Motivos Inversos

Apple is said to ready iPad 3 with sharper screen, LTE access

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 08:22:09 PST

Apple is said to ready iPad 3 with sharper screen, LTE access

I want it.

Can you tell which one is each one?

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 15:48:56 PST

My Galaxy Nexus just arrived, and I can’t tell it apart from my iPhone 4S

Love Dan Lyon's sarcasm regarding the whole controversy of Samsung ripping off Apple's designs. I hope you can guess I don't think they are (neither does Dan).

Apparently, Google starts focusing on Android design

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 15:22:07 PST

Android Design

The website is very well designed and contains lot of useful guidelines to design Android apps. Together with the inclusion of the Holo theme in all Android handsets, this is another step in the right direction.

Come on Google, keep them coming.

If you have the urge to add complexity, just go home early

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:58:40 PST

I've talked about this before (link in Spanish). A one-sentence resume of the entire post: You ain't gonna need it. Want more about the topic? Google it.

Anyway, I just read "How (not) to write Factorial in Java" by Bill Woody (late to the party, the post is one year old), and despite I'm not sure how he goes from a factorial function implementation to the conclusion of his article, I really love the final sentences, so I'm copying them here and bolding some words here and there to make them resonate even more:

The biggest complaint I have with many Java developers is that they develop a whole bunch of really bad habits. Specifications are unclear, or they think someday the code may need to be extended into a different direction. So they write a whole bunch of overblown architectural nonsense, sight unseen, thinking that the additional crap someday will help out and make things easier.

(...) Because a year from now they wade through all this excess baggage written at a time when they thought they understood the domain of the problem (but clearly didn't), instead of having simple code (...) that they can revise as needed, they wind up with the most over-engineered pile of nonsense that no-one can possibly understand.

So please, do us all a favor: if you have the urge to add complexity because "someday we'll need it, I just know it!", or because "it’s not sufficiently flexible enough" or "we need reusability in our code" or (God help us!) because it’s "cool" – just go home early. Watch some cartoons. Rent Inception on DVD.

And stop creating extra work for us in the future for no good reason.

You can sign my name next to these affirmations. They are not originally mine, but I agree 100% with them.

A case in favor of private variables and functions

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:59:46 PST

I just read "A case against private variables and functions in JavaScript" by Miller Medeiros, and honestly I'm not sure what to think about it. I understand the reasons that made him change his mind, but I also think that encapsulation is one of the most important pillars of OOP.

In short, his point is to favor public variables and functions over private so anybody can jump in and hack his way into whatever he wants to do. Obviously, if I have a private member you can't change its value from the outside, so you will be screwed...

But that's exactly what I'm trying to do.

Marking a member variable or function "private" is a design decision as important as properly organizing your class hierarchy. You can't just go "all private until I need public". It's way more complicated than that. Mastering it requires experience and knowledge, and there's no a rule of thumb to do it.

Going the other way around (fuck it, let's make everything public!) it's even worse. Giving everybody control over the internal state of a class is the worst decision we can make (no, we are not grown ups). I've been around for enough time to know what happens when developers start messing with the values of public fields. Suddenly things stop working and nobody can figure out why.

Resuming, you should pay special attention to what you make public on your classes: if you want other developers to overwrite the behavior of your functions, then fine, make them public. If something is interesting only for your class, then make it private. Never ever sacrifice encapsulation because of what could happen tomorrow.

As a bonus, IMO variables should never be public. If you want to grant access to the value of a variable outside your class, create a function to access it.

I know what Miller is doing in his code, and I think he is doing it perfectly fine. Problem is that he might was a little bit bold in some paragraphs of his post. Or maybe I freaked out when I read the title. Who knows.

Blogger, I appreciate your changes but that's not what I asked for

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 07:39:26 PST

What a coincidence: I was talking about it yesterday and a few hours later Google posted "Engage with your readers through threaded commenting" on their Blogger blog.

Thanks Google for moving forward, but I think you are using the wrong road.

Where is Google+ in all this? Seems confusing to me that you are throwing G+ everywhere in your products, and going forward with a "custom-made" commenting system for Blogger. Something doesn't add up here.

