Into The Unimaginable

So, I have avoided saying anything about the infamous iPhone until I actually had a chance to play with one. Well, now I have. A few people I know own them…and let me touch them.

First off…it’s smaller (thickness-wise) than I would have thought. It’s tiny! Thinner than an iPod, I think. Gorgeous screen, that doesn’t seem to have problems with the glass reflection from the sun and stuff that you would think it’d have.

The interface is fast…smooth. The animations aren’t choppy or skippy. They flow smoothly and there are subtle touches everywhere. For example, when deleting something, you push the trash button on the bottom of the screen…which in turn causes the trash icon to pop up a bit, open, the thing to be deleted genie-effects into it (See Mac OS X Dock), and the trash closes, falls, hits the “ground”, and bounced from side to side. IS THAT NOT INSANE?! Am I the only person who thinks that the interface guys have a bit too much time on their hands? But that’s a good thing, my friends. A good thing.

The software included is awesome. It’s not that “eh, it’s fun for the first five minutes, then it’s useless and just gets in the way” software that is in most smartphones. Everything is useful. From the incredible Google Maps app, to Safari, to the stunning iPod functionality. Everything is implemented great.

There are a few things I noticed, however, that could use some touching up. The calculator isn’t that pretty. It’s just round buttons, spaced quite a bit apart. I know, not a big deal, but it looks a little plain. Maybe a little design update or something. I dunno.

All-in-all, a knockdown, unbelievable piece of engineering marvel. I am seriously debating getting one now. Yeah. My plan is up in November, maybe I will. Who knows. Oh, and BTW, interns do NOT get iPhones. (no big deal, I don’t need everything to be free.)

So Donations are back up on the Schoolhouse site. I know what you’re thinking. OOOH, Now he asks for money. But honestly, it’s there to use if you want to. Schoolhouse is donationware. If you like it, and would like to support me a little, you can donate. I write Schoolhouse for two reasons. One, I wanted to learn to program, and Schoolhouse was my first big project. Second, I feel that college students spend enough money as it is on books, tuition, alcohol…wait, that’s not supposed to be in there…who wrote that?! Anyway. So there you go. Use as directed, if a rash occurs, stop taking immediately and consult your physician.

So I am working hard on my intern project. As well as some other stuff. For those of you who have been emailing me about Schoolhouse, yes I am still working on it. Stop asking. When I have something worth telling you about, I will.

Got to go to WWDC on Tuesday. It was incredible. Sat through the Core Audio and Core Animation sessions. They were awesome. Core Animation is a treat to everyone who has ever wanted to make anything on screen move without writing oodles of code. What a fun word. Oodles. Does a pastamaker say they have Oodles of Noodles? Whoa. Major A.D.D. Anyway.

I’m learning Ruby on Rails to do my project. I like it so far, it’s a good solid environment and I am having fun using it. I am also psyched about the Leopard situation. It’s so awesome.

I feel like everything is so great right now. I have an office. It’s awesome. I just wanted to share that. I know. Tooting my own horn now and then isn’t that bad, is it? Besides, you don’t have to read this blog. You could read Wil Shipley’s. I’m sure he has something interesting to say.

So I sit at work all day, writing code, enjoying Apple. The members of my team so fun to be around. Especially my manager. She’s amazingly cool. One of the first things she asked me when I got to meet here was “Do you like Battlestar Galactica?” Evidently the majority of our team loves it as much as I do. Yeah. Her ringtone is the Number Six theme. Awesomeness beyond words.

I hope to go up to San Francisco tomorrow or Sunday to explore with a group of interns. It will be cool. I can’t wait to see it. I only got to see a small bit during WWDC. So this should be fun.

Peace out.

So, it’s been awhile. I’ve been in Cali for over 2 weeks now, and I have to say I am having the time of my life. Apple is the most wonderful company to work for. How do I describe it? The atmosphere, the people, the FOOD.

I’m living in an apartment in Sunnyvale, California with three other interns. It’s a nice apartment. Close to things, short hop from Apple, and everyone is super-nice.

Apple is pretty cool. The entire feel when I’m at work makes me think to myself…I would love to work here. This is a place where I could see myself actually enjoying what I do for a living. Think about it. Getting paid to sit in my office, thinking of new ways to do this or that, writing code. That’s what I do in my spare time, anyway.

As many know, yesterday was the WWDC Keynote in San Francisco. While I didn’t get to see it in person, I got to watch a live feed at Apple’s campus in the Apple cafeteria, Café Macs. It was really cool. There was a ton of engineers and employees and we all were there to see Steve Jobs do his thing. I do have to say the best part was the Steve Ballmer reference (See WWDC Keynote webcast for reference).

So, as for Leopard, yes I had seen it. Could I tell you? NO. NDA. Non-Disclosure Agreement. Yep. Sorry. Yeah, I know. It hurts. But now you’ve seen it and we can be friends again. But yeah, I know some people were a little “eh” about it, being mostly comprised of features that were either expected or already talked about. But I mean think about it…those features are still really awesome. Really intuitive. Really revolutionary for the Mac platform.

