php-horde-feed 2.0.1-4 / usr / share / php / tests / Horde_Feed / Horde / Feed / fixtures / lexicon / http-daringfireball.net-index.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<feed xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom">
<title>Daring Fireball</title>
<subtitle>Mac and web curmudgeonry/nerdery. By John Gruber.</subtitle>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/" />
<link rel="self" type="application/atom+xml" href="http://daringfireball.net/index.xml" />
<id>http://daringfireball.net/feeds/combo</id>

<updated>2008-07-22T00:26:58Z</updated><rights>Copyright © 2008, John Gruber</rights><entry>
	<title>Apple Shares Fall in After Hours Trading</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/apple-earnings-top-1-billion/story.aspx?guid=%7B30D88DC8%2DF3C0%2D491C%2DAC90%2DEED0E96EE266%7D" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13189</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T20:26:58-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T20:26:58-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Rex Crum, reporting for MarketWatch:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>However, Apple&#8217;s shares fell 9% in after-hours trading as the company gave one of its typically conservative fourth-quarter earnings forecasts that fell short of Wall Street analysts&#8217; expectations. A similar event took place following the company&#8217;s prior quarterly report in April, when a conservative forecast sent the stock tumbling despite strong results for the period.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Now&#8217;s a good time to re-read the piece I <a href="http://bullcross.blogspot.com/2008/07/whats-with-irrational-preoccupation-of.html">linked to over the weekend from Andy Zaky</a> on Wall Street&#8217;s misguided obsession with Apple&#8217;s conservative guidance numbers.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Apple Shares Fall in After Hours Trading’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/aapl-shares-fall">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>TechCrunch Is Building a Web Tablet</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/21/we-want-a-dead-simple-web-tablet-help-us-build-it/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13187</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T20:00:58-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T20:00:58-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>They don&#8217;t know what the components will cost and they&#8217;re going to use volunteer labor to write the software, but they&#8217;re hoping it costs $200 or so and to have a prototype ready soon. Good luck with that.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘TechCrunch Is Building a Web Tablet’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/techcrunch">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
<title>[Sponsor] Superbiate &amp; Son, Inc.</title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://superbiate.com/" />
<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/feeds/sponsors//11.13185</id>
<author>
	<name>Daring Fireball Sponsorbot</name>
</author>
   
<published>2008-07-21T18:26:20-04:00</published>
<updated>2008-07-21T18:26:20-04:00</updated>
   
<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/feeds/sponsors/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Superbiate &amp; Son, Inc. is the storefront of George Del Barrio, a photographer from New York. His portraiture is concerned with reporting on revelations of soul and the search for truth in beauty. Clients include VSA Partners, Lehman Brothers, The Posse Foundation and The South China Morning Post. George specializes in large format studio and location work and is available for travel assignments worldwide. For bookings, portfolio requests or more information, please <a href="http://superbiate.com/contact/">contact Matthew Bogosian</a> at the Vanderbilt Republic.</p>

]]></content>
</entry><entry>
	<title>Macworld Live Coverage of Apple’s Q3 2008 Conference Call</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.macworld.com/article/134594/2008/07/liveupdate.html?lsrc=top_1" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13183</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T17:36:15-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T17:36:15-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Here&#8217;s the answer to a question about Steve Jobs&#8217;s health:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>&#8220;Steve loves Apple, he serves as CEO at pleasure of Apple&#8217;s board
  and has no plans to leave. Steve&#8217;s health is a private matter.&#8221;</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Good answer.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Macworld Live Coverage of Apple&#8217;s Q3 2008 Conference Call’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/macworld-q3-call">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Apple Reports Record Third Quarter Results</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2008/07/21results.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13181</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T17:27:05-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T17:27:05-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Apple:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The Company posted revenue of $7.46 billion and net quarterly profit
  of $1.07 billion, or $1.19 per diluted share. These results compare
  to revenue of $5.41 billion and net quarterly profit of $818
  million, or $.92 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross
  margin was 34.8 percent, down from 36.9 percent in the year-ago
  quarter. International sales accounted for 42 percent of the
  quarter’s revenue.</p>
  
  <p>Apple shipped 2,496,000 Macintosh computers during the quarter,
  representing 41 percent unit growth and 43 percent revenue growth
  over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 11,011,000 iPods during
  the quarter, representing 12 percent unit growth and seven percent
  revenue growth over the year-ago quarter. Quarterly iPhone units
  sold were 717,000 compared to 270,000 in the year-ago-quarter.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>41 percent year-over-year growth in Mac sales. Astounding. Where does this growth end?</p>

<p>iPod sales are up, too, which is interesting, given the iPhone. (These iPhone numbers are irrelevent, in that this year&#8217;s numbers cover the quarter leading up to the iPhone 3G, for much of which time iPhones weren&#8217;t even available for sale. And last year&#8217;s numbers for Q3 only covered the first two days the iPhone was available for sale.)</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Apple Reports Record Third Quarter Results’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/apple-q3-results">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>The History of AppleScript (PDF)</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.cs.utexas.edu/~wcook/Drafts/2006/ashopl.pdf" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13179</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T17:12:14-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T17:12:14-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Fascinating 37-page paper on the history of AppleScript, written in 2006 by one of AppleScript&#8217;s original creators, William R. Cook. If you&#8217;ve ever wondered why AppleScript is the way it is, this is the best explanation I&#8217;ve ever seen.</p>

<p>News to me is that Apple originally developed an alternative &#8220;Professional&#8221; dialect, wherein this bit of English AppleScript:</p>

