iPhone 3G – OS 3.0 Notes
iPhone 3.0 Home screen - Notice new icons, and additional "page" indicator by the dots
I have an iPhone 3G, and have upgraded it (early) to the 3.0 version of the operating system.
I will not disclose how I upgraded, you can find that out for yourself elsewhere. It isn’t a big secret. If you want to know, you may find the hints I saw on my twitter page, www.twitter.com/seangw
We all know the big things Apple has announced, but when we install, what changes will us 3G users still notice?
- There is the new search screen
- You can hit the Home button when on your “Home” screen, and you will go to the search screen
- Email / contacts all have search above the initial top of the page (just scroll up an extra bit)
- Installation of the “Voice Memos” app moves all of my icons around (I had added a few icons to my home page, Apple forces it on the home page)
- New icons for Messages, Stocks, Phone and iPod. Maybe the Glass button effect is wearing thin, and Apple is introducing a textured glass button?
- All the new horizontal screen displays for apps that we type into (it seems like most, if not all, have this layout now)
- Notes now sync to outlook (and vice versa)
- Safari seems to launch a little quicker
- Overall performance was a bit slower after the update, maybe I just need to restart it
- The upgrade was much easier than the 2.0 OS, I didn’t have to back up everything and restore
- Call history now displays which “number” the person dialed from (”Mobile” or “office”)
- Call Detail tells you not only when the calls were made, but also how long each call was (something that always annoyed me)
- Copy and Paste is there, but we all know we made much more of a fuss about it, than we are likely to realize now that we have it.
- Selecting cursor location in text actually seems to be trickier than before the copy paste upgrade
- Switching Screens SEEMS to be faster. This could be those psychological upgrade effects.
It’s amazing how little has been upgraded if you aren’t getting the new 3GS. Features that we are missing on our iPhone 3G are (but not limited to, if you know more, post a comment and I will update the article):
- Voice Dialing
- Video Capture
- Faster Hardware (obviously)
- Auto focus camera
- Compass
- Driving Navigation Software (?, not sure if it doesn’t have a compass)
While Tethering and MMS seem possible on the 3G, there is no word if Apple and ATT will enable it. Technically it is feasible as a number of users have already enabled MMS (as well as tethering) on their iPhone 3G with a minor tweak to the carrier files (again, I’ll leave it to you to find this one – not hard).
I’m going to be waiting for my “upgrade eligibility” which goes into effect in mid July. For now I remain a somewhat unimpress, and minorly frustrated longtime iPhone user (seems like all iPhone 3G users are being told to wait a month before getting theirs for the full discount, this sounds like a business decision to get people in that don’t already have the $30 / month plan — while initial inventory is still there).
Vendor Client Relationship in real world situations
My friend Jarrod, at www.jarrodmichael.com, posted this video on his blog, and I wanted to share it with all of you web developers out there. I’m sure you can all relate to these conversations:
How you can fix IE8’s slow “View Source”
I installed Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) on my main machine a few weeks ago, and have been using other browser’s “View Source” since IE8’s default View Source editor takes forever to load.
With all the work, I didn’t have time to figure out how to fix it, but YOU CAN!
IE8 uses an internal viewer by default, but you can easily change it:
- Get into the Developer Tools screen (F12 or Tools->Developer Tools)
- File->Customize Internet Explorer View Source (yeah I know, weird)
- Set to Notepad (like it used to be) or “Other” and use your viewer (I used TextPad)
Now, can anyone recommend a better “View Source” application? I haven’t looked into this, but it may be a great opportunity to improve efficiency doing HTML and debugging.
Google History: Distorts Search Results (Warning for SEO experts)
A growing sector in web development nowadays is the SEO “expert”.
With the blossoming effects of social networks and rapidly developing online presences, many people consider themselves SEO experts because they can gain visibility for your site.
One could argue, that’s exactly what SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is, making sure your site gets visibility.
I’m going to stay neutral on that subject, but say that SEO should generate organic traffic to your site through cooperation with modern search technologies. Proper SEO shouldn’t be a Boom and Bust scenario, but a constantly growing user base.
With all of these new SEO experts comes a group of individuals who are NOT skilled in all the fundamentals on the internet.
Google History
One warning I wanted to throw out there, is Google distorts search results for users based on sites they have clicked on previously. Take a look at Google History, and you’ll see what I mean.
