I really don’t need a Shuffle.

I don’t need one and I don’t think I’d use one because I always have my phone with me. I use spotify and rarely store music anymore… so why am I looking at the new Shuffle designs.

Found this pretty funny, Apps and Hats was mentioned this weekend in the Guardian guide as one of their Internet Picks of the Week, and the description which included “no discernible reason”, was a total highlight of my weekend. That is the most perfect description I could have ever hoped for and it’s exactly what we wanted with the show.

It’s a pity it was the same weekend I announced that I will be taking a break from it to concentrate on other things, but it still made me happy to see some recognition for our hard work. Thanks to all the amazing Apps and Hats team!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/sep/04/internet-picks-of-the-week

(If you have the guide in print we are page 32)

You can still check out all the past episodes of apps and hats, but we are currently taking a break.

http://www.youtube.com/user/tippexperience

After loving what Old Spice have done, this new ad campaign from Tipp-Ex is one that gets people talking. Have a look & enjoy!

Link

The purpose of using a notification is to do exactly that, send a notification that some information / data, has changed. In other words, notifications let you distribute information to objects. How this works is it will make the change and tell the notification the change has occurred, then when the data is needed it sends out the new information. Note: This is a new feature Apple added to the 4.0 software, so if your app targets lower than that, you will need to add script to tell you app to check which version they are using and to disable the code if it is below 4.0.

First start by creating a notification file (your .h file). File > New File > Mac OS X > C & C++ > Header File.

NotificationNames.h is a sample filename you could use to remind you that this is where the names of our notifications will be held. In this example I am going to use just one.

In this file all we write at the top is :

#define AllowanceDataWasChanged @"AllowanceDataWasChanged"

Now I go to my .m file where this data is being written, so the data I want access to. At the top of that file (or any file where I will do the same, I put:

#import "NotificationNames.h"

This means we will be able to access that files information. Now in this .m file, where the data save is occuring, I put the following code, which will alert our notification that a change is taking place. In my file I was calling:

-(void)saveClick:(id)sender{

// saved stuff goes here

}

So I added this code to the end of it:

[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] postNotificationName: AllowanceDataWasChanged object:nil];

Now we need to go to the file where the information is being read, and where we need it to be read as data changes… Again at the begining of that .m file you need to add:

#import "NotificationNames.h"

Because I would like this data to be updated (it was a users name) as soon as there is a change in the name, I added this method to recognise / pick up the change sent to the notification:

-(void) updateViewData {

NSArray* array = [PListHelper getDataFromFile: kFilename];

if (array) {

nameLabel.text = [array objectAtIndex:0];

}

NSLog(@"calling update View"); // I added the log to see if it was being called.

}

Then we need to decide where we can / want to call that by using another method to see if there was a change:

-(void) allowanceDataWasChanged:(NSNotification*) notification {

[self updateViewData]; // method call that we wrote earlier

}

So there we are saying, if there is a change, load my updateViewData. Which – will load in those new / changed values. I also stuck this method call:

[self updateViewData];

In my

- (void)viewDidLoad {

}

method because we would like the new data to load if the view is loaded. Once you have the hang of that you can really add it into your code where you need to notify of data change.

Finally in your

-(void)viewDidLoad {

}

method you need to add the information that checks the notification, and if any changes were made:

[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] removeObserver:self];

// register for notification by adding an observer

[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self

selector:@selector(allowanceDataWasChanged:)

name:AllowanceDataWasChanged

object:nil];

It’s an amazingly useful thing to know – thanks to Shaun Austin (@irvtheswirv) for talking me through it.

Study of Artist Robert Williams from Christine Morris on Vimeo.

This is a video of the amazing study of artist Robert Williams. As a spur of the moment exercise I wanted to out together a little video using just the iPhone 4. It was filmed and edited with the iMove app.

I was visiting with friends over the weekend and when I had a look at the study I was amazed, mesmerised even. I had to take a photo. Then I remembered – I have an iPhone 4, and aparently it shoots good video. So I took out my phone and thought I’d give it a try.

I took one video over the course of a few seconds and then thought how would I actually upload this somewhere? So I went looking through the apps I had and saw Ustream. I didn’t have an account properly set up and it wasn’t letting me modify my existing one on the fly so I had to wait until we came back.

The iMove interface where you can get started making your masterpiece!

At home I thought that actually it would be a perfect chance to take iMovie for iPhone for a test drive.

