Episode 318: Kind Of A Litmus Test

Manton and Daniel celebrate Sunlit 2.0’s release, and talk about the decision to make it a free app that supports the Micro.blog platform. Daniel admires Manton’s proclivity for shipping new things, and they both despair the difficulty of canceling existing projects. Daniel rants modestly about the difficulty of getting his MacBook Pro keyboard repaired, and finally, they discuss the App Stores and the ongoing disparities between Mac and iOS versions of them.

Many thanks to our sponsors this week:

Links:

  • Sunlit 2.0 – Manton announces the release of Sunlit 2.0 featuring Micro.blog support.
  • Jon Hays – Manton’s partner in developing Sunlit.
  • Daniel’s MacBook Keys – Tweet from November, 2017 showing the (then smaller) command key erosion.
  • App Previews – Apple’s documentation about App Store preview videos.
March 8, 2018 at 2:45 pm.

Episode 317: Everything Is A Tradeoff

Daniel and Manton react to Apple’s open-sourcing of SwiftNIO at the trySwift! conference. They catch up on their respective enthusiasm and lack thereof for Swift. Manton prepares to ship Sunlit 2.0, supporting direct publishing to Micro.blog. The two compare their philosophies on treating code warnings as errors, to their tolerance for clutter in the workplace and overall organization in real-life.

This week’s show is not sponsored. If you know a company that would be a good fit for future sponsorships, consider asking them to sponsor the show!

Links:

  • SwiftNIO – Apple’s new open-source client-server networking framework.
  • try! Swift Tokyo 2018 – The conference at which the SwiftNIO open sourcing was announced.
  • Netty – The open source project upon which SwiftNIO is modeled.
  • Norman Maurer – The Apple employee behind SwiftNIO and Netty.
  • Sunlit – iOS photo-blogging app which will soon support Micro.blog.
  • Flutter – Google’s cross-platform mobile development SDK.
March 2, 2018 at 1:58 pm.

Episode 316: They’ve Dialed In To Something

Manton and Daniel talk about Daniel’s HomePod experiences so far, including the best and worst of Siri’s behaviors. They speculate about how important the audio quality of the device will be to “regular people,” and compare it to other qualitative advances in technology. Finally, they bemoan the continued shortcomings of Siri’s SDK, and wonder whether Apple will expand upon it at this year’s WWDC.

Many thanks to our sponsor this week:

  • Linode: Cloud Hosting for You.

Links:

February 23, 2018 at 1:29 pm.

Episode 315: Causes For Celebration

Daniel talks to Manton about starting to use Micro.blog more in earnest, and fleshes out a rough strategy for what “weaning himself off Twitter” looks like. They talk about the struggles of Mac development, and working around bugs in an increasingly buggy AppKit. They reflect on the balancing act of focusing on bug fix releases vs. shifting focus to a more feature-heavy update. Finally, they catch up on Manton’s ongoing battle with his support queue, and look at how he’s managing his time to keep up with Micro.blog’s increasing demands.

Many thanks to our sponsors this week:

  • PDFpen: Edit PDFs with Ease.
  • Linode: Cloud Hosting for You.

Links:

  • Wean Myself Away – Daniel tweets about his ambition to become less reliant upon Twitter.
  • danielpunkass.micro.blog – Daniel’s Micro.blog-hosted blog, new origin for most “original short content.”
  • MarsEdit 4.0.7 – Blog post from Red Sweater announcing the latest bug-fix update.
  • Scrolling Text View Workarounds – Daniel’s 2015 blog post about working around NSTextView bugs.
  • Lire Review – Macstories write-up about the iOS RSS reader.
  • Lire – Direct link to Lire on the iOS App Store.
  • Zendesk – Help-desk software that Manton uses.
February 8, 2018 at 1:21 pm.

Extra Intuition 5: Three Cars For Four Drivers

After Manton’s Nissan Leaf lease expired, he’s going “car free,” to an extent. How many cars per person does a typical family need? He and Daniel consider Italian scooters, electric bikes, and other forms of local transportation.

This episode is available exclusively to members. Become a member today to gain access to this and other cool stuff!

Links:

January 30, 2018 at 8:02 am.

Episode 314: The World Does Need That

Manton launches a new iOS beta for Sunlit, redesigned with support for Micro.blog. Following up on Manton’s support burden. Daniel talks about ambition to follow up with customers after fixing bugs they’ve reported.

Many thanks to our sponsor this week:

Links:

  • Sunlit 2 Beta – Manton announces a new Micro.blog oriented update to Sunlit.
  • Boomerang – Instagram’s micro-video publishing app.
  • Layout – Instagram’s photo-collage layout app.
  • @Dialog – Micro.blog account for an Android-based Micro.blog client.
  • Micron – Alternative iOS Micro.blog app by Chris Lopez.
  • Manuscript – The bug-tracking service Daniel uses.
  • Forget Feature Requests – Old advice from Basecamp (née 37signals) about dismissing customer feedback.
  • A New Approach – Basecamp revisits the question of how to handle feature requests.
January 27, 2018 at 7:13 pm.

