Yearly Archives: 2010

The iPad is the New iPod

Remember when every company developing a portable music player called it “The iPod Killer?” There were plenty of media players, but all the general public wanted was the iPod. The one device made the MP3 player market, previously a “geeky” thing, mainstream. There were digital music players well before the iPod existed, but they weren’t something that most people would think about buying. Just early adopters.

I’ve noticed that history seems to be repeating itself with the iPad. There have been tablet PCs for years, but they were sort of clunky and impractical for most users. Apple took the concept and shaped it into something with a much more usable UI, creating something that the public actually wanted. So far it has been a big success, selling 7.5 million units as of September.

Apple is selling millions of iPads, and there isn’t another product that is even in the running to be an actual competitor. While everyone else is scrambling to build a product to compete with the iPad, Apple is already gearing up for version two. Even if someone manages to release something in the same league as the iPad, they will have a hell of a time convincing the average consumer to buy it over the iPad. Apple won the battle before it even got started.

It’s the iPod all over again.

BlogBuzz November 20, 2010

Optimize a Website for iPhone Using Only CSS

Lots of websites now have mobile versions that optimize their designs for speed and ease-of-use on the iPhone, reducing scripts and designing for the device’s smaller screen. They usually use some sort of browser detection script that loads a different template on the mobile…

iOS UIFileSharingEnabled Property List Flag

Here’s a tip for you iOS developers. Have you ever noticed how some apps let you copy files back and forth between their Documents directories and your computer from within iTunes? It’s very easy to implement it yourself. As a matter of fact, it’s…

Twitter Blackbird Pie for WordPress

Want to easily embed individual twitter messages in your blog posts? There’s a WordPress plugin for that. Twitter Blackbird Pie adds several options that allow you to embed a nicely-rendered HTML representation of a tweet. It adds buttons to the editor, shortcodes, even oEmbed…

BlogBuzz November 13, 2010

WordPress to Gain Tumblr-Style Post Formats

I’ve talked a little before about how WordPress 3.0’s custom post types made it possible, if you don’t mind doing a bit of coding, to turn your WordPress blog into a “tumbleblog.” A little while after, WooThemes released a plugin to make it a…

HTML5 May Not Be XHTML, But That’s No Excuse for Sloppiness

I was reading an interesting post about HTML5 and the failure of XHTML strict parsing recently, and it reminded me of an issue I have with the HTML5 spec. It really bothers me that the HTML5 spec permits the use of quoteless attribute values…

FireSheep: Grey Hat Security?

A scary new Firefox extension known as Firesheep came onto the scene recently. For years it has been possible for nefarious users to “sniff” unencrypted network packets for session cookies, allowing them to, with a bit of work, hijack your session with a website.…

BlogBuzz November 6, 2010