I’m not an iMovie fan on the mac only because I use Final Cut Pro and it’s really hard to use an app like iMovie once you’ve had all the features you could dream of, but I appreciate it a good starter piece of software.  I got the iMovie app for the iPhone and it was a bit confusing initially, so it’s a good idea to just play around with it. After a 30 minute or so play with the features and how it works, you really can get on and make a mini movie.

Choosing Video to import into iMovie.

I made the clip with a few titles and transitions, used the music provided in the app (they have a news theme a happy theme and so on…) in order that it is completely made solely with the iPhone. I then decided to upload it as it was…

Once I had sorted UStream, I logged into the app and went thorough the process to upload a video. It was easy to use and straight forward so it only took a minute or so. When I had a look though, UStream really compressed it a lot. The whole point of this video was to showcase a bit of the amazing quality the phone is capable of, and at that quality it was no where near impressive.

Importing Clips, Images or Music into iMovie.

I had to delete that video and think of another way. I thought YouTube would be a better option. You only need to click on your exported movie in Photos and then there is an option to upload to YouTube. Again it was really quick and easy to do, you can enter in Tags, description, titles etc, but that too had poor quality once it was up. (Note: There is an upload to MobileMe option which I haven’t tried but that might keep better quality.)

Export Options within iMove

I decided to attach the phone to the mac and just import it into iPhoto and access it as a movie file. That way I could just log into YouTube on the computer and access it that way – at the quality that I wanted. You can export your movie within the iMovie app at 360p, 540p or HD 720p and HD was what I chose.

Although in the end I had to copy across the film and then upload it from my computer, it was only because I really was after that HD quality to illustrate how good this little device is. If you are just shooting and uploading then you could try something like Youtube from the phone, TwitVide, Posterous, etc… and if folks are only watching it on their mobile devices they won’t notice the quality too much.

This really is an amazing feat, not only did I manage to shoot and edit on a single device, but it was actually fun and pretty straight forward!

Ok, I will admit, this is a rant.

I have had people on occasion – in conversation to me, spurt the phrase “I won’t support Apple because of their closed system.”

Typically, I bite my tongue and reply politely that well, that is your choice etc etc… and leave it at that. I am sick of spending my time trying to help them see reason, because I think basically they don’t want to see reason and no matter how many arguements, or examples I show them they don’t want to support Apple because they are no longer the underdog.

As I see it, everything we do in our lives is abided by completely through a closed system, so you really need a new argument.

Admit you don’t like them because they are doing well, or that you don’t like how amazingly designed their products are, or that you prefer to buy a cheaply built, component compromised machine with thousands of viruses available to you. That’s fine I can respect that it is a matter of choice but stop saying it is a closed system…

Think about the following:

Do you use Microsoft products? Write Programs for the platform? Do you use .Net or VB that you have had to pay for? Interesting, can anyone write anything for Microsoft? Of course not, you have to learn .NET or VB, you have to purchase their products to design for their system.

Do you use XBox? PS3? Have you ever made a game for those platforms? You have to use what they provide, and it has to be of a certain basic standard to be on their platforms. It isn’t an “opened system” and thank goodness, it means there is some sort of standard there and that the games I buy will work.

Do you shop at a supermarket for food? Do you actually know how many varieties of apples there actually are? well, there are over 2,000 varieties of apples in the UK alone. Supermarkets have decided that the UK consumer is only interested in a very few varieties – varieties that coincidentally are tough enough to travel long distances to supermarket shelves. That system doesn’t sound very opened to me.

Do you take a course at your local college? What evening classes are on offer? What funding was made availalible and who decided what you wanted to learn?

Have you even gone to a restaurant and booked a table? Been to one that required a black tie for admission? Hmm that’s not terribly a terribly opened system eithor – I can’t hear anyone complaining about it.

Do you drive? Do you have to pay road tax for the right?

Our lives are fuelled by rules and regulations, by all of these closed systems, even the argument of designing for Android and that being an opened system, you are forgetting that you STILL have to know how to program and actually make the apps, so it is a closed system too.

That’s all – closed for comments~

I am writing this post for & to coincide with the JCI annual business lecture, which I have kindly been asked to be on the panel for. A bit about the event from their site:

This year’s Business Lecture is titled ‘Making Sense of a Social Networking World’. Your host and compere for the evening will be Steve Parks, an ex-BBC radio journalist, professional speaker, author and entrepreneur.