I hope you have strong reasons for doing this. It took you 5+ years to revamp comments on Blogger, so I basically lost all my hopes in seeing G+ taking over here.

But again, thank you for doing something.

Beautiful, yes. But wake me up when it takes over the iPad

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 12:43:08 PST

Asus Transformer Prime

They say is the best Android tablet out there. Specs blow the iPad out of the water, but we all know it's not about specs anymore. At the same price point, I'm sorry, but they are not going to make a dent on Cupertino's sales.

Like Gizmodo says: you should buy this if you know you don't want and iPad. Wondering how many people really don't like the iPad.

Comments are off on the blog, but you can try in Google+

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 12:08:27 PST

Yes, I disabled the comments on the blog for various reasons:

1. I had to deal with spam. Too much spam. Freaking tedious hours wasted removing spam.
2. Maybe less than one percent of you read the comments anyway.
3. Comments get in the way of the article itself. They should be in a separate page/place to avoid drawing the attention from the real content.
4. Too many trolls logged in as "anonymous" saying not-nice things about me and my family.
5. It doesn't matter what you do, they just look ugly on the page.

Comments will be coming back at some point when Google+ takes over (you can read this post here of me asking Blogger for some deeper integration with Google+), but for now they will stay off.

However, that doesn't mean that you can't communicate with me regarding one post. Every single one of these posts is shared on Google+, so you can add a comment there and I will answer as always. There is a catch though; you have to follow my Google+ profile in order to find the posts :(

Hope this doesn't bother too many people.

Logging in the cloud

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 17:39:46 PST

Take a look to this site: Loggly.

Great idea and very useful. I've been thinking about this for a while, and today a college brought up this startup to the conversation while talking precisely about doing something like this for our own applications.

Can't wait to try it and see how it goes.

Anyway, I think every developer with a real application out there should think about using something like Loggly. Or maybe create his own personal version. Keeping logs of our apps is really really important.

Is SQL Server installed on your phone? No shit!

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 07:36:17 PST

A friend of mine defending his now dead Windows Mobile piece of crap phone: "... And also, it has SQL Server installed on it!".

No shit! Seriously? I'm so jealous right now! I've been dying to have a phone with SQL Server on it. It's so important for me being able to create databases and install them on my phone, and access them remotely, and run some queries, and create stored procedures... because it supports stored procedures, right? What about triggers, views, and functions? Wow!

Enough sarcasm.

Now you wonder why Windows Mobile never took off in the first place. I hope you don't have this much unnecessary freedom with the current version of Windows Phone.

P.S. Somebody told me that Windows Phone has a Windows Registry! You know, that "HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT/whatever" key collection. After that, why not to port Visual Studio and make it run there?

Microsoft and Nokia's Plans for Marketing Windows Phone in 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 01:00:00 PST

Microsoft and Nokia's Plans for Marketing Windows Phone in 2012

This is pathetic from Microsoft:

Included in the plan are sales incentives for retail workers, aimed at getting them to finally start recommending Windows Phone as an alternative to Android and iPhone. The amount of payments are $10 to $15 per handset sold, depending on the number sold, for some handset models.

If they can't get love from consumers the traditional way (by designing a compelling product), they are going to buy that love paying commissions to sell reps.

This is the kind of stuff that should be scrutinized by the Justice Department. This is really going to hurt consumers. And careful... this potentially can hurt the stores as well: who is going to trust those sellers anymore when everybody knows they are getting money by handing you a Windows Phone when you ask for "the best device"?

Microsoft, I guess my sentiments toward you are far from changing anytime soon.

Despite I don't hate Android, I agree Google is being a bitch

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 12:11:43 PST

Why I Hate Android.

No, I personally don't hate Android, but I have to agree 100% with everything said by MG Siegler on the article linked above. Google has become the bitch of the carriers and OEMs, hurting every single one of us (consumers).

The sad thing is that carriers are not going to return the favor. As soon as Android stops being the pretty one, they are going to ditch it and move onto the new shinny bitch (whoever that is). Google will end fucked and with nothing to say.

