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Hobbyist CNCDan is trying to build a real-world version of Windows' classic 3D Pinball for Windows -- Space Cadet, using 3D-printed flippers, bumpers, LEDs, slingshots, and a raised playfield modeled after the original virtual table. But in bringing the digital table into the real world, CNCDan has already run into several physical challenges the software never had to contend with... Ars Technica reports: After scaling and skewing the on-screen, perspective-shifted view of the Space Cadet playfield onto a 1-meter-tall table, he ended up with a rectangular playfield just 56 cm wide. That's on the smaller side for commercial pinball tables and maps to playfield bumpers that are just 53 mm wide -- way smaller than any prebuilt bumpers that are commercially available.
Once CNCDan dealt with issues with unreliable plastic microswitches for those tiny bumpers (Hall effect magnets seemed to help), he ran into a separate problem with the even smaller bumpers on the raised playfield. The wiring for those bumpers had to be arranged very carefully to avoid blocking a kickback return alley underneath, a positioning problem that the original designers of the virtual table didn't have to consider at all. CNCDan also ended up adding a physical mechanism to simulate the short delay 3D Space Cadet players may remember, when the ball dropped down a hole from the raised playfield back to the flippers below.
CNCDan says he's currently looking for artists to help him with a hand-drawn re-creation of the original Space Cadet playfield, which he doesn't want to use AI for. "I'm sure [AI] can do it, but I'd much rather give this job to a real human being," he said in the video.
Once CNCDan dealt with issues with unreliable plastic microswitches for those tiny bumpers (Hall effect magnets seemed to help), he ran into a separate problem with the even smaller bumpers on the raised playfield. The wiring for those bumpers had to be arranged very carefully to avoid blocking a kickback return alley underneath, a positioning problem that the original designers of the virtual table didn't have to consider at all. CNCDan also ended up adding a physical mechanism to simulate the short delay 3D Space Cadet players may remember, when the ball dropped down a hole from the raised playfield back to the flippers below.
CNCDan says he's currently looking for artists to help him with a hand-drawn re-creation of the original Space Cadet playfield, which he doesn't want to use AI for. "I'm sure [AI] can do it, but I'd much rather give this job to a real human being," he said in the video.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: Internet access has started to be restored in Iran after being cut off almost three months ago, the country's first vice-president has said. "The first step toward free and regulated access to cyberspace has been taken," Mohammad Reza Aref wrote on X on Tuesday. Internet monitoring groups Netblocks and Kentik reported "partial" restoration around 13:00 GMT, though the latter warned most networks were still down.
The Iranian government cut internet access following the launch of US and Israeli attacks on February 28. Officials suggested the aim was to prevent surveillance, espionage and cyber-attacks. It is one of the longest-running national internet shutdowns ever recorded worldwide. A content creator from Tehran told the BBC that he had been able to connect to the internet using his home WiFi on Tuesday. "The main point is, some of my income will come back," he said.
Netblocks said it was unclear whether the internet return would be sustained, and told the BBC it was consistent with what it had seen when previous blackouts were lifted -- where restoration could take hours. "Access is not universally back to its original state, with some regional variation," said the global internet tracker's research director Isik Mater on Tuesday. She added that there were signs of "more extensive filtering" than prior to January -- when a similar blackout was imposed during the regime's deadly crackdown on anti-government protests -- "including additional restrictions to messaging apps like WhatsApp."
The Iranian government cut internet access following the launch of US and Israeli attacks on February 28. Officials suggested the aim was to prevent surveillance, espionage and cyber-attacks. It is one of the longest-running national internet shutdowns ever recorded worldwide. A content creator from Tehran told the BBC that he had been able to connect to the internet using his home WiFi on Tuesday. "The main point is, some of my income will come back," he said.
