Issue 54

10^th August 2012

Written by Dave Verwer

Comment

Maybe it was me who was too busy with watching the Olympics this week or maybe everyone else was but either way it has resulted in a smaller than normal issue this week. Still some good stuff in here though and so without any more waffling, bring on the links.

News

Khronos Releases OpenGL ES 3.0 Specification

Open GL ES 3.0 spec has been finalised and published this week. iOS 7 maybe? 8? Who knows but I would imagine that Apple will be working hard to get this in and available as soon as possible. I thought the comments in the press release mentioning ARM specifically were quite interesting too.

Tools

0xced: Prepare your apps for the new iPhone

I’m not usually one to link to any speculation about new hardware for iOS but I couldn’t let this one pass. I wouldn’t take this as anything more than an indication that Apple have done anything more than experiment with this but it’s interesting to see how your apps react to a different resolution.

Code

Release the Kraken

This looks like an interesting early release of a new 3D engine written in C++ by Gilbert Kearwood. iOS only for now but with plans for cross platform support and some interesting built in features this looks like an engine to keep an eye on.

Fourgy

After a disappointing rejection this week, Daniel Tull has released his iPod look-alike app on GitHub. When I installed this all I could do was smile with nostalgia (even though it wasn’t that long ago this was current technology). Given that this will never make the App Store, it is great to see the project released as open source and I am sure there is code in here we can all learn from.

MPFlipViewController

Mark Pospesel has released another flipboard-esque view controller for providing full page flip animations between view controllers. I think I have probably linked to enough of these now that this will be the last but this one looked like a nice clean implementation of the technique so I thought it worth including.

Collision Detection Using the Separating Axis Theorem

How do you fancy stretching your mathematical muscles a little? Kah Shiu Chong goes over the theory of collision detection using the separating axis theorem which is based around attempting to draw a line between two shapes to determine if they are colliding. This article actually uses ActionScript as the language for demonstrating this technique but the concept is very applicable to iOS as well and the code could be converted easily.

Design

Source Sans Pro: Adobe’s first open source type family

Another week, another beautiful open source font release. Source Sans Pro from Adobe this week is a gorgeous typeface which has been specifically designed for use in user interfaces.

Business and Marketing

Track your iPhone, iPad and Mac app rankings with Appstatics

Appstatics from AppsFire, released this week is an iOS app for tracking App Store rankings on device. Works well if you need second by second access to your rankings wherever you are throughout the day.

Zyngapocalypse Now (And What Comes Next?)

Despite it being published on TechCrunch, this post by Tadhg Kelly is a well written look at the current state of casual and F2P games and the problems facing games on platforms like iOS and Facebook.