<pre><code>the first character of every word whose style is bold
</code></pre>

<p>could be written like this in the Professional dialect:</p>

<pre><code>{ words | style == bold }.character[1] 
</code></pre>

<p>What a shame they abandoned that.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘The History of AppleScript (PDF)’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/cook-applescript">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Peter Merholz Interviews Michael B. Johnson of Pixar</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2008/07/14/conversation-with-michael-b-johnson-of-pixar-part-1/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13177</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T16:49:58-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T16:49:58-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Michael B. Johnson, on Pixar&#8217;s practice of creating a complete prototype of every film before starting work on the actual movie:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>We’d much rather fail with a bunch of sketches that we did (relatively) quickly and cheaply, than once we’ve modeled, rigged, shaded, animated, and lit the film. “Fail fast,” that’s the mantra. With a team of 10-20 people (director, story artists, editorial staff, production designer and artists, and skeleton production management) you can make, remake, and remake again a movie that once it hits 3D will take an order of magnitude more people to execute. The complexity of the task does not ramp up linearly.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Johnson leads Pixar&#8217;s internal software tools team &#8212; his annual lunchtime talks at WWDC fill to standing-room only.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Peter Merholz Interviews Michael B. Johnson of Pixar’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/merholz-johnson">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>End of the Line for ‘Ebert and Roeper’ TV Show</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080721/FEATURED/150028057" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13175</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T16:29:32-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T16:29:32-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>The show hasn&#8217;t been the same since Gene Siskel died &#8212; he and Ebert were simply perfect together. But the basic format was brilliant for a TV show for film criticism. (<a href="http://twitter.com/Ihnatko/statuses/864359832">Via Andy Ihnatko</a>.)</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘End of the Line for &#8216;Ebert and Roeper&#8217; TV Show’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/ebert">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Sony’s Amazing Crapware-Free PC</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=501" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13173</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T15:26:43-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T15:26:43-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Ed Bott:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Sony is finally taking on its crapware problem. For the past two months, I’ve been using an astonishingly light and agile Sony VAIO notebook and loving every minute of it. The best part of all was that this machine was absolutely, completely, unequivocally crapware-free, which meant I was able to be productive within a few minutes of unboxing.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Good for Sony, but Bott&#8217;s enthusiasm is like being amazed after buying a sandwich that wasn&#8217;t spit in.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Sony’s Amazing Crapware-Free PC’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/bott">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Icahn Drops Proxy Fight, Yahoo Puts Him on Board</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080721-lose-lose-icahn-drops-proxy-fight-yahoo-puts-him-on-board.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13171</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T15:06:09-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T15:06:09-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Yahoo to Carl Icahn: &#8220;<em>You&#8217;re an idiot, your ideas for what we should do are wrong, welcome to our board.</em>&#8221;</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Icahn Drops Proxy Fight, Yahoo Puts Him on Board’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/icahn-yahoo">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>iPhone Native Apps — The Great Leap Backwards?</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.webdirections.org/blog/iphone-native-apps-the-great-leap-backwards/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13169</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T13:36:14-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T13:36:14-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>John Allsop arguing that most of the native iPhone apps he&#8217;s looked at would be better off as web apps. He has a good point but overstates his case.</p>

<p>He mentions <a href="http://cocktails.cocktaildb.com/">Cocktails</a> as an example that could have been an iPhone web app a year ago with &#8220;a little bit of CSS&#8221;, and links to <a href="http://www.apple.com/webapps/entertainment/pocketbarmobilecocktailrecipesfortheiphone_vishalseth.html">PocketBar</a>, an iPhone web app that serves the same purpose. But Cocktails is far slicker and far faster than PocketBar. That may not be worth $10 to most people, but it&#8217;s worth $10 to me.</p>

<p>(<a href="http://ajaxian.com/archives/iphone-native-apps-vs-iphone-web-apps">Via Ajaxian</a>.)</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘iPhone Native Apps — The Great Leap Backwards?’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/allsop">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Tim Bray on Mobile Software Development</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2008/07/18/Mobile-Net-Gloom" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13167</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T12:49:57-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T12:49:57-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Tim Bray, gloomy on the prospects of mobile software development:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>But there’s a little problem and a big problem. The little problem
  is that I don’t wanna learn Objective-C and I don’t wanna learn a
  whole new UI framework. I acknowledge that lots of smart people
  think Objective-C and Cocoa are both wonderful, and quite likely
  they’re right. I don’t care. I’m lazy; I know enough languages and
  enough frameworks. You’re free to disapprove, but there are a
  whole lot of people like me out there.</p>
  
  <p>The <em>big</em> problem is this: I don’t wanna be a sharecropper on
  Massa Steve’s plantation. I don’t want to write code for a
  platform where there’s someone else who gets to decide whether I
  get to play and what I’m allowed to sell, and who can flip my
  you’re-out-of-business-switch any time it furthers their business
  goals.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>These are both reasonable objections to writing native iPhone software. But there is never going to be a phone with a native API framework that isn&#8217;t new. Sure, most do and perhaps will continue to use Java as the language, but I&#8217;d say that learning Cocoa Touch (the framework) is a far bigger obstacle than learning Objective-C (the language), especially for someone like Bray, who knows C.</p>

<p>But the big thing Bray seems to be overlooking is mobile web app development. If your primary concerns are like his &#8212; (a) not wanting to learn new languages and frameworks, (b) not wanting your software distribution under anyone else&#8217;s control, and (c) not wanting to be tied to one proprietary device &#8212; web app development solves all three.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Tim Bray on Mobile Software Development’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/tim-bray-mobile">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Good News, Eh?</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://sprintconnection.kansascity.com/?q=node/706" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13165</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T11:51:38-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T11:51:38-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Sprint Connection:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The iPhone shortage may be good news for Sprint, which launched the iPhone-challenging Samsung Instinct in June.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Yes, the more iPhone customers AT&amp;T signs up, the better it gets for Sprint.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Good News, Eh?’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/sprint">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>The Fallacy of Choice</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://linuxhaters.blogspot.com/2008/07/fallacy-of-choice.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13163</id>
	<published>2008-07-21T11:39:39-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T11:39:39-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>The Linux Hater&#8217;s Blog:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>So not only does the addition of so many choices alienate would be users, it also makes it difficult for developers to create tested, working configurations. It&#8217;s a double whammy. Obsession with providing choice it every level <em>actively works against</em> efforts that would otherwise push Linux to provide what the mainstream wants.</p>
</blockquote>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘The Fallacy of Choice’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/21/fallacy-of-choice">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>iPhone 3G Sold Out Nationwide</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.apple.com/retail/iphone/availability.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13161</id>
	<published>2008-07-20T21:25:18-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-21T00:43:27-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>I just went through Apple&#8217;s iPhone availability checker for all 50 states in the U.S.: one store in Hawaii has one model (8 GB), one store in California (out of 38 in the state) has one model (16 GB black), and the Fifth Avenue flagship store in New York has one model (16 GB white). That&#8217;s it.</p>

<p>So much for my &#8220;just wait a week and then cruise in and pick one up in five minutes&#8221; plan.</p>