Google History takes your previous browsing behavior and organizes it. That information is used to tailor your search results, and I’m sure for Google to customize their search engine performance overall.
When doing SEO you frequently search for a few search terms every day, and may click on the results you like.
SEO experts should know that the results they see may differ wildly from the rest of the world.
All SEO experts should use “neutral” browsers without Google Toolbar installed such as Firefox or Safari (yes, it’s available on the PC too — and it works pretty well) to test the search placements of their clients.
Additionally, if you have hired an SEO expert, be sure to cross reference their results with searches on indepedent computers. Your SEO expert may say your site is now “top 5″ when it is in fact only in the top 20. This is because their computer is biased based on that user’s history.
Google Calendar Sync – Easy Calendar Backup
I run Microsoft Outlook 2007 as my main email / calendar application. Say what you want, but I love it (I’m always open to suggestions if anyone has them).
The problem that I encountered last week, what happens when your entire calendar / datebook for the next year is lost to a computer crash?
How do you recover?
I introduce, Google Calendar Sync. Yes, it’s meant to give you access to your calendar online, but a useful secondary feature is that it’s an online backup.
The Situation
My iPhone syncs with my Outlook calendar, my Outlook calendar syncs with my Google Calendar, and all data is shared.
Last week with my computer failure, I had to reinstall everything. I knew having my email hosted at Google would make it easy to both access it while the computer was down, as well as let me sync up when the computer came back up.
I never realized how easy it would be to re-import all of my calendar information into outlook. I thought it would be some combination of iPhone syncing (which has my full calendar) and exporting from Google Calendar.
The solution
After getting my empty outlook installed, I went to Install Google Calendar Sync. It works in Windows 7 64-bit for me, even though Google says it won’t.
It is an easy install, and seconds later my entire calendar was back in my Outlook!
I don’t have much to write, it’s just so easy.
The Conclusion
You have important data. It is so convenient to have access to your calendar online, as well as on your computer, or on your iPhone. It’s also a great way to backup and recover rapidly.
Windows 7 Tips and Tweaks
Now that I have a new operating system, Windows 7 64-bit, I must tweak.
My first few ventures out on the net looking for information returned the following 2 helpful articles:
- 20 Windows 7 Tweaks & Tips – Every Secret Uncovered to Date
This covers a good number of the tweaks and tricks I had seen out there, including some very helpful and cool keyboard shortcuts. - Start Explorer in Drive View
I hate having explorer open up to “My Music”, “My Videos” etc. Who uses that really? This tells you how to get it back to how it should be. - The Bumper List of Windows 7 Secrets
A bit dated (January 2009), but still includes many hints about how to use Windows 7 to its fullest.
Some Keyboard Shortcuts That are Awesome
- Windows + Up
Maximizes the window - Windows +Down
Lowers the window height, Max -> Restore, Restore -> Minimized (be careful, you can’t go from Minimized to Restore with Windows + Up, only Restore to maximized) - Windows + Left
Great for Side by Siding, this makes the window take up the left 50% of the screen it is on - Windows + Right
Exact opposite of Windows + Left, duh - Windows + Shift + Left
Great multiple monitor support — moves windows to the next monitor on the left - Windows + Shift + Right
Take a guess? It moves windows to the monitor to the right - Windows + Home
Hides all “other” windows (hmm, just like on OS X) so you can focus. - Windows + [Number]
Just like in Vista, Windows + 1 corresponds to the first icon in the taskbar, Windows + 2 the 2nd, and so forth - Windows + Shift + [Number]
Haven’t seen this one listed yet, but it launches another instance of the application, instead of focusing on it. Much like the old Vista quick launch functionality - Windows + Space
Lets you take a quick peak at your desktop through all the windows, it looks cool — not sure if there are many useful applications of this
I love how Microsoft is addressing the needs of the multiple monitor community. Back in 1999 I thought I was among a very select crowd. Nowadays almost everyone I know (especially in tech roles) has multiple monitors in at least 1 of their computing locations (usually work).
More to come!
Windows 7 – First Impressions
It’s been a while — life has been quite busy. Drupal, WordPress, Blender, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Illustrator, Flex, Flash, Actionscript, Papervision. Even got some bicycling and racquetball in there on the weekends.
