Omnimaga
Omnimaga => News => Topic started by: DJ Omnimaga on May 19, 2011, 02:02:29 pm
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TI has confirmed once again their stance against hobbyist calculator programmers.
A month ago, OS 3.0.1 was released, adding many new features, but then, a nasty bug was found in OS 3.0.1, along with two others, and after some people's calculators were bricked, TI removed the OS update from their website and replaced it with OS 2.1.1. Also, it was not possible to natively downgrade from OS 3.0.1 after installing it, unless you removed Boot2 with TNOC.
Today, they have released OS 3.0.2, supposedly fixing the Boot2 issue, along with the two other bugs. However, I worry that the removal of OS 3.0.1 and the delayed release of OS 3.0.2 was not just because of those bugs...
OS 3.0.1 added Lua programming support so TI can produce better-looking applications for students, such as a periodic table. It was not possible for the TI community to use Lua until someone made the tools to do so.
In that OS, you might remember that documents generated by third-party tools for older OSes would no longer work on it, due to some encryption protection. Well guess what? OS 3.0.2 adds this protection against Lua files made by the TI community too!
From now on, as reported by Goplat (http://ourl.ca/11096/210329), to get a Lua game to run under OS 3.0.2, you'll need to load it on an OS 3.0.1 calculator first, send it back to your computer then load it under OS 3.0.2. According to Goplat's post and Critor on TI-BANK (http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1108), it is still not possible (it seems TI has added a double protection, TNOC cannot downgrade 3.0.2) to downgrade to an older OS with TNOC (http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=archives&ac=voir&id=1922), though.
If, for any reason, you want to sacrify your TI-Nspire or upgrade anyway, OS 3.0.2 is available for both the regular TI-Nspire (http://education.ti.com/calculators/downloads/US/Software/Search/Results?cp=6001&ac=1) and CAS (http://education.ti.com/calculators/downloads/US/Software/Detail?id=6767) models on TI website. However, it doesn't appear to be listed there for the CX CAS.
Hopefully the TI community can fight back, else maybe there could also be a CX boycott of some kind, where students from here and other calc forums encourage teachers to switch to the Casio PRIZM. KermMartian has published an article about his concerns on this subject a few months ago here (http://www.cemetech.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5861).
Due to the nature of the Internet, we hope that TI doesn't go to the extent of taking people who creates jailbreaking tools to court, because I am sure many of you know what recently happened to Sony after they did similar things.
Now you can understand why the OS 2.71MP april fools prank was so easy to believe by many people.
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Is it a joke or something? D'aw, no colored text and it's not April 1st... Oh well, hope we get around the limitation like we did in the past :D
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Well it's not a prank, although I really felt like calling the news article "Another step towards 2.71MP?"
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Is it a joke or something? D'aw, no colored text and it's not April 1st... Oh well, hope we get around the limitation like we did in the past :D
Well, Lua on 3.0.2 is possible! It's quite complex for the developer, though...
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You can tell us how?
EDIT: Oh yeah, crypt them with OS 3.0.1.
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Yeah send them to 3.0.1, upgrade again then resend to your calc. It's a major hassle if you only have one calc, though.
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Yeah send them to 3.0.1, upgrade again then resend to your calc. It's a major hassle if you only have one calc, though.
And if you have to do all this each time you want to test the latest modifications to your script...
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Indeed. When I sent OS 3.0.1 to my clickpad, it took like 6-7 minutes <_<
I wonder if it's possible to transfer tns documents from a TI-Nspire OS 3.0.1 to another running 3.0.2? Not that everyone have two TI-Nspires, though.
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you can also open an "unencrypted" tns file whit the software if you have a 3.0.1 version of it, then re-save the document and you have a lua file who works on 3.0.2
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you can also open an "unencrypted" tns file whit the software if you have a 3.0.1 version of it, then re-save the document and you have a lua file who works on 3.0.2
Which also slows down the development of your program... It's quite annoying.
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Yeah that's the issue. Not everyone wants to wait 10 minutes everytime you debug something. X,x
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sure it's in every case something that is...
but its a faster alternative than using two nspires (it takes about 15 seconds)as long as we have no other "possibilities"
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Is there an emulator for OS 3.0.1? There's one released by TI, right?
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I wonder if it's possible to transfer tns documents from a TI-Nspire OS 3.0.1 to another running 3.0.2? Not that everyone have two TI-Nspires, though.
