Software development, startups and personal improvement.
Wow, it’s been eight years since I posted to Tumblr. And I’ve been thinking back about my passion and focus on tech. Has anything really changed since then? Let’s see. Apple - I’m dug in even deeper than ever. I buy a new iPhone every couple of years - and they are pretty much the same. I still have an iPad and I still can’t use it for anything serious - part…
The more I think about the design of the new Air Pods the more like it. Not necessarily the design itself, but the idea of it. It looks like something that Steve would have been involved with. I can imagine him walking down the hall, past marketing, past design, and going straight into the engineering department. I can see him waving a pair of tangled Ear Pods around in the air and then…
I should have known once I saved up for a new MBP there wouldn’t actually be any new model to buy. The rumors said March, then they said June. I’m not impressed with the quality of the rumor / leaks these days.
What do you call a mobile device that lets you access the web, run apps, take pictures, communicate over video / voice / text, make payments, track location, etc? Don’t tell me it is called a smart ‘phone’. A device like that has about as much in common with a telephone as my laptop does with a typewriter. Maybe it’s just a mood, but I don’t actually feel like calling it my ‘phone’ anymore.…
What's behind Amazon’s baffling decision to ban Apple TV and Chromecast? : Ok, Amazon’s decision to stop selling Apple TV and Google’s chrome cast at first glance really looks like some sort of elementary school yard tantrum. On second look I think I’m just as confused as anyone, and just as curious to know what is really going on. That whole “it will confuse customers” nonsense is pure crap. I…
More musings on a larger iPad
I hear good things about Filmic and I’ve tried over the years to use it / like it, but I never get good results. I have some filming to do with the 6+ today so I thought I’d run a few experiments with filmic before I go. Some observations: I can’t figure out the difference between standard and cinematic stabilization. The manual doesn’t help, the web site doesn’t help. I ran my own experiments and…
I can’t be the only one trying to figure this out. How cool is it that you can have access to all of your photos on your phone without having to take up all of that space? That is the promise of iCloud Photo’s optimize space option. Apple is supposed to be Smart about freeing up the image cache when you start running out of space. But they don’t give you anyway to manually trigger this cleaning.…
“Smart guys with beards…”
I’m not sure i understand the direction they are going the just announced that coming soon you will be able to create office docs from your phone. Wow just what I was waiting for. Not! It seems they are hard to be Google disc. No thanks i already have on of those.
Apple's 12.9 : More rumors about the alleged iPad Pro. I’m hoping that any USB-C connector is a secondary port, otherwise I don’t know what we would connect it to on the computer end. The idea bout force touch is interesting, but not clear if they are also talking about the haptic feedback or not. Adding NFC only makes since when using the device as a point of sale terminal, unless I’m missing…
The muddy state of photo editing on iOS : I was pretty excited to get iCloud photos set up so I could start syncing, sharing and editing on all my devices and macs. I have been having a good time cleaning up old photos on my iPad when I have a few moments to spare. But the honeymoon period has worn off…
Mac Photos App Tips - Dealing With Video : Video Users: Beware of the drag and drop. As I start to incorporate the new Photos app into my workflow I’m learning a bunch of stuff the hard way. Here are a few things to know when dealing with video. A few years back iMovie and the older Final Cut …
I was at the Apple store playing with the new Macbook and Macbook Pro and I found behavior I had not read about. Normally if you press the trackpad to drag you have to keep it pressed during the whole drag. This can be awkward as it creates more friction on your finger. With the new force trackpad there are two new behaviors to make this easier: If you ‘force’ press on a window title…
Here are some random thoughts on the upcoming Surface 3 tablet from Microsoft A tablet that runs full Windows (x86) for the price of an iPad A switch to a more reasonable 3:2 aspect ratio Support for an Active, pressure sensitive stylus That last point should really hit home for Apple. Supporting a proper pen for artists and creatives should really be higher on their list if they really want to…
Ultrabook Plus: The 2015 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro reviewed | Ars Technica : The 13" pro is still a pretty awesome machine. A very good trade off of size vs performance
Force Touch expected to bring about most significant change yet to iOS user interface : Apple may name this year’s iPhone upgrade the “iPhone 7,” instead of the “iPhone 6s,” because the addition of Force Touch input will represent such a significant change to the user interface, according to one well-connected insider. More rumors about Force Touch on the iPhone. This time they are saying that it…
Force Touch Exclusive to 'iPhone 6s Plus'? : Apple’s pressure-sensing Force Touch technology could be exclusive to the so-called “iPhone 6s Plus,” according to Taiwan’s Economic… This would make no sense. Having this tech in only one model instead of across the line would be super annoying for users and developers.
I played with the new force trackpad at the Apple store and it was cool. I wasn’t able to get the ‘bump’ cues to work in iMovie though, but I can imagine all kinds of awesome if haptic feedback is properly integrated into the OS and applications. I wonder if that means we will soon see a force Magic Trackpad, or maybe a force Magic Mouse?
Thought experiment – Intel powered iPad pro : The Apple universe runs on rumors and speculation. There has been talk of Apple eventually powering their Macs with custom Arm processors. We have yet to see this but what we have seen is an incredibly thin and small retina MacBook based on the new Intel …