"Objectified" - Jonathan Ive talks about Mac design & Unibody MacBook manufacture. The above clip is an excerpt from the "Objectified" movie.
Technology
iPhone OS 4
Engadget: "Notable new features for users ("tentpoles" are in bold):
- Multitasking.
- Spell check (like on the iPad).
- Bluetooth keyboard support (again, on the iPad).
- User-defined wallpaper (a jailbreak favorite).
- Tap to focus when recording video, just like with photos, and a 5x digital zoom for the camera.
- Playlist creation and nested playlists.
- App folders for sorting apps! You can even put an app folder in the dock.
- Enhanced Mail! You can have a merged inbox view, switch between inboxes quickly, and sync to more than one Exchange account. There's also threaded messaging (at last!) and in-app attachment viewing.
- iBooks, just like on iPad, only smaller. You can wirelessly sync books between platforms, a la Kindle.
- Enterprise features, including remote device management and wireless app distribution.
- Game Center. It's like Xbox Live, but for iPhone games. Includes achievements, leaderboards, and match making. It will be available as a "developer preview," and out for consumers later this year.
Developers are getting plenty of new tricks too:
- New SDK, available today.
- 1,500 new APIs.
- Background audio (think Pandora).
- Background VoIP (think Skype).
- Background location data, both with live GPS for backgrounded turn-by-turn, and cell tower-based for lower power draw.
- Local notifications. Like push notifications, but sends a notification straight from the app without needing a push notification server, perfect for an alarm, for instance.
- Fast app switching. Saves the state of an app and resumes it from where you left off, without dwelling in memory.
- iAd. Apple says it's for keeping "free apps free." The ads keep you in the app, while also taking over the screen and adding interactivity -- using HTML 5 for video -- up to simple gaming in-ad. Apple will offer a 60 / 40 split on revenue, and users can even buy apps straight from an ad.
- In-app SMS.
- Map overlays.
- Quick look for previewing documents.
- Photo Library access.
- Calendar access.
- Full access to the camera.
- Video playback and capture.
- Date and address "data detectors."
- Automated testing and performance / power analysis (the same tools Apple uses)."
Magnetic Movie (Video)
Semiconductor's Magnetic Movie by Ruth Jarman and Joe Gerhardt (link). Even though the movie has been on the web for quite a while, I thought it might still be worth the post. The two researchers shot the film at the NASASpace Sciences Laboratory at UC Berkeley. Originally it was produced for Channel 4.
All image copyright belongs to Semiconductor.
This is what wikipedia has to say on magnetic fields: "A magnetic field is a vector field which can exert a magnetic force on moving electric charges and on magnetic dipoles (such as permanent magnets). When placed in a magnetic field, magnetic dipoles tend to align their axes parallel to the magnetic field. Magnetic fields surround and are created by electric currents, magnetic dipoles, and changing electric fields. Magnetic fields also have their own energy, with an energy density proportional to the square of the field intensity.
There are some notable specific instances of the magnetic field. For the physics of magnetic materials, see magnetism and magnet, and more specifically ferromagnetism, paramagnetism, and diamagnetism. For constant magnetic fields, such as are generated by stationary dipoles and steady currents, see magnetostatics. A changing electric field (which is mathematically identical to a moving electric field) also results in a magnetic field (see electromagnetism).
The magnetic field forms one aspect of electromagnetism. (See also relativistic electromagnetism.) In a simplified form the magnetic field can be thought of as the relativistic part of an electric field. More precisely, magnetic fields are a necessary consequence of the existence of electric fields and special relativity. A pure electric field in one reference frame will be viewed as a combination of both an electric field and a magnetic field in a moving reference frame. Together, the electric and magnetic fields make up the electromagnetic field, which is best known for underlying light and other electromagnetic waves." via
Moodwall by Urban Alliance
Urban Alliance consists of Studio Klink, Illuminate, Matthias Oostrik and Cube. They have joined to create the Moodwall, which is a subway installation in Amsterdam. This is what Urban Alliance has to say:
"Media architecture collective Urban Alliance has recently finished the Moodwall: a 24 metre long interactive light installation in Amsterdam. The Moodwall is located in a pedestrian tunnel and interacts with people passing by, improving the atmosphere in the tunnel and making people feel happier and safer. The interactive urban wallpaper is made from 2500 LEDs behind a ribbed semi-transparent wall. The curves in the wall make it less vulnerable to graffiti and improve visibility.
The Moodwall is a pilot project for a 70 metre long media wall proposal by Urban Alliance (in collaboration with Daan Hartoog) which won a competition for ideas to improve the public space of the socially unsafe area of the Amsterdam Bijlmer.
The Moodwall was designed by Jasper Klinkhamer (Studio Klink) in collaboration with Remco Wilcke (Cube), who was also responsible for the construction. The content was developed by Hans van Helden and Matthijs ten Berge of Illuminate in collaboration with artist Matthias Oostrik and students of the Dutch art academy HKU."
Marissa Mayer on the design behind Google (Keynote Video)
Marissa Mayer, who is the Vice President of Search Products & User Experience, gave a keynote at the Google I/O Developers Conference . It gives some truly remarkable insight into the entire design process behind Google. Some of the most compelling facts are listed below.
The first ever Google homepage from 1997.
Some of the most interesting facts:
- The copyright notice at the bottom of the Google homepage is meant to provide an anchor, so people would not keep waiting for the site to load.
- Increasing the search results per page would decrease first page searches by 20 % because the page would load slower (latency, access to more servers etc.
- In an early user survey some people asked "Is this a real company"
- By entering a search into Google it will direct your query to approx. 1000 servers and travel between various data centers at the speed of light.
- Reducing the size of Google maps by 30 %, leads to an increase in usage by 30 %.
- Because the feedback loop in search is so fast (A novice user learning the "technique" to enter the best possible query very quickly matures to be an expert), they aim at building a product for the expert user. Hence things that are too didactic, will not be put on the page.
- Start thinking 10 years out and then make a product roadmap for the next 6 months. This technique helps you go in the "ultimate" direction faster without having to re-iterate.
- 1 % of the web is in Arabic vs. 50 % being English.
- “If I had asked customers what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”-Henry Ford
"Marissa leads the company's product management efforts on search products – web search, images, news, books, products, maps, Google Earth, the Google Toolbar, Google Desktop, Google Health, Google Labs, and more. She joined Google in 1999 as Google's first female engineer and led the user interface and web server teams at that time. Her efforts have included designing and developing Google's search interface, internationalizing the site to more than 100 languages, defining Google News, Gmail, and Orkut, and launching more than 100 features and products on Google.com. Several patents have been filed on her work in artificial intelligence and interface design."-Taken from the official Google exec. bio page.
Marissa Mayer on the design behind Google (Video).via
Lego Wall
Via (IchMirMich)(Sprayblog)
Europe to Australia in 5 Hours (The LAPCAT A2 Jet)
High Resolution Image 
The Lapcat A2 by Reaction Engines Limited (Link to Project)(Images)(View Animation)| Distance: | 18700 km | |
| Flight time: | 4.6 hours (under realistic air traffic control conditions) | |
| Reserve range: | 5000 km @ Mach 0.9 | |
| Payload | 300 passengers (plus baggage) |
Link to (Factsheet)
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- Curated by Michael Bollinger, student from Germany the designgeist is a visual archive for all things related to design,architecture,creativity,photography and matter that cannot be categorized. Thanks for visiting.
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