In the past, wow, month. I’ve been up to quite a bit, and will be posting things on here about them all. Right now my main focus is on my new install of Microsoft Windows 7 (the Release Candidate) while it is still fresh in my mind.
Background, Vista Recovery
A little bit of background, last week on Thursday I woke up to my Vista (32-bit) workstation completely hosed. After a lengthy chat session with a Dell support rep (I can’t say how happy I was with the Dell support guy, he was friendly, smart, and patient through an almost 6 hour long chat session), I managed to get access to the files on my disk to back them up. Happily, I reformatted. I really needed it.
The most amazing thing was when I put the Microsoft Vista DVD in, and it actually got my system to boot into “windows’. Of course I had no icons or anything, the system was actually fixed by the Vista repair actions (a first for me, usually the only use I have for those is to get a command prompt to see the extent of the damage).
While the machine was on, but with no desktop — I was able to map to the drives through another computer and backup information (\\{Computer IP}\C$, D$, E$ until I found drives K, L and M). That took forever, but it was successful.
Windows Vista 32-bit Install
It took FOREVER to get all the updates installed. I know updates just accumulate while software is out. I don’t remember it taking this long to update my XP machine which I had to reinstall 3 or 4 years into the lifecycle. Maybe Vista just has more updates, but it took forever to get my machine back in working order.
Once I was up again, things were much faster (as they always are after a fresh format).
I want to note, I’ve never had many Vista 32-bit driver issues, or any performance issues. The few issues I had revolved around a few pieces of software that didn’t have drivers or fully compatible version for a few months after the Vista launch.
Welcome to Windows 7, how Vista should have been – the first 24 hours
Wow. I downloaded the 64-bit Release Candidate from the official Windows 7 page yesterday. I want to take advantage of the 16 slots my machine has for RAM. Who wouldn’t?
I have a lot of good, and some bad, things to say about Windows 7 so far.
I’ll start with the positive:
- The install process was a piece of cake, I’m running a raid controller for my OS drive (raid 0, living on the edge) — and didn’t have to do anything special
- Updates to the OS through windows update were painless. I want to say it was less than 10% of the downloads required by my Vista install a few days earlier, though the software isn’t even released yet.
- Hardware wise, I have had ZERO, 0, problems with Windows Live 7. not like the handful of hardware issues Vista32-bit had at launch
- Google Chrome is giving me some issues. I can get it to work occassionally but it always ends up “crashing” somehow.
- I actually am not minding IE8, but I miss Chrome
- Faster. It’s true, this runs faster out of the box than my tweaked Vista install
- Clean and easy interface.
- Lots of room for running applications
- Most of my old installers worked, a few of the installers had 64-bit versions I had to download
- Everything with regards to the network seems to respond faster
- It’s free! (for now)
- Cleaner Start Menu
- Higher Windows Experience Ratings
The Bad:
- IE8 (yes, I don’t mind it, but I dislike having to use it instead of my Chrome)
- Google Chrome won’t work well
- Things have obviously moved, and I”m not comfortable with the locations yet. This is really just me being stubborn
- It will expire in 2010, and require a purchase
Conclusion
I’m happy with the install and highly recommend it. I have not lost any productivity. I’m not sure I’ve gained any though.
I will continue to report on my experiences.
Bailey (a dog) plays Dead on Letterman
The girl forwarded this to me, and I wanted to share with whoever happened onto this site.
I got a good laugh from it — Bailey plays Dead, in her own way.
How To: Track File Downloads with Google Analytics
Google Analytics is what most people use nowadays for web traffic reports. It is flexible, powerful and simple.
The problem with Google Analytics is that it doesn’t analyze web traffic reports, but generates data in real time. In most cases, this isn’t a problem. In fact, it is big feature. The problem is what about files that do not parse javascript such as PDFs, ZIP files, or other non-HTML documents.
When a user clicks on a PDF from your site, you will never see that PDF in Google Analytics.
How to track File downloads with Google Analytics
It’s very easy. As is most things with Google Analytics.
Google Analytics provides a method for tracking anything you want. It’s called “_trackPageview”.
You use it in javascript as “pageTracker._trackPageview(’/downloads/map’);”.
