I’m terrible when it comes to design and fashion, or anything even remotely related to them. So when it comes to making changes around those areas, I am a little…uneasy.

I recently made slight changes to the appearance of the blog. This is something I imagine I will do fairly regularly as it evolves, until I’m happy with a particular design ¹. The main change I wanted to try out was a darker background. I’m a big fan of dark themes in software applications. They are easier on the eye, and in my opinion they just look better. For that reason, I wanted to try out a dark background. It may not be to everyones taste but I wanted to see if it holds up after a couple of weeks of use.

I recently came across an article by Matt Gemmell from a few years back entitled “Designing blogs for readers”. In it, he details how the design of his own blog has evolved through the previous decade(!), starting out with a cluttered design full of every possible widget known to man, and eventually working it’s way to a simple design with the reader in mind. He then goes on to document his own set of guidlelines for blog readibility. Of those, I violate:

• Date-based index pages
• A feed button
• Background textures or colours

These are relatively minor things, and I’m not too bothered about them. I like date indices. I’m in the (presumable) minority in the fact that I regularly use date indexes when visiting blogs that have them. The RSS button on my header is hardly neccesary, but again is pretty useful to have available on each page ². As discussed above, I like darker themes, so having a background colour to me is often seen as a good thing.

Matt definitely has some great points in his post, but it’s ok to put your own stamp on what is essentially your website.

There is still plenty of things that I would like to try out on the site, such as footers, linked lists, recent posts, a logo, more experimentation with blogging engines and publishing with Apple News. That’s more than enough to keep me busy. I may end up linking this post sometime in the future to show how right or wrong I was, or how lazy I am for not following up.

David Smith:

Four years ago today I introduced a weather app called Check the Weather. I was really proud of how it turned out. It was my first app where I was able to do everything ‘right’ from the beginning. It was localized, had solid VoiceOver support and had an actual marketing plan to get it off the ground.

Sadly, however, the time has come to discontinue support for the app. The cost of providing weather data to it has grown too large to sustain. It has been operating at a slight loss for the last 2 years, which I didn’t mind providing as I used the app myself. However, a recent change in the pricing for my radar data provider has made it infeasible to continue providing weather data for the app.

Check the Weather has been my go to weather app for the past few years. It’s a shame to see it go.

Stephen Hackett:

I understand Apple wanting to make sure that Siri’s core functionality of controlling your iOS device keeps getting better. That stuff should be bulletproof, but we’re five years into Siri’s life. The company should be moving past these features and making Siri smarter about the world around us.

I’ve long since given up on using Siri for anything more than questions like “When are Manchester United playing next?” or “What will the weather be like today?”. I don’t find it very useful for anything more than that. Siri has a long way to go to get close to the Amazon Echo or Google Assistant. Five years into its life, it still lacks the ability to understand some reasonably simple tasks:

@bzamayo ☺️ pic.twitter.com/lKTmDQC6eB

— Colm Mulhall (@ColmMulhall) April 18, 2016

I enjoyed this review of the iPhone 7 on MacStories, particluarly the section on the W1 chip. The iPhone 7 has brought about changes that we may not be in a perfect position to take advantage of just yet, but in the near future will become the norm. Federico Viticci hit the nail on the head with his closing paragraph:

But using the iPhone 7 also made me appreciate the meaning of changes that will reshape the iPhone platform going forward – something that’s more significant than endlessly debating what we left behind.

The iPhone 7 is a bold step towards a future we can start understanding today.

Stephen Hackett:

Now that the iPhone 7 starts at 32 GB of storage, the constant juggling needed to avoid a full device has been left behind by more users than ever before.

So let’s talk about iCloud storage.

5 GB often isn’t enough to back up an iPhone and an iPad, let alone store years worth of family photos.

With the latest announcement from Google about unlimited storage for photos, the spotlight has shifted towards Apple, and it’s very stingy 5 GB free iCloud storage. Much like the 16 GB issue that has only recently been resolved ¹, this needs to be looked at sooner rather than later.

An average user can hit the 5 GB limit very quickly if they actively take photos. This becomes a bigger problem if they have multiple devices. For photos alone even 10 GB may not be enough for a lot of users. Photos are irreplaceable. So many people must have lost memories because of this storage issue.

I like what Google have done here. They recognise the importance of photos, and historically have been generous with cloud storage sizes. If Apple is serious about catching up with Google on cloud services, storage size is an obvious candidate for change. Let’s hope so.

I listen to podcasts a lot, particularly while driving or walking to/from work. I don’t have a wide enough taste in music to always have something new to to listen to during these times, and I can’t rely on radio to have the shows I want when I want. Podcasts work best for me.

Here are some podcasts I listen to regulary. Most are weekly, others are more sporadic.