<p><strong>Update:</strong> I mistakenly skipped New Hampshire, where they still have one model (16 GB white) at the Rockingham Mall. We regret the error.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘iPhone 3G Sold Out Nationwide’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/20/iphone-sold-out">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
    <title>★ WebKit Performance on iPhone OS X 2.0</title>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2008/07/webkit_performance_iphone" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008://1.13157</id>
	<published>2008-07-20T13:27:22-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-20T13:27:22-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
<summary type="html">WebKit&apos;s JavaScript performance is dramatically improved in iPhone OS X 2.0.</summary>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>As part of the iPhone SDK developer program, I&#8217;ve been running a seed of the GM build of the new OS on my original iPhone for a few weeks now. Overall, there are surprisingly few visible changes to the system. Many of the built-in apps are, at least visibly, identical to the versions in iPhone OS 1.1.4. This includes Safari &#8212; if anything has changed in Safari&#8217;s user interface, I haven&#8217;t noticed it.<sup id="fnr1-2008-07-20"><a href="#fn1-2008-07-20">1</a></sup></p>

<p>But under the hood, MobileSafari 2.0&#8217;s performance is hugely improved over 1.1.4. Everything related to web surfing feels faster, and in side-by-side comparisons using my wife&#8217;s iPhone running 1.1.4, web pages consistently load faster on 2.0, both via Wi-Fi and EDGE. This has nothing to do with the new iPhone 3G hardware &#8212; this is about dramatic performance improvements on original iPhones upgraded to the 2.0 OS.</p>

<p>Using MobileSafari simply feels faster, especially with web applications. <em>Feel</em> is by nature subjective, but JavaScript benchmarks back this up.</p>

<p>In August last year, <a href="http://furbo.org/2007/08/15/benchmarking-in-your-pants/">Craig Hockenberry posted a few simple benchmarks</a> to compare the iPhone&#8217;s processing power and JavaScript interpreter against Safari 3 running on a Mac with a 1.83 GHz Core Duo. At that time, the current version of the iPhone OS was 1.0.1. Here are the results of those same benchmarks on original iPhones running the 1.1.4 and new 2.0 OS versions, with Hockenberry&#8217;s 1.0.1 results included for comparison:</p>

<table border="0">
    <tr align="left">
        <th style="width:12em;">Test</th> <th style="width:3em;">1.0.1</th> <th style="width:3em;">1.1.4</th> <th style="width:3em;">2.0</th> <th style="width:8em;">Vs. 1.0.1 / 1.1.4</th>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>100,000 iterations</td> <td>3.209</td> <td>1.096</td> <td>0.145</td> <td>22× / 8×</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>10,000 divisions</td> <td>0.413</td> <td>0.181</td> <td>0.029</td> <td>14× / 6×</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>10,000 sin(x) calls</td> <td>0.709</td> <td>0.373</td> <td>0.140</td> <td>5× / 3×</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>10,000 string allocations</td> <td>0.777</td> <td>0.434</td> <td>0.133</td> <td>6× / 3×</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>10,000 function calls</td> <td>0.904</td> <td>0.595</td> <td>0.115</td> <td>8× / 5×</td>
    </tr>
</table>

<p>The last column shows how many times faster the 2.0 version of MobileSafari was versus 1.0.1 and 1.1.4. The same results, charted (smaller bars are faster):</p>

<p><img
    style = "background-color: #4a525a; border-width: 0;"
    alt   = "Chart displaying the results of the above table."
    src   = "http://daringfireball.net/misc/2008/07/iphone-js-bench/hockenbench-clear.png"
/></p>

<p>The results are obvious. WebKit JavaScript performance has improved steadily and significantly in just one year, with a huge jump between 1.1.4 and the new 2.0.0.</p>

<p>I also tested both iPhone 1.1.4 and 2.0.0 against <a href="http://celtickane.com/webdesign/jsspeed.php">Celtic Kane&#8217;s JavaScript benchmarks</a>. The average time over three runs for iPhone 1.1.4 was 8,945 ms; for iPhone 2.0 it was 5,307 &#8212; just under 1.7 times faster. (For comparison, Safari 3.1.2 on my 2.5 GHz MacBook Pro took just 133 ms &#8212; 40 times faster than the iPhone.)</p>

<p>The tests I ran here were specific to JavaScript, but I strongly suspect WebKit performance has improved across the board. In side-by-side page loading tests between two original iPhones running 1.1.4 and 2.0.0, the new version consistently finished at least a few seconds faster.</p>

<p>For all the hubbub regarding the new App Store, most &#8220;iPhone software&#8221; runs in the web browser. But improvements in WebKit performance often help native iPhone app performance, too &#8212; a slew of my favorite native iPhone apps have built-in WebKit browsers (e.g., NetNewsWire, Twitterrific, Instapaper, and Cocktails). When WebKit performance improves, any app that uses WebKit improves, and WebKit improved <em>a lot</em> between iPhone 1.1.4 and 2.0.0.</p>

<div class="footnotes">
<hr />
<ol>
<li id="fn1-2008-07-20">
<p>Except for the very cool new feature where you can tap-and-hold on an image to bring up a dialog that lets you save the image to your iPhone camera roll.&nbsp;<a href="#fnr1-2008-07-20"  class="footnoteBackLink"  title="Jump back to footnote 1 in the text.">&#8617;</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>



    ]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>OpenMoko Usability Train Wreck</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.vimeo.com/1366042?pg=embed&amp;sec=1366042" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13155</id>
	<published>2008-07-19T13:40:08-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-19T13:40:08-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Dave Fayram&#8217;s hilarious video demonstrating the OpenMoko user interface and on-screen keyboard.  Don&#8217;t miss <a href="http://www.vimeo.com/1366923">his follow-up video</a> showing an alternative interface also in development. This is the phone the FSF wants would-be iPhone buyers to wait for &#8212; and which is currently selling for $400.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘OpenMoko Usability Train Wreck’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/19/openmoko">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Shake It Like a Metaphorical Picture</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://jasonsantamaria.com/articles/shake-it-like-a-metaphorical-picture/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13153</id>
	<published>2008-07-19T13:28:27-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-19T13:28:27-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Jason Santa Maria on Polaroid&#8217;s decision to stop producing instant film.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Shake It Like a Metaphorical Picture’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/19/santa-maria">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Apple’s Complaint Against Psystar</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.macworld.com/article/134544/2008/07/psystar.html?lsrc=rss_weblogs_editors" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13151</id>
	<published>2008-07-19T13:16:18-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-19T13:16:18-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Philip Michaels summarizes the complaint Apple filed against would-be Mac cloner Psystar.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Apple’s Complaint Against Psystar’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/19/psystar">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Starbucks Closure List</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/18/starbucks-closure-list-al_n_113646.html?view=print" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13149</id>
	<published>2008-07-19T12:24:26-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-19T12:24:26-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>The Huffington Post has the full list of Starbucks stores that are closing. None in Philly.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Starbucks Closure List’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/19/starbucks">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
    <title>★ Distant and Remote</title>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2008/07/remote_keyboard" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008://1.13145</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T20:13:29-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T20:13:29-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
<summary type="html">Apple&apos;s new iPhone &apos;Remote&apos; app works as a remote keyboard for Apple TV.</summary>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>One thing that stinks about Apple TV is the on-screen keyboard. You don&#8217;t need to type often, but when you do &#8212; like for searching YouTube, or entering a Wi-Fi password &#8212; you get a crummy on-screen keyboard (ABCDEF rather than QWERTY) that you have to navigate using the up/down/left/right buttons on the little remote.</p>

