MWinther

for someone like me, who is familiar with vim, but not-so-familiar with emacs, it would help if you would specify which features you are looking for more specifically.

My guess would be that if the features you want are available, they might not be packaged in the same way, so listing some key features might get you more answers.

I thought the history of Apples profit margins were interesting. What happened in Q3 2010 when it was last this low?

http://ycharts.com/companies/AAPL/gross_profit_margin

And if it's the actual hardware, rather than the software/firmware, I guess they'll offer free replacements in the Apple Stores for anyone who has the problem? Sure, it's a hassle for the customer and expensive for Apple, but hardly the impossible problem to solve the author seems to want to make it out to be.

I found the checkout process needlessly confusing. The split between the first and second page once I clicked was not clear to me, and the name of the button beside the price box was "Gift". With the arrow above it specifying a price, I didn't understand if I was entering the price of the book, or an additional sum. Could I have paid less and still received the book?

Finally, once I have paid for the book, it seems I can't get back to the page again, so I guess I'm not supposed to be able to buy another copy?

I would look over the usability of the checkout process, I almost didn't buy it because of the perceived ambiguity. And I would have preferred to use Paypal.

I don't agree that the question changes. I would argue that the fact that Fortran enshrined the convention is a more relevant answer than the answer to why Fortran picked that range. The reason being that the answer to the latter question is most likely from another domain, such as Mathematics.

Although I do find the answer to the latter question interesting as well, just not as interesting as the answer to the first.

Exactly. Getting a working mental model, even if it's not very exact, does wonders for the ability to experiment. The problem is, most people get an explanation of what the different parts of the computer are, but not a working model of how it works.

And here lies the challenge of designing computers that are useful for people without the mental model, and efficient for people with it. Gadgets tend to do one or the other, but accomodating both is a good bit harder.

No, at least not without you telling me why someone needs to hold on to the information. In what way is that obvious?

Actually, if one is to believe the media over here, the rape charges have been dropped. The molestation ones still remain, though.

I don't think the German soldiers speaking English is a research problem, so it seems to be a rather contrived illustration of your point.

Whereas I can see your point, I don't particularly agree with it. When it comes to domains where I do have special knowledge of a subject, I see the errors on my own. When it comes to domains I don't have that special knowledge, I always find it fascinating to learn that Hollywood are just as incompetent across those fields as well. As well as finding out how those domains differ from the Hollywood rendition of them.

Did anyone honestly believe that use of the VoIP in background API was going to be allowed for non-VoIP stuff, though?

Having said that, the rest of the story seems conflicting and with confusing back-and-forth.

Makes me wonder about the role of the brush/pen. Is it just an extension of the finger, or does it bring more than that to the artist using it?

Considering the comments on the page, it seems to me artists have different opinions about this as well. One thing missing is pressure sensitivity, of course, but I wonder if the lack of a stylus touched upon in the comments have more to do with what one is used to than actual advantages. I can imaging that well-working pressure sensitivity in conjunction with a finger gives more precision than using a brush, once one is used to it.

I, for one, thought this was a good summary of how the Apple camp looks at the issue right now, whether you agree with that interpretation or not.

This really doesn't add anything that hasn't been said in the earlier posts here on this particular topic.

With respect, I think a lot of reasoning individuals who are Apple customers like or are at least indifferent to the walled garden approach. Just as those saying that they get better reception from the iPhone 4, or saying nothing at all like or are at least indifferent to the antenna design.

It seems that many critics of the walled garden approach as well as the antenna design have a hard time realizing (or conveniently forget) that those not complaining loudly aren't necessarily mindless drones who buys anything with an Apple logo on it.

So in my mind, I'd say that there are huge amounts of intelligent, reasoning individuals who are using the iPhone 4 at the moment who like the phone as it is. So while I agree that they should have done more when it comes to telling the world they were on the case, even though I doubt it would have helped much, I think your image of how badly Apple treat their users is vastly exaggerated.

I agree with you, except I don't know that a lot of iPhone 4 users consider this a huge issue. I remember people getting upset about slight color imperfections in the iPods a couple of years back. People tend to consider Apple products more than just a phone/mp3 player/whatever, so even minor problems are considered huge issues.