The guest speakers will include:

Patrick Crane: Vice President Marketing at LinkedIn (via video link-up from Silicon Valley)
Will Kintish: Leading networking and LinkedIn training authority
Christine Morris: Founder of Apps & Hats and Digital Communications lecturer
Consultant from v social: Leeds-based social media consultancy

SMARTPHONES CHANGING BUSINESS

My focus is on apps and how the smartphone is changing business. Although it is changing business, it is things like social media that has helped make that change. Let’s have a look at how this shift happened and where it may be headed.

We know the iPhone launch 3 years ago (05/07) and the app store launched a bit after that. In 9 months 1Billion apps were downloaded.

Where are we now – as of 25th May there are now 204,304 apps on the App Store. We are up to 4 billion downloads and 85 million iPhone / iPod touch users. It’s also worth noting 200K iPads are sold a week, more on this later.

I find these figures amazing, but it didn’t happen overnight – almost, so how did we get to where we are now, what has driven these sales and usage, why do we see this as such a different platform, and can this growth be sustained?

COMPUTING CYCLE

We are currently in a new computing cycle, connecting to the Internet from smaller mobile devices.

We go from mainframes to desktops, to internet Desktops, to mobile internet. The devices get smaller and smaller, we have more and more choice, no longer are we presented with a beige box and that is our option. There are numerous features in mobile devices and most are more powerful than our desktops of 4 years ago. (IBM mainframe shown right)

They also cost less and less for their incredible capabilities.

It is estimated based on current figures and trends that as early as 2015 there will be a shift from current internet desktops to using smartphones to connect to the internet. A dominance of using these devices for our everyday, ubiquitous internet usage, our email checking, our shopping, our document reading and of course our social networking.

How can we predict this? What changes have occurred?

UPTAKE

We know mobile technology uptake has been a lot faster than that of desktop computers. If we look at the graph below from Morgan Stanley [April 2010] we see 20 quarters depicted, and we are shown in a 20 quarter time frame the growth of Desktop Internet with Netscape (launched 12/94), Desktop Internet with AOL (launched 9/94) and NTT docomo (global Japanese mobile operator).

Looking at the figures we see that by the same timeframe, 11 quarters, mobile internet as launched on iPhone | iPod Touch (launched 06/07) has reached roughly 85 million subscribers, versus by the same time comparison, 11 quarters, 31 million for NTT, 18 Million for desktop Internet with Netscape and 8 million for AOL. By my thinking even if we added the two figures together for desktop internet with both Netscape and AOL, it would still only be 26 million, to the 85 million we are seeing by the same timeframe.

The uptake on mobile Internet is epidemic in comparison.

The mobile device (iPhone) is being credited with being the spark for this mobile liftoff, and being an Apple hater or not won’t make any difference to these figures and what they have done for the industry. It is compared to the equally impressive launch of Window’s 3.0 which sparked desktop PCs in 1990, and Netscape browser sparking desktop Internet in 1995.

SOCIAL SURGE

We need to look at other contributing factors, because we know people are not just checking their email on these devices. So what has happened to help the surge of usage and purchase of these devices?

Looking at this prediction based on past trends and usage, we can see that the cross over from desktop internet users to mobile use is estimated to happen by 2015. The overall number of internet users continues to grow but the way the data is accessed is changing. We are using our devices more and more to do tasks that we traditionally have been doing on the desktop. (Just a note here to say that the iPad may change these figures more dramatically and quicker as we are already seeing a surge in the numbers reported from the ads on websites that detail where the hits are coming from.)

So what are the things people are doing on their smart phones?

I’m sure it’s no surprise to hear that social networking has overtaken email usage. Back in 2007 Facebook, Twitter and MySpace were starting to make their presence felt and by 2009 there were more users on social networks then users of email.

Also interestingly video accounts currently for 69% of mobile data traffic. Are you using social media and or video with your business, are you one of the people who use social media now more regularly than email? Are you producing any video content for your mobile audience?

Current dominance is Apple and Android platforms and there is a decline of Windows Mobile, RIM and Palm. So there may also need to be decisions made as a company regarding what platform you will aim to cater for initially and which as your second supported platform.

Interestingly we saw touch based devices before but the iPhone / iPod Touch is touch focused that is a huge departure. There is no stylus you are using your finger in a gesture based system and so apps, sites, programs… need to be designed and thought about differently. (Palm’s Pre was the first iPhone rival to include multi-touch.)

