September

This is my favourite month of the year1. It’s my birthday month2. The weather is generally absolutely amazing3. Gone are muggy and hazy days; the air is crystal clear. It’s a transition month. It is a colourful month. It’s an Apple keynote month! I am looking forward to this long week-end with my family. Expect a few images, too. An happy guy! 😃

  1. It dates back to my childhood where it September marked the return to school. ↩︎

  2. Born on the 4th. ↩︎

  3. Weather forecasts for the upcoming days are just brilliant with sunshine and a bit hotter-than-usual temperatures. ↩︎

Some of my Expectations for Apple’s Upcoming “Wonderlust” Event

This is going to be about the iPhone, mostly. The iPhone 15, to be more precise. Of course. Apple will probably talk a lot about the A17 because of its new 3nm manufacturing process, ensuring some battery power savings while bringing faster processing. This will be welcomed for an always-on display device since the iPhone 14 Pro performance in that respect is not as good as it used to be. Will the A17 be Bionic? Something else? I trust Apple’s marketing cracks about this.

The titanium finish on the Pro line, a first for the iPhone, but something the Apple Watch is already sporting, will get some attention too. Maybe more than the A17. I’m looking forward to it because I wouldn’t say I like the current finish on the iPhone 14 Pro1. I hate it, actually. Thanks to my iPhone case, it’s a non-issue. If the Apple invite is any indication of the upcoming titanium colour finish, I’m in love already!

But the star of the iPhone 15 show will be the Ultra with the periscope lens, bringing telephoto photography beyond the 3x optic possibilities for the first time. This is what I’m waiting for. I expect an Apple twist to it.

I expect some updates about the Apple Vision Pro2. Apple will probably talk3 about how excited developers are for the device and remind us about how it will change the world4. Something on the gaming front could be in the cards, too, thanks to the game porting toolkit introduced at the WWDC conference. Are Macs finally good at gaming? Is a software trick enough?

And then what else? The Apple Watch will get updates, but not the redesign we are starting to hear about for 2024. The Ultra 2 is probably not for me. But we will learn about it, for sure.

Macs? Crickets.

This is what I expect for the upcoming “Wonderlust” event.

  1. I hate the finish of my iPhone 13 Pro for that matter, too. Too glossy. To “chromy”. ↩︎

  2. I still think the “spacial computing” moniker should have been “spacial experience” instead. More approachable if you ask me. ↩︎

  3. Brag is probably a better term ↩︎

  4. For better or for worst ↩︎

Episode 02 — I’m an Iterative Type of Guy

While writing my next edition of the Friday Notes newsletter (#107), I realized that writing has never been a one-stretch thing for me. It takes countless writing iterations before getting things done. In this episode, I share my anxieties 😰 about writing in general ✍🏻. Plus, a few words about my expectations for the upcoming Apple Event “Wonderlust”! 👀

Links

Waiting for the iPhone 15 Ultra

I’m really looking forward to the iPhone 15 Ultra👀. Coming from the iPhone 13 Pro, I skipped the 14 Pro1; I expect the camera improvements to be tangible. The telephoto lens could see the most significant improvements driving sales of the Ultra to new territories2. Using a periscope architecture, telephoto could jump from 3x to 6x or more. This could be the last thing that makes me sell my Nikon D7503. The softer and rounder edges and titanium finish might make this iPhone the best design of all time4. And, finally, USB-C will certainly simplify charging the damn thing! I wonder if I’ll still be able to use my Lightning Lavalier microphone using a Lightning-to-USB-C adaptor.🤔

It will be my first “Max” iPhone. Apparently, I’m on a stretch of going for the bigger screens5.

  1. I skip a generation to limit my consumerism habits. It’s an environmental issue here. ↩︎

  2. Kuo’s rumors about periscope lens. ↩︎

  3. I depend on a 70-200mm zoom on my Nikon which is very useful on a trip. ↩︎

  4. I still thing the best design was the matte black iPhone 7. ↩︎

  5. I recently upgraded from the 13-inch MacBook Air to a 15-inch version. ↩︎

Finally Settled on Blog Post Visual Attributes

After so many years of blogging, I think I have finally settled on the styling of each blog post. 😅 I like to emphasize key words with bold, making it easier to detect what this post is all about. Next is the use of emojis to make things a bit less serious and more approachable.🙂 Next is the selective use of Micro.blog’s post title for longer and more significant posts.1 😜 More recently, I started using footnotes because they add another dimension to the reading experience and are displayed in a nice popup on the site.2

  1. This blog post is such an example of using a title. ↩︎

  2. Footnotes are far easier to create in Ulysses than in the web interface, tough. ↩︎

One Podcast, Three Looks

From left to right: Overcast, Pocket Cast, Apple Podcast

I always subscribe to my own content distribution channels for quality control purposes 1. I’m using Overcast, Pocket Cast and Apple Podcast to display my latest podcast episode. In these screenshots, I selected the info button to display the episode details. I’m a paid subscriber of Pocket Cast. I prefer the Pocket Cast display, but it has a caching issue as it doesn’t get the latest podcast artwork, but the other two do2. Bold text is missing on Apple Podcast for some reason. The overcast look is… mildly ugly.

  1. This blog post looks like a mini-plug for my podcast. It is. ↩︎

  2. The artwork display issue is also present on the web version of the Pocket Cast player. ↩︎

On Dark Sky and Apple's Weather

A Eulogy for Dark Sky, a Data Visualization Masterpiece

The design of Dark Sky was so wonderful that I could understand the shape of the weather at a glance, even from a zoomed out view of the app.

Great analysis of the now-defunct Dark Sky weather app. I’m a bit late on that one. I don’t remember using Dark Sky because I think it wasn’t working in Canada. I’m not sure about this. Once Apple took over and brought the redesigned weather app with iOS 16, we could visually feel the Dark Sky’s influence on it. But Apple being Apple, they dropped a few things here and there and made a few things their own. I tend to use Carrot Weather more, but recently, I deep-dived into Apple’s Weather, and frankly, they did a good job. Yet, there was something unique in Dark Sky that I don’t feel in Apple’s offerings. Is it too close to the Yahoo Weather look & feel? Maybe.

Learned Something New Today

Today, while reading this blog post, I found out that we could have a “popup” note inline in a blog post. I was curious and asked the author, who gladly responded with all the required information to do the same on my blog. A plugin is required, which I gladly installed in a snap1. This blog post is a test of that feature2. The day I learn something which in turn helps me improve one of my things, is a great day. 😊 I love this community so much! 🫶🏻

  1. You can find it here, on Gitbub. ↩︎

  2. Thanks to @dandycat for your help. ↩︎