Alan Quatermain

I had the honour of moderating a panel on eBook DRM technology for the W3C earlier this week, and I’ve taken the liberty of expanding upon my presentation and providing some more talking points.

The main thrust of the argument: there are good and useful end-user features that we can build using the same technology normally used for restrictions. As long as we’re using this tech, let’s do the good things too.

Click through the link for the full post on my new blog.

Turns out, developing iOS apps is different from developing web apps. Like, hella different. For any server-side readers out there, I thought I’d hit you with a few big ones: There is no CSS. Every part of a design has to be coded in Objective-C.

• There is no flow layout (like HTML). Everything is position: absolute;.
• Small “cosmetic changes” can mean hours or days for developers to complete.
• No one unit tests in Cocoa. Like, no one.
• Likewise, unit testing is a bitch.
• No one does automated UI testing. There are some open source projects, but it’s far from the mainstream.

Truth from Mr. Furrow there. As someone who went the other way, I can absolutely say that folks using some of these new server-side frameworks have a ridiculously easy time of it.

Things are starting to change on our side, of course: starting back in the late 80’s with Interface Builder and the Application Kit, and more recently with Cocoa Autolayout. There’s still a world of difference between tweaking a CSS file to change a button’s composition and doing that in Cocoa however.

thoughtbot:

We love Rails, object-oriented programming, and refactoring. We use a process to develop applications to work faster, introduce fewer bugs, and enjoy what we’re doing. We blog, Tweet, and talk at conferences on these subjects.

After every post and discussion, there are topics left…

Hot. Shit.

Go get it.

monoceroi:

Summary: Just released RAProjectTools, a collection of Ruby and Bash scripts that make your life easier.

sync-resources / sync-resources.rb

The script in sync-resources.rb looks at your Xcode project, and finds a group named Resources. If it finds one, and the group itself is associated with a directory in your project — for example, Project/Resources — it will attempt to reconcile the contents of the directory with the contents of the group. Files added to the directory will be added to the Xcode group, and files no longer found will have their references removed.

It works well against projects with one single target. It’s possible to extend the script so it is more robust. The script uses the Xcodeproj gem from CocoaPods, and the appropriate Bundler magic is already set up for you.

Invoke sync-resources from the root-level directory containing your project.

next-version

The script in next-version bumps the version number by one. It works with Git Flow, the awesome branching model for software development, and AGVTool, Apple’s solution for software versioning.

It works pretty well if you are already using these tools. Remember to start this script from the develop branch, and it’ll make a new Git Flow release with the next version number.

Invoke next-version from the root-level directory containing your project.

That’s a fairly sizeable amount of awesome right there.

monoceroi:

Summary: Just released RATilingBackgroundView which implements a very simple UIView subclass that takes several background tiles, generates more if necessary, and scrolls them with the containing UIScrollView.

You’ll find RATilingBackgroundView in this project. It needs a delegate to work. Do these things to start using it:

• Drop the project into your app as a static library dependency.

• Implement <RATilingBackgroundViewDelegate>:

  - (CGSize) sizeForTilesInTilingBackgroundView:(RATilingBackgroundView *)tilingBackgroundView;
  - (UIView *) newTileForTilingBackgroundView:(RATilingBackgroundView *)tilingBackgroundView;
  

  It’ll ask about the default size for tiles, and will also ask for new tiles whenever the bounds of its containing view has changed and it has no dequeued tiles to cover the area.

• Optionally, set the stretching flags so you can use stretchable images for tiles.

  @property (nonatomic, readwrite, assign) BOOL horizontalStretchingEnabled;  //  YES
  @property (nonatomic, readwrite, assign) BOOL verticalStretchingEnabled;    //  NO
  

  If you don’t set any stretching flags, the tiles will be stretched horizontally to the same width of the containing view by default.

  For example, if you have a square or rectangular image you’d like to repeat, set both flags to NO.

Very useful as a counterpart to AQGridView.

monoceroi:

Summary: Just released RAReactionKit, which lets you do blocks-based KVO and key-path binding between objects, and handles premature deallocation cases gracefully without swizzling -dealloc. It is spliced from IRFoundations, which has grown too large to be instantly useful in any case.

There are three major parts of the Reaction Kit: Bindings, Observings, and Deallocation Monitors. The entire project is built upon ARC and mandates support for weak references. It does not swizzle your -dealloc methods, and work nicely with NSManagedObject instances.

