Disclaimer 1: I’ve been an Apple Fan Boy for 5 years, I own an iPhone and iPad.

The emotions have been running high among 3rd party iPhone/iPad developers since Apple has introduced this new clause (3.3.1) into their iPhone OS 4.0 beta Agreement. Basically, it reads that you can only use Objective-C, C & C++ to build iPhone Apps. If this sticks that would block many of the 3rd party developers tools (Unity3D, Appcelerator Titanium, Flash CS5 iPhone Packager and many, many others) from building iPhone Apps.

I can say that this has been pretty disheartening to read and see the fallout in the developer communities. I’ve been on the Flash CS5 beta team since the beginning of the year, have even developed 2 iPhone Apps (one live in the iTunes App Store and the other is “In Review”). I even ported one to work on my iPad at full resolution.

Adobe’s CTO, Kevin Lynch, has stated in this blog post, that they intend to keep the Flash CS5 iPhone Packager in the CS5 bundle launching tomorrow.

Greg Slepak is said to have email Steve Jobs and here is the correspondence on Greg’s Blog.

Steve is said to have written, “We’ve been there before, and intermediate layers between the platform and the developer ultimately produces sub-standard apps and hinders the progress of the platform.” in reference to how well Firefox works across multiple platforms.

MY QUESTION… How are apps created with Flash CS5 or Unity3D hindering the progress? These companies that are developing these 3rd party tools have teams of engineers constantly updating their tools based on whatever Apple updates in their SDK. As I have developed an iPhone App and iPad App using Flash CS5 I can say that there are no performance issues. Heck, go check out the South Park App or any of these other apps created with Flash. No issues at all. Quality isn’t the issue. Look at how many Fart Apps are in the iTunes App Store.

It appears Apple is becoming the IBM of the 1980’s. As they gain more market share, more power, they are becoming less open, less transparent and are turning their developer-friendly platform into an elitist club. If you don’t know the special handshake, you don’t get it.

THIS SUCKS! Instead of reaching out and building their developer community, they are alienating a good chunk of us. That doesn’t make any sense to me. Why wouldn’t a company want more developers, especially when Apple gets 30% of every sale.

This is still a beta agreement, but it doesn’t appear that Mr. Jobs cares to even reconsider changing his mind, no matter the fallout!

THERE IS STILL HOPE… If this goes through, there will be a huge community of developers wanting to put their apps on mobile phones and tablets and I think this is where Google and Android come into the picture. Google has always been so good about being transparent and cultivating a strong, open developer community. Android’s app store is growing at an incredible pace and they are selling a huge number of devices… including a huge wave of tablets slated to hit the market this year.

If Google wants to be my hero… I’m here waiting to be save from the closed-mindedness of Apple.

Get your March edition of Flash & Flex Developer Magazine now!

March 2010

http://ffdmag.com/download-2-2010

I was just reading Rana Sobhany’s blog post: Apple Closing Gap on App Store Inadequacies

To all of you iPhone App and iPad App developers this is an opportunity to get your apps in front of Bloggers and tech journalist!!!

Gift them a copy of our app.

By Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson

Yesterday I received my copy of Rework written by the gents at 37signals. So far the book is fabulous!

If you recall they wrote other books like: Getting Real: The smarter, faster, easier way to build a successful web application (Paperback, eBook & FREE online version) & Defensive Design for the Web: How to improve error messages, help, forms, and other crisis points

Rework is a series of essays, experiences and things learned by Jason and David over the last 10 years that they built 37signals into a very profitable business.

I really like how they opened the book in the second paragraph, “This book isn’t based academic theories. It’s based on our experience. We’ve been in business for ten years. Along the way, we’ve seen two recessions, one burst bubble, business-model shifts, and doom-and-gloom predictions come and go-and we’ve remained profitable through it all.”

Defensive Design for the Web: How to improve error messages, help, forms, and other crisis points

If you aren’t familiar with 37signals and their products here is a quick list:

• Basecamp (Project Management App)



• Highrise (CRM App)





Getting Real: The smarter, faster, easier way to build a successful web application

• Backpack (Small Biz Organizer App)



• Ruby on Rails (Last, but certainly not least… amazing and FREE web framework)

For a while, I’ve been working on a summary, a manifesto of sorts… about how I felt as a student at a university and how I view what I want, when I start my Master’s program… whenever that may be. This is still a work in progress, but here it is:

The Student’s Manifesto

Dear Professor, as a student, I place my trust in you. I’m trusting you to teach me relevant concepts, tools and ideas that will help me to achieve my future goals and crazy ambitions. I realize I don’t know everything, hence why I’m here at university.

I do have a voice and I will no longer be silent. I deserve to receive a relevant education in every area I study. I’m not just another student in your classroom. I’m a paying customer. I’m a sponge that desires to soak up knowledge and be mentored. I’m not some little pea-brained student looking for a dictator to tell me that I know nothing and I can’t bring my laptop into your class. I’m looking for a mentor. Someone to guide me as I start to develop and refine the skills that will help me make a living in a few short years. To be brutally honest, you are not doing your job, if you are teaching me a textbook that I could read on my own time. At that point you are a facilitator, not a teacher.

You are not doing me any service either, if you haven’t worked professionally in the area you are teaching me. Let’s face it… how can you effectively teach me something that you don’t have experience in? If you don’t have the professional experience, you don’t have much credibility in my book. If you do have the experience, I love to hear your war stories! In fact, that is one of the most fascinating ways for me to learn about the real world. But let’s not forget technology and techniques have changed since the 1970’s, 1980’s, or 1990’s. Please be sure you are teaching me relevant information that will help me get that job once I leave here.

I’m trusting that you know what you are teaching, that you have lived it, you have breathed it, you’ve made a living from doing it, and that you are constantly learning about the new advancements in that area as well. Professor, whether you realize it or not, I’m trusting you with my future. Please teach me what I need to know to get my start once I leave here. I don’t want to be average, I want to stand out and be challenged. Please be my mentor, not my dictator.

This is just my $0.02! While at university I had absolutely amazing professors and some really terrible ones.

The professors that really made an impact on me had these things in common:

• Real life experience
• A mentorship attitude towards their students.
• Taught us relevant information

How would your student manifesto read?