You might not know this about me, but when I'm not slinging Ruby or Objective-C code, I'm almost certain to have a camera in my hands. I try not to obsess about photography gear too much because a) what's behind the viewfinder is more important than what's immediately in front of it, and b) it can get very expensive very quickly. But, I'm certainly not immune to the allure of new stuff. Lately, my obsessions have been proceeding in two rather divergent directions: a new-found appreciation for film, and capturing motion in a still frame.
The second obsession is why I was excited recently to discover a Kickstarter campaign for gear that should make it incredibly easy to trigger your camera in response to external events, like a laser sensor being tripped, a sound above a certain decibel level occurring, or a bright flash appearing. As it happens, the Triggertrap Kickstarter campaign ended Saturday morning (which is the same time when I write these posts), and when I sat down to find an App of the Week, I was delighted to find the Triggertrap iOS app had been added to our list of apps.
The sheer number of open-source components, the rate at which new ones come in, and the unexpected places where these controls get used never ceases to amaze me.
Do your apps use components from Cocoa Controls? You should find the pages for the controls you use, click the Apps tab, and add a link back to your app on the App Store. I love featuring cool apps that make use of the site, and would love feature yours!
Best,
Aaron
p.s. I normally wouldn't engage in this kind of flagrant self-promotion, but I feel like I should share a macro photo I took last week that ended up being the 52nd most popular photo on Flickr the next day. Check it out, along with the setup shot.
What We're Reading
- Interview with Mattt Thompson - Even if you don't know who he is, you've almost certainly used software he's created.
- TextMate 2.0 Status and FAQ - I've moved on to Sublime Text...At least for now, but I'd love to see TM make a resurgence in 2014.
- Apple now allows 100 promo codes per app release
- The Retina iPad Mini - Gruber offers up a very thoughtful look at the new retina iPad mini. I can't wait to get mine...
- Vesper Sync Diary: #5 - Sync Tokens and Efficiency and #6 - Merging Notes - Ever thought about making an app that syncs with a backend service? Brent Simmons' multi-part series should be considered essential reading.
App of the Week
Control of the Week
JFOpenWeatherMapManager
Objective-C iOS / Mac OS X Wrapper to allow easy manipulation of the Open Weather Map API Access Weather data directly as Objective-C objects with only a few lines of code Original post: http://jonathanfield.me/objective-c-openweathermap-api-wrapper/ MIT licensed. |
Weekly Roundup
JCMenu
An expanding button menu control. MIT licensed. |
MIBAboutController
A simple tableview for static content, optimized for 'About' views. MIT licensed. |
RAMCollectionViewFlemishBondLayout
LCPickerView
A simple table view-based modal picker control. MIT licensed. |
KASlideShow
Lightweight slideshow for iOS (ARC only). Support manual or automatic slideshow, with fade and slide transitions. Apache 2.0 licensed. |
APPaginalTableView
It is implementation of view allowing navigation between views like in iOS 7 Weather App. MIT licensed. |
TINavigationView
Vertical breadcrumb navigation menu view. MIT licensed. |
OVGap
A lightweight framework which is responsible for the communication between IOS native Objective-C code and Javascript. Apache 2.0 licensed. |
UIScrollView+ScrollIndicator
Customizable scroll indicator implemented as a category on UIScrollView. MIT licensed. |
LLACircularProgressView
SKSlideViewController
BkTask
SWGradientTabBar
A simple UITabBar with gradients, motivated by CRGradientNavigationBar. Apply gradients vertically or horizontally. MIT licensed. |
ALSystemUtilities
JDStatusBarNotification
Easy, customizable notifications displayed on top of the statusbar. Very convenient API for customization. iOS 7 ready! MIT licensed. |
MZCroppableView
MZCroppableView is a subclass of UIView that helps in irregular image cropping. BSD licensed. |
MZLoading
A custom loading animation. License unspecified. |
DRDynamicSlideShow
A UIScrollView subclass to easily implement an amazing swiping interactive slide show, as IFTTT's. License unspecified. |
BMTimeFormatter
TSCurrencyTextField
UITextField subclass for ATM-style currency-amount entry. MIT licensed. |
CTFeedback
Get feedback from your iOS users. MIT licensed. |
ExtensiveCell
iOS TableViewCell component. Selected cell drops a detail view down. MIT licensed. |
DLAlertView
UIAlertView replacement that can embed custom content views, is fully themable and let's you use a delegate and/or blocks. BSD licensed. |
RDVCalendarView
Highly customizable calendarView and calendarViewController for iOS
MIT licensed. |
GRProKit
AppKit "replacement" to replicate the Pro App look BSD licensed. |
Typhoon
SimpleDatePicker
A simple date picker with flat design. MIT licensed. |