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  1. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
  2. <rss version="2.0">
  3.  <channel>
  4.    <title>inessential.com</title>
  5.    <link>https://inessential.com/</link>
  6.    <description>Brent Simmons’s weblog.</description>
  7. <language>en</language>
  9.    <item>
  10.      <title>Tough Season in the Apple Fields</title>
  11.      <link>https://inessential.com/2025/08/25/tough-season.html</link>
  12.      <guid>https://inessential.com/2025/08/25/tough-season.html</guid>
  13.      <pubDate>Mon, 25 Aug 2025 16:59:43 -0700</pubDate>
  14.      <description>&lt;p&gt;
  15. &lt;p&gt;We’re adopting Liquid Glass for NetNewsWire 7, which we’ll release some time after the new versions of macOS and iOS come out.&lt;/p&gt;
  16.  
  17. &lt;p&gt;Stuart Breckenridge has been doing great work on getting this done — and he’s written up a couple blog posts (with screenshots!) on his progress. See:&lt;/p&gt;
  18.  
  19. &lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://stuartbreckenridge.net/adopting-liquid-glass-part-ii-netnewswire-mac/&quot;&gt;Adopting Liquid Glass, Part II (NetNewsWire Mac)&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
  20. &lt;a href=&quot;https://stuartbreckenridge.net/adopting-liquid-glass-part-iii-netnewswire-ios/&quot;&gt;Adopting Liquid Glass, Part III (NetNewsWire iOS)&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
  21.  
  22. &lt;p&gt;Since the app is made with mostly stock Apple UI, you might think that using Liquid Glass would be very little work, that it might be pretty automatic or just a matter of checking a few boxes. But that’s not true this year: it’s been a fair amount of work.&lt;/p&gt;
  23.  
  24. &lt;p&gt;Other apps, apps with more custom UI, will probably have even more work, but even for us it’s been more than a bit.&lt;/p&gt;
  25.  
  26. &lt;p&gt;And we’re not done. There will be little things (hopefully just little things) still to do before shipping. Including verifying that it all works as expected on the actual OS releases.&lt;/p&gt;
  27.  
  28. &lt;p&gt;But all credit to Stuart, who got right on this and did a superb job.&lt;/p&gt;
  29.  
  30. &lt;p&gt;(Note: if you want to see the code, you can: it’s on our &lt;a href=&quot;https://github.com/Ranchero-Software/NetNewsWire/tree/experimental/liquid-glass&quot;&gt;experimental/liquid-glass branch&lt;/a&gt;.)&lt;/p&gt;
  31.  
  32. &lt;h3 id=&quot;but-my-mac&quot;&gt;But My Mac&lt;/h3&gt;
  33.  
  34. &lt;p&gt;As pleased as I am with Stuart’s work, I’m not pleased with Liquid Glass itself.&lt;/p&gt;
  35.  
  36. &lt;p&gt;I don’t really care about it on iOS/iPadOS, because whatever. I don’t love those devices. I love Macs because it’s on Macs where you can set out to make new things that change the world.&lt;/p&gt;
  37.  
  38. &lt;p&gt;(Okay. Fine. On iPhones and iPads you &lt;em&gt;can&lt;/em&gt;, I guess, but generally it’s much harder, and it has to be an approved activity using an approved app. And one thing you definitely can’t do on those devices is create apps. [All apologies to people who do manage to edit their podcast episodes on an iPad or write at length on an iPhone. Cool! But I hope that even those folks will grant me my point.])&lt;/p&gt;
  39.  
  40. &lt;p&gt;And so I seriously dislike the experience of using a Mac with Liquid Glass. The UI has become the star, but the drunken star, blurry, illegible, and physically unstable. It makes making things way more of a struggle than it used to be.&lt;/p&gt;
  41.  
  42. &lt;p&gt;We had pretty good Mac UI, but Apple took the bad parts of it — the translucency and blurriness already there — and dialed it way up and called it content-centric. But it seems to me the opposite. Liquid Glass is Liquid-Glass-centric.&lt;/p&gt;
  43.  
  44. &lt;h3 id=&quot;perspective&quot;&gt;Perspective&lt;/h3&gt;
  45.  
  46. &lt;p&gt;First thing: I have many friends at Apple and I didn’t want to write any of this. And there are legions of engineers and designers who I don’t know but whose work I respect greatly. It’s not their fault that this is the direction of the UI.&lt;/p&gt;
  47.  
  48. &lt;p&gt;And this is not the first time we’re going through a rough patch with Apple. I think of them as seasons — we had, for instance, terrible-keyboard season not so long ago. We were wondering if Apple would just stop making Macs altogether. But then that passed and we even got these wonderful Apple Silicon machines. Seasons end.&lt;/p&gt;
  49.  
  50. &lt;p&gt;And we’re in a tough season with Swift these days too. It’s gotten so complex and difficult that I find myself daydreaming about going back to Objective-C. Objective-C is definitely funny-looking, but once you get past that it’s actually small and simple.&lt;/p&gt;
  51.  