Perhaps it is better to buy one Prizm than two TI-Nspires
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That too. Now if only we could convince all teachers to switch, although I'm sure this would never happen on a worldwide scale D:. It would be nice to see more schools promoting the Prizm, though. Maybe once someone here wrote a math suite including everything the Prizm lacks that is needed.
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Much worse:
http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1108
(last part in red)
There is no way to downgrade after installing the 3.0.2 OS.
Because there are 2 downgrade protections:
- one in the Boot2 which can be removed with TNOC
- one in the OS (the same as in the OS 2.1.0) which sets the minimal installable OS version to 3.0.2.1785.
The latest protection would need something like Nleash, which works like Ndless 2.0.
But what let Ndless 2.0 work in the previous OSes was fixed...
I know of no way to downgrade my TI-Nspire, not even with a RS232 interface.
Has TI just completly closed the TI-Nspire?
Has TI won? Has the community lost?...
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Okay, wtf...
Should've asked this earlier, but what's the point of all this? Anti-ASM protection, then anti-downgrade, and now anti-Lua. Who knows how much time and resources they spent on the perfect Lua dev environment, and now they smack it out of our hands once they hand it to us. I can see only one explanation for it all, and it's that some TI engineers are either too lazy or too un-1337 to use C/ASM, so the real developers add a simple but powerful language for internal use. In other words, paid apps. Just watch.
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Okay, this is enough. Fuck TI. I'm never going to buy anything from them again.
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Okay, this is enough. Fuck TI. I'm never going to buy anything from them again.
This. There's no point anymore. They've made it clear they're not going to support us, so I don't see why we should support them.
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Okay, this is enough. Fuck TI. I'm never going to buy anything from them again.
This. There's no point anymore. They've made it clear they're not going to support us, so I don't see why we should support them.
If they cease to produce the 8x+ family, they're doomed in the hobbyist market.
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I'm just hoping that OS 2.71 won't happen... D:
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According to my latest informations ( http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1108 ), I think that the title and 1st topic of this news should be edited.
There is no way to downgrade after installing OS 3.0.2... absolutely no way... not even with TNOC or a RS232 interface.
I wish people like Goplat, Bsl, ExtendeD or Lionel are going to tell me I'm wrong :P
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Bah, just when you thought it was bad enough x.x
I can't edit the post from here. Mods?
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I've posted about this on TI's Facebook page... Let's see how long time it takes for them to remove it.
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changed topic, hopefully no one will upgrade.
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1st post:
According to Goplat's post and Critor on TI-BANK, it is still possible to downgrade to an older OS with TNOC, though.
It should be edited too.
It is still possible to use TNOC to have more free space, but it is not enough to downgrade.
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Just another reason to get a Prizm
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I don't quite understand how third-party Lua development was a problem to TI to the point of making them spend time and money to block it. Lua is well sandboxed and doesn't threaten calculator stability or press-to-test.
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TI might have plans to sell the Lua SDK.
Or TI might only want to make it available to some "trusted" developers, so that they can indirectly control what kind of programs are released.
Or something else...
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I'm sad, but on the other hand happy that I'm not forced to upgrade.
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Except that there are new Nspire users each year, who won't visit Omnimaga or TI-Bank before upgrading.
And that new Nspire calculators are going to come with this new OS preinstalled.
We're in a critic situation.
It's just a matter of time before the calculators still able to run Ndless become a minority.
Nobody will go on developing Ndless programs, if nobody can use them...
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This is horrific news! :'(
I wonder, would it be possible to somehow add a feature to send a file from Goplat's Emulator (with OS 3.0.1) back to the computer to allow direct encryption from the emulator?
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The CX is probably going to come with 3.0.2.
My CX CD has a file named "OS upgrade"
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I don't quite understand how third-party Lua development was a problem to TI to the point of making them spend time and money to block it. Lua is well sandboxed and doesn't threaten calculator stability or press-to-test.
That's what I'm wondering. I see paid apps on the horizon.
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I don't quite understand how third-party Lua development was a problem to TI to the point of making them spend time and money to block it. Lua is well sandboxed and doesn't threaten calculator stability or press-to-test.
That's what I'm wondering. I see paid apps on the horizon.
Maybe.
Check this: http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1109
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If you can send to 3.01 then pull and have it run on 3.02, then it should be pretty feasible to have some website that does that for you.
Of course, we'd need the emulator working on 3.01 first.