How does this help us track file downloads? Simply modify the link to the file asset to have an “onClick”:
Link to the file here: <p>
<a href="somefile.pdf" onClick="javascript: pageTracker._trackPageview('somefile.pdf');">Download somefile.pdf</a>
</p>
See how easy that was?
Hopefully you have a function used to print out those links, then you can modify it in one place (that’s what I did).
You should see results in Google Analytics under Top Content shortly.
Rant: Domain DNS Setup — not just www!
A problem that some websites have drives me crazy: some websites don’t setup their domain to work without WWW for their websites.
What brought this into mind, is the lack of being able to go to http://fdic.gov/ … while http://www.fdic.gov/ works just fine.
I don’t know of any good reason for this. Maybe it’s easier to load balance with a subdomain, than try to handle “fdic.gov” while there are emails going to “fdic.gov”.
I understand that the mail server is a different machine, great. Reroute traffic depending on the ports, it’s not hard to filter potrs 25, 80, 443, 110, 143, 465, 585, 993, 995 to the correct machines.
I feel better now.
Problems with Lossy Image Encoding
On the web we work in many formats. JPG, SVG, PNG, GIF, SWF … etc. I know, they’re not all image formats.
Why don’t we just have 1 image type? Because all images are different of course — and lend themselves to to certain formats.
There are two types of image formats:
- Lossy - An image encoding that is lossy means the final output, the encoded image, doesn’t have all of the information the original photo had. This is why it’s better to keep original’s of photos from your camera, instead of just saving the JPEGs which may be 1/10th the size of a full image
- Lossless - This is the opposite of lossy, obviously. An encoding that is lossless means it contains all of the information of the original image. Frequently we don’t see much savings when we do a lossless compression.
Why do we use “Lossy” encoding when we have “Lossless” encoding at our fingertips? It depends on the intent of a photo, but usually the human eye doesn’t need all of the accurate original information. For example, does it matter if the color you see in a photo is #236c2f or #236c2b?
It doesn’t matter to us. In an image, however, there are 4 shades in between the two colors. If we can eliminate the need to differentiate between those 2 colors in a green scene, we may save as much as 25% of the file size! Of course, that would be lossy — but we have dozens of other colors to optimize most likely.
In Photoshop when we set the “Image Quality” we are merely saying how accurate we want the encoded image to be.
At that we have a few different image formats … some of which are better suited to different environments.
- JPEG/JPG – Focused on handling “real world” scenes, designed for full-collor or gray-scale natural images. This is lossy, but can result in extreme image savings with a relatively minimal visual degradation. JPG doesn’t support transparencies.
- GIF – Handles solid colors well. Gif looks at an image and says “45 pixels of green.” This is better than saying “Green. Green. Green. Green. Green. Green …. Green.” 45 times. Since this is entirely accurate, it is lossless. The problem with GIF is that it has a limit of 256 colors (which was generous when GIF was invented by CompuServe in 1987). Frequently when we do GIF encoding we tell it “8 colors” or “16 colors” which boils an image down to 8 or 16 colors. This is lossy, as we aren’t allowing GIF to use the entire pallette. It saves space, and usually performs very well. GIF supports transparency and frame by frame animations.
- PNG – Portable Network Graphics – Lossy / lossless depends on how it is used. PNG is very flexible and can support truecolor, grayscale, and palette based colors (a la GIF). Transparencies are supported additionaly alpha channels are supported (GIF doesn’t support alpha channels). Frequently PNGs are used for vector assets as they look much cleaner than JPGs for vector assets, and are easier to work with transparancies
- SVG – Scalable Vector Graphics – an XML based file format that is useful for scalable vector assets. This means a 10×10 image looks perfect, while the same image blown up to 1000×1000 will also look perfect.
So which image type should you use?
Normally the difference between JPG and GIF is fairly small, although it can be a dramatic difference if you get it wrong (especially on larger scale web deployments).
It would help all web developers to learn how to properly use encoded images.
We should NEVER open up a JPG and re-export it as JPG again.
Want to know why? Watch the video below of what happens, over time, when you open up a JPG and re-export it:
Generation Loss from hadto on Vimeo.
iPhone OS 3.0: Update on “Copy and Paste”, on Tuesday 3/17/2009
According to Macrumors.com, Kevin Rose (of Digg fame) revealed details about “Copy and Paste” functionality during a taping of Diggnation at SXSW.
