www.hans-eric.com

A year ago I began the process of replacing my Palm Treo with something, well, not so ancient. The choice was simple, then. Palm had just released Palm Pre, with a brand new operating system that breathed innovation and promised the best developer experience.

The phone hadn’t been released in Sweden (or Europe) yet so I waited. And waited. Then Palm got financial troubles and was sold to HP, while I – loosing faith – entered into a state of irresolution.

That was until a friend of mine showed me an app he purchased for his iPhone. It enabled him to point his device towards the night sky and get information of the stars and planets in view. Fantastic. Breathtaking. I had to get myself an iPhone.

Of course, that was before Chad Fowler moved to Android. Now what am I to do? I guess I should try and make an informed decision.

The requirements:

• UMTS capable
• Starmap or equivalent application
• Fun to develop for

iPhone seems to have the best user experience, and integrates beautifully with other devices from apple. On the flip side is the vendor lock-in.

Android has Google Sky Map, not as good looking as Starmap on iPhone but the important  functionality seems to be there.

Developing for Android gives you several alternatives. iPhone, on the other hand, has only one allowed option. I can’t decide if having to learn Objective-C should be considered an advantage or disadvantage for iPhone.

I can’t seem to make up my mind between iPhone and Android. I’ll probably end up flipping a coin, so any input that can help me choose is much appreciated.

Cheers!

As you may or may not have discovered I have been on a long vacation, and intentionally stayed far away from any computer. Unfortunately my blog seems to have broken while I have been gone, particularely the single post pages.

Somehow the ModRewrite rules got screwed up, no idea how. Anyway, it has been taken care of now and the site should be up and running as usual. Many thank’s to Robert Ames who pointed it out for me.

Now, back to vacationing (I still have a week left).

Cheers!

Next week I’m going to attend the 2008 ESRI Developer Summit in Palm Springs. It will be my first time in the USA and I’m really looking forward to the trip. Who knows, I might even meet one of you guys over there.

I’m sad to see that the original author of the role-playing game AD&D, Gary Gygax, has died. I’d like to send a warm, thankful thought to the one who’s work meant so much to me and my role-playing friends in our youths.

I would like the world to remember me as the guy who really enjoyed playing games and sharing his knowledge and his fun pastimes with everybody else.

Rest in peace man.

Sorry for the off-topic.

I saw Al Gore on Swedish television last week. He had received the Gothenburg Sustainable Development Award and was holding a speech at the ceremony. As usual Al Gore was able to capture his audience with a mix of scaring facts and a call for action. This time he conveyed the new prediction that the arctic ice could be gone in as little as five years. While that could very well be a grave exaggeration, we can’t deny that something is terribly wrong with our climate.

Where I live, a coast town in the middle of Sweden, the rising temperature has been particularly noticeable. The first sign came in the late 1980’s when I experienced my first non-white Christmas. Now, having no snow in December has become normal.

This year, the year of 2008 – a year I’ll never forget – we have witnessed something I thought was impossible. This year we had rain in January. Where I live January is the winter month. It’s supposed to be cold and the only thing coming down from the skies should be snow. In my life, and I’ve been on this planet for 37 years, I have never experienced rain in January before. But this year it rained for ten whole days.

So what can we do? Well, Al Gore’s mantra is that “we can do something about it,” and I agree. There are definitely things I can do to reduce my share of released greenhouse gases. I can use my car much less (we have great public transportations here,) and I can, with little effort, save energy. Simple things would be a good place to start; like really turning things off when they’re not used (computers, the TV, lamps), turning heat down (human beings sleep best in 18 degree Celsius) or replacing old energy devouring machines (like our freezer from 1980).

My promise to you, my dear reader, and to the rest of the world, is that 2008 will be the year when I start to implement changes to become a more optimized human being. I will make sacrifices, my life will be less convenient, but I’ll do it happily for the sake of my children and for future generations.

My intentions are not entirely unselfish though, I expect the changes to have a significant and positive effect on my economy as well.

Cheers!

P.S. I can’t help wondering what the world would be like if the outcome of the election had been different.