Extra Intuition 4: We Still Write Checks

Manton and Daniel talk about their recent experience discovering that they owned an obscure crypto-currency, and the process of learning how to convert it to Bitcoin and then cash.

This episode is available exclusively to members. Become a member today to gain access to this and other cool stuff!

Links:

  • Stellar – The non-profit cryptocurrency organization behind Lumens.
  • Binance – One of the exchanges that trades Stellar Lumens for Bitcoin and other currencies.
  • Coinbase – One of the most established Bitcoin exchanges, offering links to USD via bank transfer.
  • GDAX – Coinbase sister-service with a much less intuitive interface, and far lower fees.
  • Hilariously Rich – NY Times article about cryptocurrency enthusiasts in San Francisco.
January 21, 2018 at 4:07 pm.

Episode 313: While We’re Complaining

Daniel and Manton talk about digging oneself out of customer support debt, and strategies for improving the efficiency of support mechanisms. They react to Apple’s disabling of free In-App-Purchases, and speculate about whether it was intentional or not. This leads them into a re-evaluation about the risks of selling on the App Stores, and the lure of selling directly to customers.

Many thanks to our sponsor this week:

  • Linode: Cloud Hosting for You.

Links:

  • Zendesk – Customer support service used by Manton
  • Replies.io – Customer support service suggested by Daniel Alm
  • Timing – Daniel Alm’s Mac-based schedule and workflow observing app.
  • TextExpander – Mac and iOS based macro expansion utility.
  • Manuscript – Formerly known as FogBugz, used by Daniel.
  • Micro.blog Help – Manton’s blog-based knowledge base.
  • No Free IAPs? – Markus Müller-Simhofer reacts to changes in iTunes Connect.
  • MindNode – Markus’s brainstorm and mind-mapping app.
  • Acorn – Gus Mueller’s Mac paint app, offering free IAPs in the App Store.
  • Ulysses – Mac and iOS writing app offering subscription pricing.
  • Setapp – Mac-based subscription service for a fixed set of commercial apps.
  • Dash’s Year in Review – 2017 turned out to be Kapeli’s best year yet.
at 1:43 pm.

Episode 312: Unlock That Mystery

Manton talks to Daniel about just missing jury duty during a busy work week. They talk about the virtues of differentiating a product by both features and personality. Finally, they react to the Stellar cryptocurrency’s surprising value, and the potential for cryptocurrency and blockchain technology to change the world.

Many thanks to our sponsor this week:

  • Linode: Cloud Hosting for You.

Links:

  • Micro Monday Launches – Jean MacDonald announces a new convention for sharing microblog recommendations on Mondays.
  • Books on Micro.blog – Manton introduces the idea of tagging posts on Micro.blog with Emoji.
  • Stellar – Non-profit cryptocurrency which has seen its value spike recently.
  • Long Blockchain Tea – Ars Technica story about the tea that renamed itself and captured Bitcoin mania.
  • What is Bitcoin? – Late Night with Seth Myers takes on the task of explaining it, sort of.
January 12, 2018 at 12:49 pm.

Episode 311: It’s Been A Year

Daniel and Manton react to Intel’s “really bad bug.” They talk about Manton’s recent surges of PR, and balancing the desire to capitalize on that against the importance of preserving site stability. They talk about Apple’s acquisition of Buddybuild and the inherent risks of relying upon fully-hosted services.

Many thanks to our sponsors this week:

  • PDFpen: Edit PDFs with Ease.
  • Linode: Cloud Hosting for You.

Links:

  • Intel Security Bug – Article on The Verge about the newly revealed security issue.
  • 5 to 30 Percent – The Register article that tries to estimate performance impact of workarounds.
  • Amazon Echo Show – Manton’s latest Echo device.
  • Linux Page Table – Analysis of the Intel bug’s applicability to FreeBSD.
  • Micro.blog – Manton’s microblogging service.
  • Just for Fun – John Gruber talks on Twitter about Micro.blog.
  • I’d Love to Try – Kevin Rose helping to spread some social buzz about Micro.blog.
  • Now Part of Apple – Announcement from Buddybuild that they have been acquired.
  • CircleCI – Another hosted continuous integration service.
  • Consultingware – Joel Spolsky’s essay breaking down his analysis of different software markets.
  • From $50K to Free – IT World report from 2005 about the lowering of WebObjects’s price.
  • fastlane – Popular suite of tools for building and deploying apps to iOS and Android.
  • Workflow – Popular iOS app that was acquired by Apple last year.
January 5, 2018 at 2:41 pm.