The Colecovision console from the early 1980s is probably not the most memorable platform of its era, but it retains a retrocomputing following to this day. The original hardware can be a bit pricey in 2023, so [nanochess] has built one of his own on a breadboard. It’s fully functional from original Colecovision cartridges, and we see it in the video below the break running Frogger.
Behind the mess of wires is a surprisingly simple circuit with only a few logic chips beyond the Z80 processor, the various memory and EPROM chips, and the video and sound chips. We’re told the complexity is considerably reduced by the use of a Texas Instruments TMS9118 video controller instead of a 9918.
Had we been building it we would probably have taken the less brave step of using color coded wires for the various signals, because we remember the fun and games associated with wiring old-style 8-bit computers by hand only too well. But we have to admit that it reminds us of a lost youth working out Z80 address decoder schematics, so it’s very pleasing to see one built today.
If you’re hungry for more Coleco goodness, this isn’t the first home made Colecovision we’ve brought you.
Microsoft is adding the AI-powered Bing search directly to the Windows 11 taskbar.
Its Phone Link app also finally supports iOS devices bringing iMessage to Windows PCs.
Microsoft has published a blog post announcing new features coming to Windows. The first significant update is AI integration on Windows 11, and the second is iOS support for its Phone Link app. Let’s dive deeper.
Microsoft’s heavy investment in OpenAI has borne many fruits for the company, starting with ChatGPT’s AI skills coming to Bing, Edge, and Teams. Now, Microsoft is bringing its new AI directly to Windows PCs. For ease of use, the software giant is implementing a typable Windows search box with the capabilities of the new AI-powered Bing directly into the Windows 11 taskbar.
“The search box is one of the most widely used features on Windows, with over half a billion users every month, and now with the typable Windows search box and the new AI-powered Bing front and center to this experience, you will be empowered to find the answers you’re looking for, faster than ever before,” Microsoft wrote in its blog.
If you’re in the Bing preview, all you’ll need to do is install the latest Windows 11 update to access the new AI-powered search box. You can join the preview waitlist if you want to try out the new Bing.
iMessage on Windows
In another significant update, Microsoft announced that its Phone Link app finally supports iOS devices. That means you can finally access iMessage on your Windows PC. You can also receive calls and notifications from your iOS device on a Windows device using the app.
The Verge explains that Microsoft is using Bluetooth to link Windows devices to iPhones. This allows the Windows device to communicate messages to the user’s messaging app, in this case, iMessage. However, there are some limits. You cannot join group conversations on iMessage or send images. iMessage conversations will be shown in a simplified form.
You also won’t be able to view the entire message history in iMessage conversations. Only messages sent or received using the Phone Link app will be displayed.
“We send the messages back and forth via Bluetooth. Apple, I think, in turn, sends those as iMessage once it gets onto their system,” explains Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft’s head of consumer marketing, in an interview with The Verge.
Having trouble solving Wordle #620 on March 1, 2023? We have the answer to today’s Wordle right here. However, before you start guessing, you might want to check out our Wordle tips for some techniques and starting words that could help you solve it yourself, in record time. Then, if you’re still having trouble, circle back here for the answer to today’s Wordle.
How Wordle works
Wordle is a vocabulary game in which players get six tries to guess a five-letter word. Once you enter a guess, individual letters within the word you entered will appear in different colors. Each color has a different meaning.
Green: The letter entered is 100% correct — the right letter in the right space.
Yellow: The entered letter is in the correct word, but you’ve placed it in the wrong space.
Gray: The entered letter is not used in today’s Wordle answer, so it’s time to go back to the drawing board.
The goal is to guess the correct word in as few attempts as possible. If you don’t get the answer in six guesses, you lose.
Best Wordle starting words
You might be able to jump right into Wordle but actually winning is another story. You only get a total of six attempts to solve the daily puzzle, and there’s only one puzzle per day. If you don’t manage to solve it in that amount of guesses, you have to wait until the next day to try again with the next word. If you want to maximize your chances of solving your daily puzzle, here are tried and true tips, and best starting words, for Wordle.
The most important guess is your first. You want to get as many green and yellow letters here as possible to help guide your future guesses. The most important letters to get started with are vowels — A, E, I, O, and U — so words containing as many of these as possible are a great start. Some popular starting words people have had good luck with are “adieu,” “media,” “arise,” and “radio.” Just make sure not to pick a word with double letters, to get as much new info as possible.
Your second word, assuming that the first one gave you a good jumping-off point, should begin to lean more heavily on common consonants like R, S, and T. More good ones here we’ve seen are “stern,” “irate,” and “atone.” This is where things will vary due to each day being a different solution, but you never want to reuse any letters from a prior round that showed up as gray. It may push you to think a little harder to come up with a word, but there’s nothing to be gained from using a letter you know isn’t in the answer.
Finally, keep in mind that words can have a duplicate letter. These words are the toughest to get, but also aren’t super common. If you get to the final round or two and are stumped, it’s a great thing to keep in mind.
And remember: As of November 2022, plural words that simply add an “es” or “s” to a singular word will not be valid answers anymore; for example “boats” and “foxes” cannot be a Wordle answer anymore. Other plurals like “fungi” or “geese” will still be valid. Crucially, all five-letter dictionary words are still valid to guess and get yellow or green letters from, but that doesn’t mean they’re available as a future solution. Other than that, just have fun with it!
Hints for today’s Wordle
Today’s Wordle starts with the letter M.
