To Be a Beer Writer
Thursday, November 01, 2007 - 03:41 PM
Dare to dream…
If only I had the developed pallet and the writing skills to be a professional beer writer. Oh, well, at least I can still enjoy it!
Anyways, Carrie forwarded this to me, and I thought I’d share:
I’d also like to talk a little bit about that site (http://www.videojug.com). This is really well done. The video quality is way beyond what you would find on YouTube. And I really like how, with this particular video by way of example, they’ve divided the video into chapters. That’s really cool. Browse around the site for a while and you’ll see that, for the most part, the quality of these videos are all really good; not too mention that they (mostly) seem extremely informative.
UPDATE - Some of them are pretty funny, too. Like This One. (My favorite part: “A man’s friends are important to him, as well as his ability to spend time with them; where he will do male activities like: growling, fighting, and measuring things.")
(As a side note, I really want to visit the Fuller’s brewery after seeing the selection behind Jeff Evans in that video!)
Returning to the Mac Community
Thursday, October 18, 2007 - 09:37 AM
This isn’t new news by any stretch, but I thought it worth mentioning.
For many of us who have been using Macs for years, and customizing them along the way, ResExcellence* was once the place to go to stay on top of Mac customization. It was the place to learn about customizing applications and the Mac interface (the name refers to the ResEdit application from the “classic” days, which was used to edit the resource forks of files and applications, where most of the customizations took place), to download other peoples customizations, or to share your own (I had submitted several iTunes customizations of my own (among other things) before it became impractical for to keep updating them).
It was pretty much the central hub on the internet for Mac Hacking (and I use that term in the good sense of “hacking").
Well, if you’re aware of ResExcellence and it’s history (long and sordid as it may be), you know it’s gone. It’s likely never to come back. However, Michael Coyle, the man behind the original ResExcellence, is back (he has been since this summer - hence this not being “new news") at http://michaelsmac.com.
The idea is to fill the need in the Mac community that the original ResExcellence filled (or even created) in the first place. Things have been slow there, due to lack of awareness of the site. That’s why I’m posting this here, to beat the drum in my little corner of the ‘net and build up what awareness that I can.
So, if you’re looking for Mac customizations (heck, even if you’re a Windows or Linux user looking for cool desktop images), or have some to share, check out the growing community over at http://michaelsmac.com.
*I’m not going to link to the site, since it’s pretty much dead and gone now.
Apple Announces iPhone SDK
Wednesday, October 17, 2007 - 12:04 PM
Apple announced today that they are going to release an SDK for the iPhone (and iPod touch).
Gee, who could have predicted this would happen? Oh, that’s right, I did!
Of course, anyone with half a friggin’ brain could have seen this coming. Except, of course, all of those idiots who complained that Apple was attacking 3rd party developers by locking the iPhone. (I guess they don’t even have half a brain!)
One thing that people seem to forget is that Apple is about quality. The iPhone is a very sticky situation, because, of course Apple would want 3rd party apps for it, but there’s no way that they can allow just anyone to come to the party. There has to be a system in place to make sure that any programs running on an iPhone are going to be stable, and not interrupt the functionality of the device. That’s going to take some time to work out. Clearly, Apple was planning an SDK all along, but it was more important for them to get the iPhone to market before the SDK was ready. I’m sure they would have liked to have the SDK ready when the iPhone shipped, but clearly that was not possible.
Anyways, I hope this quiets all of the useless bitching out there on the ‘net about how “Apple is the new Microsoft” and “Apple hates it’s customers”. (I’m sure that’s why they decided to announce this now, rather than wait until it was ready - to shut those idiots up.) Apple just wants to get it right in the first place. If Apple were the new Microsoft, they would have released the SDK before it was ready, just to be able to add to the feature checklist of the iPhone. But, since Apple is still Apple, they’re busy making sure that everything just works.
Old Computers
Monday, October 15, 2007 - 02:26 PM
Here’s a great website for delving into computer history: OldComputers.net
If you’re like me, this site may even be a fond trip down memory lane. My first computer was the Coleco Adam. I loved that thing (despite the obnoxiously loud printer); not only could I type papers for school, learn programming in Basic and Logo, but I could also play the Colecovision games. At the time, the games were the bigger draw for me, as the Colecovision games were light years beyond what we had at the time for our Atari. (The Atari we had, by the way, was one of those generic ones sold at Sears.)
My favorite games? The Star Wars game, of course, and Zaxxon. With all of the renewed interest in vintage video games, I wish I could find Zaxxon somewhere! (Okay, okay, it’s part of the “Sega Genesis” collection for the PS2, but only as an unlockable - and it’s the only game on there I would buy that for, since I already have the Sonic Mega Collection.)
But, like I said, I also learned programming in Basic and Logo, thus starting my descent foray into the life of a computer geek.
The most interesting tidbit of info learned about the Coleco Adam from this page? That Coleco started as a leather goods company!
Attention to Detail
Friday, October 05, 2007 - 12:09 PM
One of the things that many people (non-Mac using people) don’t understand about why Mac users are so passionate about their platform, and why the Macintosh experience is so superior to Windows (and, yes, Linux), is Apple’s attention to detail. This is something I’m constantly noticing when using Apple products. It’s something that I’ve noticed for years, and years. It’s not just within the OS, either, it’s all around; software and hardware.
This is a perfect example of that: http://rentzsch.com/notes/applesantiCAPSLOCK.
How many PC manufacturers would think of that?
This is how you normally notice Apple’s attention to detail, completely by accident. It’s usually while making a mistake, or doing something that has unexpected (favorable) results, that you run across the things that make you think “Gee, I’m glad they thought of that” or “Boy! That’s COOL!”
I have a good example of this. It’s something I notice on my iPod quite some time ago, and that is: if the headphone cable becomes unplugged during operation, the player stops. The iPod actually pauses itself when the headphone cable is unplugged. Think about that. The Apple engineers had the foresight to realize that if you accidentally unplugged the headphone cables (by, say, shifting the iPod around in your pocket) you probably wouldn’t want to miss any of what you were listening to when it happened. The first time it happened to me, that attention to detail blew me away.
This is an example of designing things towards the user experience that other companies don’t get (and thereby, people using other companies’ products don’t understand, either). Other companies focus on the features of their product, on how they think their product should be used. Apple focuses on the actual user experience, on how people actually use the product.
There are many, many examples of this all throughout OS X (and with the computer hardware, as well). If any more come to mind, I’ll point those out as well. (And, if there are any Mac users out there who actually read my ramblings want to share, feel free to in the comments.)