The new version of my app Favorites for iPhone has been approved and is now in the App Store; you can get it here. This version requires iOS 4 or later, and is a free upgrade if you already have it (if you don’t, it’s $2 or equivalent). I’ve made a number of improvements in this version, and I wanted to briefly mention some of them.
Touch Notation
Within the last twelve to eighteen months, I’ve crossed a threshold whereby the vast majority of my work is now aimed at touch-screen devices. I often have to sketch out feature specs, interaction designs and so forth, and I enjoy working on paper whenever I can. I quickly encountered a problem: touch-screen gestures are difficult to describe concisely. To solve this problem, I created a means of talking about such gestures symbolically; I call it Touch Notation.
MGImageUtilities
MGImageUtilities is a collection of useful UIImage categories for iPhone and iPad developers, which may be particularly handy if you intend to support the Retina Display on iPhone 4.
I use these in my visual speed-dial app, Favorites for iPhone, and I thought you might find them handy too.
World According To Gemmell Workshop Videos
Earlier this year I was an invited speaker at NSConference 2010 in both the UK (Reading, England) and the US (Atlanta, Georgia). I also held a whole-day workshop in both locations based on my recurring World According To Gemmell segment on The MDN Show podcast.
The entire workshop was recorded (both audio and video). I wore a mic, and there were several microphones and cameras around the room to capture the discussion which formed an essential part of the workshop. The workshop videos are now available here; they’re free to attendees, or you can buy them (4.5 hours of content) for $49.99. Whilst I do get some royalties, the main proceeds go to the Mac Developer Network to help support more developer podcasts, training materials and conferences in future.
You can read a synopsis of the workshop on the video page; we covered a lot of ground, and had some excellent discussion. It was split into two main parts: an initial 1-hour lecture on iPad application design with follow-up discussion, then a series of UI/UX/design questions submitted by attendees before the workshop, which we discussed as a group.
We discussed plenty of interesting material, and I think the videos represent the workshop well (I’ve watched the entire thing within the past few days). I hope you’ll enjoy them. Many thanks of course to Scotty, Dave and all the MDN/NSConference staff for making the event possible.
