Egg Freckles

I recently made the switch from Pixelmator to Acorn, but not for the reasons you might expect.

Pixelmator and Acorn are both best-in-class image editors for Mac OS X. Developed by small dedicated teams, each app has a long history of updates dating all the way back to September 2007. As far as features are concerned there is very little I can do in Pixelmator that I can’t do in Acorn and vice versa. Both apps cost $29.99, (although Pixelmator has received free upgrades since appearing in the App Store). No, the reason I switched from Pixelmator to Acorn has little to do with features and even less to do with price. I switched from Pixelmator to Acorn because I believe in indie Mac app development,nand I want to support applications that continue to grow outside of the Mac App Store.

Pixelmator has been an App Store only app since the release of version 2.0 in 2011. At the time I choose Pixelmator as my primary image editor for its impressive features and familiar Photoshop-like user interface. But since October 2011 every Pixelmator update I have received has been free of charge, and over time Pixelmator’s progress has slowed. I would argue that since the release of version 3.0 in October 2013, Pixelmator for Mac has not received a single meaningful update. Meanwhile Acorn continues to receive multiple meaningful updates several times a year.

I don’t mean to pick on Pixelmator while applauding Acorn, but I believe the difference in their business models is clear. Complex apps like Acorn and Pixelmator cannot thrive indefinitely on a one time fee. Apps require regular paid updates to fuel innovation. Pixelmator is a victim of the myth of the App Store, that somehow indie Mac developers will make up lost revenue in volume by releasing only on the Mac App Store. All while Apple takes their thirty percent off the top. If you value indie Mac development, respect Mac developers by purchasing paid upgrades outside of the Mac App Store when possible. Apple, the wealthiest company in the world doesn’t need your thirty percent, and indie Mac developers don’t deserve to fall victim to the myth of the App Store.

Last week Apple announced the 2019 MacBook Pro, and the word keyboard did not appear in the press release.

Apple is not talking about MacBook keyboard reliability because the problem is fixed. They are not talking about MacBook keyboard reliability because they want the problem to go away.

It will take times for us to learn if the ‘new materials‘ Apple has added to the 2019 MacBook Pro keyboards will solve the reliability problems, but even Apple has their doubts. The “Keyboard Service Program for MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro“has been extended to cover not just the 2018 models, but the keyboards in last week’s 2019 MacBook Pro’s as well.

If you are aware of the risks, new materials or not, now is a good time to buy a new MacBook. Should things go wrong, Apple will cover the replacement of your keyboard for up to four years from the data of purchase. If you have already been burned by Apple’s keyboard reliability problems or want to wait, don’t expect MacBooks with a new keyboard design until at least 2020.

Seven years ago this blog post by Mark O’Connor changed my life.

On September 19th, I said goodbye to my trusty MacBook Pro and started developing exclusively on an iPad + Linode 512. This is the surprising story of a month spent working in the cloud.

Mark went from working locally on his MacBook to working in the cloud using his iPad.nWith a reliable network connection Mark could take his work with him anywhere.nFrom the office to the coffee shop, Mark’s mobility was made possible by the portability of Vim.

Perhaps the only reason this transition has been so smooth was because my favourite editor / IDE looks and feels almost exactly the same running on an iSSH console as it did running locally on my Macbook. iSSH supports xterm-256color, which means you can still have pleasant colour schemes despite working in a terminal. All my plugins are there, my code-completion, quick navigation and so on.

Seven years ago I started work at MIT.nI needed to work on dozens of different systems running a variety of operating systems.nI could no longer rely on BBEdit — my text editor of choice for over a decade — to be availablenBefore long VIM became integrated into my workflow.nToday VIM is not only the best text editor available, it is my favorite text editor.

I ran my first marathon in 3:34:31 (Boston Marathon 2009), my second marathon in 3:24:34 ( Boston Marathon 2010), and my fifth marathon in 3:05:43 (San Francisco 2013). But it would take me five more years, and over a dozen races before I would reach my goal of running a sub three hour marathon.

My problem? I wasn’t running all 26.2 miles at a consistent pace I would start off too fast, and burn out before crossing the finish line. It wasn’t until last year that I realized I needed to run a 6:52 mile, every mile, if I ever hoped to finish a marathon in under three hours.

