The Week In Links - Feb 8, 2019
» Cal Newport on Why We’ll Look Back at Our Smartphones Like Cigarettes
It’s a fair analogy, I think. I’m not ready to trade my iPhone in for a flip hone, but I’m rethinking my relationship with my phone and with social media in particular.
» Watch a Homemade Robot Crack a SentrySafe Combination Safe in 15 Minutes
Last Christmas, Nathan Seidle’s wife gave him a second-hand safe she’d found on Craigslist. It was, at first glance, a strange gift. The couple already owned the same model, a $120 SentrySafe combination fire safe they’d bought from Home Depot. But this one, his wife explained, had a particular feature: The original owner had locked it and forgotten the combination. Her challenge to Seidle: Open it.
Impressive.
» Random Travel Hacks
There are some great tips in here, and he uses the same backpack I do. I should probably write a similar post at some point, I’ve accumulated a number of tips and tricks myself.
» My Travel Packing List Shortcut
Another travel related tip, this one for using Shortcuts. I’ve done something similar, and it’s a life saver. I’m generally a bit anxious when traveling anyway, and I find that having a detailed checklist for packing (almost 100 items on mine), as well as other things that have to be done, makes a huge difference in my level of anxiety.
» Microsoft’s fonts catch out another fraudster—this time in Canada
Lesson: when forging documents allegedly from many years ago, make sure you choose fonts that were around then.
» How will Apple redesign the iPad home screen?
As a heavy user of the 2018 12.9" iPad Pro, I’m keenly interested in what iOS 13 will bring. Redesigning the home screen to be more functional is high on my wish list. Jason Snell has a great take on this at Macworld.
I don’t know how radical a makeover Apple’s planning for the iPad home screen, but I hope it will provide us with more than a new view into the same old collection of apps. I like my iPhone home screen to be simple, but it’s small. My iPad screen is bigger than the one on my MacBook—it deserves to host a home screen that’s got more functionality and density than the one the iPad has suffered with for its entire existence.
» The Big List of Naughty Strings is a list of strings which have a high probability of causing issues when used as user-input data.
The Big List of Naughty Strings is an evolving list of strings which have a high probability of causing issues when used as user-input data. This is intended for use in helping both automated and manual QA testing
Handy.
» Thinking Different: Keys to Adopting an iPad-First Workflow
I’m not iPad-first, but I’m definitely using it for more tasks that I would have used a Mac for a few years ago. Writing this, for instance.
Before the iPad Pro debuted in late 2015, transitions from Mac to iPad were extremely scarce. The iPad’s hardware and software were both far too limited to compel many switchers. The software has advanced since that time – thanks to Split View, drag and drop, and Files, it’s far easier to work on an iPad than before – but there’s plenty more progress still to be made. The hardware, however, is where the iPad has shined most, especially with the newest iPad Pros.