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My CX CD has a file named "OS upgrade"
I wouldn't use it if I were you... It will probably brick it or worse prevent Lua
Damn TI they give us a great thing jut to take it away, Lua programs.
On the bright side I did predict that they would prevent downgrading even using TNOC
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It looks like we're back to the drawing boards. Although I bet hacking 3.0.2 might be a little easier than hacking 1.1.
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I'm starting to wonder about paid apps too, but on the other hand I think they're really up to eliminate calc gaming from the TI-Nspire line. It's clear they do, since they immediately retaliated with a stronger anti-downgrade protection after we found out how to bypass it.
If they allows paid apps in Lua, what if they take control of what is released or not? When games get uploaded on their server, they'll reject them all.
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I bet it won't be them hosting it, they'll probably have something like the App-Signing keys, where you buy one and have it for life, but it's expensive, and you need one for each app on the calc. (at least that's how I think it works :P)
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Yeah that could be a possibility too. If it's like in 2000-2003 with 83+ apps, not a lot of people are gonna develop apps for the Nspire...
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I downloaded os 3.0.1 for this reason, but I'm not sure if it is really os 3.0.1. Can you run an OS with the NSpire emulator?
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Yes, but be sure to download the lastest version (0.53 to my mind)
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The anti-downgrade protection is somewhat predictable. They don't want us to downgrade to OS 3.0.1 and brick our calculators: That would mean more expenses for them.
Check this: http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1109
If this tool is released for free then that could be a light at the end of the tunnel for this OS, anyway by now I'll stick with the OS 3.0.1 without boot2 and wait till something really good convinces me to upgrade. By now I can't see any reason since I can downgrade and use ndless again, ndoom was awesome and I don't want to close the doors of playing it forever.
So then is there something new which can make me see this 3.0.2 as a real upgrade?
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So then is there something new which can make me see this 3.0.2 as a real upgrade?
Besides fixing the math bugs of OS 3.0.1 (but those did not exist on earlier OS) versions, no, AFAWCT.
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Man, it is quite painful to read all of this. I don't know what to say... Programming is what truly makes graphing calculators worthwhile.
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I'm hoping someone will make something to counter all this, as we all did before.
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This does suck for all the Nspire owners and for those that put all the hard work into Ndless. Every day I am more and more thankful that I did not waste any money on an Nspire. I'll continue to support the old TI products (Z80 & 68k), and now my sexy new Casio Prizm. =)
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It's on Slashdot!
http://games.slashdot.org/story/11/05/20/0545201/TI-vs-Calculator-Hobbyists-the-Next-Round (http://games.slashdot.org/story/11/05/20/0545201/TI-vs-Calculator-Hobbyists-the-Next-Round)
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The anti-downgrade protection is somewhat predictable. They don't want us to downgrade to OS 3.0.1 and brick our calculators: That would mean more expenses for them.
Check this: http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1109
If this tool is released for free then that could be a light at the end of the tunnel for this OS
As promised in the previous link, more information today:
http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1110
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The anti-downgrade protection is somewhat predictable. They don't want us to downgrade to OS 3.0.1 and brick our calculators: That would mean more expenses for them.
Check this: http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1109
If this tool is released for free then that could be a light at the end of the tunnel for this OS
As promised in the previous link, more information today:
http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1110
I don't understand... In what way is TI involved? And what does "- seul ce qui nous est directement fourni par TI est confidentiel: pour le reste, nous restons entièrement libres d'informer" mean? Google Translate doesn't translate it well.
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The anti-downgrade protection is somewhat predictable. They don't want us to downgrade to OS 3.0.1 and brick our calculators: That would mean more expenses for them.
Check this: http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1109
If this tool is released for free then that could be a light at the end of the tunnel for this OS
As promised in the previous link, more information today:
http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=news&ac=commentaires&id=1110
I don't understand... In what way is TI involved?
Not sure if i can say more about that. I'm going to ask.
But if TI wants a public "clean" documentation about Lua, you should keep hope...
And what does "- seul ce qui nous est directement fourni par TI est confidentiel: pour le reste, nous restons entièrement libres d'informer" mean? Google Translate doesn't translate it well.
Without authorisation, we cannot share anything about what TI sends us (docs, tools...).
We remain totally free to share about things discovered by our own means, or by other people.
(to summarize very shortly...)
For now, this is only valid for Levak, AdRiWeB and me.
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Huh, okay. So the stuff I don't know about is the stuff that TI wants to keep secret...
