Leon has just informed me that version 1.0 of Galleon has been released. Here’s a copy of the email he sent me.

The Galleon 1.0.0 media server for TiVo is now available at:
http://galleon.sourceforge.net

Galleon is a free open source media server for TiVo? which allows you to enjoy many kinds of content and interactive applications right on your TV. The server runs on your home computer and organizes your media collection so that they can be viewed on your home network. Galleon also brings Internet content and applications to your TV.

Winner of the “Most Creative Application” in the TiVo Developer Challenge:

The Galleon software runs on your PC and hosts applications that can be viewed and controlled on your TiVo. Here are some examples of what the Galleon applications will let you do on your TiVo:

1. Play MP3 files using your favorite Winamp skins.
2. View your photo collection using many slideshow effects.
3. View interesting information about each MP3 file such as album covers, lyrics and web images of your favorite artists.
4. Listen to online streaming radio stations including Shoutcast stations.
5. Organize your media files in many flexible ways.
6. Play your favorite playlists including iTunes playlists.
7. View local weather forecasts and alerts.
8. View internet webcams.
9. Read your email.
10. Read your favorite RSS feeds.
11. Automatically download recordings from your TiVo using keywords.
12. Automatically download your favorite podcasts.
13. Change the look-and-feel of Galleon by using your own skins.

Here are some screenshots of the current version:

This version includes a Windows installation wizard which will install Galleon as a service.

Your TiVo needs to be running at least version 7.1 software.

Once again, I would like congratulate all of the HME Developer challenge winners. Leon has done a great job with Galleon. Download this version and let him know what you think.

The winners of the TiVo developer challenge have been announced! Congratulations to all the winners. Here’s a summary of the results:

• Music Monkey
  Best Music Application
• Flickr
  Best Photo Application
• NBC Trivia
  Best Game Application
• Digital Home
  Best Information Application
• Galleon
  Most Creative Application
• AudioFaucet
  Grand Prize Application

Unfortunately I haven’t had an opportunity to try out each of these apps. As a matter of fact, the only app that I’ve used out of this bunch is Galleon.

TiVo is offering a really great deal for anybody who is looking for a TiVo. If you purchase a 12 month gift subscription ($155.40) or a lifetime subscription ($299.00), TiVo will throw in a 40 hr factory-renewed TiVo for free! To top it off, they will even pay for shipping ($17). If you are going to do this, you better act quickly. You must purchase the TiVo by 7/15 and it must be activated by 7/31.

BTW, if you decide to take advantage of this offer, I would appreciate it you give me the referral (raianoat AT gmail DOT com).

This happened awhile ago however; I forgot to mention it on this blog. Being the big geek that I am, I decided to try out VoIP. Since my cable company doesn’t offer VoIP with their cable service, I went with Vonage as my provider. Unfortunately, I ran into problems right away. For some reason, my phone conversation was constantly being dropped. I narrowed the problem down to the fact that my internet connection was loosing packets like crazy. Using this information I tried to call my cable company (Adelphia) however; they were of no help. Since the packets were dropping off somewhere outside of my local area, they were unable to help me with the problem. Needless to say, I had to get rid of my VoIP connection and go back to the regular landline. When I went back to the landline, I ran into another problem. Since I cancelled my Vonage service while I was in the process of transferring my number, I lost my phone number! At first, I was disappointed that I had lost my number.

Like the big geek that I am, I decided to turn this problem into another geek adventure. When I established my new number, I asked the operator for something that ended in 8486. In case you haven’t caught on, 8486 spells TiVo. So, now I have a new number XXX-8486! Yes that’s correct, I am so addicted to TiVo that I switched my number so that it spells out TiVo. I know it is sad but it is true ;).

Happy Father’s day to all you Dads out there. This is an especially important Father’s day for me since it is my first :). Today I plan on spending a couple of hours catching up on a Yankees TiVo recording from yesterday. My son, who is only 4 months old, is already a Yankees fan. I bet you were wondering how I was going to incorporate TiVo into this post.

On a some what related note, TiVo recently announced the top 25 TV Dads of all time. Here is an article which talks about the survey.

I was as excited as anyone was when I received the email from TiVo promising me a refurb 40-Tivo box for the price of 12 mos. service. The email even said that because I was adding a TiVo, my Multi-Unit Discount would bring the cost down to $6.95. A TiVo for 83.40? Hell yeah.

A quick call to the mothership showed my math was right, but the e-mail was a little ambiguous. The $6.95/mo. would kick in at month 13. My $83.40 TiVo actually costs $155.40. It’s still a pretty good deal, but I’d advise any readers who get any kind of TiVo-originated sales mail to call 1-800-GET-TIVO to ensure the deal is what the email makes you think it is.

Peace, love and TiVo-ness,

Webslog

In case you did not know, TiVo offers a number of remote control tricks that make your the device do a number of different things. Up until now, the only trick that I’ve really ever used was the “SELECT-PLAY-SELECT-9-SELECT” key combination. This trick causes TiVo to display a clock in the lower right hand corner of the screen. I’ve found that this trick is extremely useful, especially since I no longer have a VCR to display the current time.

For other handy remote control tricks, head on over to PCWorld and PVRWire. Both of these sites have taken the time to list some useful tricks that you may not have known about. I especially like being able to delete my TiVo recordings without having to select each show and manually delete it.

According to this article, TiVo and Intel are going to team up to offer TiVoToGo functionality to Intel Centrino users. I’m not exactly sure what this news means since TiVoToGo technology has been out since January ‘05. The article states that:

Users of TiVo’s personal video recorders will be able to transfer recorded television content to Centrino notebooks using pre-installed software. Notebook users will then to take the programming with them while traveling, he said.

What does this mean? I have been transferring TiVo recordings to my laptop ever since TiVoToGo came out. Is this just another attempt at repackaging an already existing piece of technology in order to attract new customers? Are TiVo and Intel going to release their own version of TiVoDesktop? I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Weblogsinc, the creator of Engadget and many other successful blogs, has decided to create their very own PVR blog. The site, PVRWire, looks to be very promising. If PVRWire ends up being anything like Weblogsinc’s other sites then it will be a great success. Good luck PVRWire!