News, info, and opinion by Mac users, for Mac users.

September 12, 2007

software

Cabel vs. the three pixels

Posted Sep. 12, ’07, 9:40 AM PT by Dan Moren
Category | Software

Cabel SasserIf you’ve never had the chance to listen to or read anything by Panic co-founder Cabel Sasser, then you are dead to me. Dead. I know, it’s serious stuff. I had the pleasure of hearing Cabel speak at this year’s C4 conference about the development of Coda, Panic’s web development application.

In his latest blog post, Cabel elaborates on one of the details he touched on in that presentation: the way they wanted to draw Coda’s toolbar was incompatible with the way that OS X handles toolbars, because of a 3 pixel gap. They tried, tried, and tried some more to hack a way of making the toolbar look like their mockups, but they could never find a way to get it to work.

So they wrote their own toolbar from scratch instead.

I highly recommend the full entry if, for no other reason, it gives you an idea of just how meticulous and passionate Mac software developers can be about their products. When’s the last time you heard of a Windows developer who decided to rewrite an entire toolbar because of three pixels? That’s thinking different, my friends.

[via Daring Fireball]


6 Comments

Walt said:

I especially like his take on how iTunes (the app) came into existence. I love using Unison for my meager usenet usage. Here's my take on the name "Coda." You know slang spelling for gangster (gangsta) and sucker (sucka)? Well, they like to code. So they call themselves "codas." plural for coda. I could be waaay off, but that's what I think.

September 12, 2007 10:21 AM
jackfrost Author Profile Page said:

I think that's a little unfair to Windows developers -- software developers on both Mac and Windows can be passionate. Just don't blame Windows developers because their OS isn't as good :).

September 12, 2007 1:13 PM
Dan Moren said:

@jackfrost Perhaps they're just less vocal about it. It just hasn't been my experience. Then again, that could also be because Windows as an OS doesn't really reward its developers for paying that much thought into the look of their app. It's like putting makeup on a pig.

September 12, 2007 1:38 PM
msadesign Author Profile Page said:

Lemme see. These guys spent HOW many man-hours just so they could do a non-standard menu bar? I'm not exactly sure why this isn't met with derision by those who appreciate the standardiation that is Mac.
Oh, by the way, Panic rules…

September 13, 2007 5:18 AM
jackfrost Author Profile Page said:

@dan I agree about the aesthetics of Windows applications. I'm just saying that, in terms of the quality of their code, (good) Windows developers are no less skilled than (good) Mac developers.

September 13, 2007 7:09 AM
tayker said:

"When’s the last time you heard of a Windows developer who decided to rewrite an entire toolbar because of three pixels?"

I have never heard a Windows programmer complain about the platform they're programming for, but I have heard them rant about deadlines. I never had problems (interface, etc) when I was learning Borland C/C++ and Visual BASIC and C/C++ (I'm more of a BASIC weenie, cut my teeth on a TS-1000 and Apple IIc/IIe). Outside of scripting, I haven't done any programming on my Macs, and knowing that it can be frustrating makes me leery now.

September 14, 2007 4:29 AM

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