Linked List: March 19, 2010

Friday, 19 March 2010

OmniGraphSketcher 

My thanks to the Omni Group for sponsoring this week’s DF RSS feed to promote OmniGraphSketcher, their outstanding “fast, simple graph drawing and data plotting” app for the Mac. This is one of those apps where you just have to try it (the demo is free) to understand how cool it is. Precise data plotting combined with easy to use drawing tools.

The Omni Group is also hard at work on OmniGraphSketcher for iPad — dig the lo-fi mockups they’re using to design the UI and test the size and feel of the controls.

Nokia: Design by Community 

This is not a joke. I think.

Apple Invites Developers to Submit iPad Applications to App Store 

Submissions in by March 27 “will be considered for” the grand opening of the iPad App Store. Seems a little nutty that the vast majority of them have been tested (by developers) only using the simulator.

Why Stephen O’Grady Is Against Software Patents 

A comprehensive look at just how broken the system is. (Via Tim Bray.)

Forbes: ‘Palm’s Stock Plummets After Analysts Cut Targets to $0’ 

The message seems to be that Palm is in serious trouble — not just merely “struggling”, but in dire straits.

I don’t really understand why. Their WebOS phones are, to my eyes, the best competitors to the iPhone. People who own them seem to like them. Their marketing hasn’t been great, but it’s been better than Android’s. But Android is taking off and WebOS isn’t, and, trite though it sounds, Palm really has bet the company on WebOS.

H&FJ: Four Techniques for Combining Fonts 

Bookmark this now.

Chris Holt Reviews ‘Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars’ 

Chris Holt:

It’s huge in scale and depth—something iPhone players aren’t used to. If many games play like thin leaflets, consider Chinatown Wars your copy of War and Peace. Minus the Peace.

Raiding Eternity 

Outstanding, poetic writing at Gizmodo by Joel Johnson.

Dissecting iTunes Links 

Detailed analysis of iTunes URLs, from Bjango.

Inside the Collapse 

Compelling 60 Minutes interview with author Michael Lewis, on the Wall Street financial collapse.

The ‘Agency Model’ 

Macmillan CEO John Sargent:

Starting at the end of March, we will move from the “retail model” of selling e-books (publishers sell to retailers, who then sell to readers at a price that the retailer determines) to the “agency model” (publishers set the price, and retailers take a commission on the sale to readers). We will make this change with all our e-book retailers simultaneously.