I hope they still have time to revert that.

AT&T unveils a new API platform for HTML5 apps

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 21:27:17 PST

AT&T unveils a new API platform for HTML5 apps

The stars are aligning... The HTML5 platform API is cool, but I think what's really important is "the online store for HTML5 apps" (not sure why the news it's buried one paragraph before finishing the article).

To be honest, I don't think AT&T will be the one nailing the upcoming "place to go to buy / install HTML5 apps", but at least they are the first talking about it.

Expect more related news coming from Google and Apple. They need to take this train... soon.

Movado Museum Men's Stainless Steel Watch With Black Strap

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 05:00:17 PST

Movado Museum Men's Stainless Steel Watch With Black Strap.

First - love the website. Extremely simple and every pixel feels placed in the perfect position. After two minutes you stop browsing an online store and start feeling you are actually there. Great experience.

Second - love the watch. Extremely simple and every atom feels placed in the perfect position. I haven't seen a simpler and more elegant watch before. Two miles away you can tell it's an expensive and well-designed piece of hardware.

Dear Apple fanboys, there are places other than Cupertino where beautiful things are produced.

+1 to Movado.

Over promising and under delivering - where is the replacement for the black bar?

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 03:00:02 PST

See that black bar on top of all Google pages? Remember they were changing it to something better?

Yes, it was promised on November 29 last year but it's nowhere to be found yet. This is becoming dangerously common: Google shows stuff (a.k.a. "promises"), then goes silent about it for a long long time (remember Google Music or Android@home projects?).

I don't like this dynamic. No one probably does. Not good for users, not good for Google.

They better start putting their shit together. There's no time for such idiot mistakes.

More than 4 million Fires on the wild. Did you heard what I said 2 months ago?

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 18:11:56 PST

The holiday season ended with Amazon reportedly selling 4 to 5 million Kindle Fires. That's huge and more of what anyone expected. I won't be surprised if the Kindle Fire is already the best sold Android tablet out there. If not, I'm pretty sure it will become very very soon.

More than 2 months ago I told you to put your applications together and make them available in the Amazon Appstore. I hope you didn't miss the opportunity that was coming. If you haven't pushed them yet today, you are totally retarded.

Anyway, there's always time. Stop reading now and start doing it.

Holo Everywhere - Less piss in my soup

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 17:57:16 PST

Holo Everywhere

This is awesome. Big win for developers. Big win for users. Fuck the carriers. Fuck the OEMs. It's a ballsy move from Google, small, but definitively on the right direction.

I hope they are just testing the waters to bring a new set of changes to Android. They desperately need to fix the whole fragmentation problem. It's getting really, really bad.

And if you ask me, fuck the "open" bullshit crap. Not sure what is the definition Google is giving to "open", but my dictionary says: "The ability of carriers and / or OEMs to piss your soup, laugh about it and make you pay for it".

Anyway, this is a step forward. I wish it lasts.

From the Las Vegas Strip to your living room: Google TV partners at CES

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 17:33:20 PST

From the Las Vegas Strip to your living room: Google TV partners at CES

Google TV is resurrecting in front of my eyes. I thought it was dead after Logitech left the party, but who cares about Logitech when you sign some new major players?

Hardware partners are aligned, that's good, but there's still a huge void in the content front. Google has to overcome it if they want a piece of the pie. Don't forget people say Apple is fooling around for their coming TV solution. And that's something to be scared of.

El colmo es tener que interpretar mensajes de error

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 15:45:23 PST

Noventa y nueve por ciento de las veces que me encuentro algo que no funciona es mi culpa. No soy de los que anda echándole la culpa al Visual Studio .NET porque mi código no compila. Yo sé que hice algo mal, así que lo busco, lo resuelvo, y punto en boca.

Repito, 99%. Tengo que darme el beneficio de la duda muchas veces, pero reconozco que son contadas.

Sin embargo, el VS.NET sí es pésimo explicándome por qué y en qué me estoy equivocando. Muchas veces entiendo que un mensaje de error específico es técnicamente complejo de determinar, pero otras me dan simplemente ganas de vomitar.