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Huh, okay. So the stuff I don't know about is the stuff that TI wants to keep secret...
For now, you know as much as us: we haven't received anything yet.
Keep hope about Lua in mid-term!
(unless you manage to "open" it through another way...)
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But the tools from TI should be sent to us soon...
And btw... I don't think that it takes much time to just do like before, with 3.0.1, and when the program is done and releasable, just save it from the software, which is a matter of seconds, and this only have to be done one time...
So it's not *that* bad for devs...
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Yes, but how do we obtain 3.0.1 of the computer software? TI doesn't supply it anymore, and we can't just rehost it - it's commercial software that you need to purchase...
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Yes, but how do we obtain 3.0.1 of the computer software? TI doesn't supply it anymore, and we can't just rehost it - it's commercial software that you need to purchase...
And God invented TI-Bank
http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=archives&ac=cat&id=Utilitaires+PC+Nspire
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Yes, but how do we obtain 3.0.1 of the computer software? TI doesn't supply it anymore, and we can't just rehost it - it's commercial software that you need to purchase...
Unless this has been changed since yesterday evening, the 3.0.1 computer softwares are still hosted on TI web site and linked from TI-Bank.
http://ti.bank.free.fr/index.php?mod=archives&ac=cat&id=Utilitaires+PC+Nspire
Edit: Levak, cheater!!!! :P
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I'm surprised at that. It's great that it's available...
Are we sure that the computer software handles files in the same way as the calc?
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Are we sure that the computer software handles files in the same way as the calc?
Yes, we are :)
At least, no evidence to the contrary has been demonstrated so far, AFAIK.
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That's great. TI fails at blocking once again!
But it's too bad that they seem to have succeeded with the downgrade protection...
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That too. Now if only we could convince all teachers to switch, although I'm sure this would never happen on a worldwide scale D:. It would be nice to see more schools promoting the Prizm, though. Maybe once someone here wrote a math suite including everything the Prizm lacks that is needed.
Qwerty and I are still working on a math suite, but before that happens we've been working more on creating development tools for the Prizm which will ease that process. The expected date of arrival for any development tools I would predict to be around late August and if not then it would be around Christmas break. And I'm stilling working on turning my school away from the dark-side and into the light. I'll be meeting with my school's vice president soon to discuss the possibility of the school changing calculators. To do I will need to find some evidence that TI will cancel the 84+ soon, as in the next 2 years.
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Cancel the 84?!
I have a feeling they may start doing that...
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I hope they don't, because it seems like last year they tried with the 84+SE in some countries. I fear at one point they might do this despite losing sales, just to force everyone to buy softwares to develop games.
Also I saw the TI-BANK news about the secret stuff. I think third-party development for the Nspire will soon require us to pay money to TI, like with TI-83+ Flash apps back in 2000 or so. :/
Of course this might be something else that TI is about to release for testing to TI-BANK admins, but it is very possible that they migth want to introduce a paid SDK to make money from us.
While this would open third-party programming for the Nspire, new problems will arise:
-Not everyone will be able to buy the SDK, due to lack of money or parents disallowing them to buy stuff online. Most developers on Omnimaga are under 18.
-TI might require apps to be uploaded on TI website, giving them full control on their content, meaning if they decide to reject games, then they will.
Also I'm kinda glad the downgrade/Lua protection made Slashdot again. At least TI's actions against developers are being shown outside TI websites now.
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if TI doesn't change how they operate I bet the 8x's will be out of production by 2013 or 2014
I don't think they'll give us anything really usable like the keys.
I say there's a 90% chance they release a paid SDK. 70% chance they ad something so they can choose what apps can be used on calc. something like the upload to their site for the apps to work.
More people need to know the evil monster TI is becoming. Go Casio.
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There's nothing wrong with my TI-86.
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well the TI-84/83's will probably be discontinued soon(a couple years) they offer too many freedoms :P
I hate TI right now
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Yeah. That said, however, teachers often got the last word here. A lot of teachers still recommend the 84+ and it is their favorite calcs. A lot of them would be unhappy if TI discontinued it, and I'm sure they would even protest or threaten to switch to the cheaper Prizm.
Also it's not every parent who want to buy a more expensive TI-Nspire instead of a cheaper TI-83 Plus or TI-84 Plus... I myself was already unhappy about shelling away $159.99 for my 83+ a decade ago, even though I almost marriedlove the calc, because I spent an entire year saving for it...