<p>But it ends up Apple&#8217;s new Remote app for the iPhone solves this. Any time you need to type on Apple TV, if you have the Remote app open on your iPhone, the keyboard will appear and you can just type on your iPhone instead. Characters are <a href="http://daringfireball.net/misc/2008/07/appletv-youtube-search.jpg">reflected live on the Apple TV</a> as you type.</p>

<p><a href="http://daringfireball.net/misc/2008/07/remote-typing.png">
<img src="http://daringfireball.net/misc/2008/07/remote-typing-thumb.jpg" />
</a></p>

<p>A nice little touch, and, as far as I can tell, something Apple hasn&#8217;t mentioned as one of the Remote app&#8217;s features. (Thanks to DF reader Earl Misquitta for the tip.)</p>



    ]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>From the DF Archives: A Wee Bit More on AAC, Ogg, and MP3</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2007/04/wee_bit_more_on_aac" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13143</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T18:24:28-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T18:24:28-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>One of the Free Software Foundation&#8217;s complaints regarding the iPhone (and Apple in general) is the lack of support for &#8220;free&#8221; media file formats such as Ogg Vorbis. Here&#8217;s what I wrote last year:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>With regard to Ogg Vorbis, or the idea of “free” codecs in
  general, the consensus seems to be that this is an ugly patent
  lawsuit waiting to happen. Yes, the creators of Ogg Vorbis have
  released the format (and source code for encoding and playback)
  openly, but the holders of the patents behind MP3 (and other
  patented codecs) very likely consider part of Ogg Vorbis to
  violate their patents. If Apple, or any other company with a
  serious amount of money behind it, were to use Ogg Vorbis in a
  mainstream widely-used product, it could lead to an expensive
  lawsuit.</p>
  
  <p>Do software patents suck? Yes. Is it possible that Ogg Vorbis does
  not actually infringe on anyone’s patent, but that some patent
  holder could sue and win even though they shouldn’t? Yes. The
  point is, Ogg Vorbis is intended to be free, and it would be great
  if it were free, but no one with deep pockets has yet tested the
  water to see whether it really is. Worse, there are some experts
  who do believe that Ogg violates at least one significant patent.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Perhaps the same goes for why Apple chose to create the Apple Lossless format rather than use <a href="http://flac.sourceforge.net/">FLAC</a>. For Apple to support Ogg Vorbis would be to take a potentially large risk (a lawsuit, by, say, Fraunhofer, an MP3 patent holder) for an utterly minuscule financial upside (whatever handful of people exist who won&#8217;t buy an iPod or iPhone now but <em>would</em> if Apple supported Ogg Vorbis).</p>

<p>In short, Apple supporting Ogg Vorbis makes wonderful political sense, but no business sense whatsoever.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘From the DF Archives: A Wee Bit More on AAC, Ogg, and MP3’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/aac-ogg-mp3">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>iPhone Development NDA Holding Up Books and Screencasts</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://pragdave.blogs.pragprog.com/pragdave/2008/07/if-you-work-for.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13141</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T17:31:45-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T17:31:45-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Dave Thomas on how the NDA surrounding the iPhone SDK is preventing Pragmatic Programmers from publishing books and screencasts on iPhone Development:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>So, to write a book about the iPhone SDK, you have to download it. In order to download it, you have to accept the agreement. And the agreement says that the download will contain confidential information that you can&#8217;t pass on to third parties. That makes it hard to publish the book. And, if that wasn&#8217;t enough, it also appears that you can&#8217;t even use the word &#8220;iPhone&#8221; (for example, in a book title).</p>
</blockquote>

<p>The secrecy was frustrating but understandable while the SDK was in beta. Now it&#8217;s just frustrating.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘iPhone Development NDA Holding Up Books and Screencasts’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/dave-thomas">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Charlie Sorrel Interviews Brent Simmons Regarding iPhone Development</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/07/interview-brent.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13139</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T17:27:53-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T17:27:53-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Brent Simmons:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The secrecy makes it difficult. For Mac programming, there are all kinds of resources &#8212; mailing lists, bits of code posted on the web, wikis, other developers &#8212; to help out. It makes a difference. For iPhone programming, no. We’re not supposed to discuss actually programming on the iPhone with anybody &#8212; even though that would raise the quality of the apps.</p>
</blockquote>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Charlie Sorrel Interviews Brent Simmons Regarding iPhone Development’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/simmons-sorrel">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>What’s With the Irrational Preoccupation of Apple’s Guidance?</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://bullcross.blogspot.com/2008/07/whats-with-irrational-preoccupation-of.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13137</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T17:14:10-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T17:14:10-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>One of the smartest investor-oriented pieces about Apple I&#8217;ve seen, from Andy M. Zaky.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘What’s With the Irrational Preoccupation of Apple’s Guidance?’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/aapl">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Tap Tap Tap</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://taptaptap.com/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13135</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T16:23:43-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T16:23:43-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>My thanks to Tap Tap Tap for sponsoring this week&#8217;s DF RSS feed. Tap Tap Tap makes &#8220;tasty bits for your iPhone&#8221;, and their first two apps are very well done: <a href="http://taptaptap.com/#whereto">Where To</a>, a $3 app for finding nearby restaurants, stores, services, and more; and <a href="http://taptaptap.com/#tipulator">Tipulator</a>, a $1 tip calculator.</p>

