So, What’s up. It seems that Everybody is busy after The Eid!

Anyway, Here are some information about the technologies that will be used in development on the Playstation 3 Game Console. It seems that Sony are aiming for the Mainstream this time. Both Professional and Casual game developers will have their moments because most of the Technologies used are based on Current and Future Open source SDKs and APIs that are available for free or affordable in the market.

The list of open standards includes:
* Cg, Nvidia's C-like shading language.
* COLLADA, an open, XML-based file format for 3D models.
* OpenGL ES 2.0, the embedded version of the popular OpenGL graphics API.
* OpenMAX, a collection of fast, cross-platform tools for general "media acceleration," such as matrix calculations.
* OpenVG, for hardware-accelerated 2D vector graphics.

Sublicensed technologies includes:
* Ageia's PhysX SDK, NovodeX.
* Epic's Unreal engine 3.0 framework.
* Havok's physics and animation engines.
* Pixelux's Game Asset Synthesis Technology [7]
* Alias Systems Corporation's 3D graphics programs [8]

The list of standards they are reported to be considering includes:

* IPv6, the next generation of the Internet Protocol. [9]

I would like to know your thoughts about any of the above.
For the Complete article check: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3

By the way, The Ps3 will come with a preinstalled version of Linux on its Hardisk.
( I wish Nintendo did the same but I doubt they will ever do)

من الواضح اهتمامهم بدعم محركات الـ Physics بشكل أكبر...
أعتقد أننا سنشهد ألعاب جديدة بأنظمة simulation تضاهي تلك المستخدمة في الأفلام.

هل خانني فهمي أم أن ما استنتجته حقيقة؟
أن أدوات التطوير للـ PS3 ستكون مفتوحة للعموم؟

Actually You will still need the Full and Official SDK from sony Which costs several thousand dollars to develop games for the PS3. Developpers will use these Standard Open Technologies to create Software on the machine for simplifying the process.

This is good news for Hobbiests becasue they can learn these technologies an build Homebrew software.

ده كلام جميل جداً.
يعني ممكن تجيب الـ ODE وتعمل عليه برامج، وبكده انت بتتمرن على نفس الأدوات اللي موجودة في الـ PlayStation3...

سؤال (يمكن غبي شوية). هو نظام التشغيل للـ PS3 إيه؟
Linux؟ WinCE؟

Linux.

IBM and Sony are now supporting Linux developers by providing them with information about the hardware specs of the PS3 especially the Cell processor.

I think that sony wants to make a cult machine which you can create and distribute software on it freely ( I hope so ) and have Commercial Pro. games released like MGS4 and FF13.

This is getting better and better.

Recently, IBM has released the Cell Broadband Engine (Cell BE)
Software Development Kit. Including full Compilers, debuggers , tools,
samples and documentation that you can download and use right away to
develop applications targeted for the CELL processor (which is the heart of the PS3). To test your code, you will be able to use the IBM Full System Simulator for the CELL Broadband engine processor, Which is a real Hardware emulator for
the CELL CPU with memory management.

Think of this SDK as the official Dev kit for the playstation 3.
Just write the code, Compile run on the simulator, Burn to a CD and
Pop in the Playstation 3 and voila!

Check the following links for more information and downloading links of all the needed tools.
- Cell Broadband Engine resource center:
http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/power/cell/index.html

- Sony's GDC seminar presentation:
http://www.research.scea.com/research/html/CellGDC05/index.html

- Wikipidia's Playstation 3 article. From here you can get full details
and information about the system:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playstation_3

- A good resource and starting point for PS3 development:
http://ps3dev.info

One more thing, You will need a Linux Fedora Core 4 System in order to use this SDK. Which means if you are not used to Linux you need to start learning now.