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games

Civ V to the Mac

October 19, 2010 21:08:34.023

And there was much rejoicing:

Aspyr Media plans to bring the popular strategy game Sid Meier's Civilization V to the Mac in time for the holidays.

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Brain Surgery While the Engine is Running

October 19, 2010 19:06:08.641

Sean Denigris explains how to do brain surgery on a bunch of existing Smalltalk objects when you make a code change:

Now comes the problem…  I had objects floating around that already contained a non-empty OrderedCollection.  I didn’t want to add otherwise-not-needed accessors.  Luckily, because of Smalltalk’s awesome reflection capabilities, it was a breeze to reach into these objects and surgically change them.

You might wonder why that's useful, but consider this situation (which I've actually had):

  • You make a code change for a running app server, such as the one you're reading this post on
  • There are existing objects that have the old object shape, and need the new object shape

Just use the same sort of strategy Sean outlines above. I've done that a fair number of times over the years, both to the servers I maintained at Cincom while I was there, and to this one. It's a really handy thing to be able to do, because it's much, much better than the more standard tack of:

  • Take server down
  • Apply change
  • Bring server back up

It works great, even in production.

posted by James Robertson

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games

Fallout NV - Early Reviews Seem Problematic

October 19, 2010 9:51:46.899

I'll be receiving the game later today, and since I'll probably be cloning Macs, I'll have a chance to play it. I'm a bit worried about the early reviews....

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posted by James Robertson

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general

My Heartfelt Thanks

October 19, 2010 9:26:23.989

I'd like to thank everyone who has sent me an email, contacted me on Facebook, or commented here on the blog - I really appreciate all of the kind words.

You'll be able to follow my Smalltalk work here, no matter what I end up doing - and I've left the comments for my announcement open, so feel free to add yours.

posted by James Robertson

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general

Acid Test of Mac Transfer

October 19, 2010 7:05:47.028

Sometime in the next few days I'm going to find out how well Mac to Mac transfer works - I need to return my MacBook Pro to Cincom, which means:

  • Getting a new Mac (I'm looking at the 13" model)
  • Transferring all of my apps and data to it

I've done the transfer before, back when we bought an iMac a few years ago - but that was from an old g4 based mini, and there weren't any apps on the mini that required registration. I've installed a whole bunch of things onto this Mac, so we'll have to see how it goes...

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posted by James Robertson

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st4u

Smalltalk 4 U 2 - Getting Started with Pharo

October 19, 2010 6:29:02.882

Today's Smalltalk 4 You explains how to get Pharo installed on your system - from "where do I find it" to "how do I install and run it". If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

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[st4u2-iPhone.m4v ( Size: 6451422 )]

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Getting GLASS Running with Pharo

October 18, 2010 12:20:54.988

I'll do a screencast on this later this week, but I thought it might be useful to toss out some quick "how do I get it running?" instructions. I downloaded GLASS and a "one click" Pharo image from Gemstone's website, but then I ran into problems connecting to the database. James Foster was extremely helpful, and the steps I'm outlining here came from him.

Step one - if you're on Mac or Linux, as I am, use the installGemstone.sh script.

Step two - grab the one-click Pharo image

Step three - do this in a terminal window


source /opt/gemstone/product/seaside/defSeaside

That sets up the environment variables you'll need. Next, you'll want to get the server running, and for the "I'm just experimenting" case, you probably don't want all the security bells and whistles. So, do the following:



/opt/gemstone/product/bin/startnetldi -g -a YourUserNameHere
/opt/gemstone/product/bin/startstone seaside


It's probably simplest if you set up a script, something like this:


#! /bin/sh
source /opt/gemstone/product source /opt/gemstone/product/seaside/defSeaside
cd $GEMSTONE
./bin/startnetldi -g -a jarober
./bin/startstone seaside

And then one to shut things down:


#! /bin/sh
source /opt/gemstone/product source /opt/gemstone/product/seaside/defSeaside
cd $GEMSTONE
./bin/stopnetldi
./bin/stopstone seaside

Now, you should have GLASS running. You'll need to start your Pharo image. I used a command line from the same terminal I started GLASS from, but that's not essential - you can just double click on the app bundle. You'll get something like this:

Next, you'll want to edit the settings for the connection:

Now, hit the "Login" button, and you'll get prompted for your name:

After you enter that, here's what you should see:

From there, you can get started with your first GLASS/Pharo project!