Si el problema es que estoy forzando que 2 + 2 sea igual a 5, cualquier otro mensaje diferente a "imbécil, 2 + 2 nunca es 5" es simplemente una mierda y no ayuda para nada. Si el error es en la primera línea del fichero "A", es inadmisible que el compilador señale la línea 385 del fichero "C".

Ejemplos sobran. Todos los días se puede adicionar uno a la lista.

Que VS.NET sea tan jodidamente malo en esto no me molesta; es su problema. Que haya personas que lo defiendan diciendo que los desarrolladores tenemos que saber "interpretar" estos errores me revienta de veras. Si tú dices "rojo", ¿tengo yo que asumir que es "azul"? No me jodas.

Mientras VS.NET siga mostrando adivinanzas, pues tendremos que seguir adivinando, eso queda claro. Pero el que piensa que eso es correcto, que piense de nuevo.

Cuando diseñen sus propios sistemas, por favor, no hagan que los usuarios "interpreten", "adivinen", o se vean obligados a usar Google para corregir un problema que ustedes mismos pueden indicar con un mejor manejo de excepciones. Háganlo de la forma en que se supone que lo deban hacer.

Happy 2012 everybody!

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 16:41:23 PST

I hope this is not the year where the World ends. That will totally suck!

What I'm certain is that this is the year where my family comes to U.S. to be with me until the end of the World. That's exciting!

I wish you all the best.

El mejor regalo que me puedes dar: "Su aplicación ha sido rechazada"

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 20:06:24 PST

Ya sabía que existía, pero hasta que no chocas con él no le prestas la debida atención:

We found that your app provides access to external mechanisms for purchases or subscriptions to be used in the app, which is not in compliance with the App Store Review Guidelines.

Specifically, we found your app contains link to the website to subscribe and also references to subscription in the app description. Please see the attached screenshot/s for more information.

To be in compliance with the App Store Review Guidelines, it would be appropriate to remove the access to these mechanisms - including fully qualified links to your site that could indirectly provide access to these mechanisms, such as links to web pages for support, FAQ, product or program details, etc.

¡Ay Apple! Bonito regalo por la Navidad. En momentos como este nada parece más lindo que Android.

Aunque a nadie le importe, de vez en cuando soy el tipo más raro del barrio

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 19:43:06 PST

Llevo toda mi vida persiguiendo una idea para implementar. Algo que me apasione y a la que pueda sacarle frutos. Ya había antes hecho algo al respecto, pero ahora la idea es mucho más madura. Ahora sé cómo puede triunfar, y adicioné todos los elementos para hacer super-excitante el trabajo en ella.

Nunca mejor momento para que todo apareciese: justo antes de 4 días libres por Thanksgiving, tenía todos los cabos atados para empezar a implementar. Incluso ya había hecho los mockups necesarios y buena parte del código complicado. Cuatro días parecían suficientes para adelantar en buena parte una primera versión...

Y se me acabaron los 4 días y no hice nada. Pero cuando digo "nada" me refiero a su sentido más literal: absolutamente nada de nada. Me la he pasado durmiendo, leyendo, y durmiendo un poco más. No me puedo entender. Primero no sé que hacer, luego cuando ya lo tengo todo listo, no hago nada.

Ahora me toca joderme en las noches después del trabajo. De poquito en poquito. Todo por no aprovechar el tiempo libre. Uff, raro, raro pero raro que me pongo.

¡Fiesta, fiesta! Flash is going to die! Al menos en los dispositivos móviles... por ahora.

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 15:54:25 PST

Sorry por los amantes de Flash, pero hoy es un día feliz para mí. Para aquellos que aún no han escuchado la noticia, aquí están los comentarios al respecto por parte del propio Adobe (el artículo original puede ser encontrado en Exclusive: Adobe ceases development on mobile browser Flash, refocuses efforts on HTML5):

Our future work with Flash on mobile devices will be focused on enabling Flash developers to package native apps with Adobe AIR for all the major app stores. We will no longer adapt Flash Player for mobile devices to new browser, OS version or device configurations. Some of our source code licensees may opt to continue working on and releasing their own implementations. We will continue to support the current Android and PlayBook configurations with critical bug fixes and security updates.

