¶ iPad Second

In the early days of iOS app development, there was one screen size to worry about. A simple 3.5-inch screen at 320x240 pixels. The retina display in the iPhone 4 was the first added complexity to designing iOS apps, as the resolution doubled to 640x480 pixels, but stayed at that 3.5-inch screen.

The original iPad is what really shook things up. A much larger screen at 9.7-inches, and a different aspect ratio with 1024x768 pixels. While an existing iPhone app could be run on it, it wasn't pretty. Apple's solution was to have either apps that ran only on the iPad, or to have what they called universal apps, where the iPhone and iPad interfaces were bundled into a single app.

This was a great opportunity for app makers to reimagine their apps for a new class of device, however, those who wanted to be first to the iPad only had weeks to completely redesign their apps for a device they had not yet held.

Everything was experimental.

Naturally, this was a little risky for app makers. I recall many of my favorite apps coming to iPad as separate apps from their iPhone counterparts. It made sense, as no one knew whether the iPad would be a runaway success1, or if would be derided as "just a giant iPhone."2

As time has gone on and the iPad has found its place in the world, many apps that had separate releases for iPhone and iPad released major updates as universal apps.

There were inevitably some apps which targeted the iPad first. There is even a site dedicated to celebrating apps that ship for iPad first, though it doesn't appear to have been updated recently. One app that comes to the forefront of my mind is iA Writer. The iPad app shipped first, and an iPhone interface was added later.

These days I can't say I see too many apps debuting as iPad first. Most are universal at launch, or start out on the iPhone first.

What is more interesting to me is not the initial launch, but rather the order in which features are added. For the rest of this article, I want to focus on universal apps.

I prefer universal apps. I switch between my iPhone and iPad constantly, however the mood or situation strikes me. One thing I enjoy is that when an app is universal, it is simply there for me no matter which of the two devices I pick up. This leaves me with a certain expectation that the feature set between the iPad version and iPhone version of a universal app should be pretty on par.

Unfortunately that rarely seems to be the case. Too often these days I see universal apps gain new features and designs and layouts on the iPhone first, and the iPad side of it just lags behind.

Let's call out some apps that do this. Twitter is one of the biggest offenders. They consistently roll out new features to the iPhone first, and maybe someday bring them to the iPad side. I've seen Twitter drastically overhaul the interface of the iPhone before, and leave the iPad interface to languish for months.

Facebook is another one. They usually roll out design and feature updates to iPhone first, and iPad sometime later.

Even some apps I love dearly do this. Day One, as much as it pains me to say, has done this. They will roll out a feature on iPhone, then bring it to iPad. Thankfully, they are usually quick to bring things back into feature parity, but sometimes I'd rather just wait a couple extra weeks for a truly complete update to a universal app, rather than a staggered rollout.

I don't think this practice would bother me so much if the app in question were not universal. To me, universal does not just convey that I pay once to install on both device types. It conveys that the two interfaces should be maintained in parity.

Apps that have done this right the past couple years have been Twitterrific, Paprika, Byword, 1Password 3, and others. These apps continually release feature parity as universal apps across the two interfaces, without feeling like the iPad version is "just a bigger version of the iPhone".

I am delighted that many smaller development companies sweat the details to make sure their universal apps always feel universal in every way. My fear, though, is that some of the bigger companies like Twitter and Facebook are setting a trend where the iPad is an afterthought for universal apps, and that the iPad will become a second class citizen in app development, instead of a joint-heir with the iPhone.


  1. Spoiler alert: It was.

  2. That happened, too.

  3. Disclosure: I work for AgileBits.

¶ Making Things "Right"

I have long been a fan of Realmac Software and many of their various apps over the years. They are a fantastic company and some of the most talented developers and designers in the Mac & iOS industry.

But man, do they sometimes make some strange decisions.

For context, late last year Realmac released a new version of their to-do list app, Clear. This new version brought with it an iPad interface and a few other enhancements. They released it not as an update to the existing Clear, but as a whole new app, and they were charging money for the upgrade.

