avolcano

Not shocked by the self-promotion Dass has here, considering where his interests are, but his point is ultimately a good one.

I think Filepicker is neat software, but can't wait for a more open solution like Web Intents to mature.

It's a bummer that they don't do the interviews/final answers until after the first couple weeks of January.

I'd love to take a semester off and do this, but since there's no guarantee I'd get into Hacker School, I would want to have my usual classes to fall back on, and the payment for that is due the first week of January. If I did get into Hacker School, I'd rather not drop the university classes I'll already have paid for.

Maybe this summer the timing will work out better. I'm sure I could learn more in three months there than I ever would here :I

Basically all of my code I've ever written (as someone who's yet to find an actual job coding) is "open source" simply because I use GitHub for everything, not necessarily because I want people to look at it ;)

I have a few projects languishing I'm concerned about - an aborted attempt at making an EmberJS build system using Grunt, an aborted attempt at making a localStorage adapter - that I still see being starred or even forked.

I wish GitHub had some way of marking a project as "inactive" with a big warning banner. I suppose I should go back and update the READMEs of those repos to note such, but it'd be nice to have just a checkbox to tick and get a big ol' warning without having to actually update the repo.

Within three years, there will also be a new Xbox far more powerful than the 360. I'm not denying that mobile gaming is going to eclipse the handheld market and possibly even part of the console market, but it's going to be a LONG time before you sell consumers on "hook up your phone to a TV to play games!"

There's also entrenched franchises on consoles. Activision doesn't want to make Call of Duty for iPhone - $60 is a bit more enticing of a price point than $1. That's not to say they won't maybe make mobile versions in the future, but certainly not versions intended to replace the console versions (similar to how handhelds already have had CoD spinoffs). And that's just one example, of course.

I don't think you're necessarily wrong on where the market's going, long-term. But I think that it is a long term, at least ten years or more, until we see consumers saying "why would I buy an <Xbox Next> when I already have an iPhone and AirPlay?"

No copyright issues; it's based off of OpenDUNE: http://www.opendune.org/

Good article. I was actually working on my own demo[1] for recorder.js, though it's a bit out of date now. It's a tiny but impressive little library.

Worth noting that, besides exporting to a WAV and adding the object URL to an <audio> tag, recorder.js will also (using the getBuffer method) let you use the buffers directly as an actual Web Audio API source. This lets you do further processing during playback on the recorded audio.

I'm hoping by the time that I finish my silly little app (a loop box that you can add effects to, Reggie Watts[2]-style, using recorder.js and the wonderful effects library Tuna[3]), web audio recording in Chrome will be enabled out of the box on stable.

[1] https://github.com/thomasboyt/web-audio-recording-demo

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=344OpaQCAQI

[3] https://github.com/Dinahmoe/tuna

Cable TV has a much better value proposition than a Twitter alternative. There's no free alternative to cable TV with a comparable feature set.

I do think it's an exaggeration to say that app.net caters to the rich, but I can guarantee you that the demographics skew much more upper class, between being an app that is charged for and a service that mostly has interested hackers (who, nowadays, tend to be an affluent bunch, for better or worse).

I honestly think the Chromebook is one of the best products out there, even though I'd never buy one for myself. It's the first web-only device that isn't "ahead of its time" - it just works for everything you need.

Its major downfall is performance on Flash-heavy sites (or even JS-heavy sites, such as The Verge), but honestly I don't think that's the device's fault as much as it's the desktop web's. It took developers a while to learn to optimize their sites for less-powerful tablets and phones, and hopefully they'll bring some of those lessons to the desktop for lower-powered devices like this.

Plus, I think a lot of people just don't understand that the device has more than just web access. Chrome apps give it potential for powerful offline capabilities. This article has a good overview: http://www.zdnet.com/yes-you-can-use-the-new-chromebook-offl...

(the only thing I don't like is that all of the Chromebooks have been a bit ugly. I know that you're dealing with cheap plastic, but I actually thought my slate CR-48 looked nicer than the fat Samsung & Acer Chromebooks!)

Yeah, I'm really not digging these "big square" grid views. Pocket's web app (http://getpocket.com/) does it too, and I can't stand it - vastly prefer a standard list view (which thankfully is an option).

