Linked List: September 15, 2009

Tuesday, 15 September 2009

Caching Apple’s Signature Server 

If you ignore the “Luke Skywalker fights against the evil Apple Empire” aspects, there’s some fascinating technical information about the iPhone OS in this piece by Jay Freeman.

Adobe to Buy Omniture for $1.8 Billion 

Ina Fried reporting for CNet:

“Adobe customers are looking to us for solutions to deliver engaging experiences and more effectively monetize their content and applications online,” Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen said in the press release announcing the deal.

We are?

Apple’s Video Demo of the iPhone 3GS’s Accessibility Features 

This is truly remarkable. Watch how the visually impaired, and even the fully blind, can use the 3GS.

The Top One Essay by Paul Graham I’ve Read Today 

Paul Graham:

The list of n things is in that respect the cheeseburger of essay forms. If you’re eating at a restaurant you suspect is bad, your best bet is to order the cheeseburger. Even a bad cook can make a decent cheeseburger. And there are pretty strict conventions about what a cheeseburger should look like. You can assume the cook isn’t going to try something weird and artistic. The list of n things similarly limits the damage that can be done by a bad writer. You know it’s going to be about whatever the title says, and the format prevents the writer from indulging in any flights of fancy.

When Shortening ‘Synchronize’, Best Leave Off the ‘h’ 

I standardized on “sync” a few years ago, on the basis that it was shorter, and, to my eyes looks better. But Maeve Maddox has a good point — it’s less confusing for non-native English speakers as well. (Via ThatWhichMatter.)

Adobe Technote: Optimize Performance in Photoshop CS4 on Mac OS X 

A lot more detailed but a lot less fun than the aforelinked Make Photoshop Faster. (Via Simon Iannelli.)

Apple Hires Intel’s Top Lawyer 

The AP:

Apple Inc. said Tuesday it hired Intel Corp.’s top lawyer, Bruce Sewell, a day after the chip maker announced his departure. Apple said Sewell will report to CEO Steve Jobs as the company’s general counsel and senior vice president for legal and government affairs. […]

[Sewell] had been heading up the company’s effort to fend off antitrust claims, including the appeal of a $1.45 billion antitrust fine from the European Union.

Make Photoshop Faster 

Single-serving two-tip site from Dan Rubin.

Translation From PR-Speak to English of Zune Marketing Manager Brian Seitz’s Response to the Question of Whether the Zune Will ‘Open Up for Third-Party App Developers’ 

Zune marketing manager Brian Seitz:

It’s hard to say right now. If you look around the company at other places where things like this are important, Windows Mobile rises to the top. They have devices which are always connected, which make applications like maps really cool and important.

On a sometimes-connected device, what people are using them for are games. So what we didn’t want to do was build two parallel app store experiences that didn’t work together.

Right now our product roadmaps didn’t line up perfectly for us to snap to what they’re doing or vice versa. That being said, we know people want things like this on their devices so we’re going to build them ourselves, they’re going to be super high-quality, and they’re going to be free.

Down the road if there’s a way we can work with Windows Mobile or another group inside the company that’s building an app store and take advantage of that, that’s something we’ll look into.

Translation:

No, because our mobile strategy is a convoluted mess.

Accessibility Improvements in iPhone OS 3.1 

A slew of improvements, not just to accessibility, but usability in general. (Thanks to Joe Clark.)

Snow Leopard Details: Use Image Capture to Set Which App Opens for Each Camera You Plug In 

I think I’ve mentioned this before, but it’s such a handy tip it’s worth repeating.

NYTimes.com Delivered Malware Through Rogue Ad Server 

Ashlee Vance of the Times reports:

The creator of the malicious ads posed as Vonage, the Internet telephone company, and persuaded NYTimes.com to run ads that initially appeared as real ads for Vonage. At some point, possibly late Friday, the campaign switched to displaying the virus warnings.

Because The Times thought the campaign came straight from Vonage, which has advertised on the site before, it allowed the advertiser to use an outside vendor that it had not vetted to actually deliver the ads, Ms. McNulty said. That allowed the switch to take place. “In the future, we will not allow any advertiser to use unfamiliar third-party vendors,” she said.

Embarrassing.