I, personally, fully support this approach. Businesses need money to survive, and making great apps is not cheap. I have absolutely no qualms for paying for a great upgrade to a great app. I am even okay with paying full price for it.

That seems to be Apple's preferred approach for app makers to take in the App Store. They did it themselves with the latest major upgrade to Logic. New app, full price.1

But, it appears that I am in the minority here. Presumably Realmac felt a pretty hefty backlash with the new version of Clear. So, they updated the old app with the enhancements they had made to the iPhone side of things, left out the iPad stuff, and put the old one back on the App Store. Then they made the new app known as Clear+, and its draw was that it has an iPad interface.

I honestly thought they should have weathered the storm and stuck to their guns, and it all would have died down eventually, but, I saw this as a fair compromise, as well. Existing users of the original Clear aren't left out in the water, and those who wanted an iPad version could pay for the new app.

But the drama didn't end there. I guess users still were not satiated, and today Realmac backpedaled. A lot.

They released updates to Clear and Clear+. The Clear update made it completely like Clear+, iPad interface and all. The Clear+ update made provided a way to go back to Clear if the user wasn't using iCloud sync. And it sounds like Clear+ is riding off into the sunset.

Realmac says they are making things right. The users who supported them with Clear and Clear+ paid twice to get shuffled around over a couple months. The users who complained get a freebie.

I'm not sure I agree that was the right move.

I really don't care about the money. It was a few bucks, and I love the folks at Realmac. I'm happy to support them.

What I take issue with is that for great developers to keep making great things, it is obvious that free updates forever is unsustainable. Apple is not going to give developers a way to give previous users a discount, that is abundantly clear. 2 And Apple led the way by example with a major Pro app of theirs. That example was to release a new app and charge money. Simple.

And Realmac seemed to be on board with that, as well as many other developers. It will be rough to train the pricing model that has been used for years out of people. And I don't think it will take long if many developers charge for major upgrades. People will realize the new world order of the App Store.

All that this backstep with Clear has accomplished is reinforcing the entitled folks who complain the loudest and longest that they can guilt developers out of a livelihood.


  1. And quite frankly, software is pretty much the only industry I know of that does upgrade pricing. I've never been given a discount on a TV because I owned a previous model.

  2. No pun intended.

¶ My First Mac

My first Mac was technically not my own. It was my parents', but it belonged to the family. The year was 1990. I was 5 years old. The Macintosh Classic was its name. It sported a 9-inch grayscale screen at 512 x 342 pixels, a 40 MB hard drive, and 1.44 MB diskette drive. It was the first Mac to cost less than $1,000.

Yeah, baby.

I was enamored with it. It seemed light years ahead of the black screen and green text IBMs my school had. I could play Wheel of Fortune on it. By far my favorite thing to do was to open AppleWorks and make a new drawing document and begin using a digital canvas to create a city with that big clunky mouse. Then I'd select this tool that looked like a tornado to send pixels flying!1

That little Mac was the beginning of my love for technology. When my folks upgraded to a Power Macintosh 7100 a few years later, the Internet was also just gaining traction with the public. My folks were always early adopters, and so we of course had the Internet.2 I remember adding USB to the Power Mac, upgrading the processor to a G3 processor from Sonnet, and how lightning fast it felt when we switched out the 14.4k modem for a 28.8k.

We got a full decade out of that machine with all the upgrades, and it likely could have gone more.

Then came the eMac I got for college. This was truly my first Mac. I quickly found out that a 50-pound behemoth was not ideal at college in 2003. This was my first experience with OS X. I hopped on the bus with 10.2 Jaguar, and 10.3 Panther was released just a couple months later. Safari was at version 1.0, and I haven't changed my default browser since. I used the eMac my freshman year, then it went to my parents to replace the old Power Mac.

My sophomore year I went with the 14-inch iBook G4. I used this through most of college and wrote many papers on it.

My senior year I treated myself to the black MacBook while I still had an education discount. That thing was lovely. I still kind of miss it, as it just looked fantastic. I would love for Apple to make a black space gray MacBook Air.

A few years later I got the first unibody MacBook Pro, 15-inch. This felt like a dream computer. It had real horsepower and was the fastest & thinnest computer I had used yet.

