What Is Your IDE Coding Font of Choice?

John Haros Blahg |
posts from a technologist and ne'er-do-well |

Programming is an exercise in overcoming how wrong you’ve been in the past. At first you’ll overcome the syntax errors, then you’ll overcome the structural errors, and then you’ll come to align your code with the standards of a greater community and you’ll feel safe and like you’ve made it. You haven’t – you’re still wrong because you’re always wrong. You are playing a game you cannot win. And let’s face it – if it was a game you could win you’d not be playing at all.
I like this quote - and maybe just this time, he is right.
I just created a quick and dirty screencast of Briefs code in action after pulling it from Github and just running it. We develop iPhone apps for clients at iCrossing and I just think this is a simple (read: elegant) way to demo work without putting in too much up front time (which I'm told equals money).
I don't work on the consulting side anymore but did for a very long time. We always tried to think of useful ways for our creative to show their stuff without having to us in (us = software engineers).
code here: http://github.com/capttaco/Briefs
Test & Validate Your Designs on the iPhone
Briefs is a framework for packaging concept screens & control schemes that run live on the iPhone and iPod Touch. This allows you to experience the feel of your concept without the expense of development.
Each brief is simply a
.plistthat references images, in formats such as PNG, GIF and JPEG. Since they are image based, it allows anything from scanned paper sketches, to the full blown mockups you created in your favorite image editor. These briefs are loaded into the Briefs application and can be run directly on the device. Briefs can be loaded manually onto the device or pulled dynamically from a briefcast.Other Uses
There are several creative uses for Briefs. Elevator pitches, notes, and interactive books can all take advantage of the technology in the framework. And using briefcasts, there is a simple avenue for distributing your content to other Briefs users.
Beta source code available today on Github
Great idea and a lot easier for designers to mock up UI for touch apps without having to learning Interface Builder or having to ask a developer to mock up for you.
But development has come in fits and starts. Mr. Jobs killed the project twice in recent years, the first time because the battery life was too short, and the second time because there was insufficient memory, said one of the people familiar with the matter.
Knowing when to apply the brakes is probably as important as knowing when to step on the gas.