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posted by James Robertson

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general

Ah, The Phone Company

October 18, 2010 10:48:44.475

One of the things I no longer need is a second phone line - my former employer was paying for a work line and a fax line. i don't really need either one; the fax number just brings up a steady stream of junk, and I rely on my mobile for everything anyway.

Sounds simple, right? Well, there was a voice message from the phone company notifying me that my service had been flipped back to me, and a phone number to call. That's when the awesome started - it's a non working number. The good news is, the message included an 800 number I could call. But the question is, why is the non-working line still in their system?

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Smalltalk 4 U

October 18, 2010 8:51:33.478

As you probably noticed this morning, I pushed out a new screencast series - I intend to cover various Smalltalk dialects the way I was covering Cincom Smalltalk. The links you'll want to keep track of:

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posted by James Robertson

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st4u

Smalltalk 4 You 1: How to Install Squeak

October 18, 2010 6:49:35.513

Today's Smalltalk 4You explains how to get Squeak installed on your system - from "where do I find it" to "how do I install and run it". To watch now, use the viewer below - if you have trouble viewing the embedded video, you can also go to the YouTube video directly

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

Enclosures:
[st4u1-iPhone.m4v ( Size: 12560996 )]

posted by James Robertson

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humor

Sad But True

October 18, 2010 6:02:50.343

posted by James Robertson

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podcastAAC

Independent Misinterpretations 1: Soek Goodies

October 17, 2010 22:19:52.608

Welcome to episode 1 of Independent Misinterpretations - a new Smalltalk and dynamic language oriented podcast with James Robertson and Michael Lucas-Smith.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed - I'll be submitting it to the iTunes store, and will let you know when the podcast is listed there.

This week's podcast is a coversation with Ernest Micklei about his new website, soek.goodies.st. - it's a library of open source code for Smalltalk, allowing you to explore code without having to load it in an image. It's an interesting application, built in Seaside.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

If you like the music we use, please visit Josh Woodward's site. We use the song Troublemaker for our intro/outro music. I'm sure he'd appreciate your support!

If you have feedback, send it to jarober@gmail.com - or visit us on Facebook - you can subscribe in iTunes using this iTunes enabled feed.. If you enjoy the podcast, pass the word - we would love to have more people hear about Smalltalk!

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[im1.m4a ( Size: 20890300 )]

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podcast

Independent Misinterpretations 1: Soek Goodies

October 17, 2010 21:16:55.514

Welcome to episode 1 of Independent Misinterpretations - a new Smalltalk and dynamic language oriented podcast with James Robertson and Michael Lucas-Smith.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed - I'll be submitting it to the iTunes store, and will let you know when the podcast is listed there.

This week's podcast is a coversation with Ernest Micklei about his new website, soek.goodies.st. - it's a library of open source code for Smalltalk, allowing you to explore code without having to load it in an image. It's an interesting application, built in Seaside.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

If you like the music we use, please visit Josh Woodward's site. We use the song Troublemaker for our intro/outro music. I'm sure he'd appreciate your support!

If you have feedback, send it to jarober@gmail.com - or visit us on Facebook - you can subscribe in iTunes using this iTunes enabled feed.. If you enjoy the podcast, pass the word - we would love to have more people hear about Smalltalk!