Accidental Tech Podcast

The show is described as “Three nerds discussing tech, Apple, programming, and loosely related matters.” - and I think that tells you all you need to know about it. Add to that John Siracusa’s typically razer sharp critique style and you got a good mix of entertainment and information.

Connected

This is fairly similar to ATP, except the views are light on the technical and more on the user side of things. Worth the listen alone for Federico Viticcis (of MacStories) insights into iOS. Find it on Relay.

Causality

John Chidgey analyzes what went right and what went wrong during disasters. He breaks them down in an easy to follow format and comes up with his report card based on his own experience as an engineer. Causality is part of the Engineered network.

Monkey Tennis

One for the Partridge fans. Four fans of Alan Partridge go through each episode of I’m Alan Partridge, providing interesting facts and a lot of quotes. Find it here.

Dubland

Suzanne Kane and PJ Gallagher provide nearly an hour of entertainment regarding the goings on in Ireland for the previous week. They pick their heros of the week and tell us some strange animal facts. Hosted on SoundCloud.

Pod-a-rooney

Comedian Joe Rooney ¹ interviews people in the entertainment industry about how they got to where they are. Always an interesting listen with plenty of laughs along the way. It’s on Castaway Media.

Back of the net!

When Apple brought out support for third party keyboards in iOS 8, I tried out several of them, such as Swype and SwiftKey. None of these came close to the ever-reliable stock iOS keyboard. So when Google announced their new iOS keyboard ‘Gboard’, I didn’t have high hopes. Not for the first time however, Google have answered the call and surprised me with their take on how a keyboard should work.

The stock iOS keyboard

For the most part I like the stock keyboard on iOS. It provides fast, accurate typing and I’m a big fan of QuickType. One big problem with this keyboard is when you want to use emoji.

Often I find myself wanting to use a certain emoji, but not being exactly sure which section to find it under. Unless it is recently used, which automatically places it in the first tray of the emojis, you have to manually search through the various categories to find it. ¹

There are plenty of examples where developers have recognised this issue and developed their own solutions to finding emoji, but I didn’t want another keyboard to have to switch between with the sole purpose of finding emoji.

Gboard - A modern keyboard

Gboard is just as functional as a normal keyboard, but adds some really cool features on top of it. It has its own version of QuickType, offering suggestions based on what you are writing as you go. Google is good at this sort of thing so it’s no surprise that it works flawlessly. Gboard also supports glide typing, similar to Swype and SwiftKey. Again, it works flawlessly.

My favourite thing about Gboard is how easy it makes finding emoji. Just tap on the emoji button and type what you are looking for in the search box. It’s ridiculously easy, and surely only a matter of time before Apple implement their own version.

Gboard wouldn’t be a Google application without some form of Google search implemented. Clicking on the Google icon brings up a search, where you can quickly find links, images and gifs. This solves a problem I didn’t know I had. It’s now simple to send media without having to leave the application you are using.

I tried Gboard after hearing about it in passing on a podcast ² and it has surpassed any expectations I had of it. They have succeeded where Apple have failed in making the best keyboard for iOS. Maybe I should lose the skepticism around Google..

Stephen Hackett on the possibility of a cellular Apple Watch:

Assuming it doesn’t cost me another $30/month for service, I’d be very interested in having my Watch be able to talk to a cellular network when I go out for a ride. Until then, my iPhone will be tucked in my back pocket.

I’ve talked here before about how, in it’s current state, I wouldn’t find the Watch useful. If cellular data was to be added it it would make the Watch a lot more appealing to me. The idea of being able to go to go outside without having my phone would be a good enough reason in itself to buy one.

If rumors are to be believed, the next iPhone will ditch the 3.5mm headphone jack. I have mixed feeling about that. While I understand (and agree with) the need to have less cables in our lives, this will be the single most disruptive change to the iPhone since it’s arrival. There’s no doubt that a lot more smartphones and devices will follow suit once Apple decide to remove it.

The 3.5mm jack has been around for a long time ¹. Almost every piece of technology that I own uses it, including my car! How Apple approaches this is important.

Presumably they will have some sort of adapter for the lightning port to allow 3.5mm jacks to be used. This should be included in the box with new phones, although that seems unlikely based on Apples track record in making a lot of money on overpriced accessories.

Another question is what kind of headphones will be included with the new phones. Earpods are unlikely to be discontinued for some time, but they won’t work with the new iPhone if the jack is removed. Will Apple include bluetooth Earpods? Again, seems unlikely. But it would be bad for Apple to not include any earphones. That would be the first time they wouldn’t be included in the box since the original phone.

Bluetooth earphones/headphones have their own issues. They are generally more flimsy, more expensive and have to be charged or run on batteries. Who wants another battery to have to worry about? Is that not just creating a new problem that removing the jack was solving?

There doesn’t seem to be a way to make this transition pain free, but lets hope it is at least handled well. Best case scenario in my opinion? - include the adapter for free and let us make the transition at our own pace.