jamesthomson

jamesthomson, 4 months ago to random

Reasonably acceptable for 51.

jamesthomson, 11 months ago to random

Adult life mostly consists of exclaiming “christ, that happened ten years ago!” about a variety of different events until you die.

jamesthomson, 10 months ago to random

PCalc for iOS is 15 years old today, which does not seem possible. As the Mac version is just over 30 years old, that also means at some point very very soon, the iOS version will have been around for more than half of PCalc's entire existence.

If you bought it on day one, I hope you have appreciated the one and a half decades of free updates, and I shall direct you to the tip jar 😉

The About screen for PCalc 1.0.2, which is a lot less exciting that today’s.
The settings section, which isn’t actually very different, aside from the retro iOS theme.
The vertical layout for PCalc 1.0 for iOS, with a very different button layout.

jamesthomson, 3 months ago to random

Thursday: Finally gets Vision Pro
Monday: Is diagnosed with early-stage cataracts

Alanis Morissette Reaction GIF by MOODMAN

jamesthomson, 1 year ago to random

I tried the Photoshop beta’s new generative AI stuff, and the first two results it returned for "a hand” do not inspire confidence.

A hand with four fingers.

jamesthomson, 10 months ago to random

Turns out, there’s an account on Instagram that’s cloned mine, is impersonating me, and sending DMs to my followers. They’ve also blocked me, so I can’t report them.

It’s https://instagram.com/stressspanda (note the three S’s in the middle of the name)

Mine is https://instagram.com/stresspanda

If you’re following me on Instagram, could you please report it, and watch out for scam DMs from the bad one.

Must say the timing was amazing for today 🤬

jamesthomson, 3 months ago to random

Well this is fun! I finally got my Apple Vision Pro in Glasgow, but it turns out it's not actually my Apple Vision Pro.

It's in the right box, but it's a 256GB model, not a 512GB, and the serial number of the device doesn't match my order. I have to assume that the store in San Francisco mixed up devices when they were packing them. And somebody in SF got a free upgrade to a 512GB one.

I suspect they would say “just bring it back”, but that's kinda hard now that I'm 5,000 miles away. Fuck.

jamesthomson, 10 months ago to random

This is what 15 years of iOS development will do to you.

image/jpeg

jamesthomson, 7 months ago to random

If you want to confuse an AI image generator, ask it to draw Doctor Who.

Fairly generic woman Doctor, but at least it came up with one eventually.
A slightly different mix of Tennant, Smith, and Capaldi.
Another slightly different mix of Tennant, Smith, and Capaldi, with a touch more Tennant?

jamesthomson, 4 months ago to random

As an Apple shareholder, I wish Apple wouldn’t push for services revenue. How much better of a company would they be, if it was mostly about selling cool devices that everybody wanted to use? Would they make less money? Yes. Would they still be insanely profitable? Also yes!

jamesthomson, 4 months ago (edited 4 months ago) to random

Nearly 16 years of PCalc hitting day one on the App Store:

iPhone - 10th July 2008
iPad - 3rd April 2010
Mac - 6 January 2011
Apple Watch - 24th April 2015
Apple TV - 30th October 2015
Apple Vision Pro - 2nd February 2024

No wonder I feel tired!

jamesthomson, 5 months ago to random

Well, I nearly made it four years!

jamesthomson, 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago) to random

This is PCalc running as a native Apple Vision Pro app (rather than running the existing iPadOS app as before).

jamesthomson, 10 months ago (edited 10 months ago) to random

The attempts to get the account removed that is clearly impersonating me on Instagram are going super well!

https://instagram.com/stressspanda/ is the imposter with three S's in the middle

https://instagram.com/stresspanda/ is me

(I think you need to be following the real me to report the imposter)

Anybody have any contacts that can help?

jamesthomson, 1 year ago to random

While investigating some boxes at my parents’ house, I found an appropriate collection of lost lanyards.

jamesthomson, 4 months ago to random

I sure hope you like big calculators.

jamesthomson, 3 months ago to random

Going to rejoin Apple, work my way into the Photos team for iOS, add a top level button to rotate a photo, then quit the next day knowing I have improved the lives of billions.

jamesthomson, 4 months ago to random

I know what you people want.

The About screen in the visionOS version of PCalc, showing the canonical 3D banana.

jamesthomson, 4 months ago to random

So, if around 500 of you could buy a copy of PCalc on or before the 2nd of February, that would be great. Thanks in advance.

jamesthomson, 9 months ago to random

I’ve been playing around with a prototype calculator widget for PCalc on iOS 17, and I don’t think - currently - it’s feasible.

It’s a bit sluggish because of the round trip through the AppIntent and re-rendering the widget, for one. But also, if you type too fast, and tap while it’s rendering, it just randomly opens the app.

I’m not sure if that’s a widget bug, or if there’s a way to turn off the opening behaviour, but right now I don’t think I can ship this.

A video of a PCalc calculator widget failing in a variety of ways.

jamesthomson, 1 year ago to random

Broke the toilet seat by sitting on it weirdly, and have duct-taped a temporary repair until I can somehow source a replacement, as this model has been discontinued entirely.

As a metaphor for indie software development, it’s a bit on the nose.

#wwdc

jamesthomson, 11 months ago to random

World's biggest calculator.

jamesthomson, 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago) to random

Just in time for WWDC, I'd like to introduce you to my latest product:

Hat by PCalc

http://pcalc.fun

jamesthomson, 3 months ago to random

I can finally properly show off the Dice by PCalc prototype I built at the Apple Vision Pro lab in August!

This is quite far away from being an actual product, but it does look very pretty.

Dice, a banana, duck are dropped into a wooden tray.

jamesthomson, 3 months ago to random

Today the internet has brought me a thread of people on Twitter complaining about PCalc being featured on the Vision Pro store:

https://twitter.com/_LucasRizzotto/status/1757361280732606603