You’re an indie developer. You spend your time developing your product, answering customer support, or promoting your application. You might even still have a day job or consulting gig outside of your Mac software venture. You’re stretched for time. How can you get relevant information that fits your busy schedule? One answer is podcasts. With…
Google Reader API for Cocoa
Today I have just made the world a slightly better place. Better for Mac developers, that is. That’s because I have made an open-source Google Reader library for Cocoa. You can download the library from Github: GReader-Cocoa and hopefully you’ll like it enough to contribute patches. Why yet another Google API library? Two reasons why,…
News Anchor 2 – a better way to enjoy blogs and news sites
News Anchor 2 is launched today along with the opening of the Mac App Store. With News Anchor you can now listen to your favorite blogs and news sites and simply sit back, relax, and enjoy as the virtual newscaster reads you the news. The user interface have been completely revamped with a fresh selection…
Apple’s iTunes Connect gone crazy
I’m an iOS & Mac Developer but when I log in to iTunes Connect today (5-Nov-10 21:37 SGT) to check out my application sales, I was presented with a screen for music sales instead. See below. What’s worse is that there isn’t any link to check my app sales.
Microsoft files Patent Infringement against Motorola Android
Redmond, Washington, 1 October 2010 In a desperate move to save it’s dying Windows Mobile operating system line, Microsoft is suing Motorola for its Android smartphones and Microsoft said they own the intellectual property rights for these technologies: Synchronizing email, calendars, and contacts. Scheduling meetings Notifying applications of changes in signal strength and battery power.…
LinkedIn is busted
Today (24-Sep-2010 22:54 SGT) LinkedIn is showing 404 “page not found” error in their (actually my) profile page.. screenshot below: LinkedIn 404 “Not Found” error Is it growing pains or they are having “difficulties” in maintaining their servers? (i.e. another social network that is about to go bust?). At least we now know that LinkedIn…
Smart Playlists not Syncing to iPod touch
Recently I gave my 80GB iPod Classic (Generation 5.5) to my girlfriend to help her to concentrate more at work. Music does help tune out unnecessary distractions that is typical of a cubical-style workplace (and open plan workspaces are worse). That leaves me with the 1st get iPod touch that I also use to develop…
Core Data and Multithreading
Core Data isn’t thread safe and Apple recommends to use multiple contexts instead to handle concurrency. However Apple seems to have forgotten that on Mac OS X, there are hooks like the undo manager that can cause havoc in multi-threaded Core Data applications, even each thread having its own context.
Building mp4v2 library for Leopard compatibility
How to build mp4v2 for Leopard compatibility. 1. Download mp4v2-r355 from the MP4v2 project. 2. Setup these environment variables: export MACOSX_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET=10.5export CFLAGS=”-isysroot /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk”export CXXFLAGS=”-isysroot /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk” 3. Run configure with the following command: (refer to mp4v2 issue 58) ./configure –disable-gch –enable-ub=ppc,i386,x86_64 4. Go to the “.libs” directory that contains the compiled mp4v2 library and adjust the…
Feature sheets for Speech Timer and News Anchor
I’ve just submitted the feature sheets of Speech Timer and News Anchor to Scribd. Speech Timer Feature SheetSpeech Timer – the most comprehensive Toastmasters time keeper software for the iPhone and iPod touchSpeech Timer 1.6 Feature Sheet News Anchor Feature SheetNews Anchor is a new way to enjoy RSS feeds with text to speech.News Anchor…
News Anchor from Conception to Completion
How News Anchor came into fruition – slide deck.
News Reader for the Visually impaired
Being a voice text news reader, News Anchor may become the news reader for the visually impaired. Visual impairment doesn’t always mean blindness, but also those who may have difficulties in reading 10-point text on a computer. By reading the RSS feeds, News Anchor lessens the demands on the eyes as with regular news readers.But…
The Story behind News Anchor
Finally News Anchor 1.0 is released – those of you who subscribes to my Facebook profile probably already know by now ^_^ News Anchor is an alternative news reader (RSS/ATOM feed client) for Mac OS X. It is a universal binary application designed to run on Leopard and Snow Leopard. The rest of this article…
Supporting Leopard while developing in Snow Leopard
Apparently Apple’s Cocoa method availability documentation is not enough to determine whether something will work on an earlier version of Mac OS X. That is, avoiding 10.6-only methods doesn’t ensure that your application will also work flawlessly in 10.5. As a first-time Mac developer programming an application on Snow Leopard that is also targeted for…