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Benjamin Sandofsky

https://mastodon.social/@sandofsky

The End of The Twitter Era

I've been thinking a lot about how social networks die, these past two years. It's an unusually personal topic. In 2009, I picked up my life to move to San Francisco and work for Twitter. I joined a startup you could fit around a giant lunch

Fast Crimes at Lambda School

Two days after his company's downfall, Austen Allred wrote: I wish people could see how ugly it is to be envious, and how obvious it is to those around you when that's what's happening. There's not much uglier than trying to tear

Clever Hans and the Uncanny Valley

In 2001, Rob Malda reacted to the first iPod with, "No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame." This might be the worst hot-take in the history of tech, but I wonder if it'll be dethroned by the reactions to Apple's AI offerings on

My Soft Reboot

If you enjoyed one of my newer essays and decided to dig into the archives, you'll find a lot of technical stuff about programming. I want to talk about why I've shifted away. Look at the timestamps of those old essays and you'll notice

Oh the Humanity

Why You Can't Build Apple with Venture Capital An ex-Apple designer who went on to startup success once told me, "I wish I could give a workshop for Apple alumni jumping into startups, to help them un-learn The Apple Way." As someone who strives to build

Controller Hierarchies

Occasionally an activity within your app requires multiple screens. Consider uploading a photo to Instagram: pick a photo, pick the filter, and add a description. When the user taps a photo in the first screen, it might look like: func userDidPickPhoto(_ photo:Photo){ let filter = FilterViewController() filter.photo = photo navigationController?

How I Learned to Build Apps

From time to time, people ask me how to learn iOS development. So here we go. Before you start, be serious about your goal. Are you trying to prototype a concept, get funding, and then hire someone else to deal with it? Are you a "generalist" who needs

The Trouble with Manager Objects

The first time I look at a legacy project, I scan for warning signs. I’ve covered singletons, excessive observers, and today I'll talk about "Manager" classes. I have to reiterate these are guidelines, not rules, and among guidelines, this one isn't critical. A

KVO

In my last post, I explained why you should prefer delegates over observers. The former encourages a tree-like data flow, while the latter leads to a cat's cradle. If you're sure you need an observer, Cocoa lets you choose between Notification Center and KVO. Which should

Delegates vs Observers

A well structured app consists of simple objects with well-defined responsibilities talking to each other. When you design an object, you might think of an object's properties, and the actions they take, but it's just as important to decide how they'll communicate. Cocoa provides