Mac

As many of my colleagues mourn the death of a great tech icon, Steve Jobs, I pray for his soul, and hope (sincerely) that he makes it to Heaven. For all his flaws, he was a good neighbor, an optimist, a great strategist, an opponent of pornography, and he built up the tech industry in ways the future history books will show.

Much of my life has been lived along with products created or conceived by Steve himself (see my ongoing computing history here), and my current profession would be nowhere near as interesting as it is without his continual push towards extending the reach of technology into my life.

Through it all, we must remember what Steve (as well as many before him) has pointed out:

Once you realize the death is a part of life, you will live life more fully.

In other words,

"For we brought nothing into the world, just as we shall not be able to take anything out of it"
(1 Timothy 6:7).

I'm going to be reading Steve Jobs (the authorized biography) when it is released on October 24, 2011. I enjoyed reading iWoz, which spoke to much of Apple's successes in the engineering field, but the design and strategy aspects of Apple's success will likely be covered in-depth in this book.

Since I've started working full-time as a web developer a few years ago, I've probably spent more than 8 hours every workday (and a few hours most weekends) sitting perfectly still at a desk, moving only my fingers, and occasionally my arms, to type, move a mouse, and drink something here and there.

With reports that working standing up isn't really all it's made out to be (you still need to move around, and you're moving pressure points from your lower back to your lower legs...), and other reports stating that it's more about periodic movement and stretching that will help with musculoskeletal fitness, I've been thinking more about ways I can force myself to move.

I've finally found the perfect tool for this, and it's simple and easy to use, to boot! It's called BreakTime, and it's $2.99 on the Mac App Store.

The screenshot says it all, but once you use it for a day, you'll realize how quickly a 45-minute period can go by, and how infrequently you would move around without a tool like this. I try to get up, walk around my condo, do a stretch or two, and refill my water bottle, before sitting back down and hitting the Done button.

If you're like me, you need this app.

Reeder, the new best RSS reader for Mac, is finally out of beta! It's only $9.99, on the Mac App Store.

I used NetNewsWire back in the early '00s, but it has become a complicated beast, and after learning about Reeder beta 1 a few months ago, I was an instant convert.

Reeder is great, because all I ever do is arrow-down through news stories, glance over ones I might be interested, press 'B' to open the really interesting articles in my browser, and then press 'A' then 'return' to mark all stories as read.

It's fast, simple, elegant, and hides a ton of extra complexity (in case you want to do more with it than I do). I love it even more on the iPad... it's simply the best solution for iPad or Mac. I don't bother reading news feeds on the iPhone much, though (I use both NetNewsWire and Reeder on that platform).

More on Reeder and RSS:

• Reeder for Mac - Usage Tips
• What do "Syndicate this Site" and "RSS" mean?
• News Feed 

Dear Things developers (Cultured Code),

I know you are perfectionists. I know you're purists. Your software is inspirational, in a way. It's clean, it's fast, and it's functional. You make beautiful software, and I'm glad you've had such great success in the past.

But I have to say, "Goodbye."

The one and only feature that I've been waiting for—OTA sync—is still not here.

You've made some pretty status indicators telling me nothing, but impressing me nonetheless. You've posted some great developer stories about this feature, but given no backbone to your words.

Two times in the past year I'd almost made up my mind to leave behind my $100 investment in your company, but two times I've waited. This, I fear, is the third strike. How can I ignore so many different people praising your competitor's software, but sit on the sidelines with nothing but hope and dreams of what could be?

(Image adapted from Things blog)

Things, I will miss your beautiful, simple, functional interface. I hope you will take this lesson to heart: ship early, and ship often. You can't string your users along forever.

Sincerely,
Jeff Geerling