  52. &lt;p&gt;But with &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.donnywals.com/what-is-approachable-concurrency-in-xcode-26/&quot;&gt;Swift approachable concurrency&lt;/a&gt; and other changes I can see eventually getting through this season and to a pretty great place, so I’m optimistic.&lt;/p&gt;
  53.  
  54. &lt;p&gt;Seasons do end, in other words, or mostly seem to end (though not the App Store monopoly season, not so far), and I’ve resolved to just wait for Liquid Glass’s replacement. Perhaps along the way it will get refined enough so that people like me can use it without eye strain.&lt;/p&gt;
  55.  
  56. &lt;h3 id=&quot;better-perspective&quot;&gt;Better Perspective&lt;/h3&gt;
  57.  
  58. &lt;p&gt;But far, far worse than any of the above is Tim Cook’s gold statue presented to the President. And everything that went along with that. I felt utterly sick and I bet you did too. (And it made me seriously wonder if I wanted to continue writing apps for Apple platforms.)&lt;/p&gt;
  59.  
  60. &lt;p&gt;I understand John Gruber’s argument in &lt;a href=&quot;https://daringfireball.net/2025/08/gold_frankincense_and_silicon&quot;&gt;Gold, Frankincense, and Silicon&lt;/a&gt; that maybe Cook’s move was the best possible move in a terribly corrupted system.&lt;/p&gt;
  61.  
  62. &lt;p&gt;But what’s the use of being so rich and so powerful, I would ask Tim Cook, if you, even more than regular people, have to debase yourself before the dictator?&lt;/p&gt;
  63.  
  64. &lt;p&gt;It’s tempting to think that our current government is just a season, like the bad keyboards or like Liquid Glass will eventually prove to be. Wait till the mid-terms or the next presidential election, you might think.&lt;/p&gt;
  65.  
  66. &lt;p&gt;But there’s no reason to think that this authoritarian turn is just a season. Something besides just wishing and waiting for better is required.&lt;/p&gt;</description>
  67.    </item>
  68.  
  69.    <item>
  70.      <title>Breakpoints Show Thursday in Seattle</title>
  71.      <link>https://inessential.com/2025/08/18/free-breakpoints-show.html</link>
  72.      <guid>https://inessential.com/2025/08/18/free-breakpoints-show.html</guid>
  73.      <pubDate>Mon, 18 Aug 2025 10:54:18 -0700</pubDate>
  74.      <description>&lt;p&gt;
  75. &lt;p&gt;James Dempsey and the Breakpoints will be appearing in a &lt;a href=&quot;https://xcoders.org/2025/08/12/special-event-breakpoint-jam-with.html&quot;&gt;Breakpoints Jam this Thursday&lt;/a&gt; (Aug. 21) at Bale Breaker in Ballard. Free show! Awesome songs!&lt;/p&gt;
  76.  
  77. &lt;p&gt;The event starts at 6 pm and music will start around 7 pm. I’ll be on guitar — and you can expect local superstars Ken Case (keyboard, vocals) and Laura Savino (vocals) plus a special mystery guest or two from out of town.&lt;/p&gt;
  78.  
  79. &lt;p&gt;The show will be mostly acoustic, and it will be outside at the picnic tables. I hope to see you there!&lt;/p&gt;</description>
  80.    </item>
  81.  
  82.    <item>
  83.      <title>Saturday March</title>
  84.      <link>https://inessential.com/2025/06/13/saturday-march.html</link>
  85.      <guid>https://inessential.com/2025/06/13/saturday-march.html</guid>
  86.      <pubDate>Fri, 13 Jun 2025 20:04:06 -0700</pubDate>
  87.      <description>&lt;p&gt;
  88. &lt;p&gt;Tomorrow is &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.nokings.org/&quot;&gt;No Kings&lt;/a&gt;. There’s one near you!&lt;/p&gt;
  89.  
  90. &lt;p&gt;Chatting with my friends about how I hate these fascist assholes doesn’t do a damn thing. Protests work. (Imperfectly, sure, with no guarantees. But it sure beats &lt;em&gt;not&lt;/em&gt; protesting.)&lt;/p&gt;</description>
  91.    </item>
  92.  
  93.    <item>
  94.      <title>Retirement Day</title>
  95.      <link>https://inessential.com/2025/06/06/retirement-day.html</link>
  96.      <guid>https://inessential.com/2025/06/06/retirement-day.html</guid>
  97.      <pubDate>Fri, 06 Jun 2025 11:20:46 -0700</pubDate>
  98.      <description>&lt;p&gt;
  99. &lt;p&gt;I wrote in my &lt;a href=&quot;https://inessential.com/2025/05/23/love_letter.html&quot;&gt;love letter to my colleagues at Audible&lt;/a&gt; that retirement is coming up — and now it’s here. Today’s the day!&lt;/p&gt;
  100.  
  101. &lt;p&gt;I’ve attended my last meetings. I’ve said my goodbyes. My laptop’s ready to ship back to Audible HQ.&lt;/p&gt;
  102.  
  103. &lt;p style=&quot;text-align:center&quot;&gt;* * *&lt;/p&gt;
  104.  