Watch the video of Kevin’s description of the functionality. You just double click the word, it highlights, then you use the magnified view to drag quotes before and after the word to select your target. You can then cut or copy it.
Additionally, the Apple event announcing details on iPhone OS 3.0 is actually on Tuesday, not Monday like I had reported last week.
iPhone OS 3.0 – Apple to preview on March 17th, 2009
Apple will be previewing the new iPhone OS 3.0 on Monday March 17th, 2009 @ 1pm EST (10am PST) at the Cupertino Apple Town Hall.
This has been repoted by quite a few various sources including Engadget, Macrumors, etc.
As far as “What” will be presented, it is known that this will be a developer version of the operating system only. It will show off an updated SDK (for developing for the iPhone OS 3.0).
Rumors are running rampant on the net with regards to what the new OS major revision will contain.
Widely held to be true, are rumors of:
- MMS (Multimedia text messaging)
- Tethering via Bluetooth and USB (we’ve been talking about tethering on the iPhone for a while now, this isn’t a big surprise — after all it already worked almost a year ago)
More “out there” options, that have no confirmation, but seem likely are:
- New Home screen app (SpringBoard) – we all now have too many apps to efficiently manage with the 16 icons (+4 static) per screen
- Push notification to apps
- Background processes
- Copy & Paste
- Flash support
- Magnetometer support (digital compasses, as in the Android G1)
- Syncing of notes
- Better bluetooth support (headphones, car kits, etc)
- Horizontal Keyboard
- Video Conferencing (ok, we’re stretching it now)
In my opinion, we’re likely to see MMS, as well as tethering. Don’t get too excited, I’m sure tethering will come with a clause from ATT (most likely a monthly fee just like the blackberry).
Otherwise if we get just 1 or 2 of the wishlist items, I think we should be happy. We’ve been looking for Copy / Paste, Flash, Push notification, and background processes for a while. I know push notification is working for “MobileMe”, but I mean the type of push notification Apple was touting last summer (here’s a hint, its the same as the original Exchange push notification that Apple NEEDED to have in order to somewhat compete with blackberry).
Let’s hope there is good news on Monday for us all.
How To: Throw an iTunes DJ Party
With Apple’s iTunes 8.1 release, we now have iTunes DJ. It used to be Party Shuffle (for the past few years) but now we have a few new toys.
The biggest of which is the ability to allow guests to your party to vote for songs. Guests can see the song details, upcoming songs, request songs in your library, and vote on which songs they want to hear next.
So how do we do it?
Setup iTunes for DJ
You’ll need a computer running iTunes. Open up iTunes (making sure to have updated to the newest release, 8.1 is the first release to support all the functionality mentioned here). Click on iTunes DJ.
You are now in the iTunes DJ screen. In the lower part of the playlist window are the iTunes DJ options (seen below)
Here are the various components:
Source – This is where iTunes DJ will get the songs it shuffles automatically. Remember this when throwing a party, so people don’t have to see your Backstreet Boys collection. I have it set to my entire music collection (uh oh!)
Refresh – It refreshes your playlist. Real boring.
Settings – click here to setup iTunes DJ properly, here’s the window you will see (seen below)
A bit more fun, I have filled in some values.
The most important thing on this screen is the “Allow guests to request songs with Remote for iPhone or iPod touch”, as it lets us do everything in the rest of this article.
Your welcome message will show up in your guests Remote application (seen below, ignore my note about looking in a playlist, you can’t do that only browse by artist, album, song, genre, music videos, composers or a general search)
Going back to the settings in iTunes… you will want to click “Enable Voting” to let guests vote for the next song.
If you don’t set a password, anyone on your Wifi can see your iTunes DJ list, and make requests. Then again, hopefully you don’t have an open wifi point. If you do, I recommend a password.
Easy setup right?
Now the fun stuff: Remote.
As I discovered, if you are already registered with your iTunes on Remote, you will not see the welcome message. That is only for guests. If you want to see it work, remove your iTunes from remote. Tada!