<p>A year ago I <a href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2007/07/03/engadget">was dismissive</a> of the idea of a dedicated &#8220;tip calculator&#8221;, but I got a bunch of emails about that from DF readers who clearly didn&#8217;t enjoy math class as much as I did. There are a bunch of tip calculators in the App Store already, and eventually I&#8217;m sure there will be dozens &#8212; but what Tipulator has going for it is that it looks and feels like the tip calculator that Apple would make if Apple were to make one. A few simple features with a very detailed UI.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Tap Tap Tap’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/tap-tap-tap">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Counterpoint</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.theangrydrunk.com/2008/07/16/how-did-i-miss-this-tripe/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13133</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T11:17:33-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T11:17:33-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Darby Lines sees it otherwise.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Counterpoint’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/lines">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Point</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://lifehacker.com/398658/why-youre-better-off-avoiding-the-iphone" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13131</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T11:13:44-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T11:13:44-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Gina Trapani on the Free Software Foundation&#8217;s iPhone screed.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Point’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/trapani">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>iPhone 3Gs in Short Supply</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.macworld.com/article/134567/2008/07/iphone3g_shortage.html?lsrc=rss_main" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13129</id>
	<published>2008-07-18T11:01:07-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-18T11:01:07-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Only one out of four Apple Stores has any in stock, and the black 16 GB model is even harder to find.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘iPhone 3Gs in Short Supply’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/18/iphone-supply">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Twinkle 1.0</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://tapulous.com/twinkle/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13127</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T22:23:05-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T22:23:05-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Twinkle, previously a jailbreak API Twitter client, has been revised and expanded by Tapulous and is <a href="http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=284967867&amp;mt=8">now available for free at the App Store</a>. It&#8217;s an interesting contrast with Twitterrific &#8212; even ignoring cosmetic differences, the two apps take significantly different UI approaches.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Twinkle 1.0’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/twinkle">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>The Free Software Foundation’s Five Reasons Not to Buy an iPhone</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/5-reasons-to-avoid-iphone-3g" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13125</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T20:04:37-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T20:04:37-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>They&#8217;re accusing Apple of concocting the whole thing as some sort of profit-making scheme.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘The Free Software Foundation&#8217;s Five Reasons Not to Buy an iPhone’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/fsf">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Sean Tevis: Running for Office xkcd-Style</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://seantevis.com/kansas/3000/running-for-office-xkcd-style/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13123</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T19:58:27-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T19:58:27-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Information architect Sean Tevis is running for the state legislature in Kansas. An innovative way to bootstrap a campaign.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Sean Tevis: Running for Office xkcd-Style’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/tevis">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Demographics Is Destiny</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://speirs.org/2008/07/16/demographics-is-destiny/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13121</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T19:15:36-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T19:15:36-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Fraser Speirs, predicting (rightly, I think) that the iPhone OS will be Apple&#8217;s main platform four years from now:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Put this another way: my iPhone app, <a href="http://connectedflow.com/exposure">Exposure</a>, has picked up on average 3,200 new users <em>per day</em> since the App Store opened. Exposure <em>already</em> has twice as many users as FlickrExport for Aperture.</p>
</blockquote>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Demographics Is Destiny’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/fraser-speirs">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Stanley Kubrick’s Notebooks</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gruber/sets/72157606225341018/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13119</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T18:57:21-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T18:57:21-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>I put together a small photoset of stills from Jon Ronson’s new documentary <em><a href="http://www.channel4.com/more4/documentaries/doc-feature.jsp?id=215">Stanley Kubrick’s Boxes</a></em> — “A biography of a remarkably talented man as seen though the rich collection of material he left behind.”</p>

<p>It ends up Kubrick was a bit of a notebook and stationery aficionado.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Stanley Kubrick’s Notebooks’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/kubricks-notebooks">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>PHP Syntax Checking in BBEdit</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2003/12/php_syntax_checking_in_bbedit" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13117</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T15:45:00-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T15:45:00-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Back in December 2003, I posted this AppleScript to add a simple PHP syntax checker to BBEdit. I just fixed a few minor bugs, so if you&#8217;ve already got a copy, you might want to replace your version with the current script.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘PHP Syntax Checking in BBEdit’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/php-syntax-bbedit">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Richard Solo Backup Battery for iPhone and iPod</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://richardsolo.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&amp;ProdID=264" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13115</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T15:06:56-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T15:06:56-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>$50 external battery for iPhones and iPods. (<a href="http://www.tuaw.com/2008/07/17/iphone-3g-extended-battery-options/">Via Steven Sande</a>.)</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Richard Solo Backup Battery for iPhone and iPod’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/solo-battery">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>For a Phone</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.lancearthur.com/archives/001893.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13113</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T14:05:54-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T14:05:54-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Lance Arthur on his experience in line for an iPhone 3G. (<a href="http://www.kottke.org/remainder/08/07/16058.html">Via Kottke</a>.)</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘For a Phone’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/lance-arthur">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Apple Fixes App Store Alphabetical Listings</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/07/16/app-store-alphabetical-listings-quietly-fixed" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13111</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T13:19:01-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T13:19:01-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>I still say they should sort by a criterion other than alphabetical by default.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Apple Fixes App Store Alphabetical Listings’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/app-store-alpha">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Cocktails 1.0</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://cocktails.cocktaildb.com/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13109</id>
	<published>2008-07-17T11:18:52-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-17T11:18:52-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Nicely designed $10 iPhone App from Skorpiostech: a searchable cocktail recipe database. Check out <a href="http://www.friday.com/bbum/2008/07/12/cocktails-beautifully-designed-mixology-tool/">Bill Bumgarner&#8217;s review</a>. I love the way that the older the recipe is, the older the &#8220;paper&#8221; looks.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Cocktails 1.0’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/17/bbum-cocktails">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>What Getting Buzzed Says About Yahoo</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://gigaom.com/2008/07/16/what-getting-buzzed-says-about-yahoo/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13107</id>
	<published>2008-07-16T18:12:52-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-16T18:12:52-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Om Malik:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>A story by Judi Sohn, who edits WebWorkerDaily, one of our growing portfolio of blogs, was featured on the home page of Yahoo last night. The story got voted up via Yahoo’s Buzz, a service akin to Digg, except much more powerful.</p>
  