Las letras negritas son mías, y es esa oración todo lo que necesité para sentirme feliz durante todo el día.

Esto obviamente no debe ser una sorpresa para los que me conocen. Ya he criticado Flash más de una vez aquí, aquí, aquí, y también aquí. No me gusta para nada, y saber ahora que no va a ser soportado más en los dispositivos móviles es un alivio.

Y recuerdo muy bien los gritos entre los comentarios de los artículos citados anteriormente, y antes que lo hagan de nuevo, hagan una lectura de Thoughts on Flash escrito por Steve Jobs en Abril del 2010. En aquel momento todo el mundo gritó también: "¿está este tipo loco o qué cosa le pasa?", "¡el fin del iPhone/iPad se acerca porque no soportan Flash!", y otras por el estilo. ¿Pues saben qué? No solo iOS sigue aquí, sino que está más fuerte que nunca. A las personas parece no interesarles mucho que Flash no funcione allí... Y los dueños del contenido han comenzado a migrar para HTML5... Apple gana esta batalla.

Pero hay más. Y pueden apostar sus casas a que Apple va trás Flash también en los espacios no-móviles. ¿Y saben qué? Pues que vamos a sobrevivir, y los que producen contenido van a eliminar Flash. Uno a uno, step by step, lo que queda de Flash va a desaparecer.

Y si no me creen abran los ojos. El skillset de Flash está cada vez menos valorado. Ahora todos quieren desarrolladores para HTML5, y esta tendencia va a aumentar cada mes. Flash ya dijo todo lo que tenía que decir. HTML5 está aún en su infancia. Peor aún, Flash ya tiene enemigos y pésima reputación. Buena suerte Adobe luchando contra eso.

Y obviamente no va a pasar de hoy para mañana. Nada cambia de esa manera. Aún Flash es mucho más potente que el HTML, pero Adobe acaba de claudicar nada menos que en el espacio del futuro: los móviles. Todos saben que la computación en 10 años va a estar principalmente en nuestros bolsillos, y ahora ya sabemos que Adobe no pretende colarse allí, así que oh well, bien por ellos.

Y que no le quepa duda a nadie; el motivo de Adobe es bien sencillo: ellos mejor que nadie saben que no tienen competencia posible. Han tratado durante 3 años completos de sacar una versión decente para los teléfonos móviles, y han fallado desastrosamente. Al que se le ocurra mencionar Flash en Android no tiene ni idea qué es "buen funcionamiento" o simplemente no ha tenido la oportunidad de probarlo por más de 5 minutos.

Así que Angel, lo que dije casi un año atrás de ActionScript, el lenguaje utilizado por Flash, lo repito a continuación textualmente:

ActionScript está destinado al fracaso. Demasiada presión de alguien tan poderoso como Apple, y demasiada competencia por parte del HTML 5. Lo siento Adobe, pero mi opinión es que puedes patalear todo lo que quieras, pero tienes los días contados.

Y sí, estaba jugando a Nostradamus, pero al parecer razón tenía, ¿no crees?

I'm a fucking idiot: my blog turned 1 last month and I didn't notice

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 18:09:57 PST

How could I? It was on October 7th. Apparently I was so busy by the time I didn't even notice it.

This was my first post. In Spanish. And it was precisely a rant about Blogger. I have to say that during this year my sentiments have changed since Blogger has pushed a lot of cool features. I'm glad now... for now.

Want to thank everybody for the continuos support all these months. I expect an even better second year. Again, thanks to you.

Want to see something cool from Google? Do this and enjoy

noreply@blogger.com (Santiago L. Valdarrama) — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 12:31:06 PDT

Go to Google and type "do a barrel roll". No quotes, of course.

Pretty cool, huh? That's an Ester Egg created using CSS3 transformations. I love the way these guys hide tricks like these all over the web.