And, just about a year ago, I went to the MacBook Air. The Air is just plain fantastic. It's fast, it's battery lasts ages, and it is light. When you want to close up and go, you can do just that.

The Mac has been a significant part of my life for the past 23 years. It sparked the curiosity of a young boy and challenged me to learn more throughout the years. And these days it is integral to my way of life, not only in how I accomplish my own goals, but also to how I am able to provide for my family. Right now, I simply could not do what I do without the Mac.

Happy 30th birthday, Mac. Here's to many more.


  1. And they were pretty big pixels when you think about it!

  2. "You’ve got mail!"

¶ The Nest Acquisition

A few weeks after moving into our first house last summer, my wife and I bought a Nest thermostat and installed it. It…didn't go as smoothly as I had hoped. In fact, it wasn't working right at all.

I had done my homework, too. I had checked and re-checked Nest's compatibility guide, and I even called in to their support, talked to a rep for a bit, and he even had me email him a picture of our current sucky thermostat and the wiring, and gave the green light that Nest was 100% compatible. So I made the order on Amazon and 48 hours later UPS dropped the box off at my front door.

It was super easy to install, but it just wasn't operating correctly. Another call to Nest, a few more pictures of the wiring, and two levels of support later, I had a workaround solution of putting certain wires into differnt terminals on the Nest, and the support rep told me Nest was going to set up a certified tech to come out on their dime and make sure it works right.

Two days later a guy from a local company that was Nest certified came out, and started testing the Nest and my HVAC system. Everything should have been working, so he investigated deeper. Turns out there was a fault in the wiring between the HVAC system and the Nest. The tech pulled out the bad wiring and ran brand new wiring through my basement's suspended ceiling and up the main floor wall.

This was not a problem with the Nest thermostat at all, but Nest footed the bill to make sure it worked. I never found out how much the job costs, but Nest paid it all. I have to imagine it was either close to, or surpassed the $250 I spent on the Nest.

This is right up there in my top 3 best customer support experiences ever. It solidified my love for Nest as a product and as a company.

Fast forward to three days ago when Nest founder Tony Fadell announced Google's acquisition of Nest. When I read it, my heart sank a little. I used to love Google, and for some things, I still think they do an exceptionally great job. But Google got a little weird when their romance with Apple took a turn. Their "don't be evil" moniker started to feel hypocritical in some aspects.

Then Google+ happened, and they became so obsessed with promoting their new social network that they became downright creepy about all the data they have on each person that uses Google services.

So here I have a service that I used to love that went mad with power, and a product/service that I love that just sold out.

Rock, meet hard place.

I have friends seriously considering ripping their Nest off their wall over the news. Let's face it, Google doesn't have the greatest reputation anymore, at least with nerds.

Will I be removing my Nest Thermostat? Not yet. It did cross my mind, though. As silly as it is when folks snark that Google now has the ability to know when you are home, when you're not, what temp you prefer, and the movements you make you're asleep — well, it sounds silly, but I can also see that totally being a reality.

I'm just not ready to give up my Nest yet, especially since there isn't a comparable product to replace it yet. But I'll be keeping an eye on it, since it isn't all that impossible that it may be keeping an eye on me. 1


  1. Funny side story: I named my Nest HAL when I installed it. Seems a little apt, now.

¶ Frequency

Back in the day when iPhone OS iOS was still fairly new, we received a fair amount of frequent updates. Not just bug fixes, but feature updates. There would be the March or April preview of a new version of iOS, a June or July release shortly after WWDC, one or two bug fix updates right away, and the big x.1 release with some new feature or significant improvement in the fall when the iPods were updated.

If my memory serves correctly, this trend continued through iOS 4. I remember iOS 4.1 brought HDR images to the Camera app on the iPhone 4. And of course iOS 4.2 brought AirPlay and unified the iPad and iPhone/iPod version numbering. And iOS 4.3 brought better AirPlay, Personal Hotspot on the iPhone 4, and iTunes Home Sharing.

