seanmonstar

GitHub for Windows

Mon, 21 May 2012 11:41:02 -0700

Absoutely beautiful application for Windows. Finally, using git on Windows doesn’t have to suck. Love the Metro theme, also.

How is lock-in good for anyone besides the owner?

Wed, 16 May 2012 11:51:16 -0700

How is lock-in good for anyone besides the owner?:

Ben Brooks wrote this regarding what is gained by improving iCloud:

Platform lock-in. If all your data lives in iCloud and not Microsoft or Google, well you are far less likely to undertake such a large data migration.

That’s certainly great for Apple, but no one else. Lock-in is the enemy of competition. It’s why social networks don’t really have to compete over the best experience. And it’s why so many people prefer keeping their notes in plain .txt files, because it’s easily tranferable.

Lock-in is never good for users.

Two Universes

Tue, 15 May 2012 16:01:11 -0700

Two Universes:

Application design and Portal? Yup.

Firefox for Windows on ARM

Fri, 11 May 2012 14:52:01 -0700

Firefox for Windows on ARM:

Asa Dotzler:

On ARM chips, Microsoft gives IE access special APIs absolutely necessary for building a modern browser that it won’t give to other browsers so there’s no way another browser can possibly compete with IE in terms of features or performance.

This is huge. It’s not that it’s difficult to make a Metro-style app. It’s that some core underlying APIs that users take for granted aren’t available. An easy one to notice: Firefox on ARM won’t be able to dynamically load and execute generated code; commonly known as JIT compilation. JIT compilation of JavaScript is how all modern browsers are able to make JavaScript run so quickly. Users will certainly notice that Firefox seems slow, and think it’s all Mozilla’s fault.

Then, John Gruber points this out:

In other words, Microsoft is setting policies for Windows for ARM that are a lot like Apple’s policies for iOS. These policies and restrictions make just as much sense for Microsoft as they do for Apple.

I can never understand people who have the mind of “that’s fine, it’s better for the parent company.” It’s also worse for the user. The policy that Apple has for the iOS store is just as bonkers.

Simperium

Thu, 10 May 2012 12:01:08 -0700

Simperium:

The service that backs Simplenote; they spent the time figuring out the hard problem of synchronizing data. Now, you can use it yourself, and focus on other difficult problems.

Android vs iOS Video

Wed, 09 May 2012 16:01:03 -0700

Android vs iOS Video:

I think both Android and iOS are decent operating systems, and that they serve different kinds of people. One thing that always irks me is when people say againt Android “iOS is just better put together.” This video shows a couple examples where Android is far more cohesive than iOS is.

I’m sure Apple fans would flock and come up with examples where Android is less consistent or nice. It seems obvious to me, then, that we just leave it as each appeals to different people, and shut up about it.

Ads Are Secondary

Wed, 09 May 2012 11:51:24 -0700

Ads Are Secondary:

As Ben Brooks points out, many mediums are free, and show ads instead. He suggests mediums (specifically, writing) should ditch ads and ask viewers to pay directly. My feeling on the matter is that the best option is a mixed one.

Mediums should provide their content, free of charge, but showing tasteful ads. Mediums should probably also offer a way for users to directly pay for the content they enjoy. If they pay, it’s imperative that the ads be removed. Paying and having to view ads is just dirty¹.

Hulu. Or cable. ↩

Lasting Value

Tue, 08 May 2012 16:35:46 -0700

Lasting Value:

This article by Marco Arment made me think about what things I’ve created that would last. The software I write likely won’t be used in 10 years, but I sure hope some of the articles I’ve written could be. I looked through my archive, and found a small number of articles that meet that description. I thought it’d be fun to share them again, here.

There’s a few more articles that I’m rather proud of, but I’m not as sure they would be useful to someone in the 2020’s.

JSFixed

Mon, 07 May 2012 17:46:46 -0700

JSFixed:

Angus Croll, on trying to improve EcmaScript 6:

There are some in the JavaScript development community who have severe misgivings over this approach, while others are generally happy but have the knowledge and experience to offer improvements. Unfortunately members of both groups are having a hard time being heard.

There are tons of (conflicting) opinions out there on where JavaScript should go, and I hope this doesn’t give naysayers too high of a pedestal, but overall the idea seems sound. JSFixed is trying to provide a familiar place for JavaScript developers to add their input on the proposed changes to their language.

Paying The Price On Android

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 12:00:13 -0700

Paying The Price On Android:

Myke Hurley has an interesting take at why people don’t buy Android apps:

If apps are generally crappy looking or functioning, should users be more accustomed to paying little to nothing?

There certainly are an abundance of crappy apps. That doesn’t stop me from buying good apps.

Many people point to this blog post about Papermill, which is a nicely designed Android app for Instapaper. It says that since it didn’t sell well, Android users don’t want to pay for good apps. That’s not why I didn’t buy it. I didn’t because it didn’t strike me as a good app. It looks nicely designed, but it’s lacking many features from Instapaper. Instead, I spent my money on ReadItLater, back when it was a paid app. It does more, and looked good to boot.

I’d say the reason is a bit of a catch-22. Users don’t buy apps on Android, because developers don’t make good, featured apps. In turn, the apps aren’t developed because users don’t apps. Android users will spend their money on excellent apps.

