Archive for: css
Still helplessly holding onto any hope that Steve Jobs would relent and let Flash on the iPhone platform? Just give it up now. It’s not ever going to happen. This is of course based off of an official “Fireside chat” of sorts put out by Steve himself.
Truth be told, it’s not as vindictive and cut throat as I thought a letter concerning such a matter would be. It is very straight to the point, bulleted list type of affair laying out how it’s going to be. If you’ve got a few (it’s long), please hang by a bit longer and give Steve’s response to the Adobe/Apple drama a through reading. It’s kinda of weird though, hearing Steve Jobs — leader of one of the most closed and proprietary companies — pushing for more open web standards. Oh well. It’s interesting none the less.
Get out your popcorn folks and stroll on in…
What a way to start off the GDC today, with some of the biggest news in gaming history! Yesterday Valve announced, (which is completely out of left field, lol) that they are in fact porting Steam to us Mac fanboys. After all the teaser posters we saw last week, it is finally happening! It looks that the first release will be Portal 2, which will be released to both Mac and Windows computers, and then it is on to their more popular titles this Spring.
Not only will the games work on the Mac OS, but it also looks like the cross-platforming will go above and beyond, if you had any Left4Dead saves, or the purchased game, it will swap to the Mac OS, no re-buying the game, just download Steam’s ‘Steam Play’ which will allow the cross-platform migration, so it will work natively on the Mac side. Same goes for Left4Dead 2. We’ll even be able to play head-to-head with PC gamers, we aren’t going to have to deal with our half crowded servers, we’ll actually be able to play with the Windows users, probably giving them more n00bs to pwn since most of the Mac users probably don’t dualboot to Boot Camp just to play video games.
This is some of the best news I have heard in a long time. It looks like my Windows Boot Camp install might go neglected for a really long time 
I hope you all are as excited as me, or am I alone at this blog?? As soon as this is final, and working, Counter Strike: Source and Team Fortress 2 parties all night long!
Valve
[Image Source]
- February 28, 2010 11:28 am
Okay, I love my Mac, I wouldn’t dare to ever by a Windows machine, over 20 years and counting to not owning one…But, I do have Windows running under Boot Camp on my Mac, the reason for this is…Counter Strike:Source running under Steam(Valve). I love this game, and it has forced me to run an inferior product. I have been involved in countless marital spats because of this game, and soon, hopefully, I’ll be in a hell of a lot more.
A post over at the Steam Forums has been gathering a lot of ‘steam’ and been blowing up about the possibility of Valve’s Steam being able to run on Mac OSX, and possibly even Linux. As you can see in the image below, you can see Mac OS X components in the file directory. I am hoping this is more than just a possible OS X theme, just because it is extremely inconvenient to have to re-boot every time I want to slay 16 year kids with my M-4, knife, and smoke grenades.
A lot of work will have to be done, as the entire Steam store will have to be ported to work under OS X, but, this at least gives us some hope of a better future. So for all of those Counter Terrorists out there that hate paying the dynamic weapons pricing, just think, you might be able to do it on the Operating System God intended us to be using!
Mac Rumors <-> Steam Forum
- December 17, 2009 1:44 pm
The App Store is for mobile devices what iTunes was for mp3 players. Apple’s 180 on native applications after first announcing web apps were the way to do back in 2007 was a shock to many and welcomed by most. Since the App Store’s launch however, numerous complaints have been made and even websites created to highlight Apple’s draconian and sometimes senseless decisions concerning the App Store and polices within. It is that negative image and bad press that has re-energized the view of many iPhone devs into the world of web apps.
Wait a second. Weren’t web apps poo-pooed because they were inferior to native apps back in ’07? Why yes, yes they were. Don’t forget however that the mobile market has undergone some vast changes over the last year and a half. Not only has the mobile app world changed in regard to the limits mobile apps could obtain but also in the technologies used for said apps. Like their native cousins, web apps and the supporting technology have equally improved.
We are now at a point where tools such as “PastryKit” allow web developers to code and create webapps that feature some of the most desktop/native-like style and features yet, blurring the line between what is native and what is web. Right about now you’re probably asking yourself what the heck PastryKit is. Allow me to indulge…
PastryKit
- PastryKit is an innovative and constantly improving set of tools allowing web apps. A blend of multiple technologies and languages including JavaScript, CSS, and some supporting graphics resources ensures the new generation of web apps is more robust, functional, and visually appealing. Need an example? If you own an iPhone, simply navigate to support.apple.com/manuals/iphone/ and notice the iPhone optimized manual that loads. Said manual relies on — you guessed it — PastryKit.
For now, consumers will have to wait it out or figure out the workings of PastryKit themselves as Apple hasn’t released the necessary information and source material to include PastryKit in any non-Apple/3rd party solutions. Such an approach has to at least have to do in some part with preventing App Store devs an easy out from App Store restrictions by way of open and free web apps powered by PastryKit. Still, those with the know-how will figure it out soon enough and spread the knowledge to others.
I’m not a developer so I couldn’t begin to explain the pros and cons to each method being used, but if any developer — native or web — want’s to speak up and give some insight into this hotly debated topic, feel free to jump in.
Ars Technica
Flash is the latest craze these days. The iPhone, among others are constantly knocked for not including flash. The few phones that brag of their flash content don’t do all that well in handling it because flash isn’t built for mobile browsers. This means that often flash content won’t scale appropriately as well choppy playback because flash is pretty CPU intensive. There is another option. Animation and 3D support in CSS! And guess what, the iPhone and iPod touch already have it included in mobile Safari. Want to see what I mean? In order to check out a few of the live demos get either a nightly webkit build or just use your iPhone or iPod touch check out a few live demos of what CSS and webkit can do at:
The only problem is flash is extremely common place in the wild web. Animation and 3D through CSS not so much. But adoption is slowly gaining. Hopefully more people hop on the bandwagon as it opens a ton of new doors for mobile web development!
Source: Macrumors, the iPhone Blog