  <p>In a few hours, the story about what to expect when switching from a BlackBerry to an iPhone was viewed over 200,000 times and attracted over 350 comments.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>That&#8217;s about ten times the traffic that I&#8217;ve seen from Digg.</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>At the risk of repeating myself, Yahoo’s core business now is “audience”. The company, instead of trying to out-Google Google, needs to beat itself by figuring out new ways to keep the audience growing.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>This goes along with <a href="http://davenetics.com/2008/06/do-what-youre-great-at/">Dave Pell&#8217;s advice from a few weeks ago</a>.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘What Getting Buzzed Says About Yahoo’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/16/om-yahoo-buzz">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Mike Arrington Interviews Evan Williams</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/15/interview-with-evan-william-summize-acquisition-api-issues-and-their-revenue-model/" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13105</id>
	<published>2008-07-16T17:55:55-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-16T17:55:55-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Video, with a transcript below.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Mike Arrington Interviews Evan Williams’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/16/ev-williams">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Apple Apologizes for MobileMe Launch, Extends Subscriptions</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.macworld.com/article/134530/2008/07/mobileme.html" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13103</id>
	<published>2008-07-16T16:59:24-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-16T16:59:24-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Pretty good way to handle this. A free month of service for four or five days of downtime. Here&#8217;s <a href="http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2408">Apple&#8217;s FAQ on the extension</a>.</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Apple Apologizes for MobileMe Launch, Extends Subscriptions’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/16/mobileme-apology">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
	<title>Grawlix</title>
	<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://www.typography.com/ask/showBlog.php?blogID=122" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008:/linked//6.13101</id>
	<published>2008-07-16T16:47:23-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-16T16:47:23-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/linked/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>&#8220;A string of typographical symbols used (especially in comic strips) to represent an obscenity or swear word.&#8221;</p>

<div>
<a  title="Permanent link to ‘Grawlix’"  href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/16/grawlix">&nbsp;★&nbsp;</a>
</div>

	]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
    <title>★ Copy and Paste</title>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2008/07/copy_and_paste" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008://1.13095</id>
	<published>2008-07-15T15:29:16-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-15T15:29:17-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
<summary type="html">There are two possibilities regarding the iPhone&apos;s continued lack of a system-wide copy-and-paste clipboard. Either Apple&apos;s iPhone UI team doesn&apos;t plan to add it, or, they haven&apos;t gotten to it yet.</summary>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>There are two possibilities regarding the iPhone&#8217;s continued lack of a system-wide copy-and-paste clipboard. Either Apple&#8217;s iPhone UI team doesn&#8217;t plan to add it, or, they haven&#8217;t gotten to it yet.</p>

<p>I saw a couple of links today pointing, incredulously, to <a href="http://www.appscout.com/2008/07/apple_we_dont_hate_gps_cut_and.php">this post from Sascha Segan at AppScout</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>I got a few minutes of quality time today to ask Apple product
  head Greg Joswiak some of the most burning questions about missing
  iPhone applications and features.</p>
  
  <p>Why isn&#8217;t there cut and paste? Apple has a priority list of
  features, and they got as far as they could down that list with
  this model, Joswiak said. In other words, they don&#8217;t have anything
  against cut and paste. They just judged other things to be more
  important.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>No direct quotes from Joswiak, but based on Segan&#8217;s paraphrasing, it sounds like the latter of the two explanations &#8212; that they haven&#8217;t gotten to it yet. I&#8217;m not sure why so many people find this explanation so hard to believe.</p>

<p>Additional features take additional time to develop. Many <a href="http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/14/apple-says-turn-by-turn-gps-coming-to-iphone-copy-paste-not-a/">commenters at Engadget</a>, for example, seem to think adding copy and paste to the iPhone is simply a matter of &#8220;<a href="http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/14/apple-says-turn-by-turn-gps-coming-to-iphone-copy-paste-not-a/comments/13167489/">storing a text string into memory</a>&#8221; or writing <a href="http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/14/apple-says-turn-by-turn-gps-coming-to-iphone-copy-paste-not-a/comments/13172351/">two lines of code</a>.</p>

<p>Writing the code to implement a system-wide clipboard isn&#8217;t the hard part &#8212; <a href="http://daringfireball.net/2007/08/clipboard_and_arrows">as I wrote in August</a>, the hard part is coming up with the right UI design for it. Whatever the UI for copy-and-paste for the iPhone OS eventually is, it&#8217;s very likely to remain as <em>the</em> UI for copy-and-paste on the iPhone for decades to come. (The basic UI for copy-and-paste on the original Mac remains in use today by everyone using Mac OS X and Windows &#8212; same concepts, same menu commands, even the same keyboard shortcuts.)</p>

<p>But even if Apple has already decided upon a UI design for iPhone clipboard features, it would take time to write the code. There are some very interesting new features in the 2.0 release of the iPhone OS, but what&#8217;s most striking is how <em>little</em> has changed, at least visually, since the 1.0 release last June.</p>

<p>Part of it is that Apple&#8217;s iPhone UI is exceedingly minimal &#8212; most apps seem to be designed using &#8220;figure out the least we can possibly do, then implement those basic features with as much attention to detail as we can&#8221; as the guiding principle. Do way less, but way better. So, most of the UI that appeared in iPhone OS 1.0 remains unchanged. Very little has changed at all in Safari, iPod, or Phone &#8212; three of the four primary apps. And even Mail&#8217;s biggest change is rather minor (multiple selection for deleting and filing messages).</p>

<p>But a big part is that the iPhone software engineering teams had an enormous amount of work on their plates implementing the features that <em>did</em> appear in the 2.0 OS &#8212; most obviously with everything associated with opening the iPhone to third-party software &#8212; the App Store, the Cocoa Touch APIs, the sandboxing of individual applications, integration with Xcode development tools, etc. There&#8217;s also a thing called MobileMe. And the iPhone performance team had to integrate 3G networking, and wound up with <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/148348/3g_iphones_mediocre_battery_life_still_beats_rivals.html">the highest-performing battery life</a> of any 3G phone PC World tested.</p>

<p>And if you&#8217;re actually using iPhone OS 2.0, you&#8217;ve probably seen a few spots where a lot of this new stuff isn&#8217;t working perfectly. Like, say, with third-party apps that crash on start and <a href="http://blogs.oreilly.com/iphone/2008/07/entirely-random-notes-on-iphon.html">force the entire OS to restart</a>.</p>

<p>I want copy-and-paste as much as the next guy. Probably more, really. But given the evidence at hand &#8212; that the new iPhone OS 2.0 as it actually is has significant new features, which were already a little late, and which still have at least a few significant bugs &#8212; it boggles the mind that anyone could take Joswiak&#8217;s explanation regarding the lack of copy-and-paste as anything other than the obvious truth.</p>



    ]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
    <title>★ iPhone Display Color Temperature, and the Difference Between Builds 5A345 and 5A347 of the iPhone OS</title>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2008/07/iphone_display_color_temperature" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008://1.13059</id>
	<published>2008-07-14T15:27:19-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-14T17:40:12-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
<summary type="html">Regarding the difference between builds 5A345 and 5A347 of iPhone OS 2.0.</summary>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>So I <a href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/07/13/color-temp">linked yesterday</a> to a <a href="http://www.macworld.com/article/134472/2008/07/iphone_display_warm.html">piece by Jason Snell</a> at Macworld regarding the different color temperature of new iPhone 3G displays. Snell asked iPhone product marketing director Bob Borchers (the same &#8220;Bob&#8221; from the iPhone Guided Tour videos, by the way) about the change, and Borchers said it was a deliberate design change.</p>