Netblocks said it was unclear whether the internet return would be sustained, and told the BBC it was consistent with what it had seen when previous blackouts were lifted -- where restoration could take hours. "Access is not universally back to its original state, with some regional variation," said the global internet tracker's research director Isik Mater on Tuesday. She added that there were signs of "more extensive filtering" than prior to January -- when a similar blackout was imposed during the regime's deadly crackdown on anti-government protests -- "including additional restrictions to messaging apps like WhatsApp."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Race had wide implications for Trump’s strength heading into midterms, where Paxton will face Democratic candidate James Talarico
Ken Paxton, the Donald Trump-backed Texas attorney general, triumphed over incumbent John Cornyn in the Republican primary runoff for senator. His victory signals that even a scandal-plagued candidate can win over the deep red state with the support of the president.
“After a public service career lasting more than four decades and 18 consecutive campaign wins, tonight we’ve come up short in this primary runoff,” Cornyn said shortly after the race was called. “I’ve always supported the GOP ticket. I intend to do so again this general election.”
Continue reading...Their influence is evident in every corner of society, the imperial family owns some, and Tokyo even has its own ‘cat town’
Feline features stare out from the covers of umpteen novels, they have an officially designated day devoted to their mystique and popularity, and have outnumbered dogs as pets for a decades.
The influence of cats is evident across every corner of Japanese society, with a recent report crediting them with generating an expected ¥3tn ($18.8bn) in value to the Japanese economy this year – a phenomenon dubbed “catnomics”.
Continue reading...While approval is due soon for $14bn deal, actual deliveries to Taiwan are years away – making ‘Operation Epic Fury’ in the Gulf an unlikely cause
The Trump administration’s war against Iran should have no impact on arms sales to Taiwan, experts have said, after a US official suggested a pause in the delivery of a key weapons package was due to the Gulf conflict.
Analysts told the Guardian that a $14bn arms package left in limbo after Donald Trump’s meeting with Xi Jinping could take up to six years to process, and there was a “low likelihood” of any true connection between events in Iran and weapons delivery to Taiwan.
Continue reading...Central bank and commercial institutions would arm themselves under new law; anger at UN over Russian threats to embassies. What we know on day 1,554
The Russian government has told top banks including its federal reserve that they should shoot down Ukrainian drones themselves, as well as handling the costs. It comes as Moscow struggles to defend key sites on its vast territory against Ukrainian attacks that have forced Russia to cluster its air defence in some areas, including Moscow, leaving it spread extremely thin or nonexistent elsewhere. Kyiv’s forces have targeted infrastructure and equipment within Russia used to either carry out or fund the war – from ships, planes and airfields to oil refineries, depots and pipelines, natural gas networks and factories that make military electronics and explosives.
Reuters reports that the Russian parliament has passed a law allowing the banks including Russia’s biggest, Sberbank, and other financial institutions to operate defence systems and arm staff against drones without special forces involvement. They would handle the cost themselves, Anatoly Aksakov, the head of the State Duma’s financial committee, was quoted as saying by the RBC news outlet. Alexander Shokhin, head of Russia’s most powerful business lobby, on Monday told Vladimir Putin that companies were prepared to buy heavier weapons and electronic systems to defend themselves against drone attacks.
Almost 50 countries at the United Nations have condemned what they said were “threats by Russia to diplomatic institutions and embassies in Kyiv”. “This is something which we cannot accept,” said a joint statement signed by European countries, Japan, South Korea and others. The EU also lashed out, saying it had no plans to move its staff. Germany and Norway summoned Russia’s ambassadors to deliver reprimands.
Russia announced on Monday that it had started a campaign of “systematic” strikes on Kyiv that would target the Ukrainian capital’s “decision-making centres” and urged foreign citizens and diplomats “to leave the city as soon as possible”, as well as for Kyiv residents to avoid public buildings. Ukraine has called the threats “blackmail” and encouraged its allies to ignore the warning, which they largely have.