One important thing to remember is we received these fairly frequent updates in a time before delta updates and over-the-air. These were big features and steady bug fix releases that required to to cable to your computer and download the entirety of iOS all over again like a barbarian.

Then iOS 5 came out and brought those delta and over-the-air updates. I thought for sure we'd see even more frequent releases — at least for the bug fixes — now that they could easily be pushed to everyone and would take far less bandwidth.

I was wrong. More or less, the x.1 releases (5.1 and 6.1) were essentially bug fix releases with little to no new features. And we haven't been seeing x.2 releases.

It has seemed these past two years that Apple has done the one big iOS release, and goes a long way between even fixing bugs in it.

One thing I am hoping for in iOS 7, since it is such a drastic change, is that we'll see Apple quicken the pace of improving iOS. I don't want frequent updates and fixes and possibly a new feature here or there for the sake of frequency, but rather to keep Apple on its toes and in the game.

One big release per year may work fine, but keeping the improvements coming between the big releases helps to keep things feeling fresh. I can't imagine Apple implemented these delta and over-the-air updates to just download a gargantuan file once a year and then a couple things here or there in between. That whole system feels like it was made for keeping iOS fresh and at its best.

iOS 7 is a new beginning for just about every aspect of iOS. Refining the details through frequent updates is an old beginning that I hope becomes new again.

¶ July 11

July of 2008 was a busy and significant month for me. Most importantly, I celebrated my first wedding anniversary with my wife, and welcomed our son into the world.

But that month also holds other historical significance, one being recognized by a lot of geeks this week. On July 11, 2008, the App Store launched alongside iPhone OS 2.0, the iPhone 3G, and MobileMe. That morning I woke ridiculously early to drive an hour to my nearest Apple Store and wait in line. In retrospect, it was pretty silly of me to head an hour away from home when my wife was home 9 months pregnant and days away from the due date. I remember standing in line kind of afraid my Motorola RAZR would ring.

The next few hours went by uneventfully. AT&T's activation servers had turned into molten slag, so I was able to purchase my iPhone and head home, where I activated it through iTunes later that day.

Since the prior winter I had been using a first-generation iPod touch, which ran nothing but Apple's stock apps. So July 11 was pretty neat in that the App Store was opening up. My first purchase was Twitterrific, which is now in its fifth version and is still my twitter app of choice. In fact, it has held the same position on my home screen for five years through three different iPhone models I have owned.

The App Store really did unleash the true potential of the iPhone, and later the iPad. The iPhone is essentially my connection to the world at large. Sure, I have my local friends and community, but the advent of the iPhone and the apps people have made have connected me to new friendships across the globe (back int he day those were called pen pals ).

Heck, if it weren't for the booming success of the App Store and iPhone and iPad, I wouldn't be where I am today. I don't think my job would exist without the App Store.

So much has happened in the past five years. I am days from celebrating my sixth anniversary with my wife and my son's fifth birthday. I am coming up on a year of working at the company of my dreams, and Apple's future is shining bright as they prepare to radically re-invent what iOS will be for years to come.

I really can't wait to see where we'll be on July 11, 2018.

¶ Yummy Yummy Chat Heads

I have to admit, like my friend David Chartier, I am a rare breed of nerd who actually likes Facebook. David talked a lot about Facebook Home and its potential. I want to talk about the new iOS app, Facebook 6.0.

The 6.0 update to the Facebook app streamlines the interface for the better, and beefs up its messaging capabilities. One way it does this is through Stickers, which are fun little pictures you can sling around through private or group messages. They’re cute, because they were designed by the awesome David Lanham.

But the real news here is Chat Heads, which show the avatar of the friend(s) you are currently chatting with in a little circle off to the side of wherever you are inside Facebook’s app. You can simply tap the circle and a conversation expands as a layer on top of where you are at, you send a message, tap the circle again, and it collapses the conversation and you go right back to where you were.

It’s a really enjoyable and nice experience.

On Facebook Home for Android, Chat Heads can appear anywhere on your device, even when you are in another app. Right now, this only works within Facebook on iOS, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it stayed that way.