Vote for the podcast on Podcast Alley:

My Podcast Alley feed! {pca-902515a0bc7a7814a2721c389a7a8b7f}

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[im1.mp3 ( Size: 14987358 )]

posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Online CMS in Seaside

October 17, 2010 15:07:09.761

Reza Razavi' on-line programmable CMS implemented in Seaside is now online. he announced it on the Seaside mailing list:

It is implemented by a home-made software platform that reuses and extends Seaside and Pier CMS.

You can get more details with his post on the topic. Hat tip Torsten.

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posted by James Robertson

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general

Still Life

October 17, 2010 14:38:07.992

Not the best photo in the world, but it was the only way - had I opened the door, the squirrel would have bugged out:

posted by James Robertson

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general

New Endeavors

October 17, 2010 11:10:27.817

While I look for work, I'll be busy with a few new things. The podcast and screencast series I was doing at Cincom are done; if you subscribe to those feeds, there won't be anything new coming (at least not from me; I can't speak to what Cincom may do with those properties).

However, I'll be continuing forward with Michael Lucas-Smith on a podcast - episode one of "Independent Misinterpretations" will be starting up later today. I've also created an index page for the ESUG 2010 videos; they will continue to be posted to the Vimeo site. Here are the links - the first two won't work until I get that first episode posted :):

On Monday, I'll be launching a new screencast series as well - you'll want to check back here for details then. I plan to continue posting the ESUG videos as well, but I don't think I want to pay to host them. Instead, I'll continue to push them up to Vimeo - follow the last link above for the index page for that

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games

Looking Forward to Fallout New Vegas

October 16, 2010 14:01:55.591

James and Michael on Games The list of perks for Fallout: New Vegas is out. Looks cool! This game looks like it will be a whole lot of fun.

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posted by James Robertson

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general

Getting Ready for Halloween

October 16, 2010 13:34:02.794

Life does go on - we are having a Halloween party soon, so it's time to get the decorations up. First one: Halloween Town:

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Taking a Look at GLASS

October 16, 2010 9:10:39.639

I just downloaded the Gemstone installer I found here - while it seems pretty basic on first inspection (it's a shell script), it worked right out of the box for me. I'm grabbing the associated Pharo image (same place)as I write this, and I'll see how things go from there.

One thing I'm interested in doing is something I know how to do - a blog server - in Seaside using Gemstone as my back end. It should be a nice little project to start off with both GLASS and Pharo with - I clearly know the domain :)

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posted by James Robertson

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podcasting

Old Podcast Closed Out, New One Begins

October 15, 2010 23:35:25.703

Since I'm no longer at Cincom, the "Industry Misinterpretations" podcast is at an end. There will be a podcast continuing on - hosted here, under the not terribly inventive name "Independent Misinterpretations".

The archives for the old work are still on the Cincom website; for your convenience, I have links to them on the archive page that's waiting for episode one here. Point your browsers and podcatchers this way on Sunday for episode 1!

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posted by James Robertson

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law

Patent Trolls Gone Wild

October 15, 2010 17:22:00.204

Amazing - there's a patent troll that somehow managed to get a patent on - get this - rollover menus. Arstechnica is as unimpressed as I am:

Hello? Pardon our dropping jaws, but is Webvention suggesting that it owns rollover online pictures with embedded hyperlinks?

Every time I see stuff like this, it makes me think that patents themselves are no longer useful...

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posted by James Robertson

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jobs

Need a Smalltalker? I'm Looking

October 15, 2010 10:03:53.225

As of this morning, I'm no longer working for Cincom - I'm not going to go into the reasons for that here. However, that does mean that I'm looking for work - if anyone needs a Smalltalker, I'm pretty familiar with VisualWorks and ObjectStudio (and could pick up any other dialect pretty quickly).

You can contact me via jarober@gmail.com - I'm open to either fulltime work or contract work. I think "Smalltalk Daily" will be on hiatus for now; the podcast is ended as well, but there's new work media work I'm doing in that area:

Wish me luck!