<p>At Ars Infinite Loop, however, <a href="http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/07/13/tip-updating-iphone-to-3a347-reduces-yellow-tinge">Clint Ecker is reporting</a> that the color change is slightly less warm/yellow in build 5A347 of the iPhone OS, as compared to build 5A345. This is confusing, so bear with me. 5A345 is the version that iPhone SDK members received as the final beta, and it is the version that many brand-new iPhone 3Gs shipped with from the factory. 5A347 is the very latest version, however, and so it is the one iTunes will download if you restore an iPhone.</p>

<p>I found that hard to believe &#8212; I had assumed that the differences between 345 and 347 were nearly insignificant. For example, if you have an iPhone with 5A345 installed, connect it to your computer, and tell iTunes to &#8220;Check for Updates&#8221;, iTunes will report: &#8220;This version of the iPhone software (2.0) is the current version.&#8221; I.e. iTunes does not treat 5A347 as an update for 5A345.</p>

<p><a href="http://ax.phobos.apple.com.edgesuite.net/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/com.apple.jingle.appserver.client.MZITunesClientCheck/version">This</a> is the URL iTunes pulls down when performing a version check for an iPhone. It is an XML document (gzip-encoded). The pertinent section looks like this:</p>

<pre><code>&lt;key&gt;5A345&lt;/key&gt;
&lt;dict&gt;
    &lt;key&gt;SameAs&lt;/key&gt;
    &lt;string&gt;5A347&lt;/string&gt;
&lt;/dict&gt;

&lt;key&gt;5A347&lt;/key&gt;
&lt;dict&gt;
    &lt;key&gt;Restore&lt;/key&gt;
    &lt;dict&gt;
        &lt;key&gt;BuildVersion&lt;/key&gt;
        &lt;string&gt;5A347&lt;/string&gt;

        &lt;key&gt;DocumentationURL&lt;/key&gt;
        &lt;string&gt;[…]&lt;/string&gt;

        &lt;key&gt;FirmwareURL&lt;/key&gt;
        &lt;string&gt;[…]&lt;/string&gt;

        &lt;key&gt;ProductVersion&lt;/key&gt;
        &lt;string&gt;2.0&lt;/string&gt;
    &lt;/dict&gt;
&lt;/dict&gt;
</code></pre>

<p>(I replaced two long URLs with &#8220;[…]&#8221; for the sake of clarity.)</p>

<p>5A345 is explicitly marked as being the same as 5A347, at least for the purposes of recommended software updates.</p>

<p>It struck me as very unlikely that Apple would make a change as significant as tweaking the display color temperature at the last minute. But if they <em>were</em> to make a change like that, it seems even more unlikely that they would do so in a build that isn&#8217;t pushed out as an automatic update for iPhones running 5A345. So I asked a source at Apple on the iPhone engineering team who is, as they say, <em>familiar with the situation</em>, and my source told me there were no changes regarding display color temperature between 5A345 and 5A347, and that there&#8217;s no practical reason why someone with an iPhone with 5A345 installed should go through a complete system restoration just to get 5A347.</p>

<p><strong>Update:</strong> Clearly, there is some variation in display color temperature between different iPhones, and even between different brand-new iPhone 3Gs. Whatever is causing this variation &#8212; my guess is slightly different screen components &#8212; isn&#8217;t related to versions 5A345 and 5A347 of the OS.</p>



    ]]></content>
  </entry><entry>
    <title>★ The App Store, Day One</title>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2008/07/app_store_day_one" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008://1.13017</id>
	<published>2008-07-10T23:59:59-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-07-11T00:38:33-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
<summary type="html">A few comments and observations after the first day of the iTunes App Store.</summary>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>Observations regarding the App Store and some of the apps:</p>

<h2>Download Counts</h2>

<p>On the iPhone&#8217;s App Store app, at the bottom of the details page for every app is a downloads count. Given that the only way to download a non-free app is to buy it, it more or less puts sales figures out in the open. These download numbers are not visible in iTunes &#8212; only in the App Store app.</p>

<p>[<strong>Update, 11 am EDT:</strong> At some point overnight, Apple reset the download counts to zero, and they&#8217;ve stayed there. Second thoughts regarding the open kimonos? Also, it&#8217;s unclear whether the download counts that were visible yesterday (and reported below) were U.S.-only or worldwide.]</p>

<p>This is interesting for a couple of reasons. First, obviously, you can look at popular apps and figure out how much money they (and Apple) have made. As I type this, Sega&#8217;s Super Monkey Ball game has been downloaded 10,955 times, and costs $9.99. That&#8217;s $109,440 in revenue in under a day &#8212; about $76K for Sega, and $33K for Apple.</p>

<p>Second, for the handful of apps with free and paid counterparts, we can see how many people are willing to pay for the non-free versions. The Iconfactory&#8217;s <a href="http://iconfactory.com/home/permalink/2009">Twitterrific</a> and Fraser Speirs&#8217;s Flickr client <a href="http://connectedflow.com/exposure/">Exposure</a> share a very similar model: both apps are available through the App Store in two forms: (a) a free version, supported by occasional ads from <a href="http://decknetwork.net/">The Deck</a><sup id="fnr1-2008-07-10"><a href="#fn1-2008-07-10">1</a></sup>, and a paid ad-free version for $9.99. As of this writing, here&#8217;s how the download counts look:</p>

<table>
    <tr>
        <td align="left">Exposure</td> <td align="right">3,638</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>Exposure Premium</td> <td align="right">76</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>Twitterrific</td> <td align="right">13,638</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>Twitterrific Premium</td> <td align="right">322</td>
    </tr>
</table>

<p>So the ratios are very similar: 48-1 for Exposure, and 42-1 for Twitterrific. These numbers very well may change over time &#8212; for example, perhaps some users are treating the free ad-supported versions as the equivalent of demo versions, and, if they continue using and enjoying the apps, will spring for the paid premium versions in a few weeks.</p>

<p>The download numbers don&#8217;t seem to be live, and a few developers who&#8217;ve been (understandably) obsessing over their numbers all day have told me that they&#8217;ve seen them fluctuate &#8212; both up and down. I suspect both the non-live updates and downward fluctuations are related to caching.</p>

