Time out for Tech

OK. I was supposed to run tonight. But I have way too much work to do, and a serious lack of energy to run. Plus I am tired of running in the snow. I will make up my run sometime this week - not sure when exactly, but I know I will catch up those 8k one day.

So, instead of writing about a run - and instead of focusing on the mountain of work I have to do - I am going to take a quick timeout to highlight three quick cool things that make up the other 2/3 of this blog's title. For those not paying attention, that would be Create and Code.

First off, I neglected to mention something very exciting last week. My company - Red Piston Inc. - recently launched our first major game, called Banzai Blowfish!. for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. Banzai is the result of many, many months of hard effort from my colleagues Ali, Jakub and Patryk. They've done a tremendous job, and on Thursday, our app was selected by Apple to be featured in the "New & Noteworthy" section of the App Store. This is a HUGE deal for us, and I'm proud of the guys. And, while I wasn't directly involved in the day to day development - other projects have kept me busy - I threw in my $0.02 from time to time on level design, sounds, game play, etc. In any case, check it out and let me know what you think.

Secondly, I came across this article today on one of the sites I read daily - daringfireball.net. John Gruber is an Apple pundit, and often has great scoop on what's happening in Cupertino and on the tech scene. Anyway, he posted a link to another site tonight to an article that just shows how much attention to detail Apple pays to their products. It's stuff like this that makes owning and using an iPhone so great, and 99% of the time, you don't even think about these types of things as you use them. Reading stuff like this is a reminder that the small details do matter, and that winning isn't always about hitting home runs, but rather taking care of small details like hitting singles, advancing the runner, etc. How's that for mixing metaphors of baseball and life? Anyway, the article deals with how new email is displayed when you're currently checking out your inbox - it's worth a read, even if you're not a tech-nerd.

And finally, I came across another cool little mention from the folks at iPhoneInCanada.ca - Google has made checking the weather - regardless of what city you're in - just a little bit easier. You need to be connected to Google.com (google.ca doesn't work yet for some reason) from your iPhone or Android, and do a search on Weather. You'll get a cool little interactive weather forecast, without launching an app. Normally I prefer dedicated apps to web apps, but this is pretty cool. More details and screen shots are at iPhoneInCandada.ca.

OK - that's it for now. Next time, I'll bring the run report, but I can't promise that this is the last tech talk....

A Combo of Running and Technology? I'm sold.

To be honest, one of the things that really got me hooked on running was that I could integrate technology into my new weight loss routine. Initially, this meant the Nike+ system and an iPod Nano. Of course, that meant I got to buy an iPod Nano - my iPod mini with a black and white screen seemed sooo dated - and a funky Nike+ dongle. After every workout, I eagerly checked my stats, and studied the wonderful graphics of the Nike site.

Unfortunately and eventually, my Nike+ chip died, and I couldn't be bothered to replace it. I'd moved on to a Garmin 405 - what a piece of crap! - and then did a "downgrade" (but really so much of an upgrade) to a Garmin 305. The satellite tracking and Garmin web site are top-notch. Of course, along the way, I'd also become quite a fan of my iPhone, but have yet to really embrace running with the phone, due to it's bulk and my serious fear of killing the phone from excess sweating.


Yet, even though I don't really want to use my iPhone for running, I've come across a few good apps that can help complement my Garmin. One that I'm currently looking at in my quest to find a decent, flexible training plan is the SmartCoach from Runner's World. I'm not really going to give it a full review - there are plenty of those out there already - but from what I've seen so far, this might be exactly what I'm looking for.

The price is perfect - Free! - and so far, all I've had to do is answer some basic set-up questions - what day do I want my long run to be on, when is the event I'm training for, what's my typical 5K time, etc. - and it spits out a training plan to get you where you need to go. In my initial test, I set up the info for the Angus Glen 10 Miler, and it 'customized' a plan for me that actually seems like something I can follow.

I'll keep you posted on how it works, but for now, I'm quite satisfied.