Here are some screens you will see in iTunes:
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When your guests first load your “iTunes DJ” guest, they will see the current song. The album artwork will be there (a nice touch, I like having all album artwork in there, easy with “Get Album Artwork”). Your guests are presented with 3 options here. They can Request a Song (big button on bottom) to be added to your playlist, go back to the current playlist, or view Genius recommendations. |
 |
If your guests click on the “i” in the top right corner, they will see the Genius recommendations, clicking on “+” will add it to the iTunes DJ playlist. It will be added with “1″ vote. If other guests like the song and want it sooner, tell them to “vote” for the song (coming up in the next screengrab). Again this screen doesn’t look so good if you have a messy library, or missing artwork. Guests can tap “Back” to go back to “Now Playing”. |
 |
Here is how your users see your playlist. In light grey up top, we see “This Town” was just played. Normally the single most recent is visible but guests can scroll up to see more (based on the setting in iTunes). Currently playing is highlighted in black. Next songs are below. If a guest clicks on a “heart” next to a song they are voting for that song to be played next. The song with the most votes comes next. Guests can still request a song, exit out to setting, or view the “Now Playing” song. |
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If, at any point, a guest clicks on “Request a Song” — they are brought to a basic music navigation screen. There is no playlists option, or some other options. Users can search by most other parameters though. Keep in mind, that this is your entire “Source” that you defined earlier. If you want to limit choices to “Country”, or maybe “80s” music, then make an appropriate Playlist/Smart Playlist, and mark it as the source in the iTunes DJ “Source”. Interestingly “Music Videos” is listed here. Maybe just for the music, maybe for a future AppleTV update. |
How do I use transparent PNGs in IE6: Using AlphaImageLoader
Internet Explorer is a tough beast. It was very popular years ago. Unfortunately, it’s still in use in out there.
This site, www.seangw.com, has a fairly technical crowd. We still see approximately 3% of our visits from IE6 (Firefox is the most popular at 64%, then IE7 at 14%, Safari at 10%, then Chrome at 5%).
I don’t believe IE6 should be supported anymore. In many jobs, that isn’t our decision to make. We can recommend ignoring IE6 specific issues, but should do so intelligently:
- Identify the current IE6 audience (knowing it will probably decrease over time)
- Approximate the cost of supporting IE6 (depends on what you are trying to do)
- Present the pertinent information to the client, and let them make an informed decision
- You should tell the client what you feel, but make sure they understand the difference between emotion and facts
Note: If your client makes $1,000,000 online every year, ignoring that minor 3% audience means possibly ignoring about $30,000 in revenue. Math is enlightening sometimes.
At that, you are here, and STILL want to do transparent PNGs in IE6.
How to implement transparent PNGs in IE6
It’s pretty standard the method for implementing transparent PNGs in IE6 by now.
This method is for implementations in CSS (you are using CSS, aren’t you?).
Frequently I find myself making a quick browser detect for IE6 (since there are oh so many issues that only affect IE6). I use basic IE conditional comments:
<body> <head> <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css" type="text/css" /> <!-- [if lte IE 6]> <link rel="stylesheet" href="styleIE6.css" type="text/css" /> < ![endif] --> </head> <body> </body> </html>
There you go, now when you setup your styles in style.css and realize they don’t work in ie6, edit them in styleIE6.css to get them working again.
Assuming you defined a logo in style.css as follows:
#logo {
width: 300px;
height: 150px;
background: url(images/logo.png) no-repeat left top;
}
You will find that the PNG does NOT work in IE6.
The fix is easy, we tell IE6 to use the Microsoft DXImageTransform AlphaImageLoader to render the PNG. So we add an IE6 specific change ot the styleIE6.css file:
#logo {
background: transparent;
filter: progid:DXImageTransform:Microsoft.AlphaImageLoader(src='images/logo.png', sizingMethod='scale');
}
There you go. It should work now.
The background: transparent thing tells the browser to ignore the originally defined background used in the original CSS document.
GE Smart Grid Augmented Reality and FLArToolkit
If you haven’t seen the many internet postings about the website, check out the video below. Even better, if you have a camera and a printer handy, check out GE Smart Grid Augmented Reality. The reason being the “cool” part about the site is the ability to put it’s 3d animation in your “hands” through your web camera. Just print out the pattern, and you can do it.
The more interesting part is: how do they do it?
We had posted an article on this technology back in December, Papervision Augmented Reality. Look familiar now? It’s pretty easy to see that this is the same core technology. I can’t say for sure whether they use the FLARToolkit and Papervision (which the original post described) but if they didn’t, there are 2 similiar tools.