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I hate TI right now
^this ++
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Man if my maths teacher heard about how they are forcing anti downgrade and the rest, he would be shocked at the actions from TI. He definitely prefers the 84+, as it is so hard to work out how to do things on an TI-nspire. The 84+ has it all you need for maths, and the way they're going with releasing not two, not four, but now six different versions of Ti-nspire shows they're really pushing the pace for the whole ti market to be dominated by 50 gazillion versions of ti-nspire and nothing else for more creative calculators.
Personally i don't think that the cx was really a satisfactory response to the release of the Prizm, as the incompetence of much of the os system is still there in version 3.0, they just tried to patch up their mistakes with colour.
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Man if my maths heard about how they are forcing anti downgrade and the rest, he would be shocked at the actions from TI. He definitely prefers the 84+, as it is so hard to work out how to do things on an TI-nspire. The 84+ has it all you need for maths, and the way they're going with releasing not two, not four, but now six different versions of Ti-nspire shows they're really pushing the pace for the whole ti market to be dominated by 50 gazillion versions of ti-nspire and nothing else for more creative calculators.
Personally i don't think that the cx was really a satisfactory response to the release of the Prizm, as the incompetence of much of the os system is still there in version 3.0, they just tried to patch up their mistakes with colour.
And on top of that they did not even get the color screen right.
1) See Yunhua's thread: The screen sometimes glitches
2) In most calculator areas, barely any color was used. Sometimes, it's just grayscale aside from the battery status icon.
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is there any chance to run ndless in OS 3.0 in any term?
do you think TI left any hole which can be exploited?
can the emulator run OS 3.0.2?
EDIT: post 40!!! i can chat with you now :D
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{yes, no} and {yes}.
In other words, ExtendeD is working on it.
And why does the OS 3.0.2 can't run in the emulator ?
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I didn't tested it on the emulator I was kinda asking if anyone did...
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can the emulator run OS 3.0.2?
Yes. However, the boot2 updater now reboots if the boot2 version you're using is less than the one included with the OS, which means you must either remove the boot2 update with TNOC, or use boot2 3.01 (which requires that you also use boot1 and use emulator version 0.53 or above)
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And on top of that they did not even get the color screen right.
1) See Yunhua's thread: The screen sometimes glitches
They didn't get the grayscale screen right either - I think Jim said that the glitch is on the normal Nspire too... (Might've been Stefan, though)
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can the emulator run OS 3.0.2?
Yes. However, the boot2 updater now reboots if the boot2 version you're using is less than the one included with the OS, which means you must either remove the boot2 update with TNOC, or use boot2 3.01 (which requires that you also use boot1 and use emulator version 0.53 or above)
How do you get the boot 1?
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Apparently, according to TI-Bank, the Ndless blog says that he'll be doing something to open up Ndless to Lua.
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Hmm that would be nice. Apparently it might be possible to use Lua to launch Ndless too.
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Apparently it might be possible to use Lua to launch Ndless too.
maybe that's what pianoman meant.
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I hope we get Lua on the CX's soon. I think it might be a good idea to make any ndless backwards compatible also(maybe seperate code ofr color...)
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Lua IS on the cx.
Check out psydelic tunnel by apcalc
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I'd still like to have a ndless like program on it for C development
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Yeah it would be nice to still have ASM/C, since Lua is much slower than them, thus, no nDoom is possible.
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It looks liek TI is sending out emails to whoever they see hasn't upgraded yet
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It looks liek TI is sending out emails to whoever they see hasn't upgraded yet
Spamalot?!/me hopes TI can't see him.
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It looks liek TI is sending out emails to whoever they see hasn't upgraded yet
O.O
I hope they don't start spamming people until they do... wouldn't that be illegal?
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WAT!
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That would be in-awesome thing.
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I'm not upgrading till There is a ay to downgrade again. I like my CAS(OSLauncher) calc.
I'mnot sure if it would be illegal. I think they sent tit to me because I haven't downloaded it using my account
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What aren't you sure is legal?
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sending out emails to users they haven't registered as downloading OS 3.02 many times like spam. I think it might be considered harassment
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sending out emails to users they haven't registered as downloading OS 3.02 many times like spam. I think it might be considered harassment
Yeah... knowing the US's legal system, they could easily lose a lawsuit because of that (yes, I am a proud cynic).
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they haven't sent me a second one so I think they are safe. Its probably just a one time thing for they don't have registered as having downloaded the new OS