than my 5 quid budget).
Nice stuff.

Not just an MTV video, but it is worth of checking this. It's a music video called Nikdy nic nebylo by Czech band 100 Zvirat. In English it could be translated like Never there was anything by 100 Animals. While watching the video you will be teleported back to the early 90's, transferred into robot Karel from the so called programming language for absolute beginners, which was extremely popular in the 80's in Czech and Slovak elementary schools and computer clubs.

Just a note to mention that the life's work of Andrew Rollings (well ok, it's been something he's worked on for the last year or so) is "at the printers". The ZX Spectrum Book covers a big bundle of games from around ten years of the ZX. The preview chapters are well-written, and it's designed to be a coffee-table book... so leave it out for guests to peruse. What? You mean you've not pre-ordered? There are apparently around 500 left "un-sold", so I suggest you go order one this minute. I would order an extra copy as a prize for the upcoming raww.orgy, but my guess is that anyone who wins will probably have pre-ordered the book anyway. Hehe.
Delivery of the printed books to Andrew is expected mid-December, so they'll hopefully arrive with us consumers a little after the Christmas. Just in time for your New Year hangover to subside.

If you're one of those people who love to look at other people's code and work out how it's all done (you know who you are you wierdo's), you'll be pleased to know that Open Source ZX has had a recent update, adding a few more programs to the growing collection. There's a couple games and utilities, and also a bundle of source from our own Gasman, who has a fondness for the GPL.
Whilst technically the site is all in Russian, the bulk of the content is source code... how hard can it be?

If you're keen to add your comment to a bundle of ZX demos, saying stuff like "Oh, the music roxx", "The design is great", or "how do I run this in an emulator? Can someone provide a divx?", then you'll be pleased to know that Factor6 has been upping his glops over on Pouet by adding a large backlog of ZX Spectrum productions. Yay for that! Go comment on some old demos. Especially if it's one of mine and you only have good things to say.

In the first update to their site for nearly six months, Brom has announced that Ell!pse have decided to close down. The site itself has oft been used by me as a source of news, so it's a shame to see it go. And as always, it's a shame to see groups disappear from the scene, tho' as Brom mentions they have not been overly active in the last few years (releasing mostly music, I think). Ho-hum.

In case you didn't spot it from the previous article, there's a new version of DTP's Emulator Files Runner, or DEMFIR for short. This was the first firmware I saw running on the DivIDE board, and works really well (tho' I now use FATWare, but it's simple to swap between the two). In this new release, which comes after a year of silence, are some nice additional features. For a start there's a file-search, booting from El Torito CD ROMs, and most interestingly there is some preliminary support for .TZX files. Very handy.

This weekend has been held a little meeting of Speccy fans in the heart of Czech Republic, Prague. For those who didn't attend, there were presentations of DivIDE, new version of DEMFIR, MDOS3 and FatWare. Everything in a big cultural hall of Praha-Smichov Railway Station, about 30 meters from a local pub (yes, beeeeer!), filled also by a small Barbarian competition. Here is a bunch of photos.