Messages to Nowhere

This article has been updated, and moved here

NSWorkspace Bug in - openFile: ?

EDITED TO ADD: I could reproduce this bug in a large project, but not isolate it in a smaller one. It is much likely for my code to have a bug then NSWorkspace. I’m still not 100% certain that this issue wasn’t my fault in some way I don’t understand. But no [...]

Hick’s Law

I do not put much faith in Hick’s Law. I’ve seen it misapplied and drastically misinterpreted. Its limits, and edge-cases, are not widely known. I am convinced that it is generally not a dominant factor, even when it is relevant. I don’t agree with many design choices it is used to justify. In [...]

Leopard Unready

EDITED TO ADD: IMLocation now runs on Leopard.

I thought maybe it might receive more attention if you, the Mac OS X software-buying public, were aware of the situation. The third-party software that you’re paying for, depending on, and hoping to run on Leopard, we cannot test on the final release build until we can run [...]

When Computers Kill: Radiation Overdose

I was watching BBC News on EyeTV this morning, and caught the tail end of a horrific story about hundreds of French patients who received crippling, and sometimes fatal, overdoses of radiation.
Earlier this year, a major scandal erupted in France when it was discovered that between 1989 and 2006, two radiotherapy units had accidentally given [...]

MacOSX Redesign: Feedback for “Hold Keys”

To prevent particularly bad slips (errors while performing the physical actions required to achieve a goal), Apple makes certain keys hold keys. That means you have to hold them down for a while before they do their thing, unlike any other button that you just tap to use. This prevents accidentally engaging the [...]

Freakish Bug

A single fruit-fly had been pestering me today. I made a few half-hearted attempts to swat it, but no joy. Then as I was pouring out of a 2L bottle of club-soda, it flew up into the bottle. I don’t know how it made it in through that little opening, while avoiding [...]

NSApplicationName Inconsistencies

This article has been updated, and moved here.

Error Message Rogues Gallery

Here’s a rogues gallery of terrible error messages I’ve encountered personally; along with what the programmers and designers should do to fix them.
I’ve been saving this screenshot for years (To be exact, since January 10, 2000):

An unexpected error occurred, because it cannot be found.
[OK]

Seriously, WTF? This is one of the best (worst?) examples of [...]

Bad WordPress Graphs: Inconsistent Units

The “Blog Stats” graphs at WordPress.com (my blog host as I write this) could use some work. One problem: the last point is bogus, and has different units then every other point on the graph. This strongly distorts the most recent traffic information (this is the most topical, and generally most valuable part [...]