Mobile Tagging

Attending a presentation on mobile tagging. The simplest example is a 2D barcode that encodes a URL, printed as part of an advertisement. Load mobile app, shoot barcode with camera, and URL is loaded in your browser.

Google is extending AdSense and YouTube to support QR Code generation. MS has proprietary tag format.

Can be read from print, screen even plaque.

Privacy issues. Is URL malicious? Perhaps creator of reader (eg google) could provide clearinghouse that qualified URL before redirecting to it.

Debug Logging

Today I'm taking some time to enhance my debug logging.  I now have so many debug log messages that I need a way to enable/disable them quickly at compile time.

I have it mostly done, so now's the time when I usually find out that this capability is already provided for me somehow...  ;-)

XCode & Subversion

I'm back to full-time iPhone development, and I am determined to solve a problem I've been having with Subversion. Our project repo is up on projectlocker.com. I can access it fine via every mechanism (XCode Repository browser, Safari, svn command-line) EXCEPT from within the "Groups & Files" window. It always fails as follows:

Error: 170001 (Authorization failed) Description: PROPFIND request failed on ...
Error: 170001 (Authorization failed) Description: PROPFIND of ... : authorization failed (https://seed1.projectlocker.com)

Oh, this works fine for my partner.

Google has been no help. Nor have the ProjectLocker nor Apple Developer web-sites.

So, I created a new dummy repo, uploaded some dummy code, and ... it works.

Hmm. So it is something with the files in my project repo. Is some path hardcoded maybe? I did demote the code under a "trunk" path at some point..

Oh, I can't believe it.  In Project Info - General, there is an "SCM Repository" field.  It was set to my local file:// repository for some reason.  Probably because that's where I had done my original development.  Not sure why it didn't default to the repo from which it was checked out - Doh!

Anyway, it works now.  Yea!

iPhone Tips

Check out these iPhone tips.  My tip: learn all 10 of them.

What to do after you reflash your iPhone

Apple does a good job of keeping backups of your iPhone data, but they don't backup everything.  Here's a list of stuff you have to fix after you reflash your iPhone:

• Passcode Lock: Settings - General - Auto-Lock, Passcode Lock
• E-mail: If you leave mail on the server, your iPhone will forget which e-mails you have already read, so you'll have to read or delete them.  A couple of tricks:
• Reduce the number of messages displayed in your inbox - Settings - Mail... - Show
  
• In Mail, hit "Edit", then select a bunch of messages and delete them all at once
  

I'll keep adding to this list as I remember stuff.

Tonchidot - Amazing iPhone app

Seriously, Tonchidot is so amazing I can't believe it isn't a hoax.  

I can't figure out how they figure out orientation of the device - GPS can tell you where it is, but how does it know where it is pointing?  Image recognition?

GTD

I'm trying to get serious about planning using Getting Things Done (GTD).  I've tried Remember The Milk and Nozbe, both web-based apps.  I like them fairly well, but each has some limitation that drives me crazy.  So today I downloaded "Things" from Cultured Code.

Things is free (while in Beta) on the Mac, and $10 on the iPhone.  The two can be sync'd via wifi.  I haven't tried the iPhone version, but I really like the Mac version.  The UI just makes sense, and I like the way tags work.  We'll see how it does over time...

OK, that's enough time.  I REALLY like it.  Time to buy the iPhone version...

Easily installed, easily sync'd.  I like the way the sync works - very bluetooth-pairing-like.

For some reason the iPhone app is missing the "Areas" tab - maybe it isn't implemented yet.. yup... patience, patience...

Update 2008.09.23: Lovin' Things.  Again - UI "just makes sense".