The thing that gets me up in the morning is progression. I’m inspired to do things I’ve never done before and often those things can be very simple. The part that is exciting is doing something I couldn’t do before. This goes hand in hand with slow, steady progress, which may not seem like the fastest route but actually is.
Good code satisfies all the requirements of a project while still being logically organized into manageable chunks. If the requirements of a project change, good code can turn into bad code. So, the enemy of good code is a change in requirements.
I noticed that documentation searches in Xcode seemed to be getting infuriatingly slower (even on a recent Mac with an SSD) over the past few years so I wanted to see if this could be fixed.
Deleting old documentation sets was the first thing I tried (and it worked) but I soon discovered a better approach, which is to set the searchable doc sets directly in the Xcode Organizer.
To do this, first click on the magnifying glass next to the search field in the Organizer (shown below) and select Show Find Options.
Next, click on the Find In drop down and uncheck any doc sets that you don’t need.
That’s it. Searches should run smoother and hopefully you won’t see any more beach balls.
I learn by a cycle of trial and research. The more I try something the more I discover what knowledge and skills I lack. Once I know what I lack, I can seek out and absorb the information. In terms of snowboarding, the trial part is riding at the mountain and watching snowboarding videos is the research. Here are some of the videos I’ve found useful.
Snowboard Addiction Videos
Really great, detailed videos. I have the Freestyle Program which is a package of almost all of the videos offered on the site. Burton sponsors the making of these and some of the content comes from the Burton Snowboard Academy. Highly recommended. I’ve watched most of them multiple times. There is so much to absorb and some of it won’t even register until you’ve tried to apply it on the mountain.
Transworld FunDuhMentals
It’s a 45 minute video available on iTunes. Worth getting. They go over the basics like choosing a board and setting up your gear as well as riding fundamentals like turning. Next is a tricks section. Even though I’ve seen many of these things explained before I still found it valuable to hear something explained differently or to see it from a different camera angle.
Transworld Snowboarding’s 20 Tricks
Transworld snowboarding also has a 20 Tricks video series that goes back to 2008. There are 5 volumes out now but so far I’ve only seen Volume 1. Volume 1 is worth it just to see Jeremy Jones explain the ollie. Most of the tricks are very advanced but it’s enlightening to see the attitude of the pros towards skill progression.
These are the OS X apps (besides Xcode) that I find almost essential for iOS development:
A native OS X git client for viewing repositories. It’s useful to quickly see what files I’ve modified as well as any changes team members have pushed. Searching commit messages with a simple search box is also super handy and nicer than using the command line.
I held out on this one but started getting annoyed with not being able to see line numbers in diffs in OS X’s File Merge app. Worth getting if you spend time looking at diffs every day.
Essential for more advance git commands and for a better look under the hood.
My preferred music streaming service. I tried out both Spotify and Rdio over a year ago and preferred Rdio’s user interfaces on OS X and iOS. The “Play Later” feature is well done and often used.
It’s not that good but I’ve been using it for a long time. I used to write Rails code with it but now I use it primarily for editing plain text files and as a secondary code browser. Not recommend.
It’s been my primary browser for a few years. I use Chrome as my secondary but prefer Safari since it looks and behaves more like a native OS X app.
Technically this isn’t aways open but I’m constantly using the Safari browser extension to automagically enter passwords.
This Ars Technica article from Stack Exchange asks people to weigh in on the question “Do it right” or “Do it ASAP” in the context of writing code for a company.
My thoughts
If ASAP results in sloppy code (overly convoluted, error prone, messy, etc) it’s not good enough and needs more work. Once you consider it good (not perfect) it’s done.
Don’t rewrite code that satisfies requirements if doing so will likely result in missing a deadline. Hopefully the code you wrote is already pretty solid and clean anyway.
Focus on writing good (solid, clean) first iterations. You’ll have ideas for making better iterations but don’t act on them unless you have the time. Write them down for later. It’s better to have a good first iteration delivered on time than an ostensibly better second iteration delivered late.
Gorilla Workout is an app I’m excited about. You start by picking a level on a scale of 1 to 4, which is based on your level of fitness. Then you do the first workout. All the workouts are sets of exercises using your body weight so no special equipment is required (although I’ve read that a pull up bar may be needed in the advanced levels). For example, a workout could be 10 pushups and 10 squats repeated for four sets. When you begin a workout, you see written instructions for each exercise as well as the option to view a short (20 to 30 second) video showing how to do the exercise.
I’m aiming to complete all the exercises this year. There seems to be around 80 days worth of workouts so it’ll take at least a few months. I started on level 1 to build momentum. The workouts have been easy but challenging enough that I still feel the burn a day later especially in some of my lesser used muscle groups. I’m on the 4th day and each workout has been taking between 10 and 15.
There are some moderately annoying things about the app, like the headers needlessly taking up too much space, which reduces the space available for the workout steps. However, the app has great content which matter most.
I highly recommend checking out Gorilla Workout if you want to be in better shape and need something to help get you there. It’s cheap and there is a free version to try too.
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