Linked List: July 17, 2009

Friday, 17 July 2009

And That’s the Way It Was 

Walter Cronkite dies at 92.

My earliest memory of TV news is simply that Cronkite was the news.

Kottke’s Giant Apollo 11 Post 

Eagle has landed.

VMware Fusion 2.0 

My thanks to VMware for sponsoring this week’s DF RSS feed to promote VMware Fusion, their excellent virtualization software for the Mac. What I like best about VMware Fusion is that it provides a very Mac-like interface and experience for doing the most un-Mac-like thing possible — running operating systems other than Mac OS X on your Mac.

Lots of people use VMware Fusion to run Windows simultaneously with Mac OS X, and it’s great for that — its ease of use and smooth integration is a big reason why many Windows users have been able to switch to the Mac even if they have a few must-use Windows apps. But you can use VMware to run any x86 operating system. I’ve been using it this week to play with the new Live Android “netbook” OS release, for example.

Amazon Flushes Kindle Editions of Orwell Books Down the Memory Hole 

It’s one thing to stop selling them. It’s something else entirely to remove them from the Kindles of those who already bought them. That this happened with 1984, of all the books that have ever been written, is simply incredible.

(Point of comparison: when apps get yanked from the App Store, they don’t get deleted from the iPhones of people who already bought them.)

Regarding Evernote 

I’ve gotten a slew of nice responses to my piece on Simplenote yesterday, but the most common one is “Why not Evernote?” It’s free, it has over-the-air-syncing, it has native Mac and Windows clients in addition to the web and iPhone apps, and it offers a slew of additional features.

I have no doubt that many people love Evernote. That’s great. But I don’t like it at all. I don’t like the Mac app. I don’t like the web app. And I especially dislike the iPhone app, which, even if I did like it, doesn’t work at all on the iPhone OS 3.1 betas. (I’m sure they’ll fix that before OS 3.1 actually ships, but every app I do depend on runs just fine on the OS 3.1 betas.)

Simplenote is a perfect example of my primary guideline for iPhone UI design:

Figure out the absolute least you need to do to implement the idea, do just that, and then polish the hell out of the experience.

Evernote goes in a very different direction: a long list of features but a janky experience.

Jackasses of the Week: CNN 

40 years after the launch of Apollo 11, one of the greatest achievements in the history of mankind, CNN runs a top-of-the-homepage story lending credence to the tin-foil-hat kooks who claim it was a hoax.

For those of you who are as proud of the Apollo 11 mission as I am, I suggest a few viewings of this clip of Buzz Aldrin punching jackass moon-landing-doubter Bart Sibrel in the face.

Regarding Simplenote’s Icon 

Patrick Rhone:

That said, I do have to take issue with one little thing that I don’t like about Simplenote. I hate the icon. Seriously, it has the most unattractive icon of any app I’ve seen for the iPhone.

It is pretty bad.

Don’t Offer $50 for Your Favorite Feature 

Brent Simmons:

I bet every Mac and iPhone developer (and probably some Windows developers too) has heard this at least once, if not dozens of times, from someone who uses their software: “I will PayPal you $50 right now if you will add this feature for me.”

Note to world: don’t do that!

Bye-Bye Pocketpedia 

Amazon kills another iPhone app for violating their new mobile software licensing terms.

iPhone Developer Craig Hunter on Palm’s WebOS SDK 

Craig Hunter:

While the webOS SDK allows access to raw accelerometer data, it’s limited to a 4 Hz sampling rate (that’s four samples per second). Applications like gMeter and greenMeter need 50-100 Hz to even be practical, and most games need at least 20 Hz for smooth inputs that won’t lag too far behind typical graphics framerates. A low rate of 4Hz is not usable for dynamic motion where high fidelity is desired. Accelerometer support in the webOS is suitable for detecting basic movement of the phone for interface rotation, but that’s about it.