The greatest thing about this, is that this is only the beginning. I have many ideas for commercial applications with this technology (which I won’t share, because I can make money off that… send me an email if you want to discuss this privately). I’m sure you can come up with a few on your own.
Watch the video, it will probably bring everything together. Great job GE in taking a publically available technology, and “finishing” the idea with some nice execution.
JSDoc: How to document your JavaScript
JSDoc is meant to do for Javascript, what Javadoc does for Java.
It does.
You can download and install JSDoc easily:
- Download JSDoc
- Expand the tgz.gz file (I use Winrar)
- Optional – I copy the jsdoc folder to my C: drive to make things easier
- Reminder – you need a perl runtime installed. ActivePerl is recommended
- Open up a command prompt
- Change to your JSDoc folder (mine is c:\JSDoc-1.10.2\)
- Run it: “perl jsdoc.pl test.js” (to test it against the built in JS file)
Usage of JSDoc is as simple as Javadoc was. An example of usage taken from the official JSDoc page is below:
/**
* Shape is an abstract base class. It is defined simply
* to have something to inherit from for geometric
* subclasses
* @constructor
*/
function Shape(color){
this.color = color;
}
// Bind the Shape_getColor method to the Shape class
Shape.prototype.getColor = Shape_getColor;
/**
* Get the name of the color for this shape
* @returns A color string for this shape
*/
function Shape_getColor(){
return this.color;
}
/**
* Circle is a subclass of Shape
*/
function Circle(radius){
this.radius = radius;
}
/**
* A very rough value for pi
*/
Circle.PI = 3.14;
/**
* Get the radius of this circle
* @returns The radius of this circle
*/
function Circle_getRadius(){
return this.radius;
}
// Circle is a subclass of Shape
Circle.prototype = new Shape(null);
You can use the reference on the official site to learn about more of the “@” attributes you can use for JSDoc.
The example code is here:
- test.js – original example javascript file
- JSDoc generated documentation for the test.js file.
Virtual Water: An Interactive Installation
The video below is an interactive installation by Mike Burton (couldn’t find a link, let me know if you have one, he deserves it) called Waterboard. The interactive artwork lets participants manipulate the flow of water on a wall. Of course the water is digital. Water reacts in a handful of ecologically logical ways (putrid water, plants growing near water, life forms forming in fresh water, etc.).
This is the kind of stuff that makes you think about the future of technology, while it may only be an art demonstration.
Inspiration: New York Slow Motion Video Montage
Some things must be shared. I’m not that into video editing, or shooting video traditionally, but this video makes you want to be involved in art. There are some beautiful textures, scenes, and colors in this video. It took the artist to put it together so we can all see what he sees. I have very high respect for the artist.
This video is by Vicente Sahuc and blows me away.
I initially saw this video on Procrastineering. He mentions that this video was shot on a Casio EX-F1
New York 2008 from Vicente Sahuc on Vimeo.
David Sedaris and his books…
David Sedaris
David Sedaris is an author, among other things, of comedic books. For the past 6 months I’ve been listening to some of his audiobooks while I drive back and forth to Boston and skiing. So far I’ve finished Me Talk Pretty One Day, and have been working my way through When You Are Engulfed in Flames recently.
I wanted to point out a few things. First of all, audiobooks aren’t that bad. I’ve always looked down on audiobooks myself somewhat. They’re not really reading, and I’ve always detested abridged versions of books. I’m not saying I love the concept of abridging books, but I didn’t find that it bothered me. The winning point of audiobooks, for me, is having the author read the books. I fully believe my experience listening to David Sedaris’ audiobook Me Talk Pretty One Day, was significantly improved by hearing David tell the story himself. It does help that he’s a great writer, and reader.
His stories are the types of stories we would all have gathered throughout our lives, with a comedic edge. I got into reading his books when my girlfriend couldn’t stop laughing on a plane ride about an event in a bathroom.
What brought me to writing this, was that I wanted to point out David Sedaris would be appearing at the Providence Performing Arts Center on Monday, April 6 @ 8:00pm. Unfortunately I can’t go, but would love for someone else to get to experience it.
Here are some other books by David Sedaris:
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