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smalltalkDaily

Smalltalk Daily 10/15/10: Convenient Dialog Methods

October 15, 2010 7:44:02.543

Today's Smalltalk Daily looks at some of the other (non file/directory) convenience methods in class Dialog. If you can't see the embedded video directly, you can go directly to YouTube for it. To watch now, click on the viewer below:

You can follow the Smalltalk channel on YouTube for all the "Smalltalk Daily" videos. You can also check out the videos on Vimeo, where the quality is higher, or over on Facebook, if you are a member.

You can download the video directly here. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here. If you like this kind of video, why not subscribe to "Smalltalk Daily"?

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posted by James Robertson

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humor

Nerd Dreams

October 15, 2010 6:24:00.000

If you have this sort of dream, well..... :)

posted by James Robertson

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gamecast

James and Michael on Games - Fallout 3 and DAO

October 14, 2010 18:49:45.502

James and Michael on Games

Michael Lucas-Smith and I are fans of a number of video games - we both like Fallout 3 quite a bit, for instance. Since we end up talking about the games we play so much, we thought it might be fun to do a podcast on the subject - so here it is, episode 1 of "James and Michael on Games". We aren't sure what kind of schedule we'll be keeping to yet, but we plan to release regularly.

We're looking forward to Fallout: New Vegas enough that we might do a more frequent update on our impressions of the game. If that happens, it'll come out under a separate podcast feed. In this podcast, we talk about Fallout 3 and Dragon Age: Origins - the plot, game play, things we liked, things we didn't like. We have a lot more to talk about - there are plenty of other games we like!

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the Ogg Vorbis edition. You can subscribe to the MP3 edition in iTunes using this feed. I'll be submitting the feed to Apple's iTunes store for a listing there, but in the meantime, just go ahead and subscribe manually.

If you have feedback, send it to James Robertson.

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[gamecast1.mp3 ( Size: 8426836 )]

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smalltalk

Open Source Smalltalk Code for Book

October 14, 2010 18:25:25.092

Didier Bisset has released the code (the examples given) for his book, "Object Oriented Implementaton of Numerical Methods", under the MIT license.

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posted by James Robertson

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games

Talking About Games

October 14, 2010 17:35:08.000

Michael and I play many of the same video games, and we have spent a fair amount of time talking about them - so what the heck, we figured we'd take our bull sessions and make them into a podcast. Later this evening I'll be releasing episode 1 of "James and Michael on Games" - it'll be a periodic podcast, audio-only. I'll have details about the home page for the archives after I get the first episode posted :)

posted by James Robertson

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esug2010

Cincom Smalltalk Product Roadmap

October 14, 2010 14:13:05.554

Here's a video from ESUG 2010, which was held in Barcelona, Spain, the week of September 13, 2010. In this presentation, Cincom's Arden Thomas talks about the product roadmap going forward. You can watch using the embedded player below, or follow the download links at the bottom of the post.

Cincom Smalltalk Produce Roadmap from James Robertson on Vimeo.

You can follow the ESUG channel on Vimeo for all the videos from the conference.

You can download the video directly here. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here. If you like this kind of video, why not subscribe to "Smalltalk Videos"? If you would rather subscribe specifically to the ESUG videos, then use this Vimeo feed - which will work in iTunes.

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posted by James Robertson

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gadgets

Baby Steps with Verizon

October 14, 2010 9:48:23.779

Interesting - Apple has done a distribution deal for the WiFi only version of the iPad with Verizon - a bundle with Verizon's MiFi device:

Verizon Wireless and Apple® today announced that iPad™ will be available at over 2,000 Verizon Wireless Stores nationwide beginning Thursday, October 28. Verizon Wireless will offer three bundles, all featuring an iPad Wi-Fi model and a Verizon MiFi 2200 Intelligent Mobile Hotspot, for a suggested retail price of $629.99 for iPad Wi-Fi 16GB + MiFi, $729.99 for iPad Wi-Fi 32GB + MiFi and $829.99 for iPad Wi-Fi 64GB + MiFi. Verizon Wireless is offering a monthly access plan to iPad customers of up to 1GB of data for just $20 a month. In addition, Verizon Wireless will also offer all three iPad Wi-Fi models on a stand-alone basis.