Bindings

In NSObject+RABindings.h you’ll find these methods added to NSObject:

- (void) ra_bind:(NSString *)aKeyPath toObject:(id)anObservedObject keyPath:(NSString *)remoteKeyPath options:(NSDictionary *)options;
- (void) ra_unbind:(NSString *)aKeyPath;

For now, the binding is strictly one-way. Two-way bindings are very interesting to have, though. :)

You use the binding mechanism like this:

[cell ra_bind:@"someView.elements" 
    toObject:modelObject 
    keyPath:@"someOtherElements"
    options:@{
        RABindingsMainQueueGravityOption: @YES
}];

There are currently two options keys:

• RABindingsMainQueueGravityOption: If it is set to @YES, RABindings will take care to asynchronously set the value on the receiver from the main queue. If you have an non-atomic object that gets hit from all the places (mediated with a serial dispatch queue), this can be handy.

• RABindingsValueTransformerOption: You can pass a RABindingsValueTransformer block:

  typedef id (^RABindingsValueTransformer) (id inOldValue, id     inNewValue, NSString *changeKind);
  

  This allows you to do some very cheap value transforming, for example between NSDate and NSString.

Observings

In NSObject+RAObservings.h you’ll find a bunch of methods added to NSObject:

- (id) ra_observe:(NSString *)keyPath options:(NSKeyValueObservingOptions)options context:(void *)context withBlock:(RAObservingsCallback)block;

- (void) ra_removeObservingsHelper:(id)aHelper;
- (void) ra_removeObserverBlocksForKeyPath:(NSString *)keyPath;
- (void) ra_removeObserverBlocksForKeyPath:(NSString *)keyPath context:(void *)context;

- (NSMutableArray *) ra_observingsHelperBlocksForKeyPath:(NSString *)aKeyPath;

- (void) ra_observeObject:(id)target keyPath:(NSString *)keyPath options:(NSKeyValueObservingOptions)options context:(void *)context withBlock:(RAObservingsCallback)block;

The main reason for exposure are two-fold:

• The code was written by a more naïve version of myself
• Observings are assumed to be frequently made and broken.

You use the Observing mechanism by invoking ra_observe:options:context:withBlock:. It spins up a temporary, private KVO listener which forwards incoming communication from the Key-Value Binding mechanism to your handler block.

Deallocation Monitors

The Deallocation Monitor is provided in NSObject+RALifetimeHelper.h:

- (void) ra_performOnDeallocation:(void(^)(void))aBlock;

If you pass a block to -ra_performOnDeallocation:, the block will be called when the object is deallocated.

Please note that for static NSString instances (the @"" string literals you specified in code), or special cases like @YES and @NO, they will never be deallocated.

If you have zombies on, nothing will be deallocated — as well.

Looks very interesting indeed.

Via Marco— squashed : Mitt Romney thinks you need to take responsibility for your life:

Generally, there’s nothing wrong with asking people to take responsibility for their actions to avoid social ills. Stop littering. Spay or neuter your pets. Vaccinate your children. Get up early enough to eat breakfast so you’re not so grouchy at work. If your diet is making you sick, change it….

Apparently anyone earning less than 3x the minimum wage is an underachiever, and thus not worthy of the Republican candidate’s attention…

seenontabletop:

I’ve been playing Catan for years and it was nice to see it featured on Tabletop. Being the father of a rapidly evolving, small humanoid, I of course want to start impressing upon him my love of board games.

This past week, at GenCon, I got the opportunity to try out Catan…

My daughter is four right now… I therefore need this game. Like, *medically need* it.

wilwheaton:

This is great. A guy shares five reasons he wants his children to play D&D.

Reblogging in the hope that my wife will see it & be convinced… ;o)

monoceroi:

IRAQPhotoPickerController is essentially a photo picker that does multiple selection with AQGridView driving its photo grid. It’s reasonably fast and the header is tiny.

The controller has exactly one public method, which is also its initializer. What it’s doing isn’t exactly new. However it is designed to be friendly with Interface Builder based photo cell customisation.

Here’s a sample app which is still being worked on. Push the Add button, and pick something.

Astonishingly proud & happy to see this 😊

The study also reveals that as eReaders grow in popularity, the brand landscape is showing a runaway brand winner: the Kobo. Twelve months earlier, the Sony eReader, the Kobo, and Amazon’s Kindle were virtually tied for market penetration at 28%, 27% and 25% respectively. The January 2012 wave of the Mobil-ology Study shows the Kobo far out in front with 46% penetration and the Kindle slipping one point to 24%.

Le w00t.

