Marc Rochkind's Apps, Books, and Opinions

Time to drop iOS apps

2015-08-10 11:38:13

Most of my iOS apps show photos stored on Smugmug, and somewhere the URLs changed. (I think it’s an Apple problem, not Smugmug’s.) It’s a very minor fix, but it involves updating all the apps. That, unfortunately, involves creating new icons and launch images for different iPhone screen resolutions, and fixing up all sorts of app-submission changes since those apps were last updated.

I would do the work, but Apple’s Xcode-based packaging and submittal process is so ridiculously clumsy that it’s just too unpleasant, for way too many hours. (Example: Apple demands a launch image with a “-568h” suffix for 4-inch iPhone 5 devices. I’ve spent maybe 4 hours trying to get App Store to accept my app with the icon, with no luck. 9/11 and Dorothea Lange worked, but not Manzanar. I give up.)

I went through the torture for 9/11 and Dorothea Lange and got them submitted. If Apple accepts them, fine. If they’re as difficult to deal with as they are on the Mac side, then those will go, too, although I will make a huge effort to keep at least 9/11 available.

This is only for iOS apps. Mac versions in the App Store will continue to be there as long as they continue to work, which they do as of now. For some of them (Ingestamatic, ExifChanger, and ProofSheet), you can get an unlock code for the newer version downloadable from basepath.com just by sending an email to support. None of my Mac apps will be updated on the Mac App Store, ever, because Apple rejects all of my updates. (Features that were acceptable a few years ago no longer are, and I don’t have time or interest in redesigning the apps to suit Apple’s changing requirements.)

Do you get the impression that I don’t think much of Apple from a developer viewpoint? They’re arrogant, non-communicative, inflexible, and stupid, and life’s too short to spend any of it dealing with them. Fortunately, it’s still possible to distribute Mac apps outside of the App Store, which I’ll continue to do. When and if Apple puts a stop to that, I’ll drop Apple completely.

Topaz Adjust and Simplify

2015-05-27 14:51:23

Been playing around with these two Lightroom (and Photoshop) plugins for the last couple of days. Some results are in the SmugMug gallery on this page, or here.

ProofSheet Version 1.71

2015-05-08 13:00:28

One more nifty new feature: I’m creating a book (Dorothea Lange: 500 FSA Photographs) with captions that vary widely in length, and if I allow enough footer space for the longest, the photos are smaller than they could be:

Some captions are much longer than the one shown here, so the problem is even worse than it appears here. But with a new {Expand} variable, anywhere in the footer text, captions that don’t fill the footer space are moved down, and the image is expanded, like this:

Note that {Expand} only works in cell footers.

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