The Czech Republic’s initiative to arrange large-calibre ammunition supplies to Ukraine has contracts to deliver around a million rounds in 2026, the Czech defence ministry has announced. Officials said it delivered about 1.5m rounds in 2024 and 1.8m last year. It came close to cancellation when the new Czech prime minister, Andrej Babis, and his anti-Ukrainian partners entered government together in December 2024, but he kept the project running under pressure from foreign allies. The Czech president, Petr Pavel, is a staunch supporter of Ukraine and its defence against Russian aggression.
The ammunition initiative matches foreign donor countries, such as Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany and others, together with Czech arms traders seeking supplies from around the world. Funding has also come from the yield on frozen Russian assets provided by the European Commission. The ministry said financing of “nearly €1bn euros” had been secured so far this year. The amount this year may still rise if more donors deliver funding, the ministry added, or if Ukraine uses funds from the EU’s €90bn loan for Kyiv. Babis has rejected any further Czech financial contribution, which had been a small fraction of the overall amount but had symbolic value.
Continue reading...A behind-the-scenes second world war drama focused on the importance of weather is too stodgy and repetitive to work as anything but a so-so TV movie
In a world of increasingly segmented audiences, the new movie Pressure cleverly brings together two adjacent demographics: weather dads and history dads. Those designations are honorifics, not gender-essentialist; spiritually dad-curious people of all ages (but, let’s be real: mostly over 50) may be interested in a behind-the-scenes story set in the last few days leading up to the allied invasion of Normandy in June 1944. Because this is the largest-scale seaborne invasion ever mounted, weather is a major factor, and the movie follows military higher-ups as they work around the clock trying to figure out whether a possible incoming storm will create unfavorable or impossible conditions.
To put it in contemporary terms, this is essentially a movie about Dwight Eisenhower (Brendan Fraser) nervously refreshing his weather app to see if he needs to change his upcoming plans. The weather app is played by Andrew Scott. Scott’s actual character is James Stagg, a somewhat brusque and chilly Scotsman brought in to the D-day planning as the operation’s chief meteorological officer. Stagg quickly clashes with the American Irving Krick (Chris Messina), who knows that D-day is crucial and time is of the essence – and is therefore bullish about (selectively) using past data to “predict” that the storms will quickly pass. Stagg’s analysis is far less optimistic. Anyone who has held tickets to a forecast-dependent outdoor concert will relate.
Continue reading...Fourth Paddington film will be written by Iannucci and Simon Blackwell, who wrote with Iannucci on The Thick of It, In The Loop and Veep
Paddington is about to develop a particularly hard stare, with The Thick of It and Veep creator Armando Iannucci set to write the bear’s next cinematic adventure.
Variety reported on Tuesday that the fourth Paddington film will be written by Iannucci and his longtime collaborator Simon Blackwell, who wrote with Iannucci on The Thick of It, In The Loop and Veep.
Continue reading...
‘Grote akkoorden’ wil Rob Jetten niet sluiten met Gidi Markuszower, die opriep tot geweld. Maar wat dat waard is, is nog onduidelijk: ook met andere partijen zijn die er nog lang niet. In de Tweede Kamer ging het dinsdagavond verder vooral over FVD. „Hoe góór wil je het hebben”, roept CDA-leider Bontenbal.
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PARAMARIBO (ANP) - KLM-vlucht KL714 van Paramaribo naar Amsterdam is dinsdag kort na vertrek vanaf de Johan Adolf Pengel-luchthaven in Suriname niet rechtstreeks naar Schiphol gevlogen, maar eerst uitgeweken naar Frans-Guyana om bij te tanken. Dat schrijft de Surinaamse nieuwssite Waterkant.
KLM liet passagiers volgens de nieuwssite in een officieel bericht weten dat de vlucht was gewijzigd, omdat er minder brandstof beschikbaar was. Daardoor moest een korte tussenstop worden gemaakt in Cayenne, waarna de reis naar Amsterdam zou worden voortgezet.
Door de onverwachte stop liep de rechtstreekse verbinding tussen Suriname en Nederland vertraging op.
