Oh, great, just what I need, a new distraction: Missle Command. Almost like the arcade but kind of hard to drag your whole arm across the track ball while laying down a phalanx of missiles.
For all of you mapping geekoids out there, what do you think about Keyhole? At my last job I used to get demos of this kind of stuff all the time. The problem with mapping apps is getting beyond the one-city demo. Sure, cruising around San Fran in 3d technowebclay is groovy, but if someone can't use it for their hometown or a place in the news, then it doesn't have much appeal beyond the initial coolness factor. I think coverage of the major metros is barely enough for making a demo, much less a long lived product. [coudal]
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email this"Some people may dislike it. But that's a sign of good design," he said. "If you don't provoke strong opinions, you haven't done your job."
That from computer design guru Don Norman, who evaluated the new iMac (iFlatMac?) and declared it brilliant.
On the coding front release notes for AppleScript 1.8.1 “The main features of this release are support for AppleScript Studio development and debugging, and access to UNIX functionality from any script.”
Peepee posters? News story Eau de urine to lure pet lovers. [backupbrain]
"It is not actual urine, it is the scent of urine. I haven't actually smelt it myself, but I am told it is lovely for a dog" Animal Planet's commissioning editor Emma Read told Reuters.
This really got me to thinking so I wrote a story: Dear Zeke...letters to my dog.
Try your own homemade NASA experiment: call a friend with a cell phone and try to drive their car via remote control commands. You should do this in an empty parking lot, or better yet a large field in Nebraska. They can only adjust the steering wheel, brakes, and gas based on your instructions (left 45 degrees, stop, start, maintain 5mph, etc..) and conversely they must communicate back what they see (speed, obstacles, cops). Better yet, use text messaging.
Hmm, maybe that's not such a good idea. How about calling the same friend (not in their car) and have them draw a picture using a canned set of instructions. Like turtle draw over the phone.
I've been reading Joel Spolsky's User Interface Design for Programmers. I enjoy reading the articles on Joel's website and the book is just as accessible. Joel has an easy writing style and the book helps us step back to look at what may or may not be working in a UI. As coincidence would have it I also downloaded a copy of Joel's new product, CityDesk, another content management system like Radio. My evaluation was two-fold: I wanted to replace Blogger for managing this weblog and I wanted something to retrofit and manage my old EV Conversion web pages. Radio wins hands down for weblog management, primarily because that's it's main purpose in life. You could maintain a weblog with CityDesk but in the process you'd be missing out on the whole XML/SOAP/whatever sharing aspect of the process along with some cool weblog centric tools built into Radio.
So I tried CityDesk on my EV web site. No joy. Oh, I know that I could make it work but what I really wanted was a tool which made it a joy, or at least a less painful chore. I also discovered something else. Just as folks who write get-rich books aren't competing with Bill Gates to be the wealthiest, Joel (or more importantly CityDesk) hasn't completely transcended all issues to create the epitome of UI nirvana. That's OK, he shouldn't be expected to, at least in version 1.0. ":^)