Cool weather and a fast course certainly helped, but my Apple Watch is really what made my sub three hour marathon possible. Unlike most fitness watches, my Apple Watch shows me my current pace and average pace together every time I look down at my wrist. Keeping me on track to run a 6:52 mile 26 times!

I almost didn’t make it. The three hour pace group sped passed me with just over a mile to go, and I let my pace slip as I became discouraged. Luckily for me they were just eager to finish the race a head of time, because when I looked down at my Apple Watch I saw I still had a minute to go on the last turn before the finish line.

I finished the race with a time of 2:59:50. or just ten seconds under goal. I can now say I am sub three hour marathoner until next year, when I do it again if only to prove it was not a fluke.

As an Apple fan growing up in the 90’s, Apple’s Infinite Loop headquarters has always been a special place. Not just an office park, but Disneyland. A place where magic happened and new Macs were made. One Infinite Loop is where the Apple faithful would pilgrimage, take self portraits outside the main entrance, and buy “I visited the Mothership” t-shirts from the Company Store. As a east coast kid I could not wait for my chance to go.

Now that I am an adult and Apple’s corporate address reads “One Apple Park Way,” I know Apple’s old HQ has lost some of its magic. But for me and the other Apple kids of the 90’s, Infinite Loop is still a symbol of Apple’s storied resurrection. The place where the Apple we know was born, and where all of our favorite Apple products came to be. If I could choose only one Apple HQ to visit, it would be the icon infested gardens of Infinite Loop on the eve of Steve Job’s return over the rolling hills, magnificent orchards, and curved glass ring of today’s Apple Park.

Unfortunately no time machine exists to take me back to the Apple HQ of lore, but this collection of interviews curated by Stephen Levy may be the next best thing. Here Apple employees past and present tell us the behind scenes stories that helped make Infinite Loop the mecca for so many Apple fans.

For more than a year I’ve been interviewing Apple employees, past and present, about their recollections of Infinite Loop. In their own words, edited for clarity and concision, here is the story of a plot of land in Cupertino, California, that brought us the Mac revival, the iPod, iTunes, the iPhone, and the Steve Jobs legacy.

My two favorite quotes come from Phil Schiller, and Tim Cook on his first day working at Apple.

Schiller: We’re like, “Steve! Newton customers are picketing! What do you want to do? They’re angry.” And Steve said, “They have every right to be angry. They love Newton. It’s a great product, and we have to kill it, and that’s not fun, so we have to get them coffee and doughnuts and send it down to them and tell them we love them and we’re sorry and we support them.”

Cook: At IBM and Compaq, where I had been working, I had been involved in helping with thousands of product introductions and withdrawals—and, I have to say, very few people cared about the withdrawals—and not very many people cared about the intro, either. I had never seen this passion that close up.

Steve Jobs is often criticized for killing the Newton because it was John Sculley’s creation, but I have long believed killing the Newton was a sacrifice Steve had to make to save Apple. Both hypotheses can be true, but these two quotes show a rare glimpse of Steve’s empathy for Apple’s customers and the passion for Apple’s products that made the company worth saving.

Of course I could not share this article without passing on a little Infinite Loop lore of my own.

My tenure at Apple’s Infinite Loop was shorter than most. During my two weeks of Mac Genius training during the summer of 2004 my classmates and I made the trip to Caffè Macs every day for lunch; often spending the remainder of our lunch break touring the halls of Infinite Loop and finding out what doors our employee badges opened (answer: none). During our initial orientation we were told to avoid contact with Apple’s “celebrity CEO,” a warning that played out humorously later in the weak when one of my classmates suddenly stepped out of the Caffè Macs lunch line because Steve was standing behind him waiting to “pay” for his Odwalla.

The highlight of my visit was hearing Steve Jobs speak during an employees only Town Hall meeting at IL4. (We got there early to get good seats; but sat far enough back from the stage as not to stand out in the crowd.) The topic was Microsoft’s entrance into the music business with their new PlaysForSure music service, how they couldn’t leave enough alone, and wanted to rule the world. Steve told us not to worry, Apple had great products in the pipeline, and they did.

After my two week stay in Cupertino, I vowed to return to Infinite Loop as a full-fledged Apple employee, but I never did. Looking back I am grateful to have shared — however small — a tiny bit of Apple’s Infinite Loop’s history.