Linked List: April 5, 2013

Friday, 5 April 2013

Secure Incremental Store Framework for Core Data ★

My thanks to Stoeger IT for sponsoring this week’s DF RSS feed to promote their Secure Incremental Store. It’s a developer framework that allows you to build data encryption right into your Core Data based apps for iOS and OS X, just by changing a few lines of code. Stoeger’s background is in banking software, so they’ve got the experience to do this sort of thing right. See for yourself by downloading it and trying it yourself. Then use coupon code “DARING20” to save 20 percent buying a license.

Microsoft’s Mobile Comeback Isn’t Happening ★

The numbers just aren’t there.

Roger Ebert: The Essential Man ★

Worth a re-link: Chris Jones’s profile of Ebert for Esquire back in 2010:

Roger Ebert can’t remember the last thing he ate. He can’t remember the last thing he drank, either, or the last thing he said. Of course, those things existed; those lasts happened. They just didn’t happen with enough warning for him to have bothered committing them to memory — it wasn’t as though he sat down, knowingly, to his last supper or last cup of coffee or to whisper a last word into Chaz’s ear. The doctors told him they were going to give him back his ability to eat, drink, and talk. But the doctors were wrong, weren’t they? On some morning or afternoon or evening, sometime in 2006, Ebert took his last bite and sip, and he spoke his last word.

Ebert’s lasts almost certainly took place in a hospital. That much he can guess.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos Invests in Henry Blodget’s Business Insider ★

This makes sense somehow, I’m sure. Give me a minute, here, I’m thinking.

Nope. I got nothing.

I need a drink.

New Leaked Picture of the BlackBerry R-Series Smartphone ★

Had to check the year on this one before linking it. Thought it might have been re-blogged from 2007.

Roger Ebert Wins The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest ★

“Now watch how I lift my tray table to its original and upright position.”

Yoni Heisler on Facebook Home ★

Yoni Heisler:

For instance, Facebook writes of its chat heads feature:

With chat heads you can keep chatting with friends even when you’re using other apps. When friends send you messages, a chat head appears with your friend’s face, so you see exactly who you’re chatting with. Messages reach you no matter what you’re doing - whether you’re checking email, browsing the web, or listening to music.

Is that a feature or a threat?

Here’s the thing about apps, and on a larger scale, technology that people love — no matter how much someone is into something, they don’t want it thrust in their face 24/7.

That’s exactly why I described Facebook Home as a “nicely-designed phone interface that I would personally never want to use”. I don’t want photos from other people on my lock screen or as my home screen wallpaper. But given that they’re putting it into the Play Store, Facebook obviously thinks many people do want this. We shall see.

Neophilia as a Form of Hiding ★

Seth Godin:

But when we’re discussing our goals, our passion and the way we interact with the culture, it seems to me that what works is significantly more important than what’s new. Racing to build your organization around the latest social network tool or graphics-rendering technology permits you to spend a lot of time learning the new system and skiing in the fresh powder of the unproven, but it might just distract you from the difficult work of telling the truth, looking people in the eye and making a difference.

The same is true of design trends. Many — not all, maybe not even most, but many — of the complaints I see about iOS, for example, boil down to it being familiar. It no longer scratches our itch for new. Apple needs to scratch that itch for us eventually or someone else will, but it’s essential that they find something new and better, not merely new and different.

Sergey Brin Wearing Google Glass Driving a Pink Tesla Dressed Like a Batmobile ★

Remember, smartphones are emasculating.

Ebert on Twitter ★

Roger Ebert, back in 2010:

My rules for Twittering are few: I tweet in basic English. I avoid abbreviations and ChatSpell. I go for complete sentences. I try to make my links worth a click. I am not above snark, no matter what I may have written in the past. I tweet my interests, including science and politics, as well as the movies. I try to keep links to stuff on my own site down to around 5 or 10%. I try to think twice before posting.

When Cancer Took Roger Ebert’s Voice, Twitter Gave Him a New One ★

Nice piece by Mathew Ingram for PaidContent.