On the developer side of Leopard, I think everyone will be happy. Everything has been given a serious tune-up. Core Animation and Objective-C 2.0 are two things I am loving as I tinker with them in my off time.

On a personal note, this past weekend a group of us interns went to Monterey to the Aquarium. It was really fun. We got to see sea otters, penguins, jellies, and a bunch of things I can’t really describe. We saw Cannery Row, which the aquarium is situated on. I got this weird vibe from the Aquarium, and couldn’t figure it out, as if I’d seen or been there before. Then it hit me…ever seen Star Trek IV? You know, the one with the whales? Well, the scenes of the Aquarium there take place in Saucalito, but is filmed in the Monterey Bay Aquarium! Yeah. I realized it when I got home. It looks a little different now, as 20 years have passed, but it’s still cool.

Well, that’s the past 2 weeks in a nutshell. Or perhaps a seashell. Whatever.

Wow. Double wow. Wow with a shot of hot damn. I just got confirmation that I have been accepted into the Apple Internship program this summer! The past couple weeks I’ve been having interviews over the phone with various members of the Mac OS X Product Release team, and I have to say I am incredibly excited.

While I realize most of my summer will be taken up by the internship, I am blown away that I have such an incredible opportunity. I am not sure of the exact dates yet, but I guess it will start a week or two after the end of the semester, and then end around the same distance from the beginning of next semester. So I will get to enjoy the glorious Summer California weather.

This also brings up another fact…the WWDC is this June. In San Francisco. A short distance from Cupertino, where I will be. I am not sure yet if it’s on the internship agenda, but I can’t wrap my head around that fact. Rubbing elbows with Steve Jobs. Okay, maybe not that far.

This is the most amazing thing I could have imagined for my summer.

I was pleased to hear recently from one of the web developers from Apple’s website. He said that he recommended Schoolhouse to the guy who manages the Featured Downloads area, and low and behold, the next day it was the Featured Download! This is an awesome thing. It shows off Schoolhouse to anyone who visits the page. Also, I couldn’t help but notice that after I updated Schoolhouse to 2.1 it showed up in the Top 20 list…as number 4! Just behind iTunes, QuickTime, and WMP. Who could have guessed?

I have just released Schoolhouse 2.1, an update that addresses several issues I have received comments about. Included in this version is support for multiple instructors and occurrences for courses, a new week view, the ability to hide weekends, the ability to ignore empty kinds instead of assigning a value, and a lot of bug fixes.

I was very proud to hear that Schoolhouse was featured on two very prominent blogs, TUAW (The Unofficial Apple Weblog) and Lifehacker. They both give great reviews for Schoolhouse, and since then I have received about 10 times as many emails about feature ideas. Talk about publicity! Anyway, I would like to thank the people at both of these for offering a review and helping to further get Schoolhouse into the mainstream. Links to the sites are below.

http://lifehacker.com/software/college/download-of-the-day–schoolhouse-2-mac-248705.php

http://www.tuaw.com/2007/04/04/schoolhouse-2/

Ah, I do love Spring Break. Time off from homework, stress, and the weather is starting to get nice. It’s not surprising that all I have done is sit around and do…well…nothing.

I’m kinda looking forward to going back to KU. I miss the atmosphere more than the homework, mind you, but still. I feel like there is so much more I could be doing going out and having fun instead of sitting home all day watching reruns of Stargate SG-1. Seems like this year’s Spring Break was kind of lame. My friends and I have been talking about taking a trip somewhere next year, or even next semester on Fall Break, say to Cali. It’d be around $1,200 each (flight, hotel, meals, nightlife, etc.), but I think for a college life it’d be worth it to experience more than Kansas has to offer.

I’ve been seriously thinking about studying abroad in an upcoming year or semester. I think somewhere like Italy or elsewhere in Western Europe would be incredible. I don’t know…do they even have programs for Programming majors for study abroad? I know they do, it just doesn’t seem as flashy as say Architecture.

As for the developer side of my persona, I’m working on an update to Schoolhouse that should cover some bugs and add some features. On the bugs side I hope to have isolated the crash when assigning a course to an item, this was reported by a few people. Also the importing feature has been updated to support import of legacy data from other apps, namely Assignment Planner and Task List. Also I’m working on iCal and iPod Syncing. I hope to have the update ready within the next week or so.

Well, that should catch things up nicely. A month of my life in a minute and a half, and my kingdom for a Dr. Pepper.

I am glad to (finally) announce the release of Schoolhouse 2. I believe I was able to catch all of the bugs for this release. I am so happy to finally be able to release it, considering it’s been under development since last August.

I hope everyone enjoys this version and continues to send me feature ideas and bug reports! You can grab the new version here.