This recording of Steve Jobs is “old” in terms of the Internet, but its message remains cutting-edge. If you don’t know it yet, it’s worth watching. NB: When I watched that the first time, I was surprised that a versed speaker like Jobs told stories of his own life but still had to read them from his notes.
This is mainly a note to self because I screw up every time I need to write something like that, so here’s an example for myself in the future. Reference: java.sun.com, Tadtech
Last year’s success story continues. If you consider to do GWT 1.7.x development on a 10.5.8 Leopard, you better spare the 4.0.5 update too and stick to Safari 4.0.3; it keeps crashing even though the bug was reported to be fixed in 4.0.5. I am displeased.
Presentation by Mike Booth of Valve, interesting read. (Via sheijk)
Jordan Mechner’s (creator of Prince Of Persia) old journals. Tales from a time long gone. (Via Chris)
Christopher, one of my highly-paid sechsta sinn colleagues, has spent some of his expensive hours to compile a panorama screenshot of a DVW map. But it all pays off when the fans are happy. Click here for the fully blown version.
I was searching for that today and thought I could write a short wrap-up of what I ended up with. Particularly helpful was the Android TranslucentGLSurface sample code and a thread in the Android Beginners group. Keep reading below for the fully commented source code.
I installed the Safari 4.0.4 update yesterday on my OS X 10.5.8 (Leopard) and got GWT 1.7.x crashes ever since then. That’s a pitty since I’m involved in a larger GWT project (featuring GWT Canvas). There’s already a ticket and a simple workaround available but that’s no choice for production environments. So if you have a Google account, please vote for it so it gets resolved soon. Apparently it’s a Webkit bug which will be fixed in Safari 4.0.5. Update: I could downgrade back to Safari 4.0.3 using Pacifist and the Safari 4.0.3 installation package. I opened the package with Pacifist and chose “Replace” as the option for all files. Trying to apply the package alone won’t help because it detects that a later version was installed, even if you try to remove Safari competely using AppZapper. Safari’s “About” screen shows version 4.0.3 again, OS X asks me to update to 4.0.4 again and my GWT application is back running. Not sure whether there are any other side effects, though, so handle with care. Another …
One of the best things I did last year around this time was writing ELFrun together with Martin. It was great fun and I think we both really enjoyed it. This year, I have even more pretentious projects but I hardly find the time to sit down and work on them. Sometimes I really want to cocoon myself and eliminate any external influences for hours or days. I guess that’s why I love working at night. I was always working on PCs before and bought my MacBook Pro solely for the purpose of writing an iPhone app. It’s funny how things have changed in the meantime: I bought an HTC Hero, which is an Android phone, meaning I eventually turned away from the iPhone, but I spend most of my time in front of the MacBook Pro and use my PC mainly for playing games. I even consider buying the new 27″ quad-core iMac – if it ever gets a matte screen. Funny how things have changed.
Earlier this year I purchased Unity3D Indie after I evaluated it for a while, along with several assets to do some prototyping for these adventure game ideas I have in my head. I found Unity to be an incredible flexible, easy-to-use and serious toolkit and actually the first “game maker” that ever convinced me that I don’t have to build everything myself. I don’t have any time to look into it further right now since I’m way too busy with plenty of other jobs and obligations I currently have. But I’ve heard some great news today (at least for those who did not yet purchase Unity): the Indie version is free now! Unity Technologies has released a new version 2.6 and decided to make the Indie version completely freely available. If you’ve ever considered creating a game or if you don’t emphasize on writing all code yourself, Unity may be for you. It’s the most mature game development toolkit I’ve ever seen and if you’ve played around with game makers earlier, you should give it …