THE CLOUD

This is becoming a bit of a buzz word but actually, it will play an important part of our future computing. We are already using the cloud even if we aren’t aware of it. Users are expecting to have access to their things, their music, their files, their applications even, all to hand and all immediately accessible. When we log into our computers, we wait, and we watch for when the browser can be launched, where is our browser so we can check email, look at our Facebook, see who’s following on Twitter… all waiting for the internet to be ready for us. However, with our mobiles, we literally click a button and our mail is waiting for us, we expect immediacy.

From this same study we see that if Skype were a telecommunications carrier, it would be the largest carrier in the world, with 521 million registered users. That is a lot of people using the service for so many different reasons and equally so many different ways. Whereas initially many of these services when introduced were not trusted and people were worried about using them, we can see how it is quickly becoming mainstream.

BUSINESS AND SMARTPHONES, and sex?

In a survey from RingCentral they declared that smartphones tied with sex as the number one thing that business professionals can not live without. In a survey among RingCentral’s small to medium-sized business customers in the U.S., the importance of the smartphone in daily and business life was reiterated over and over again.

This study, (a survey of nearly 400 customers), showed that smartphones are taking on the defacto role in business communication.

Here are some highlights:

• Smartphones and intimate relationships tied at 40% for the number one thing respondents can’t live without.
• 79% of respondents use their smartphones to conduct most business calls, versus an office phone or home phone.
• 34% use a smartphone more than a computer for business. 7% even said they don’t take their laptops with them when they travel for business if they have a smartphone.

All it is really illustrating is that with platforms like Android and the iPhone, you can do a lot of work from your mobile device. It will be interesting to see how tablet devices like the iPad will be used for business and how those devices will be classified.

THE SHIFT

There was a time when people started to realize that you needed a website to exist. People would talk to you about your job and would always ask “do you have a website”, it seemed you didn’t exist if you weren’t on the web. Billions of webpages later, and yes we almost all have a website in some shape or form, heck a huge amount of people have a personal one, a professional one, a club one, a hobby one etc etc. Now we are starting to see the appearance of apps, becing the new norm. There’s an app for that which really has become a joke but actually, there most likely is an app for that, or one in development I’m sure!

I would add though that if you do have an app – do not have a bad poorly designed app. That seems more damaging to the business then is necessary. I recently came across an app for the estate agents ReMax and they had paid some company to essentially build “cookie cutter” apps for them. This means they had the exact same app, per location, and all of them were substandard. The wait for the app to load and get through all the ads was unacceptable, and it basically means I delete the app, and go pick up RightMove instead. So not only are they losing out on the slight ad revenue from the app, but I wouldn’t even buy my house from them. A bit extreme I understand but there is no excuse for some of the poorly designed time wasting apps out there.

Apps that have got it right are paypal, evernote, bump to name a few.

Here is an example of a new style of app that is appearing on the App Store – one to hopefully save us all money – these are brilliant! (Uk vouchercloud app)

Also the branded style of apps that offer the user more than just brand information are a great idea. They aim to make things easier for the consumer, and when you do that, then you will get customers because they will always go where things are easier. This Starbucks app is great, it’s all paid and you just get it scanned. Quick easy coffee, I think they are on to a winner here.

Hopefully we can see how these trends are occurring and the potential that we are experiencing this moment in time with technology. It is a real hive of creativity and ingenuity and I hope we continue to see real innovation with the creation of these apps and their uses.

SOURCES

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainframe_computer
http://www.morganstanley.com/institutional/techresearch/pdfs/Internet_Trends_041210.pdf
RingCentral
http://www.businessinsider.com/10-ways-the-iphone-changed-smartphones-forever-2009-6#ixzz0owKtv8LE
http://mashable.com/2010/04/13/ringcentral-survey/
http://www.businessinsider.com/2009/1/apple-palm-multi-touch

One of the Exercises I worked through with the iPhone SDK.

Documenting the process of starting app development seems to be as difficult as the actual app development. I started a new blog, where I would put code snippets I was working on, and had every intention of noting down my findings as they happened, but I found as I was learning I couldn’t stop long enough to write it down. I realise how valuable this process is and I am taking the time to look back on what has happened during these whirlwind few weeks.

Summer 2009

I had started looking at iPhone development summer of 2009. I had the Apress book, ‘Beginning iPhone Development‘, and I started working through the chapters. The trouble was that I really had no context of why and how it was actually working, which meant I wouldn’t be very likely to code my own apps. Anyway, from that point forward work started up again and I had to put it to one side because I could see the dedication it would take.

Some of the notes I took in my notebook while learning the languages.