Pocket

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 16:58:47 -0700

Pocket:

I missed this while I was on vacation, but Read It Later re-branded itself as Pocket. Overall, it’s a beautiful update. It’s another app to point to when people say that you can’t make pretty applications on Android.

I have minor concerns with them making it into a free app. I don’t think they’ll switch to ads, but I still imagine the worst until they actually tell us their plan.

iOS vs Metro App Design

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 15:35:50 -0700

iOS vs Metro App Design :

Apple may have been first, and Android is largely just copying, but Microsoft’s touch interfaces really look like touch done right. There is much more emphasis on natural gestures, and a reduction of buttons. You’re not manipulating an app, you’re manipulating actual data and photos.

My only concern is hiding the app bar until gestured. Android hid things behind the menu button, and most people never knew to look there; despite it being a prominent, permanent button at the bottom of every phone.

Shipyard 0.1

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 15:30:35 -0700

I’ve been working on a JavaScript MVC framework for past several months called Shipyard. It’s an incredibly modular framework, with ease of testing, and all that other kool-aid. What’s important now is that this is the first release point for Shipyard. Here’s what it comes packed with:

Models
- Syncs to various locations
- Fields to serialize data easily
Views
- Automatic updates using Bindings
- Uses EJS templates underneath
- Templates get pre-compiled for production, so templating engine isn’t needed in final file.

There are plenty of other modules included, but not all have public docs currently as many of them aren’t needed specifically by app developers, only by the internals of Models and Views.

It’s already powering Mozilla’s Add-on Builder.

Start Playing

You can read more about Shipyard at the docs page, play with the obligatory example to-do app, or the brave can start at the source.

Or, you can grab your require and try it out in jsFiddle right now.

To use it locally, you could check it out with git, but it’s also available on npm, via npm install shipyard.

What’s Next

With this release, work begins on version 0.2, which will bring about Model Relationships, QuerySets, some Controllers, and a configurable logger.

Firefox and H.264

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 16:04:12 -0700

Firefox and H.264:

Brendan Eich of Mozilla:

What I do know for certain is this: H.264 is absolutely required right now to compete on mobile. I do not believe that we can reject H.264 content in Firefox on Android or in B2G and survive the shift to mobile.

I can’t say I care too much about the non-openness of H.264, but I’m glad Mozilla does. The only thing allowing movie producers to use H.264 encoding is a “promise” that the owner of the technology won’t charge them. If it ever goes away, and all those people get charged for using H.264, I won’t have to pay directly, but the Internet will suffer as producers scramble to do something about it. That means I will be affected anyways.

Still, everyone else thinks it’s better to just move forward with H.264 because there’s already hardware that supports it.¹ Mozilla is the only one that has stood against it, and now, all Firefox users get video through Flash, instead of the native HTML5 video element like the rest of the Internet.

The goal is to allow H.264 to play, but to continue to fight for a better technology as well.

People who say this are playing blind. ↩

Social isn't a Product

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 11:22:08 -0700

Social isn't a Product:

James Whittaker, an ex-Googler:

I couldn’t even get my own teenage daughter to look at Google+ twice, “social isn’t a product,” she told me after I gave her a demo, “social is people and the people are on Facebook.”

It’s frustrating that Google+ is actually a better product; the web app has a better design, Hangouts are a cool addition, and the mobile app is far faster and less buggy than Facebook’s turd. Still, being a better product isn’t enough. Facebook wins, not by being the best, but by simply having everyone already on it.

Competition could exist if social networks could communicate between each other, because then it would be all about who could make the experience better. Yet, as much as everyone knows competition is a good thing, no one ever wants competition against their own product.

Boot to Gecko

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 09:00:06 -0700

Boot to Gecko:

This is Mozilla’s way of making the web be a capable platform for the mobile world. Instead of having to write Objective-C, or Java, and then, only being able to distribute through certain walled gardens, Boot to Gecko makes websites first-class citizens.

This means developers only need to make a website, using technology they already know, and their app is freely available (or they can charge, of course) to anyone who’s mobile device implements the modern web.

Specifically, Boot to Gecko has every single part written in HTML and JavaScript, including the home screen, the dialer, the SMS app, all of it. The Verge has a write up and video showing excellent performance, which is great news.

This is big.

Google Play

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 10:34:44 -0800

Google Play:

Um, what? No more Android Market?

Windows Desktop UI Concept

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 17:00:05 -0800

Windows Desktop UI Concept:

This. This should be Windows 8 Desktop. This so much.

Collusion

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 11:24:06 -0800

Collusion:

A Firefox add-on by Mozilla that helps visualize sites that track you with cookies. As you visit sites, it will build a graph, so you can see which websites are following your path across the internet.

Chrome for Android: Update

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 12:17:00 -0800

Chrome for Android: Update:

I upgraded my Galaxy S to an Ice Cream Sandwich ROM just to try out Chrome for Android. I had also made some statements about how it must be better than Firefox for Android, before knowing better.

Now, having used it for the past 3 weeks, Chrome for Android is terrible. It’s startup time is unbearable, often taking 15-30 seconds. Even simply the “New Tab” page takes way too long to load. Rendering pages is incredibly slow, and often the “App Not Responding” message shows up. It’s even crashed my phone.

The up side, though, is that Firefox for Android saw some speed improvements with my switch to ICS. It now loads fairly quickly, opening to a new page in ~5 seconds.

The tab card-like interaction on Chrome for Android is still far more fun, though (if you can wait for it to load).