iPhone finger-painting by Jorge Colombo.
For those who say iOS is just for consumption.
(via Trendland)
From Asymco’s iOS vs. Microsoft: Comparing the Bottom Lines.
The graph takes Apple’s revenue just for iOS devices (iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch, not including iTunes revenue) and compares it to Microsoft’s entire revenue. The graph makes it very clear how Apple overtook Microsoft in less than 4 years.
Neven Mrgan: Labeling the Back button
The title of the entire bar is the title of this view; the Back button shows the previous, parent view’s title. Here, then, is a piece of advice for app designers: The Back button should never show the text “Back”.
Great advice from Neven Mrgan.
Coyote Tracks: But WE were here FIRST!
Does iCloud mean less business for Dropbox? Sure, but is that an argument against Apple creating a document syncing API? People have been rightfully complaining since the iPad was released that moving documents on and off the device through iTunes was a tremendous pain in the ass. A lot of people find iTunes to be a tremendous pain in the ass, period. Look, folks: the only way to get iTunes out of the picture is for the operating system to do something like what Dropbox does. What’s being argued—that Apple should have bought Dropbox as some kind of acknowledgement they were there first? That’s nuts.
I could not agree more.
(Source: chipotle)
Apple previews iCloud and iOS 5
http://www.apple.com/ios/ios5/
Some very exciting new stuff is on the way from Apple. I’ll digest for a bit and post my opinions soon.
Multitouch multitasking gestures
John Gruber comments on a blog post by Guy English which is a response to a tweet by Neven Mrgan.
I definitely agree with Gruber and English: that making the multitouch multitasking gestures currently only available to iPad developers available by default would be a bad thing. The beauty of the single physical home button is perfect, and immediately understood by users. Android devices went from having 4 buttons (too many, which gave developers an excuse to not design intelligently enough for a touch-based device) to no buttons (too few, leaving the users in the hands of the developer when it came to navigating their device).
Yet I have found the gestures handy when developing. The number of times I’ve had to press my iPhone home button to switch apps leaves me with the belief it will be the first thing to eventually wear out. This makes me believe that Mrgan’s original tweet was really just saying it was essential for developers, not users as a whole.
One approach that English didn’t consider when thinking of solutions was to have it off by default, then an advanced user could opt to turn it on through settings. I can see how it would be useful to power users who aren’t developers too. To address the problem of limited multitouch gestures in apps, make app gestures the priority: then if no gesture exists for the app, fall back to the multitasking-related gesture. Obviously this would still require the home button for those apps. Of course, there are still problems with this, which is why it should only be an option for more advanced users to turn on if they want it.
Getting Notified
http://blog.cocoia.com/2011/notify/
As much as I love my iPhone, there’s no doubt the notification system leaves much to be desired. In this article, Sebastiaan de With takes a look at a few mobile notification systems.
I hope we’ll see a more flexible and graceful notification solution in the next iOS version. It’s definitely the area in which Apple is most behind their competitors.
(via Daring Fireball)
Zapped in the alarm clock
After my reblog comment yesterday, my wife asked if iOS alarm clock failings in the wake of the new year counted as being “zapped in the arse”.
Well, yes, I suppose it does. Apple is deservedly copping a lot of flak over their latest bug in the Clock app. You can read the details of it at MacWorld. This bug is completely unrelated to the Clock bug in 2010 relating to daylight savings time changes, and although this recent bug affects a smaller number of alarms than the previous one, two screw-ups like this is not the kind of thing we expect from Apple. That’s why the bug gets so much attention: Apple doesn’t usually make mistakes like this. As John Gruber noted, the iOS alarm clock code needs some attention.
In 2008 I was working for a small start-up company. We made Windows-based software and sold it in multiple countries. A very important product demonstration was scheduled for March 1… one day after the leap year’s February 29. Microsoft had somehow failed to realise 2008 was a leap year, and as a result our product built on Microsoft technology displayed the wrong date. But we explained what had happened and still managed to garner interest in our product.
The fact Apple is getting so much criticism for their clock bugs while you hear barely a peep about Microsoft’s clock bugs emphasises the point of the previous reblog. So let me rephrase my comment: it’s not that you’re guaranteed to escape a zap in the arse with Apple. It’s that a zap in the arse when using an Apple product is unexpected, which makes it all the more painful. A zap in the arse from competing products is just par for the course… or maybe you’re numb from the constant zapping.
