Roel.io

Apr 23, 2018 ∞

How Susan Kare designed the original Mac icons

I finally read the New Yorker article on Susan Kare, ‘The Woman Who Gave the Macintosh a Smile’. And loved this detail about the Command icon on every Mac keyboard:

The command icon, still right there to the left of your space bar, was based on a Swedish campground sign meaning “interesting feature,” pulled from a book of historical symbols.

The hardest icons were actions that didn’t have a real world equivalent, like Undo. And what about the Copy icon?

At one point, there was to be an icon of a copy machine for making a copy of a file, and users would drag and drop a file onto it to copy it, but it was difficult to render a copier at that scale. Kare also tried a cat in a mirror, for copycat. Neither made the cut.

Apr 22, 2018 ∞

Earth Day achievement ✅🏃‍♂️

Apr 22, 2018 ∞

In Espresso in the Mountains: an Interview with Alex Strohl, he notes:

I think that photography and coffee meet somewhere on the scale of dedication and precision.

I love that.

Apr 21, 2018 ∞

Good news from The Guardian:

Scientists have created a mutant enzyme that breaks down plastic drinks bottles – by accident. The breakthrough could help solve the global plastic pollution crisis by enabling for the first time the full recycling of bottles.

(via @adamproctor)

Apr 20, 2018 ∞

On The Expanse and Back Burner thinkers

Very interesting article by Rob Rhyne on one of the main characters in The Expanse and Back Burner thinking:

I rely on my sub-conscious brain to churn through what I observe, and process everything into a cohesive picture. The shower, the dinner table, and the car are most often the places where an idea will surface that pulls everything together for me. At times I’ll gaze into the distance. Other times, I need a monotonous task which requires only a little attention.
An early manager—who really understands engineers—used to tell me I was a “burst worker”. That is, I would sit on a problem, and think it completely through. Then I’d open a text editor and dash out a solution in an afternoon. The process was neither slower, or faster, than my fellow engineers. But unless you observed an entire cycle, I would either appear a procrastinator, or a 10x engineer.

It took me years to figure out (some of) the different types of people in my surroundings. And how every one of them thinks, works and reacts in a different way.

Apr 20, 2018 ∞

I just switched from Feed Wrangler to Feedbin as my RSS reader of choice. Because Feedbin already added a share to Micro.blog feature, but mainly because I really like the very deliberate product development and the clean UI.

Apr 19, 2018 ∞