So … what’s “other” mean and why did it not go away when I removed all music, videos, podcasts, mail, contacts, calendars, and most of my apps?

Restore in progress…

So I’ve been posting my updates to Twitter during the conference for a couple of reasons: first, if I tag them “#wwdc” then everyone at the conf will see them and that’s kind of neat and second, FB is pulling them for status, so it’s a quick double-update.

Well, I posted this one yesterday: http://twitter.com/ahknight/status/2092801084

Little did I know, the first part of that was more true than I thought. The Stump guys themselves were searching Twitter for references to themselves and the host, at the start of the show, starts off: “So I saw on Twitter that some guy said he had ‘the best question’ for us tonight. Is he here? Is that guy here?” After that initial, “Oh. Crap.” I stood up to take my lumps only for the host to have apparently moved on to something else. As I went to myself “eh, oh well” one of the other folks on stage points “he’s over there!” and I’m subsequently called out entirely.

“Come up here. Come here.”

So I put some things down and start the long walk up to the stage. As I go there, some big video cameras start to float around me (obviously with operators behind them, but as far as I can see they’re cameras with legs). Yay, make me more nervous. Thanks!

I get up to the stage and the host points to the stage and says to come up there. Oh boy. So I do. He then says some things that I’m sure other people remember but around this time I realize I probably have a social disorder of some kind as everyone sounds like the teacher in Peanuts cartoons. I do make out that he’s said that he’s going to abide by the statement I made: the experts will have two seconds to answer my question. Go.

So I paused and organized my question, much to the disappointment of the audience, though the host backed me up a little with ‘what you don’t know is that just standing on the stage makes you lose 25 IQ points’. Then I released:

“What two pins on the LC III were disabled on the LC II?

Oh God, I hate this thing. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it.

Here’s the current method for adding an application to the iPhone:

1. Download an app from iTunes.
2. Connect iPhone.
3. Wait for backup. Wait for sync.
4. Disconnect iPhone.
5. Use application for a while.
6. Connect iPhone.
7. Wait for backup.
8. Wait for backup.
9. Wait for backup.
10. Wait for backup.
11. Wait for backup.
12. Wait for backup.

1. Wait for backup.

It doesn’t seem to be one application, either. At some point I’m going to add an application that completely destroys the backup process. In order to determine which one it is, I have to uncheck applications in iTunes like they’re extensions. This wouldn’t be so bad if not for one problem…

iTunes deletes the application’s data when I do this.

So, even for apps that aren’t hosed, I have to hose them in order to find the app that’s hosed and remove it.

We write Mac applications at work. We have several ideas for great iPhone apps (not the cheesy $5 ones, but real applications) that we’re working on. We can test on the simulator, yes, and that works most of the time, but it’s not perfect¹ and we do need to test on the device now and again so we decided to get a pair of iPhone 3Gs to start off with and see how the development process was.

First, we approached the local Apple Store’s business contact. He said that they don’t handle business orders for the iPhone at all and gave us a name at AT&T that handles small business orders and said that he’d get us set up. That person would be Christopher Spain. Remember that name, he’s going to be coming up a lot here soon.

So I went back to coding and let my business partner handle all the fun of getting this setup. He called Chris and left a voicemail message that first day. The next day we got some information back about how to get setup.

MySQL client libraries and headers are not included with Mac OS X Server 10.5. If you are developing a MySQL client application for Mac OS X 10.5, you’ll need to download the MySQL client libraries and headers.

You can’t build MySQLdb for Django apps on Mac OS X Server without the MySQL libraries and headers, so follow those directions to get the files and then you can use the MySQL that shipped with the OS rather than trying to fight with another MySQL installation.

There’s something magical about the Internet. I recently bought a house and have been doing cleanup from the previous occupants’ apparent lack of concern for their living conditions.

One of these jewels of neglect was a refrigerator whose bottom seal had dislodged and hung in a U-shape below the door. When I finally decided the more concerning things were fixed and I wanted to look at that, I figured I’d need a new seal and that I’d have to order it and then find instructions, etc. To get started, I hit Google up for “refrigerator door seal”. Lo, instructions on how to proceed that were clear enough that I could simply re-attach the existing seal.

Think about it. Even as recently as 1995, if you sat on the couch at 9p and decided to go fix the fridge door and hadn’t a clue about how to proceed, what were your options? Call family or friends, or dive in and guess. What do we do today? A simple search, read up on it, and dive in, knowing exactly what to do and expect.

It just doesn’t get old for me.