I've always thought Evernote looked neat, but never saw a reason to move away from Notational Velocity (http://notational.net/), which is a fantastic little program - maybe the most simple app that I use, and that's a good thing. Still, might try the new version.

Erm, I haven't seen this at all. In fact, most of the people I know who are most critical of Israel are also critical of Obama's foreign policy (though most begrudgingly voted for him anyways, because, y'know, Romney).

Gotta say, as a sophomore who's been debating dropping out college, that these junior positions exist at all is encouraging.

I always thought my trajectory would be to go to my current school, transfer to a better one, get some good internships, and graduate with a CS degree. But my grades aren't where they need to be, so I probably won't be able to transfer to a good school. Honestly I've been concerned whether or not I can afford it anyways. Going for a junior position, or even a paid non-college-affiliated internship, is far more appealing.

I've got a pretty decent GitHub, and I've launched a few apps with another in the works. My major (and it is major) concern is that I don't have a good grasp on CS fundamentals - algorithms, data structures, etc. But it seems easier now than ever to teach yourself this - whether through Coursera, or through reading a variety of sources, and practicing on sites like Project Euler or Interview Street.

Maybe Hugo's experience was different than the average developer drop-out because of his ability to get into App Academy, but I'd like to think anyone who can demonstrate programming knowledge and intelligence has a shot, degree or not.

Are we to applaud innovation for the sake of innovation, regardless of whether or not it produces a good product?

Apple made a new phone with a few inches of extra screen and a new processor because that's what they needed to make their phone better. No reason to start attaching gimmicks for the sake of being a little different.

This might sound ridiculous, but Valve are actually really good at responding, or at least reading, emails sent right to the top. If you just send your thoughts to gaben@valvesoftware.com, I'm sure he'll forward it to whoever it's relevant to.

(I say this from experience - I sent him an email saying I thought the end of Half Life 2: Episode 2 was really fantastic stuff, and got a response back from the script writer, who he had forwarded the email to :])

Not all touch screens are created equal.

I remember the old Nintendo DS touch screen, which was resistive, required user calibration where you would press on the corners of the screen. If you missed the corners (which, with the relatively thick stylus and the relatively thick bezel on the original DS, wasn't uncommon), the accuracy of your touch positions would be very notably off, to the point that using touch-screen keyboards in some games would be difficult.

Obviously I don't know for sure if this was the exact case with this voting machine, but the point being, some touch screens do require calibration and there is a chance for error. Or, of course, it could simply have been a factory mistake.

Either way, I doubt there's any malice behind this error.

I tried to figure it out from MSDN and couldn't, so maybe someone here knows something I don't:

Is there any functional difference between LocalSettings and LocalStorage in terms of capabilities? I see the use case for file storage, of course, for special purposes; I see the use case for IndexedDB, for more powerful object storage; I see the use case for RoamingSettings, which syncs between Windows 8 devices; but I don't see the use case for LocalSettings when LocalStorage already exists (or vice versa).

It seems to me that the only reason that they're both usable in WinJS apps is because one comes from the .NET APIs and one comes, of course, from the HTML5 APIs, and no one ever stopped to think they might be redundant.

Of course, I could be totally wrong. MSDN isn't exactly illuminating on this matter, nor on, well, anything related to WinJS.

Oh, and an aside - if anyone's looking for a nice wrapper for IndexedDB that plays nice with WinJS, give db.js (http://aaronpowell.github.com/db.js/) a shot.

Have to say, the most intriguing ideas I saw in the concept were the two "split view" concepts - one for managing blog posts, and one for writing posts.

Has any blogging platform implemented anything like that? I know there are Markdown editors with a split view, but I don't know of any that are web-based, nor any that are integrated into existing blogging platforms. And I've definitely never seen any "manage/edit old posts" system as clean and simple as the one in the concept.

Oh, and btw, a brilliant concept that's super easy to miss - being able to type "(image)" in the editor pane and seeing an image upload placeholder in the preview pane. It's a small thing, but one of those things that seems way more obvious than it actually is.

Yes, Windows 8 will ship on millions of desktops and laptops. And almost no one using those devices would prefer a full-screen Metro app to the website. This isn't like Instagram or something where a native app is the service; the vast majority of people using Facebook are going to be doing it through the browser.