Today’s Wordle uses the same vowel twice.
Today’s Wordle is an animal.
wachiwit – stock.adobe.com
What’s today’s Wordle Answer?
Are you still having trouble? No worries — you can’t get them all! If you just want to see today’s Wordle answer to continue your streak, you can find it below.
The answer to today’s Wordle is …
MOOSE
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It’s the beginning of March, and that can only mean one thing: March Madness is around the corner.
It’s that time of the year when we buckle down for some serious basketball season research and begin filling out our brackets with the foolish hope that our No. 1 pick isn’t going to get knocked out in the first round by a Cinderella team. We put so much attention on the NCAA Basketball Tournament that a 2022 study by WalletHub found that distracted employees cost employers nearly $14 billion each year.
Yeah, it’s a pretty big deal, which is why Google is welcoming the tournament and all the associated madness with a Yoodle marking the very first slam dunk in basketball’s history. (A Yoodle is kind of like Google’s famous Doodle, only it’s animated and appears on YouTube instead.)
The Yoodle, which features a pair of players squaring off in a one-on-one game, commemorates the 87th anniversary later this month of the first slam dunk in the sport’s history. It occurred at the West Side YMCA in New York on March 9, 1936, when two American teams were competing to decide which would be sailing to Berlin for the Olympic debut of the sport invented just 45 years earlier by James Naismith.
The shot by Joe Fortenberry, a 6-foot-8 center for the Oilers of McPherson, Kansas, left observers “simply flabbergasted,” wrote Arthur J. Daley, a reporter for The New York Times, who was covering the game that night. Fortenberry “left the floor, reached up and pitched the ball downward into the hoop, much like a cafeteria customer dunking a roll in coffee,” Daley wrote, unwittingly giving the iconic move its name. The Oilers would go on to win the game, as well as the gold medal in Berlin.
But not everyone was impressed, and the NCAA actually banned the dunk in 1967, reasoning that it “was not a skillful shot,” and one that could result in injuries. Others speculated the ban was enacted because UCLA’s Lew Alcindor (later known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) regularly dunked over his opponents during his freshman year in college, leading many to refer to the ban as the “Lew Alcindor Rule.”
Alcindor rejected the NCAA’s explanation, suggesting the ban was more rooted in racism.
“To me the new ‘no-dunk’ rule smacks a little of discrimination,” he told the Chicago Defender at the time. “When you look at it … most of the people who dunk are Black athletes.”
The ban, which never reached the NBA, lasted a decade before it was repealed, apparently due in no small way to its popularity among fans. And its popularity continues to grow. In 2022, YouTube videos featuring slam dunks scored 9 billion views, a 25% increase over the previous year, according to Google.
The most-viewed video related to slam dunks features basketball great Michael Jordan. The video, Michael Jordan Top 50 All Time Plays, has wracked up more than 91 million views in the past 10 years. Filling out the list of players players with the most all-time viewership related to slam dunks are LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Stephen Curry and Shaquille O’Neal.
But as popular as the slam dunk is on YouTube, one-on-one (or 1v1) is still pretty popular. Google reports that basketball videos with “1v1” in the title brought in more than 195 million views in 2022. Some of YouTube’s most popular channels with “1v1” in the title include Professor Live, Jesser, Ballislife, Jeffrey Bui and CashNasty, among others.
The drama on Syfy’s The Ark is heating up as the remaining members of Ark One fight to stay on course and complete their mission, as is evident in an exclusive clip from the upcoming fifth episode titled One Step Forward, Two Steps Back.
In the clip, Lt. Spencer Lane (The Outpost’s Reece Ritchie) confronts Lt. Sharon Garnet (Maid’s Christie Burke) over the shocking revelation that she is a clone. Lane demands Garnet to relinquish command, but Garnet refuses, believing she is still the best person to command the ship. The official logline for the fifth episode reads, “As a radiation leak sparks a crisis, there’s a break in the murder investigation. Someone will have to sacrifice themselves for any hope of survival.”
Watch the exclusive footage below.
On a colonization mission set 100 years in the future, the crew aboard Ark One experience a disastrous event one year away from reaching its destination. The event leads to the deaths of many high-ranking officials and others. Three lieutenants — Garnet, Lane, and James Brice (The Sandman’s Richard Fleeshman) — must act quickly to save the remaining members of Ark One and continue with their mission.
The Ark is created by Dean Devlin (Independence Day) and Jonathan Glassner (Stargate SG-1). When Digitial Trends spoke with the creators and cast, Fleeshman discussed the idea of leadership and the fight to be in charge as a pivotal storyline that would develop throughout the first season.
“There’s a little echo of Game of Thrones fighting for the chair,” Fleeshman said. “Throughout the series, the captain’s chair remains vacant for an awfully long time, maybe indefinitely. It’s always the pride of place in the bridge. It’s kind of in the background. Everybody’s got their eye on the prize.”
THE ARK — “One Step Forward, Two Steps Back” Episode 105 — Pictured: (l-r) Richard Fleeshman as Lt. James Brice, Reece Ritchie as Lt. Spencer Lane, Tiana Upcheva as Eva Markovic, Stacey Read as Alicia Nevins, Christie Burke as Lt. Sharon Garnet — (Photo by: Aleksandar Letic/Ark TV Holdings, Inc./SYFY)
The fifth episode of The Ark airs at 10 p.m. ET on Wednesday, March 1, on Syfy. You can stream it the next day on Peacock.
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