

iOS7 marks the best time to get started in app development - mikeyanderson
https://www.codefellows.org/blogs/5-reasons-ios7-marks-the-best-time-to-get-started-in-app-development

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RealCasually
I would assert this is the _worst_ time in history to get started in app
development. I have been building apps since 2008, and things have been going
downhill for indie developers. Back in 2008, many large companies didn't
understand the space, and indie devs were able to carve out very lucrative
niches. Now, with the abundance of simple toolsets, tutorials and classes,
there is an app for seemingly everything. Worse still is the price for apps
has been pushed down to effectively $0. Without creative marketing or a
sizable marketing budget, creating an app in today's market is brutally
challenging. Sure, you can hack up a quick utility now, but the chance it pays
your rent for a month is approaching zero, quickly.

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mikeyanderson
If you're experienced I'll bet you could get a great job at a dozen companies.

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maxjg
Worth noting that Letterpress is _not_ implemented in UIKit, it's pure OpenGL
([http://www.imore.com/loren-brichter-talks-opengl-tweetie-
let...](http://www.imore.com/loren-brichter-talks-opengl-tweetie-letterpress-
and-future-interface)).

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meghagulati
Will this make easier to make games like Letterpress?

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hijk
It sounds like UIKit Dynamics will make things like flicking tiles around a
lot easier to implement, without creating a physics engine from scratch... And
UIKit is generally more friendly to flat designs... And the whole game engine
thing is built in now.

But the real value of the best games comes from game-play dynamics, and not
just how well the app simulates physics. Hopefully these changes in iOS will
allow game-builders to focus more on the things that really matter, rather
than redoing the work every game needs to do.

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crazygringo
Who on earth puts the body text in 25px?!?!

I've been noticing a lot of blog fonts getting annoyingly bigger, where I keep
having to zoom-out a couple of times in my browser for good legibility, but
this is just flat-out INSANE.

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mikeyanderson
What size monitor do you have? I've written about big type on blogs here:
[http://mikeyanderson.com/optimal_characters_per_line](http://mikeyanderson.com/optimal_characters_per_line)

~~~
aes
Here's a data point for you:

For me, the text on that article felt way too big when viewed in a full screen
browser on a 1280x800 display. Frankly, it's about as bad as if the font-size
were 12px or 13px.

Resizing the browser window to only take half of the screen width makes it
better on my eyes (it appears to be 17px). Still, after that, I felt the need
to go to developer console and change line-height to 1.4.

I chuckled a bit when, after these adjustments, I arrived at the sentence:

> The fact you’ve read to this paragraph is proof that there is something to
> my argument.

I'm on a 13" Macbook Pro, and lying on a couch, so my viewing distance may be
a bit closer than if I were sitting on a desk. I'm 33 years old, with
relatively ok eyesight (no glasses), and totally buy your other arguments (I'm
a fan of Bringhurst myself).

It's just that anything more than 18px on a laptop display just feels too big.

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mikeyanderson
Any other reasons you can add?

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AdrianRossouw
i think there might be a small case for the more aesthetically inclined people
being in the market for replacement apps that are more in-line with the new
IOS design language.

this MIGHT lead to opportunities for a very well written new app in a
currently well populated niche to gain an advantage over existing entrants.
Provided the competitors don't release a newer re-designed version post-haste.

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devanti
probably true on the development side. but on the business side, there are
just so many apps popping out left and right for every niche market you can
think of.

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hijk
...which means everyone agrees it's a good time to be making apps?

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dennycd
iOS 7 SDK stuff is still under developer preview NDA, shouldn't be discussed
in the light i think....

