Category: Programming
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Binge Watching Handmade Hero
For the last several weeks I’ve been obsessed with one TV show. It’s changed my viewing habits, my buying habits, and my computing habits. Technically it’s not even a “TV show” (if your definition of that term doesn’t include content created by non-professionals that is only available for free over the Internet). But for me,…
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In Defense of Bubble Sort
Bubble sort is an algorithm with a very bad reputation. Robert Sedgwick, in Algorithms in C, notes that bubble sort is “an elementary sorting method” and “it does much more work” than it needs to. Donald Knuth is much more harsh when he states “the bubble sort seems to have nothing to recommend it, except…
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Identity used to sign executable no longer valid
The last thing I wanted to do on a Sunday morning is write a blog post about an an Xcode executable problem. What I had planned to do is test my most recent Swift 2.0 SpriteKit game on my iPad and iPhone. Last night I got a “Identity used to sign the executable is no…
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Four Tips for Xcode Storyboard Users
Apple’s Xcode Storyboard is both your best friend and your worst enemy when it comes to developing state-of-the-art iOS, Mac OS X, tvOS, and watchOS apps. Sometimes, what would be really hard, like associating a function with a gesture is quick and easy. Sometimes, what should be easy, like toggling a property, requires hunting down…
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Fun with Core Graphics and Swift Part 2
Hey, you have 10 minuets, don’t you? Then you can add pinch and rotate gestures to our fake-genigraphics app. I didn’t realize it would be this easy. But sometimes Apple’s developer tools engineering team does something amazing–and gesture recognizers are super amazing. A good way to start is to read the UIGestureRecognizer Tutorial on Ray…
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Fun with Core Graphics and Swift
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away… I was a computer graphics artist. Specifically I was a Genigraphics console operator. I worked the night shift creating illustrations and slides with vector graphics for big corporations. This was the early 1980s and fast, cheap personal computers with color graphics had not quite been…
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The Desktop Strikes Back
I was surprised and delighted by Microsoft’s introduction of the Surface Pro 4 and and Surface Book. I have a feeling that Microsoft is doing something really interesting: Bringing back the general purpose personal computer. Wait, wait, I know what you are thinking! It’s all about the phones and pads and the Internet of things!…
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The Secret to Swift is Enums
I’ve found the CS193P (Developing iOS 8 Apps with Swift) iTuneU class really helpful in wrapping my old Objective-C head around Apple’s new Swift programming language. Yes, I know we’re at iOS9 but the fundamentals of the class are still relevant and coaxing the code to compile in iOS 9/Swift 2.0 is a fun little…
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Nothing Changes More Swiftly than Apple’s Swift Syntax
I’m enjoying the Stanford University class CS193P: Developing iOS 8 Applications with Swift. It’s free on iTunes U and the instructor Paul Hegarty knows his stuff. He’s a great explainer. I like how first he writes some code in a naive way and then fools around with it, getting it to work and then reworking…
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Lisp Cons Cell and List Cheat Sheet
A diagram of a nested linked-list and how it is structured in Lisp with Con Cells, Symbols, Pointers, and our old friends CAR and CDR. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.