CBS (via John Gruber):
Steve Wozniak, who helped introduce new technologies by inventing the earliest Apple computers, is sounding the alarm about one of the great threats of this new Information Age: internet fraud. He talks with correspondent John Blackstone about fighting for the victims of online scams involving AI, cryptocurrency and faked messages, and about his yearslong lawsuit against YouTube seeking what he considers better protections for consumers – a fight made harder by the government’s legal protections for online publishers.
They mean Section 230. YouTube will promptly remove copyright violations, but even after Woz reported that his likeness was being used to promote Bitcoin scams, it wouldn’t take them down. His litigation has been stalled for five years.
Woz just turned 75 and took some time on his birthday to comment on Slashdot (via Hacker News):
I gave all my Apple wealth away because wealth and power are not what I live for. I have a lot of fun and happiness. I funded a lot of important museums and arts groups in San Jose, the city of my birth, and they named a street after me for being good. I now speak publicly and have risen to the top. I have no idea how much I have but after speaking for 20 years it might be $10M plus a couple of homes. I never look for any type of tax dodge. I earn money from my labor and pay something like 55% combined tax on it. I am the happiest person ever. Life to me was never about accomplishment, but about Happiness, which is Smiles minus Frowns. I developed these philosophies when I was 18-20 years old and I never sold out.
John Blackstone:
Wozniak sold most of his Apple stock in the mid-1980s when he left the company. Today, though, he still gets a small paycheck from Apple for making speeches and representing the company.
He says he’s proud to see Apple become a trillion-dollar company. “Apple is still the best,” he said. “And when Apple does things I don’t like, and some of the closeness I wish it were more open, I’ll speak out about it. Nobody buys my voice!”
I asked, “Apple listen to you when you speak out?”
“No,” Wozniak smiled. “Oh, no. Oh, no.”
Previously:
Apple Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Business History Lawsuit Legal Steve Wozniak Web YouTube
Marcin Krzyżanowski (Mastodon):
TextKit 2 (NSTextLayoutManager) API was announced publicly during WWDC21, which is over 4 years ago. Before that, it was in private development for a few years and gained widespread adoption in the macOS and iOS frameworks. Promised an easier, faster, overall better API and text layout engine that replaces the aged TextKit 1 (NSLayoutManager) engine.
[…]
Based on my 4 years of experience working with it, I feel like I fell into a trap. It’s not a silver bullet. It is arguably an improvement over TextKit 1. I want to discuss certain issues that make the TextKit 2 annoying to use (at best) and not the right tool for the job (at the worst).
[…]
Bugs in software are expected, and for TextKit 2, it’s no exception. I reported many bugs myself. Some issues are fixed, while others remain unresolved. Many users received no response. Additionally, bugs occur in specific versions, and regressions are common. It is annoying to maintain compatibility, of course. From my perspective, probably the most annoying bugs are around the “extra line fragment” (the rectangle for the extra line fragment at the end of a document) and its broken layout.
[…]
When ensuring layout only in the viewport (visible area), all other parts of the document are estimated. Specifically, the total height of the document is estimated. The estimation changes frequently as I lay out more/different parts of the document. […] The jiggery is super annoying and hard to accept. […] For a long time, I thought that I “hold it wrong” and there must be a way (maybe a private API) that addresses these problems, then I realized I’m not wrong. TextEdit app from macOS suffers from the very same issues I do in my implementations.
The API is designed for subclassing different pieces but doesn’t actually work if you try to do that.
Simon B. Støvring:
Marcin is way further down the rabbit hole than I am, but I can certainly relate to his frustrations.
In fact, this is part of the reason I haven’t gotten further with Runestone for Mac. I hope to get further one day, but building a great text editor is incredibly time-consuming because you either add workaround upon workaround or you drop down to Core Text, which I did with Runestone for iOS/iPadOS.
Peter Steinberger:
Building stuff on closed source broken API is so incredibly frustrating.
Dominik Wagner:
It used to be worth it to provide the best native experience you can bring. But with the latest best of breed quality of first party apps not even knowing what that should mean it becomes futile.
I know if I would start now I would prioritize both cross platform and open source.
Previously:
Bug Cocoa Mac macOS 15 Sequoia Programming Text Kit TextEdit
Marcin Krzyżanowski (tweet):
Notepad.exe is a native macOS application I've crafted with love to enhance your development experience. Built on a plug-and-play philosophy, it gets you coding instantly with zero setup, then scales with your needs. Whether you're prototyping Swift apps, experimenting with Python scripts, building iOS apps with automatic simulator support, or exploring new ideas, Notepad.exe provides a streamlined environment that grows with your expertise - from simple snippets to complex projects.
[…]
Write code and hit run. No project files, no configuration. Start simple, scale up with packages and iOS simulators when needed.
[…]
Local AI assistance that respects your code. What happens on your Mac, stays on your Mac.
It’s kind of like CodeRunner but with a more powerful editor (with inline compiler errors and local AI assistance) and more Swift-specific features and templates. It costs $99 for a lifetime license or $24.99/year.
Fatbobman:
Nowadays, Xcode Playgrounds seems to have deviated from its original purpose, and configuring VSCode can be overly complex for beginners. Against this backdrop, how can we easily set up an environment suitable for learning and testing Swift? Perhaps Notepad.exe, as introduced in this article, will provide a satisfying solution.
[…]
On the surface, Notepad.exe seems limited to single-code-file projects. However, this doesn’t prevent developers from thoroughly learning and testing functionalities. By simply adding @main to the code, Notepad.exe can run it as a complete macOS application. This allows developers not only to explore individual APIs but also to observe their behavior throughout a complete application lifecycle.
From my perspective, Swift Playgrounds were a great idea that didn’t really deliver. They’re weirdly heavyweight and slow and oftentimes just don’t work (though Xcode 26 seems to improve things). Notepad.exe is much more my style for doing quick experiments. If you use Little Snitch, be aware that Notepad.exe has very aggressive online activation. It won’t work without constant network access.
Previously:
Artificial Intelligence Developer Tool iOS iOS 18 Little Snitch Mac Mac App macOS 15 Sequoia Notepad.exe Privacy Programming Python Simulator Swift Playgrounds Swift Programming Language Text Editor
