I sure wish my truck had an AC right about now.
Garbage In, Garbage Out →
Seth Goden:
“Garbage in, garbage out.”
It has a nice ring to it. And engineers have long embraced it as a mantra. If you don’t put the right stuff in, don’t expect to get good results.
I have been reading Seth’s blog every day for almost a year now. I think this post is my favorite from him that I have read yet.
I really drives home how important it is to design for your users instead of defaulting to blaming them when things go wrong.
That is definitely something that I need to be reminded of every now and then.
On Sunday, I switched up my workout routine and started running. Today, I had already shaved 45 seconds off my mile pace. I’m aiming for 7ish minutes. About 90 seconds to go!
None of this changes any of my feelings about running though. It is, and always will be, stupid.
I don’t think you are supposed to have two of these?
While the world is going crazy around us, watching my three year old tell his little brother “you are my buckaroo and my friend” makes my heart happy.
I think something is a little wrong here.
Weird. Apple just updated the MacBook Pro, but my 2017 model does not feel old and busted. Why can’t this happen with iOS devices?
I guess a bunch of people want to buy that new MacBook Pro.
A Tribute to iBeer →
Craig Hockenberry on an early innovative App Store standout:
Today’s a big day for app developers.
In the lead-up to today’s event, I spent some time digging through my old purchases. After launching the App Store app, tap on your profile in the upper-right corner, then tap on the Purchased menu of your account page. After spending a few hours scrolling down, you’ll see your first apps!
One the apps was something called “Carling Tap” – and I had no recollection of anything by that name. A little bit of research helped me remember that the app was formerly named “iBeer”. This hiccup with the name not only paused my scrolling: it also got me thinking about the importance of this early app.
That app was so great.
Apple combines machine learning and Siri teams under Giannandrea →
Another big scoop for Panzarino and TechCrunch:
Apple is creating a new AI/ML team that brings together its Core ML and Siri teams under one leader in John Giannandrea.
Apple confirmed this morning that the combined Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning team, which houses Siri, will be led by the recent hire, who came to Apple this year after an 8 year stint at Google where he led the Machine Intelligence, Research and Search teams. Before that he founded Metaweb Technologies and Tellme.
The internal structures of the Siri and Core ML teams will remain the same, but they will now answer to Giannandrea. Apple’s internal structure means that the teams will likely remain integrated across the org as they’re wedded to various projects including developer tools, mapping, Core OS and more. ML is everywhere, basically.
We saw some nice improvements to the “features” side of Siri at WWDC with the introduction of Shortcuts. Hopefully this leads to seeing similar improvements to “smarts” side in the near future.
Apple is Considering Acquiring 1Password →
Jonathan Geller at BGR:
We have exclusively learned that Apple is planning an interesting partnership and a potential acquisition of AgileBits, maker of the popular password manager 1Password.
According to our source, after many months of planning, Apple plans to deploy 1Password internally to all 100,000 employees. This includes not just employees in Cupertino, but extends all the way to retail, too. Furthermore, the company is said to have carved out a deal that includes family plans, giving up to 5 family members of each employee a free license for 1Password. With more and more emphasis on security in general, and especially at Apple, there are a number of reasons this deal makes sense. We’re told that 100 Apple employees will start using 1Password through this initiative starting this week, with the full 100,000 users expected to be activated within the next one to two months.
I have been using 1Password almost as long as I have been using Apple products. It is always the first app I install when setting up a new device. I think that it would be a great fit for Apple to buy.
The most interesting part of this report is that their deployment agreement with Apple includes Family Plan support. The ability to share certain passwords with my wife is one of the main reasons I continue to use 1Password over Apple’s iCloud Keychain even though Apple’s offering has significantly improved in the last few years. If they are offering family plans to their employees, it would serve as evidence that those features would stick around if Apple follows through with acquiring them.
If this acquisition does go through, it would be another example of Apple buying up a nerdier app and giving it to their users (similar to buying Workflow and releasing it as Shortcuts). I am a big fan of Apple spending more time an attention on professional features and apps like this.
However if I were a 1Password user who depended on the cross-platform features, I would star researching other options. Apple’s track record of keeping their products working on other platforms isn’t great.
Update: Well apparently Apple will not be acquiring 1Password.
Mattt Thompson Returns to NSHipster →
When the iPhone SDK first came out, there was a disconnect between how futuristic the iPhone was and how, well… not Objective-C was.
For many new developers, Objective-C was seen as an ugly, obscure language — something you merely put up with in exchange for the privilege of developing on this amazing new platform. That was certainly the case for me when I wrote my first app. But over time, I learned to appreciate the beauty of the language and its frameworks.
I started NSHipster in July 2012 as a way to share my newfound passion. At the time, the term “hipster” was tossed around frequently as a casual pejorative for people who ironically enjoyed obscure or bad things. What better term for someone excited about Objective-C, right? Rather than being ashamed or annoyed by the language we used in our day-to-day, it felt good to turn it around and say “Oh, this? It’s an obscure API. You’ve probably never heard of it.”
Today marks six years since I first launched NSHipster (which is a big milestone for all of you out there counting in base-6). To mark the occasion, I’m very excited to announce my return as the managing editor of NSHipster.
I’m extremely thankful to Nate Cook for his stewardship of NSHipster. During my tenure at Apple from 2015 to 2018, I was unable to contribute to the site; it’s entirely thanks to him that NSHipster exists today. His contributions to Swift are extraordinary and immeasurable, and we all benefit immensely as a community from his work.
I don’t think I can overstate how important NSHipster was to my early career in iPhone app development. I already had a few years of app development experience when the site launched, but the techniques I learned from Mattt1 helped me transition from a student writing apps to being a professional developer.
I am excited to see him back in control of the site.
- Many of which I still use today. ↩
I’m starting to think that there is a going to be a pretty big market for fitness apps that don’t send any of your data to their servers so they can be assured that stuff like this doesn’t happen.
Ollie: Where is God at?
Me: He is everywhere!
Ollie: He’s in my tummy?
Hard to beat an accidental Sunday afternoon nap on the couch with my three year old.