One million British travellers planning to fly to Canada, the Caribbean and Mexico this year face the risk of being turned away at the airport – at the insistence of the US Department of Homeland Security.

Er, so after I visit my parents in the UK, the United States of America gets to decide if I can return to my home, job, and all worldly possessions in Canada, simply because I’m based in Toronto rather than Vancouver…?

Why the fuck is this being accepted? I mean, airlines are already complying with this. Where’s the outcry? As the linked article points out:

Neil Taylor, a tour operator who pioneered tourism to Cuba, said: “Imagine if the Chinese were to ask for such data on all passengers to Taiwan, and similarly if the Saudis were to ask about flights to Israel – would the US government understand?

“One also has to wonder how an American traveller in Europe would react if he were denied boarding on a flight from London to Rome because the German government had not received sufficient data from him.”

It’s literally that simple: if anyone else were to try and pull this sort of stunt, the retaliation would be swift and uncompromising. But it’s the US asking, and they’ve got enough political clout (read: ability to spread propaganda) around the western world that this is tolerated. If the US does it, it’s for safety; if anyone else does it, it’s oppression, and that country goes straight onto the ‘Axis of Evil’ list.

Having written this, the chances of my being able to return to Canada this September have probably been reduced by at least a couple of percentage points 😏

Apple’s lawyers:

[I]f Amazon was a “threat” that needed to be squelched by means of an illegal conspiracy, why would Apple offer Amazon’s Kindle app on the iPad? Why would Apple conclude that conspiring to force Amazon to no longer lose money on eBooks would cripple Amazon’s competitive fortunes? And why would Apple perceive the need for an illegal solution to the “Kindle threat” when it had an obvious and lawful one which it implemented – namely, introducing a multipurpose device (the iPad) whose marketing and sales success was not centered on eBook sales?

This sounds quite fair— until you consider the restrictions placed upon competing eReader apps on this multipurpose device:

• No sales except through Apple IAP @ ~110% of revenue.
• No sign-up for accounts.
• No links to store websites via Safari.
• No links to company website (even for displaying corporate privacy policy, etc.).
• No static text giving the address of company/store website.
• No static text saying ‘our website’ or similar.
• No introduction or mention of non-free content availability.
• No use of the words ‘trial’ or ‘preview’ to refer to content.
• No means to acquire new content aside from 100% free content within the application.
• No text suggesting that non-free content is available for purchase (even without discussion of where one might do so).

For the record, all of the above were cause for the Kobo app to be pulled from the store if we did not submit a hotfix immediately. I find it hard to believe that they wouldn’t be doing the same to Amazon.

A great article on a disturbing subject. And today, one of my favourite authors, China Miéville, posts a perfect rebuttal to such thinking:

It is depressing to have to point out, yet again, that there is a distinction between having the legal right to say something & having the moral right not to be held accountable for what you say. Being asked to apologise for saying something unconscionable is not the same as being stripped of the legal right to say it. It’s really not very fucking complicated. Cry Free Speech in such contexts, you are demanding the right to speak any bilge you wish without apology or fear of comeback.

A few weeks ago I had the great honor of being interviewed for Objective-See about my development setup and processes. That interview was posted today— go check it out!

A nice little tutorial here on the use of AQGridView on iOS 5.0.

So here’s the Big News to which I’d earlier alluded. The IDPF has got together a who’s-who of people and companies in the eBook world to work on an open-source implementation of a reference ePub3 reading system and container library. And of course Kobo is putting a ton of weight behind it. Also, me: I’m going to be working on this project full-time here very shortly.

Looking through the project’s goals, you’ll see a good amount of overlap with the goals I’d previously stated for the ePub Author project. The core aims are all there:

• A browser of ‘ePub3-flavoured HTML’ content.
• A library encapsulating the correct parsing and generation of all forms of structured content described in the ePub3 standard.
• Best-in-class support for non-Roman scripts, particularly vertically-flowing ones.
• No limits on its use as the core of a larger project, even commercial ones.
• Lots of industry know-how being funnelled into a single output.

So yeah: I’m rather excited about this one. Expect to hear more from me as it all progresses.

Now I’ll just go back to writing ePub3 structured content handling code…

nikf:

Consider me signed up.

…and what’s more, there’s courses on Cryptography, Natural Language Processing, and Machine Learning. I’ve just signed up the to NLP and Machine Learning, as they’re astonishingly useful in a project I’m working on right now. Not sure if I’ll be doing the coursework or just the read-along version, but dammit I want that stuff in my head right now.