Live data from Hacker News

Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

whydoeseverythingsuck.com

31–40 of 234 posts

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"merely (!) trying to control what tools people use to create software on their platform" Put any OS of your choice, except iPhone, in that sentence and it sounds pretty darn insane to me.

Don't game consoles have expensive, compulsory SDKs?

Even if they do you can still write your own languages that compile down. Ala: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Oriented_Assembly_Lisp

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#32
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insane? No. Worrisome in its arbitrary restrictiveness? IMHO very much!

Since my memory span goes more than a year or two back, I vividly recall Apple shipping a product that had native app development available only to Apple . I simply don't believe that Apple owes everyone Flash. Maybe this will get different when Apple owns 70% of the smart phone market. Right now, people are upset about not being able to use their preferred tools on the coolest phone. But they have no inherent right…

Some of us have already invested over a grand buying Macbooks and Unity licenses and test iPod Touches specifically so that we can develop games for the iPhone, though... Would have been nice to have known in advance that this would be ruled out!

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#33
post #15

Sure I've had my moments of App Store frustration, but all in all, I haven't been as offended by it as a lot of folks. I think that's because I felt that Apple was giving me something that I couldn't easily find elsewhere (single point of distribution that everyone knows about, very few taps for users to install my apps, the ability to easily charge for apps), so I was okay if they were a little particular about the…

I'm puzzled, since Apple has been shutting off fundamental techniques in computer science since day one. Today it's Flash compilers. Yesterday it was access to the filesystem, things that run in the background, etc.

Yes, denying filesystem access (well, raw filesystem access--Apple gives you access to the "Documents" directory, etc), may be offensive to some, but for me this falls under the category of "sure, it'd be nice if it did more, but I'm not gonna be mad about it." The TI-82 programmable calculator didn't allow me to reprogram my keys or to redefine the built-in math operations, but that didn't make me love that device any less.

The "originally written" requirement is different because it's not something that Apple could restrict by means other than by telling us, "you can't do that." It's kind of like saying, "Don't program in a functional style", or "Use a model view controller architecture." Uhm, excuse me? I'll decide that for myself, thank you very much!

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't game consoles have expensive, compulsory SDKs?

Yeah, and that's why your console spends 90% of its life powered off.

Don't get me wrong, I think it is a stupid policy even for Nintendo, Sony et al. My point is that stupid != insane.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#35
I've had a couple of close friends and relatives have health issues that almost killed them. Afterwords their personality changed. They became much more negative and harder to be around. The things I have read about Jobs is that he is a health nut. To have the problems he has had might have been a big emotional blow for him.

Since he has come back, things have gotten much worse for partner relations and there is almost a continual barrage of news about Apple jerking someone around. I really think they could do better with a new CEO.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#36
Enough!

If you don't like Apple's terms of service, DONT USE APPLE, and DON'T DEVELOP SOFTWARE FOR APPLE'S PRODUCTS.

It's not unfair. Whether or not he's insane is irrelevant. Stop bitching and solve the problem.

EDIT: downvote me for having an opinion? come on, HN.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#37

Enough! If you don't like Apple's terms of service, DONT USE APPLE, and DON'T DEVELOP SOFTWARE FOR APPLE'S PRODUCTS. It's not unfair. Whether or not he's insane is irrelevant. Stop bitching and solve the problem. EDIT: downvote me for having an opinion? come on, HN.

I'd rather just avoid the problem all together by building apps on an open system like Android.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#38
I don't get this at all.

Why does everyone act like the iPhone should be as 'open' as an OS on your computer? Did everyone forget that when the iPhone shipped you couldn't write apps at all? You can't write apps in Erlang for your Zune, your PS3, your cable modem, your microwave, your car or your apartments alarm system... no one cares.

Yes, Apple wants (insists, even, if this ToS becomes final) you to use their tools, their stack, etc for making apps on their consumer electronics device - shocking? No. Annoying? Of course. Don't like it? Go somewhere else!

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#39
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since my memory span goes more than a year or two back, I vividly recall Apple shipping a product that had native app development available only to Apple . I simply don't believe that Apple owes everyone Flash. Maybe this will get different when Apple owns 70% of the smart phone market. Right now, people are upset about not being able to use their preferred tools on the coolest phone. But they have no inherent right…

Some of us have already invested over a grand buying Macbooks and Unity licenses and test iPod Touches specifically so that we can develop games for the iPhone, though... Would have been nice to have known in advance that this would be ruled out!

Conceded completely: that sucks.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#40
post #15

Sure I've had my moments of App Store frustration, but all in all, I haven't been as offended by it as a lot of folks. I think that's because I felt that Apple was giving me something that I couldn't easily find elsewhere (single point of distribution that everyone knows about, very few taps for users to install my apps, the ability to easily charge for apps), so I was okay if they were a little particular about the…

I'm puzzled, since Apple has been shutting off fundamental techniques in computer science since day one. Today it's Flash compilers. Yesterday it was access to the filesystem, things that run in the background, etc.

I half agree. The filesystem is just a device. No running in the background is kinda icky, but that doesn't seem like a computer science kinda thing. (not that multitasking isn't hard, it's just not the first thing that jumps to mind when thinking of simulating things on a turing machine)

Language to language translation, that's core. that's fundamental to CS.

The most popular virtual machine ever is the regular expression interpreter. It's such a, fundamental thing. Nothing to do with a particular set of hardware or instructions, just the concept of interpreting match, split, jmp, and char.

I'm having a real hard time understanding how to write C without unions of tagged structs... Maybe that's allowed? I just don't get where one language ends and another begins. how much can i abuse the macro preprocessor? have you ever seen the bash source with BEGIN END blocks? it's sick.

Of course #define is nothing compared to c++ templates. If i just write scheme as partially applied templates, am i cheating?

it's pretty nucking futz.

Post reply on HN