Day: January 2, 2012

Misconceptions About iOS Multitasking

Misconceptions About iOS Multitasking:

Here is the advice – and remember it is wrong:

All those apps in the multitasking bar on your iOS device are currently active and slowing it down, filling the device’s memory or using up your battery. To maximise performance and battery life, you should kill them all manually.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. There are caveats to this but anyone dispensing the advice above is clearly uninformed enough that they will certainly not be aware of these subtleties.

[Listen up.]

Source: Fraser Speirs

A VeloDramatic Report Card

Fran and Alberto Contador

A VeloDramatic Report Card:

I took it to my friendly neighborhood Apple store and remarkably they confirmed they had a known video issue with the original mainboard. They wrote up the $500 repair then credited me for the whole amount promising a five-day turnaround. The next day, less than 24 hours later, the store called to say the repair was done and the MBP ready for pickup. Superb!
Now you could chalk this video resurrection up to luck, but twice during the year I had power bricks fail. The Apple mag connector is very cool, but like all cables eventually wires pull loose. Both times, with no prompting from me, Apple representatives replaced the adapters free of charge. In an age where service and customer loyalty are largely forgotten, Apple does all the little things to earn my trust. I don’t think I’m alone and that’s why Apple is doing so well.
Because of that experience my next laptop will be a Mac.

[Nice. Interesting changes for Michael this past year. Nice to see his business flourishing.]

Cipollini’s take on Andy Schlek’s Tour

Cipollini Warns That Cavendish Must Not Waste Talent:

While Cipollini expects that Contador and Cadel Evans will again be the men to beat at the Grand Tours in 2012, he is somewhat less enthusiastic about Andy Schleck’s prospects and has scant regard for his cautious tactical approach.

“His problem is Fränk and vice-versa,” he said. “How they rode the Tour de Suisse is an example of that. They’re incomprehensible. They cancel each other out in turn. I’d like to see him more decisive, but instead he attacks and after four pedal strokes he turned around. He gives the impression of being a radio-controlled rider.”

[I’m curious to see if this changes with Bruneel at the helm.]

Ruby On REST: Introducing the Representer Pattern

Ruby On REST: Introducing the Representer Pattern:

The calls for more object-orientation in Ruby frameworks are growing ever louder. Most web frameworks, like Rails, come with a nice database abstraction, a Rack-like HTTP endpoint, routing, and a template engine. It’s the lack of additional abstraction layers that make many programmers ask for “more OOP”.

[Yeah, been feeling this for a while. The problem is unless you can put in some serious refactoring to an established project the weight of getting things done (momentum) often overwhelms the desire to improve the codebase (which, of course, makes the future refactoring larger in the ugliest of loops).]

The artificiality of time

The artificiality of time:

The web is asynchronous. Time frames have accelerated (started/funded/built/sold!) at the same time they have slowed down. It’s up to you to decide how long your time horizon is–perhaps you’re willing to invest five years into building a solid reputation on a web platform. The decision to work at a different rate than others can be a significant competitive advantage.

[The part I struggle with is the change between building things that I expect to last centuries, and things that I think will be gone in a few short years (if that).]

Source: Seth’s Blog

Scripting News: The Un-Internet

Scripting News: The Un-Internet:

Every time around the loop, since then, the Internet has served as the antidote to the controls that the tech industry would place on users. Every time, the tech industry has a rationale, with some validity, that wide-open access would be a nightmare. But eventually we overcome their barriers, and another layer comes on. And the upstarts become the installed-base, and they make the same mistakes all over again. 

[Like all things, we run in cycles. They are rarely broken.]