I think they feel that most of this reception frenzy has been whipped up by people who don't own/use the phone, and whose basis of determining the usability of the device is a series of youtube clips.

I respect the shouting and screaming from those who made the 0.55% of AppleCare calls regarding this issue, and the 1.6% who returned the phone. But I think the majority of the noise is made by others, which feels a whole lot more lika whining to me. And I'm hard pressed to respect whining.

Just like there are people not being able to reproduce the problem on their iPhone 4.

In what way has Apple forgot that their customers are reasoning individuals? I don't see how you come to that conclusion in this case, but you seem to argue that this has happened before?

I'm sorry, but do you honestly compare the Droid X eFuse story, which has been written about in select geek blogs to some extent to the iPhone 4 reception story, which has occupied pretty much every mainstream news reporting media outlet for quite a while now?

I took a course in philosophy during my Cognitive Science studies, and our course book (http://www.amazon.com/Philosophy-Mind-Anthology-John-Heil/dp...) was really useful, since they had an original text and a couple of criticisms of that text, sometimes followed by a retort on that criticism. That was really good to get a grasp of the subject, even though I agree with others here that having an excellent teacher did a lot more to get the subject than any book would have.

I bought GEB when I was 13, mostly because I liked the Escher paintings. I was hooked after reading the first Achilles/Turtle episode, though, and even though many concepts went over my head at the time. I still haven't read it cover to cover, though, but I still have a hard time not agreeing with this particular recommendation.

Is there something fundamentally different in the approach taken in Froyo that makes for this kind of speed improvement?

It's somewhat redundant, since the domain part is missing from the title, but that being said, I really prefer the prefix as well.

My first resource to get to grips with Cocoa programming was the Hillegass book pointed out elsewhere. But when starting the iPhone focus, the Stanford iPhone Programming Lectures on iTunes U really were a great help for me, even though they didn't cover the latest version of the OS (They were doing it on 2.x when I did it, I suspect the latest one was for 3.x) they really explained a lot about philosophy and methodology, not to mention giving assignments and generally acting like a class.

In fact, I am intent on revisit the latest version of the course, but all the dev videos kind of ambushed me, so I haven't gotten around to them yet. Speaking of which, I really get a lot out of, but I think a lot of the reason for that is taking the iTunes U course first.

I think that these affordances are more important for non-tech people than what techies in particular give them credit for. In order for people who prefer using the analogue equivalents, this is a great way to inspire confidence enough to rely on the computerized tools, and to see some of the advantages of having the stuff in a computer.

I think it's a phase in many ways, but an important phase nonetheless. Scaling UX to handle total newbies and hardcore experts is not a simple one, and so far examples of doing that in any way that could be considered successful are few and far between.

Actually, when the Mercedes A-class showed up, and the motor press were able to tip it over, Mercedes did pretty much exactly the same thing. Of course, the A-class isn't a CL550, but then again, it still cost a whole lot more to buy than an iPhone. :)

My 3G is getting really slow, can't wait until they start selling the iPhone 4 over here so I can upgrade. I've heard the 3G gets bogged down when keeping a gazillion SMS messages on it, though, so maybe it's more to do with that than iOS4.

It's a strange title... It doesn't seem to be much about Google winning the hearts of anyone, even though this particular developer chose Android because he was familiar with Java from before. Seems more like brain-winning to me.

It seems like a moderately good piece on someone who has chosen to develop for Android though, even though I would have liked to see the conclusion (that the choice to develop for Android was looking good) supported by some kind of metric, I didn't get any feel for the success of his company so far.

I can't reproduce that in my Safari 5 either, so it doesn't seem to be a general problem with that browser.

Engadget reports that one of their units is having this particular problem, but their testing unit does not. To me, that sounds like something is wrong with a number of the first units released, rather than a fundamental design flaw.

Either way, it can't be the way Apple would like to start this release, since they want to make units that go to new customers rather than to replace units already bought. I just hope they find the problem quickly and are open about the issue.

If I were to venture a guess, I'd say that the constant fanboy angle on practically all Apple stories a) gets tiresome and b) takes away from the discussion of the article at hand.