So Apple and Verizon are working together on a limited basis at least. The question is, do all the Apple/Verizon rumors point back to this deal, or is there something real coming with the iPhone? I'm still skeptical based on the whole branding and CDMA thing, but we'll see.

Update: Apple is also getting iPads to AT&T, under what can only be described as more consumer friendly terms:

AT&T* and Apple® today announced that all three iPad™ Wi-Fi + 3G models will be available at more than 2,200 AT&T stores starting Thursday, October 28. AT&T will offer customers 3G Apple iPad Data Plans, complete with Apple's easy, on-device activation and management. All iPad data plans are available without a term contract and include unlimited access to AT&T's 23,000+ domestic Wi-Fi Hot Spots.

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posted by James Robertson

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Smalltalk Daily 10/14/10: Using File Dialogs

October 14, 2010 6:39:06.233

Today's Smalltalk Daily looks at File and Directory dialogs in VisualWorks - both native and non-native. If you can't see the embedded video directly, you can go directly to YouTube for it. To watch now, click on the viewer below:

You can follow the Smalltalk channel on YouTube for all the "Smalltalk Daily" videos. You can also check out the videos on Vimeo, where the quality is higher, or over on Facebook, if you are a member.

You can download the video directly here. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here. If you like this kind of video, why not subscribe to "Smalltalk Daily"?

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Smalltalk on the iPhone

October 14, 2010 5:46:22.000

John McIntosh's Wiki Server and WikiServer Pro are free (for a limited time, apparently) for the iPhone and iPad. These are Smalltalk (Squeak) apps running on IOS.

I helped beta test the Wiki Server app, and it's pretty cool.

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posted by James Robertson

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itNews

Price Comparison Gets Smarter

October 13, 2010 19:13:00.000

Your local retailers are just going to love this - the Amazon mobile app now does barcode scanning:

So when you aren't sure whether you're getting a bargain or not - now you can ask your phone. Pretty cool.

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Pier Import and Export

October 13, 2010 17:53:11.000

John McKeon has put together a SIXX based Pier facility to import and export entire Pier based sites. Follow the link for access to the code - it should be showing up in the PIer Monticello repository shortly. It addresses a known issue in Pier, apparently.

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posted by James Robertson

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gadgets

Google Voice to the iPhone

October 13, 2010 15:58:29.000

Apple must be feeling that Android heat - they have been opening things up a bit for app developers, and now it looks like Google Voice is cleared. TechCrunch reports:

we’ve gotten word that the official Google Voice application is on its way to the iPhone in the next few weeks. In fact, we’ve heard from a source close to Google that it’s already been approved — Google just needs to revamp the application to work with the iPhone 4 and iOS’s multitasking capabilities.

I bailed on Google voice because it didn't really work with the iPhone; I'll have to take another look if this pans out.

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posted by James Robertson

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law

Feeding the Troll

October 13, 2010 11:36:25.000

How dumb is the US PTO? Dumb enough that they issued a patent troll company, Sharing Sound, a patent on "web distribution of music" in 2001.

Yeah, as if there wasn't any prior art. It's gotten to the point that patents are actively harmful; I'm not sure that even having them is useful any longer. Especially when trolls can set their settlement fees lower than the cost of litigation, and get away with free money leeched from the system. Follow the link for more details; here's a great summation though:

As Winston & Strawn attorneys Gene Schaerr and Jacob Loshin argued rather convincingly in a September 22 Washington Legal Foundation Web Seminar, the risk-benefit analysis on litigating vs. settling more often comes out on the side of fighting patent trolls. This should especially hold true in situations where a patent is as glaringly weak as the Sharing Sound patent.

