I’m not a gamer. At all.
If I’m staring at a screen for fun, it’s to read, write, socialise or code.
But I’m truly impressed with the real-time 3D rendering this free showcase app demonstrates:
Epic Citadel for iOS
Epic Citadel for Android (Google Play)
Check out the falling leaves, flowing water and dynamic sun flare!
Here’s the kicker: the framerate on Mr 3’s first-gen iPad is perfectly acceptable. Of course the iPad 4, iPad Mini and Nexus 7 smoke it, but still. Unreal Engine 3 is amazing.
I take things far too seriously to gameify my to-do list with an app like this, but it DOES look awesome.
An interesting story from Ars Technica on the security implications of grammar in your passwords:
…a password composed of “pronoun-verb-adjective-noun,” such as “Shehave3cats” is inherently easier to crack than a “noun-verb-adjective-noun” passphrase such as “Andyhave3cats”. A password that incorporates more nouns would be even more secure.
(Unrelated: every time I see “Ars Technica” I think “Arse Technica” and laugh a little. Can’t help it.)
“I Quit Facebook and Email is Broken”
An amusing critique of how it’s suddenly become fashionable to quit using social network X / device Y / the Internet in general, and narrate the whole thing for the rest of us.
(I’m not quitting anything, by the way.)
(via Svbtle)
I’ve posted before about my ever-deepening love for this excellent text-editor-come-IDE, but I haven’t shared the specifics of my Sublime Text 2 configuration, so for the geeks out there, here’s the gazillionth post on this topic.
Do what it says on the box. Nothing should go wrong. If it does, quit coding on Linux and use one of the other two supported platforms.
(That was a joke. I haven’t tested the Linux version, that’s all.)
There’s a package for pretty much anything you might want to do with Sublime Text 2, but managing them manually can be a bit of a pain. Sublime Package Control looks after installing them for you, and automagically updates them – silently – in the background. (Unless you’re a control freak and tell it not to.)
The Sublime console method has worked flawlessly for me.
Sublime Text 2 is pretty, but the Soda theme makes it prettier.
From the Tools menu, select Command Palette and find Package Control: Install Package. (You’ll do this for each upcoming package installation.)
Select Theme – Soda.
Almost done. Now, for pretty syntax highlighting, follow these instructions.
No pretty UI yet? Don’t worry, we’ll make that happen in the next step.
Go to Preferences > Settings – User from the main Sublime Text 2 menu, and your user preferences file will open. It’s JSON-formatted and almost empty, which is confusing at first, but makes sense once you dig in. All of the options available to you are explained in Preferences > Settings – Default.
Here’s how I have mine configured (note the “theme” and “color_scheme” entries):
{
"auto_complete_commit_on_tab": false,
"auto_match_enabled": false,
"color_scheme": "Packages/User/Espresso Soda.tmTheme",
"drag_text": false,
"file_exclude_patterns":
[
"*.pyc",
"*.pyo",
"*.exe",
"*.dll",
"*.obj",
"*.o",
"*.a",
"*.lib",
"*.so",
"*.dylib",
"*.ncb",
"*.sdf",
"*.suo",
"*.pdb",
"*.idb",
".DS_Store",
"*.class",
"*.psd",
"*.db",
"*.bak"
],
"find_selected_text": true,
"folder_exclude_patterns":
[
".svn",
".git",
".hg",
"CVS"
],
"font_face": "Source Code Pro",
"font_size": 10,
"highlight_line": true,
"highlight_modified_tabs": true,
"ignored_packages":
[
"Vintage"
],
"show_full_path": true,
"tab_size": 4,
"theme": "Soda Light.sublime-theme",
"translate_tabs_to_spaces": true,
"trim_trailing_white_space_on_save": true
}
Project-wide code completion, function tooltips and jump-to-declaration are provided by the SublimeCodeIntel package. Syntax error highlighting is provided by sublimelint. Install both using the method described above (be careful not to accidentally install similarly named packages). Both should work out of the box (on Mac OS X, anyway – on Windoze you might need to add interpreters to your PATH for sublimelint to work).
Update: I also install the VBScript package. Its code completion isn’t very smart, but then VBScript isn’t very smart either.
I’ve already posted about how I use Sublime Text 2’s build system for PHP and JSON formatting.
I’ve found that new themes don’t “take” fully until Sublime Text 2 is restarted. Your mileage may vary.
Why “Open In” doesn’t solve the brokenness of iOS silos
From Federico Viticci, on MacStories:
You just used five apps and created four copies of a file (two of them are iOS Camera Roll + Photo Stream) to annotate a photo. Lather, rinse, repeat for note taking, PDF reading, electronic bill management, and assembling that nice slideshow of your vacation in Italy.
Yes, I love a lot of things about Apple, but it’s not a blind love.
File sharing between apps on iOS still needs a LOT of work. Meanwhile, it’s incredibly annoying, benefits notwithstanding.
Confession: I didn’t know anything about him until he took his own life on Friday.
But I did know about a few of the things he founded and fought for, and I’m sad that he appears to have been yet another victim of large corporations and government departments at their worst.
Hopefully this opportunity to make mental health a higher priority – especially among nerds – isn’t lost in all the other debriefing that’s happening right now.
If you don’t know who or what I’m talking about, this is the best tribute I’ve read so far. (via Daring Fireball)
…apparently includes plying Instagram’s foremost iPhoneographers with Samsung smartphones.
Apple would never do that. They don’t need to, and they’re too classy for such pathetic tactics.
No, I won’t link to Instagram feeds. It’s just a trend I’ve noticed. Roughly as transparent as cash-for-comment on radio.
Fraser Speirs: which platform for schools THIS year?
I should probably find a WordPress plugin to automate the process of linking to all of Fraser’s posts. And when I’ve done that, I should find a Scottish accent coach … become an Apple Distinguished Educator … change my name …
Anyway, in his latest post, Fraser Speirs explains why it makes sense to keep deploying iPads in schools (or to start deploying iPads, if you’re me). Worth a read if you’re not convinced.
The biggest problem with Android? The users.
Stephen Hackett, on The Next Web’s withdrawal of its magazine offering for Android:
I’m starting to think that the biggest thing holding Android back isn’t the carriers and Google, but the users of the platform.
It occurred to me a few months ago that most of the rabid Android fans I know aren’t good friends, and never will be (for unrelated reasons).
There might be more to that anecdotal correlation than I thought. It looks like Android users tend to be content-thieving if-it-ain’t-free-I-don’t-want-it types, for example.
Interesting.