March 2010

By the time Easter holidays came round I had decided that I wanted to start back getting to learn code. I had been thinking of iPhone development on and off through out the year and the time was right. So this time I planned it all a bit better. I would start off with learning the absolute basics, C during March.

I spent 4 weeks of March working through Apress ‘Learn C on the Mac‘, and an old C book I found from when I had first studied it years back (Teach Yourself C). I made hundreds of pages of notes in the process and worked through exercises from both books. I think some concepts made sense quite quickly from what I had recognised from earlier. I was now able to move on to ‘Learn Objective-C on the Mac’.

While I was reading the coding books I was also spending time reading about User Interface design. As important and essential the code is, no app will sell if it is unusable, or takes no notice of UI principles. along with that I was reading some more generic information about app planning. This was one planning phase I wrote out:

1 – Overall UI. This is the generic layout of the items for the features / functions of your app.

2 – Architecting. (application) This phase you are building all the elements so that they will work and are connected.

3 – User Testing. Testing phase of the app, though I would say that this phase really needs to be done throughout the whole process, continually as you try and check new things.

4 – Graphic Design. Make it slick~

April 2010

I spent an intense 2 weeks of Easter holiday reading and doing the exercises for Obj-C. I made a few of the sample apps as demonstrated, and I tried to modify them and add things to them to stretch what they were showing me.

By this point I was so excited that I was finding it increasingly harder to focus, I wanted to read faster than my eyes would let me because I knew the next step would be working through the first book I initially got – the iPhone Development book… I began sticking notes all over my computer and study of all the little reminders of things to do when developing, and conventions to follow as well as designing / sketching out app ideas.

One thing I hadn’t realised was that sketching out an app isn’t always as representative as I thought it would be. There was an app I had sketched out and when I went to just create a mock up in Interface Builder I realised that several things just wouldn’t be appropriate for touch, or that things could be done far more efficiently through touch. Mapping out the app while constantly questioning the touch factor of it is essential.

An image from Snippets, the code collecting program I have started to use to organise code.

I have also started collecting code snippets that I find useful and that I know I will reuse. I have tried a few applications for mac but I found Snippets (shown above) suited me best.

May 2010

Some frustrating code issues. I was lucky enough to bug coder friend @irvtheswirv about.

By the time May came round, I had tried and experimented with a few chunks of code from the books and from the Internet. This led to me wanting to go through the entire process of app – start to finish. Planing, coding and submitting.

Lil Tweet

The lil tweet app was initially created to just be a quick tweeting app, so I would not even need to look at twitter, I could launch the app and send a tweet really quickly. As I was working on it I wondered what it would be like if everyone was sharing one account, so I changed the app to reflect it no longer it being an app that I tweet from – but an app that everyone can tweet from.

I spent about a week coding and testing the Lil Tweet app, and from that time there was design issues, making the background image in Photoshop to match up where I was going to put the components.

I made the app initially just with the tweet field, and when it was looked at and tried, I was asked how can they then see the tweet they sent, so i spent time working on adding that you can then launch viewing the twitter feed you have just added to.  From there I realised that it would be very difficult to use if you didn’t have a character count down. This was the most difficult aspect of the app. I had so many errors and troubles to figure out how to get it to work. I swapped textFields with texeViews and Labels and back again…. This took up most of the entire time of the app development.

From there I worked on getting everything to Apple standard for submission, the images, screen shots, icons etc all had to be created to a set standard. This was then ready for submission which actually took me an entire day to do. I kept getting the certificates wrong and error messages about the certificates not matching were bugging me all day. Finally by the evening, I deleted all certificates and profiles and proisioning and went for it from the start of the process. This finally worked. *phews* Leaving me Waiting For Review…

Today (May 24 2010), 7 days after submission, the Lil Tweet app was approved and is now for sale.

£0.59

The Future

It has been an amazing journey and I am so glad I stuck with it. Since waiting for review, I started the Apps and Hats app for the show, and that has gone in for submission today. I hope I am as lucky and I get approved as quickly because I would love to launch it with the show on Friday. Just started planning for my first iPad application…

This is the video from the GirlGeek Dinner I spoke at alongside Sarah Hartley in Leeds Nov 2009. I really wanted to try to hopefully get some more people realizing that there shouldn’t be anything holding them back if they want to get video online. I look at how you can do it for free or very little money and that really the only barrier there is is themselves.

It’s funny though, watching a video back of a presentation always looks and sounds different, and I see so many things I would do differently – including the nervous pacing for the first 10 minutes of the video!