  105. &lt;p&gt;I started working in 1984, while in high school, busing tables part time at &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.schaeferscanalhouse.com/&quot;&gt;Schaefers Canal House&lt;/a&gt; in Chesapeake City, MD.&lt;/p&gt;
  106.  
  107. &lt;p&gt;And I stopped working this day in 2025, almost 41 years later, as a senior engineer (which is surprisingly a lot like busing tables — lots of cleanup and setting the table just right for the customers to have a great time).&lt;/p&gt;
  108.  
  109. &lt;p&gt;Along the way I worked on, among other apps, Userland Frontier, NetNewsWire, MarsEdit, Glassboard, Vesper, OmniFocus, OmniOutliner, and Audible.&lt;/p&gt;
  110.  
  111. &lt;p style=&quot;text-align:center&quot;&gt;* * *&lt;/p&gt;
  112.  
  113. &lt;p&gt;My immediate plan — Exhale! Breathe. Enjoy a steak. Watch WWDC from the comfort of home next week. Get back to work on NetNewsWire.&lt;/p&gt;
  114.  
  115. &lt;p&gt;🌲&lt;/p&gt;</description>
  116.    </item>
  117.  
  118.    <item>
  119.      <title>Retirement and NetNewsWire</title>
  120.      <link>https://inessential.com/2025/05/24/retirement_and_netnewswire.html</link>
  121.      <guid>https://inessential.com/2025/05/24/retirement_and_netnewswire.html</guid>
  122.      <pubDate>Sat, 24 May 2025 11:29:44 -0700</pubDate>
  123.      <description>&lt;p&gt;
  124. &lt;p&gt;To answer some questions people have asked me about my impending retirement…&lt;/p&gt;
  125.  
  126. &lt;h4 id=&quot;what-does-it-mean-for-netnewswire&quot;&gt;What does it mean for NetNewsWire?&lt;/h4&gt;
  127.  
  128. &lt;p&gt;Good things! I’m not retiring from writing apps — which means I’ll have a lot more time for working on NetNewsWire.&lt;/p&gt;
  129.  
  130. &lt;p&gt;It’s been 15 years since the last time I could work on NetNewsWire during weekdays (as opposed to just nights and weekends), and I’m super-psyched for this.&lt;/p&gt;
  131.  
  132. &lt;h4 id=&quot;will-you-work-on-any-other-apps&quot;&gt;Will you work on any other apps?&lt;/h4&gt;
  133.  
  134. &lt;p&gt;Yes. I have several ideas for other apps I’d like to work on, and have made a little progress on one of them.&lt;/p&gt;
  135.  
  136. &lt;p&gt;They will all be free and open source. I have no plans to create apps for money. (I’ll be retired — &lt;em&gt;not working for money anymore&lt;/em&gt; is the point.)&lt;/p&gt;
  137.  
  138. &lt;h4 id=&quot;will-you-be-taking-a-big-trip-right-after-retiring&quot;&gt;Will you be taking a big trip right after retiring?&lt;/h4&gt;
  139.  
  140. &lt;p&gt;Every time this comes up, I joke that the first thing I’ll be doing is &lt;em&gt;sleeping&lt;/em&gt;. Forty years of work is a long time, and I’ve earned a long nap.&lt;/p&gt;
  141.  
  142. &lt;p&gt;We do have some travel plans, but no big trips yet. We will. There’s so much of the world we want to see!&lt;/p&gt;
  143.  
  144. &lt;p&gt;My actual first week of retirement will be taken up by WWDC. I won’t be there — I’ll be at home watching the videos like most everyone else. Only this time I won’t have to think about how the changes will affect things at work.&lt;/p&gt;
  145.  
  146. &lt;h4 id=&quot;do-you-have-any-other-hobbies-or-plans-are-you-getting-into-woodworking-pizza-making&quot;&gt;Do you have any other hobbies or plans? Are you getting into woodworking? Pizza-making?&lt;/h4&gt;
  147.  
  148. &lt;p&gt;Yes to other hobbies and plans, though probably not woodworking or pizza (but never say never — those are pretty tempting ideas!).&lt;/p&gt;
  149.  
  150. &lt;p&gt;Making apps is important to me — contributing to the public stack is how I can best use my abilities to make the world better — but it’s also not the only thing.&lt;/p&gt;
  151.  
  152. &lt;p&gt;I have more ideas than time, which is a good problem to have, and once I have some space to think and feel I’ll be able to start picking and get to work.&lt;/p&gt;
  153.  
  154. &lt;h4 id=&quot;will-you-be-blogging-more&quot;&gt;Will you be blogging more?&lt;/h4&gt;
  155.  
  156. &lt;p&gt;I hope so!&lt;/p&gt;
  157.  
  158. &lt;p&gt;The hard part is, after 25 years, finding things to say that I haven’t already said. Maybe I’ll just decide it’s okay to repeat myself in new ways. 🐥&lt;/p&gt;</description>
  159.    </item>
  160.  
  161.  
  162.    
  163.  </channel>
  164. </rss>
  165.  

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