<p>It&#8217;ll be interesting to see if Apple continues displaying these numbers going forward. And it&#8217;ll be interesting to see what happens tomorrow, after the iPhone 3G goes on sale in Europe and North America, and after (I presume) the iPhone 2.0 OS update is officially released for existing iPhone users.</p>

<h2>Reliability</h2>

<p>Given the high daily traffic of the iTunes Store (for music and video), I&#8217;m not surprised, but the App Store seemed perfectly responsive all day long. Again, though, tomorrow &#8212; after the worldwide launch of the iPhone 3G and the 2.0 OS &#8212; will be the real test.</p>

<p>I even bought and downloaded an app over EDGE, no problem at all. (Apps purchased over the phone network &#8212; EDGE or 3G &#8212; are limited to 10 MB, but most apps are well under that.)</p>

<h2>Re-Downloads</h2>

<p>If you accidentally delete an app you&#8217;ve bought, you can re-download it for free. The App Store UI doesn&#8217;t make this clear, but Apple describes it in <a href="http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1702">this KBase article</a>. What you do is act like you&#8217;re buying it again &#8212; tap the app&#8217;s price, and the App Store will recognize that you&#8217;ve already purchased it and ask if you wish to download it again. You can also do this from iTunes, to re-download an app to your computer that you originally purchased on your iPhone.</p>

<h2>Sandboxing</h2>

<p>Each app <em>and its data</em> are stored together, at least conceptually. When you delete an app from your phone, all of the files belonging to that app are deleted as well &#8212; preferences, data, support files &#8212; all of it is removed. Further, apps are not able to install files in the system behind your back. Delete an app from the home screen and there&#8217;s no sign of it left behind.</p>

<p>This doesn&#8217;t mean data files are stored within an application&#8217;s bundle &#8212; they&#8217;re not. What it means is that because you, the user, don&#8217;t manage anything at the file system level, iTunes and the iPhone OS take care of all of it for you. Foolproof, almost &#8212; a very friendly conceptual design for typical users.</p>

<h2>AOL&#8217;s AIM App, and Third-Party Prefs in the System-Wide Settings App</h2>

<p>I&#8217;d sort of forgotten about it after the early demo back at the SDK announcement event in March, but one of today&#8217;s top downloads is an official AIM client from AOL &#8212; 43,226 downloads at this writing. I found it to be buggy as hell. At one point it was crashing for me on launch, endlessly, until I deleted it and re-installed. It doesn&#8217;t do links &#8212; URLs in a message aren&#8217;t tappable. Some messages came in blank &#8212; I could see who they were from, but there was no visible text.</p>

<p>One other thing I noticed might prove important when using other applications, as well. AIM&#8217;s settings are not accessed within the app itself; rather, AIM adds a settings panel to the system-wide Settings app. What makes this so confusing, though, is that the first time you launch AIM, it (logically) prompts you for an AIM username and password. However, if you make a typo entering either, there&#8217;s no visible way to correct it &#8212; the account setup screen goes away after your first attempt. To change them, you need to leave AIM and open Settings, then scroll down (third-party panels are at the bottom).</p>

<p>AOL is not being untoward in this regard; this is actually what Apple encourages iPhone developers to do. Based on the apps I&#8217;ve seen today, though, most developers aren&#8217;t doing it. That&#8217;s a bad combination &#8212; if most third-party apps display their settings screens themselves, then when users do encounter an app that uses the system-wide Settings app, they&#8217;re very likely to assume that the app simply doesn&#8217;t have any settings.</p>

<div class="footnotes">
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<p>Disclosure: Daring Fireball has been part of The Deck ad network since February 2006.&nbsp;<a href="#fnr1-2008-07-10"  class="footnoteBackLink"  title="Jump back to footnote 1 in the text.">&#8617;</a></p>
</li>
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  </entry><entry>
    <title>★ Android Expectations</title>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://daringfireball.net/2008/06/android_expectations" />
	<id>tag:daringfireball.net,2008://1.12725</id>
	<published>2008-06-24T18:34:10-04:00</published>
	<updated>2008-06-24T18:34:10-04:00</updated>
	<author>
		<name>John Gruber</name>
		<uri>http://daringfireball.net/</uri>
	</author>
<summary type="html">I have high hopes, but not expectations, for Android.</summary>
	<content type="html" xml:base="http://daringfireball.net/" xml:lang="en"><![CDATA[
<p>The new issue of Wired has a nice <a href="http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/magazine/16-07/ff_android?currentPage=all">5,000-word piece by Daniel Roth</a> offering a behind-the-scenes look at Google Android. More about Google&#8217;s (and their Android team&#8217;s) motivation and goals than about specific details of the platform, but interesting.</p>

<p>One thing I should make clear, given some of the email I&#8217;ve gotten this week, is that I&#8217;m rooting for Android, big-time. My obsession is with wonderful, thoughtful software and gadgetry. I love the iPhone because it&#8217;s fucking amazing, not because it&#8217;s from Apple. It&#8217;d be fantastic if even one Android-based phone is as good or better than the iPhone. And Android&#8217;s &#8220;code what you want to code, install what you want to install&#8221; openness is a fascinating contrast to Apple&#8217;s tightly controlled iPhone software platform.</p>

<p>If things work out ideally with Android, it&#8217;s easy to imagine how Android, as an overall platform, could wind up being better than the iPhone, or at least could force Apple to open the iPhone software platform further. But that&#8217;s an enormously big <em>if</em>.</p>

<p>The big advantage Apple has with the iPhone is that they control the entire product, top to bottom. The case, the chipsets, the OS, the user interface. Apple knows exactly what the screen will look like when a brand new iPhone is turned on for the first time. Google&#8217;s dependence on hardware and carrier partners puts the final product out of their control &#8212; and into the control of companies whose histories have shown them to be incompetent at design and hostile to users.</p>

<p>I&#8217;d be happy to be proven wrong, but my hunch is that the only way we&#8217;ll see an iPhone-caliber Android phone is if Google does what they&#8217;ve said they&#8217;re not going to do, which is to design and ship their own reference model &#8220;gPhone&#8221;. That doesn&#8217;t mean Android won&#8217;t still be successful in some sense if it remains on its current course, but that I don&#8217;t expect it to be successful in the &#8220;holy shit is this awesome!&#8221; sense that the iPhone is.</p>

<p>I have high hopes for Android, but my <em>expectations</em> are pretty low.</p>



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