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social media

Features Versus Practice

October 13, 2010 8:31:07.000

This should be interesting - Twitter is going to introduce an "Event" feature - something you would use instead of the ubiquitous hashtag. The hashtag has gone into general use though; I wonder how much adoption of this there's going to be? Not from a "we don't need it" standpoint so much as from a sheer inertia of common practice standpoint. Anyway:

"I think we're finally going to have the Events feature," Stone said, in a brief interview. "It's something we've been talking about forever... and now that Ev's back on products, I think that's something that's going to be coming up soon.

IMHO, they'll have to make it pretty darn useful in order to override the very, very easy (and extremely widespread) hashtag usage.

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Smalltalk Daily 10/13/10: Announcements

October 13, 2010 6:38:57.477

Today's Smalltalk Daily looks at the Announcement framework - the replacement for both trigger events and change/update. To follow along with the code, download it here (zip archive of the parcel). If you can't see the embedded video directly, you can go directly to YouTube for it. To watch now, click on the viewer below:

You can follow the Smalltalk channel on YouTube for all the "Smalltalk Daily" videos. You can also check out the videos on Vimeo, where the quality is higher, or over on Facebook, if you are a member.

You can download the video directly here. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here. If you like this kind of video, why not subscribe to "Smalltalk Daily"?

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

JQuery and Seaside

October 12, 2010 17:26:34.904

The jQuery section of the online Seaside book has been updated - here's the summary for that section:

jQuery and jQuery UI are both well integrated into Seaside 3.0. This allows you to access all aspects of the library from Smalltalk by writing Smalltalk code only. The Smalltalk side of the integration is automatically built from the excellent jQuery documentation, so you can be sure that the integration is up-to-date and feature-complete.

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posted by James Robertson

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itNews

Oracle and IBM Shoot at Android

October 12, 2010 12:07:09.502

Looks to me like Google will have to do a lot more of the heavy lifting on the underlying Andrloid platform - it's based on Harmony, something that IBM had been supporting until now. InfoWorld reports:

The core of the IBM-Oracle deal is that those employees will now switch their attention to OpenJDK, Oracle's in-house open source Java implementation. The move completely sucks the wind out of Harmony's sails, with Tim Ellison, one of Harmony's senior developers, essentially conceding the project will probably fold in short order.

At the very least, Google will have to start throwing resources at the project - resources that they have been putting elsewhere. The Google/Oracle lawsuit will drag on for eons before anything happens - this, on the other hand, will have a pretty immediate impact.

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posted by James Robertson

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Smalltalk Daily 10/12/10: Basic File I/O

October 12, 2010 8:42:36.991

Today's Smalltalk Daily looks at some file and stream i/o basics. If you can't see the embedded video directly, you can go directly to YouTube for it. To watch now, click on the viewer below:

You can follow the Smalltalk channel on YouTube for all the "Smalltalk Daily" videos. You can also check out the videos on Vimeo, where the quality is higher, or over on Facebook, if you are a member.

You can download the video directly here. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here. If you like this kind of video, why not subscribe to "Smalltalk Daily"?

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posted by James Robertson

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gadgets

Standards or Chaos?

October 12, 2010 6:23:00.678

We're about to get a real world test of two very different approaches to phone OS use - Google's "throw it over the wall approach", and Microsoft's "create a standard" approach:

Each device must feature three standard hardware buttons, for example, and before they can ship with Windows Phone 7, they have to pass a series of tests directed by Microsoft. (As I mentioned in a feature story about Windows Phone 7, Microsoft has created new lab facilities containing robots and automated programs to test each handset to ensure that features work properly and consistently across multiple devices.)

The iPhone has had the consistency thing going for it all along; Microsoft is trying to create something similar across a broad range of hardware vendors. It might help them take the slot Google is in right now, or at least split it with them.

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posted by James Robertson

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