Hello new (and old) followers

I see this blog has picked up some subscribers lately. Don’t count on much activity here from now on– everything’s moved to http://post404.com.

If you liked this blog, you’ll LOVE that one! So update your subscriptions!

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New Year, New Direction

I want to thank WordPress for the very cool blog stats job they did for the 2011 summary.  Saved me a lot of work!

Which is especially good since I’ve been working hard on something new (I know, I know: what’s new in that, right?).  But bear with me!

2011 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

Madison Square Garden can seat 20,000 people for a concert. This blog was viewed about 67,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Madison Square Garden, it would take about 3 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Microsoft + Nokia Babies: Hate at a Distance, Love Up Close

original source: http://www.pop.com.br/

Apologies to QML fans but I’m going to to extend the interruption of that series by at least one more article.  Blame a cynical friend’s recent conversion to the Dark Side of mobile Microsoft. 

More Post-MeeGo Musing: Community Echoes

Ever since Intel’s MeeGo-cedes-to-Tizen announcement, I’ve been in a slightly unfocused state.  It’s familiar territory– when Maemo was set aside by Nokia for MeeGo, there was the same quandary: what now?  Better yet, what next?

After a little over two years of scant free time, I’m finally working normal hours.  So that liberates me for more community engagement, aka the stuff I really love.  It also frees me up to think.  But looking back on the past 5 years of support for open source projects with great promise but ultimate abandonment, I’m left to wonder what to target. 

A Qt QML Beginner’s Project: MotoRing, part 2 – Rewind and Reveal

Finally, here’s the much-demanded second part to this QML beginner-focused series.  Okay, one guy asked, but he sounded really interested.

I said at the end of the first article that I would progress to the next phase in this one.  But the request for a screenshot of the app at this point got me to thinking that it would be worth more to fledgling QML developers if I backed up and broke down the code.  So let’s do it.  There’s a lot to cover, so I’ll spread it across two or three articles.

A Qt QML Beginner’s Project: MotoRing, part 1 – GPS

I unloaded some Qt newbie frustration the other day detailing my first serious efforts to code for the Nokia N9.  Now I’d like to step back a bit and outline the actual project, and in subsequent posts walk other newcomers through my coding journey of pleasure and pain.

First a disclaimer: I’ve been programming for over 25 years.  That has included COBOL, Forth, Logo, DOS/VAX/Unix batch commands, Basic, LISP, Pascal, C, JavaScript and Visual Basic (both COM and .NET).  While I could work minor wonders with scripting and compiled linear languages, I found that I have been most productive in event-driven VB.Net.  Readers should know that I am not targeting an audience that’s totally new to programming, but rather, programmers who like me are experienced with other languages and platforms but new to Qt.

I really wasn’t very apprehensive about Qt, especially the mature 4.7.  Friends kept telling me how easy it was, and the Qt Creator environment did not look difficult at all at first glance.