So you're right, Windows 8 will sell a lot of copies for PC usage, and maybe a few people will find apps they want to use in the store, but primarily, those people are going to prefer browser apps to Metro apps, guaranteed - store apps offer no advantage, in this case.

Now, Windows 8 on tablets? If that takes off, I'm sure Facebook will start to target it. Until it does, though, I think we'd all rather them spend their resources on the platforms that they know are important to the vast majority of their users.

Uh, really?

Not developing for a completely unproven platform, where most users are served perfectly fine by the existing web app, isn't "foolish," it's a good use of resources.

Yikes, looks like I didn't investigate quite far enough. Thanks for the information :)

I'm disappointed to see that there is no option for students to waive the entire fee. Microsoft does this on the Windows Store (students get a free year), so it would only make sense to carry over to Windows Phone 8.

Of course, that would require actual inter-department consistency at Microsoft. And we all know how impossible that is.

Their jobs page is a blast to play with too: http://www.kickstarter.com/jobs

(roll over the links :])

I don't think it's entirely Microsoft fanboys that are trying to champion the Surface.

A lot of people still think an iPad can't be used for content creation (not true at all; the thing has supported a Bluetooth keyboard since day one, there's tons of music being made with the thing, there's tons of apps for content creation at this point...) or productivity purposes (a somewhat fair point, but unless Surface somehow takes off, I can guarantee there will be Office for iPad someday). Ask anyone how they can justify spending the same amount of money as an iPad on a tablet that's smaller, with a far worse screen, with almost no ecosystem to speak of, unproven software, and with no accessory ecosystem, and they'll probably tell you "because this one will let me be more productive!"

I dunno. I try not to get too negative about products. I've come around on a lot of Android tablets; the Nexus 7 is a genuinely impressive device for $200. But the Surface seems not only woefully underpowered, but with Windows 8, has proven to manage to be cross-contaminating, harming the desktop OS that Microsoft had so finely perfected with Windows 7.

None.

Zero.

This is why I don't understand, say, the Verge's positive Windows 8 review. Sure, the desktop is still "usable." If you ignore Metro, it becomes an over-engineered full screen start menu.

And somehow, having the most massive upgrade to Windows be, at best, ignoreable on desktops and laptops doesn't make Windows 8 instantly a massive failure?

This article comes at a good time for me - was wondering how exactly I was supposed to be using the Promises in WinJS (which are woefully undocumented in terms of actual usage, as are, well, all things WinJS/Metro, unfortunately).

Yep. Not only can you not share to desktop apps, you can't share from desktop apps, though they still have the Charm on the side for it. So you get this wonderful little flyout:

http://i.imgur.com/THJHM.png

Google has a 30-day guarantee for it.

It broke on day 35.

It's now under Samsung's 12-month limited warranty. No refunds, no exchanges, just repairs, unfortunately.

My Galaxy Nexus (via Google Play)'s wifi broke after one month, just outside of the Google Play Store 30-day guarantee. No attempts at software changes fixed the issue; clearly something went bad in the hardware.

I've been delaying getting it fixed because it'll be a five week turnaround from Samsung support, according to forum posts regarding similar issues. It also sounds like Samsung's support is nightmarish.

Meanwhile, I'm sure if this had happened with my old iPhone 4 (which I'll be using while my GNex is away), I could have gone to the Apple Store about half an hour away and gotten it either replaced on the spot, or at least been able to work with an employee right there to get it sent out instead of having to go through the standard terrible warranty processes. Even if there was no Apple Store near me, I've never heard any complaints about Apple's phone support like I have about other manufacturers.

The point of all of this: while Google obviously won't have the retail support an Apple Store does, by having exclusive call centers regarding only a few devices, they'll be able to make sure their employees are better trained and their phone processes much more streamlined than the manufacturers ever could. In fact, maybe I'll just tough it out with my wifi-less phone until the new call center opens...

Not only were they bought by Sony, they were bought by Sony for $380 million dollars.

Shows what a difference a business model can have. They both had cloud gaming technologies, but while OnLive wanted to sell it right to consumers, Gaikai went for the publishers.

I go for a hybrid approach. A personal blog (or nowadays, Twitter) for sharing random Youtube videos, commenting on politics, and other stuff, and then a "professional" blog for writing longer articles on. It's nice knowing potential employers can see writings that are actually relevant to my field, and not "check out this Gangnam Style parody" ;)