But here is why I like the concept of Chat Heads, and where I’d like to see them go as a concept.

I like that they are not too intrusive during a conversation when you are doing something else. And I think they’d be the perfect interface for iMessage. Right now on iOS, it is kind of jarring to have an active back and forth with a friend over iMessage when you are also trying to look at or do something else. You switch fully from what you are doing to the conversation, then have to switch fully back.

Let’s say I am writing up a post like this on my iPad. I would much rather an iMessage come up off to the side as a little icon and wait for me to tend to it. I simply tap the icon, a conversation popover appears, I fire off a sentence, and tap back to what I am doing. It is a much less distracting way of giving a few seconds for a reply. Why?

Because even though it is a context switch, it is a very good illusion of a partial context switch (which doesn’t exist). It feels like you are only giving away attention peripherally, instead of having to be ripped from your focus of one app and dumped into another. Because you feel like you only give away quick aside of context, and you can see the task at hand right behind the conversation popover, it is easier to return to what you are doing.

Facebook and Apple seem to have a nice relationship, what with the deep integration with iOS and OS X last year. I hope that relationship could start a collaboration where maybe Apple can use the Chat Heads concept for iMessage and SMS, if they also allow Facebook Messages to be a global deal through it. I think I’d be okay with that, especially if there were a toggle.

¶ Three Years

It is a little hard to imagine that in a short three years how much the iPad has changed the world. It almost feels like it has been around much longer than three years.

I remember not knowing exactly why I needed wanted an iPad, but venturing out to look at one anyway. Of course, I ended up buying one. And I remember finding that oversized iPhone to be magical.

In these past three years I have owned four — count ‘em, four — iPads. The original, the iPad 2, The New iPad (or iPad 3 in regular person speak), and the best of them all so far — the iPad mini.

I still think that not even Apple knew exactly what the iPad would become when they launched it. And the truth is, it becomes whatever app you are currently running. It can be a book, an instrument, a race car, a movie studio (or movie theater), or be the future of communication drawn into the present.

The truly great thing is the amount of creativity the iPad can unleash in a person as the barrier to interact with a computer is broken down to simply directly touching the thing you are creating.

With each iteration of the iPad, my favorite has been the concentration of it to the lighter, more portable iPad mini. And I can’t help but feel that if we have come this far in three short years, how much further will we be in three more?

¶ Twenty-Thirteen

Happy New Year. I had planned to have some grand post about what is coming up for techēse this year, but I don’t have anything concrete planned. I have an updated design on Squarespace 6 (I’m currently on Squarespace 5) that I hope to launch soon, as long as a couple components on Squarespace’s end fall into place. The new design would include responsiveness for smaller screens, and a few other goodies.

More than anything, I am conscious that most posting has dropped off quite a bit. I’ve had a lot of changes in my life the past few months, and I am still settling into new roles and routines. More so, I have felt a lot like I have been repeating what others are already saying.

I feel like my voice is not my own, and in order to find it I need to write more. I’ve known this, but I have been afraid of it.

And then I read an article today by John Acuff that was a fricken kick in the pants.

So what now?

As we face 2013 down and our fifth year of this blog, what do we do going forward?

That’s the question I’ve been wrestling with for the last three months.

And I think the answer is we get messy again.

We let go of the sanitized ideas, the safe ideas, the easily digestible ideas.

And we open the gates and seize the day. (Newsies!)

Go read John’s entire post, because it’s awesome.

While my site has not become “big”, I have the same fears. I have enough readers to where I feel the compulsion to placate by not challenging any ideas. And that is why I have been another “me too” and I am tired of it.

So, I do not how things will progress this year. But I know I’ve lost my voice (or maybe never fully found it). I need my voice. And maybe in order to find it I need to let things get a little messy.

Merry Christmas

I hope you all have had a wonderfully merry Christmas. I have enjoyed a wonderful day with family, and it was great to witness the delight on my son’s face when he opened his presents.

As a bit of nerdy Christmas cheer, I leave you with this tweet I saw earlier today, which pretty much describes my life as the Family Geek.

P.S. Don’t forget to give the Gift of Geek.