Categories
Haiku

Haiku (June 15th)

I thought I’d try a suggestion from Gretchen Rubin. Write a Haiku everyday. I’m planning on publishing this approximately every seven days.

Wednesday (9 june)

Sunshine on my face
Mostly feels good but maybe
Less warm is better

Yummy peas growing
On very tippy lattice
Taste so crunchy good

Lovely irises
Translucent purple from
The sun shining through

I feel a fly that
Is walking among leg hairs
Not gonna smack him

Thursday

I see evil faces
In the reflected water
Upon the table

Stanley Park Seawall
Has become my happy place
Beautiful, tranquil

Start with five syllables
Next a line of seven more
Then the final five

Little ants walking
Relentlessly up the chair.
Where are they going?

Stuck on a puzzle
A sudoku idea
Eureka, it’s done!

Friday

When the rain begins
For a while, it’s dry under
trees. Then drip drop drip.

Pure Bread Bakery
Has so many yummy treats.
Ooey-Gooey bar!

Monday

I’m on the couch now
But I had an active day
Such defensiveness!

Categories
Happy

On the Cusp of Raspberry Season

It makes me happy to see that our raspberries will be ripe soon. We have a thriving colony of Golden Raspberries (the orange ones).

Categories
Hobbies

My Stanley Park ride

Most days, I bike around the stanley park seawall. Some days, I stop to take photos of the remarkable scenery. Other days I take photos of graffiti on train cars. Some days, ok most days, I do multiple loops around the park.

When the weather is sketchy, I’ll take my commuter bike called Ada. On bright sunny days, I’ll usually take my fancy Pinarello racing bike.

I’ve seen seals, otters, coyotes, goslings, ducklings, and a marmot/ferret. One day I even saw a whale. (oddly enough, a few days after writing this draft post, I saw another whale)

The path is populated by cyclists, rollerbladers, walkers, joggers, photographers, readers and fishers. Approximately one third of the people I see are regulars, that I see more than once per week. There is one woman I’ve seen a couple of times who likes to yell at me that I should be on the road, not the bike path. I try not to take it personally.

Sometimes I take the road, but I do prefer the path, as it’s right on the ocean.

I feel a titch disingenuous writing about riding in Stanley Park without discussing my Strava Local Legend situation. Still, I’m going to save that for another post.

View from the Stanley Park Seawall, looking towards Gondor… er no, Vancouver!
Categories
Software

WWDC 2021

No this does not refer to the Western Washington Debutantes Convention. Today is the first day of Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference. For anyone who writes software for iPhones, iPads, Watches, and Apple computers, it tends to be a very exciting week.

Sometimes there are new hardware announcements and releases. Other times there are big technology changes, such as a new development language (eg Swift!). Every time there are a lot of new technology announcements, that are usually obscure as heck. (eg. a new interface for coding In App Purchases)

Buried among the intimidating amount and complexity of detailed information, there are usually a few fun nuggets of new things I find very cool. So far this year, the best example of this is a new feature in the photos app that detects text in photos. Users will be able to copy text in photos and paste it into any other apps. They will also be able to detect and call phone numbers when they show up in photos. Crazy!

Before Covid, the conference was in San Francisco and the information was really only available to people who attended in person. Some time in the past 10 years the conference became ridiculously over subscribed and it became a lottery to be able to attend. At about the same time the information from all the presentations was made available on line.

The last two years, due to Covid, the conference was entirely online and free for everyone. (Attending in person in previous years typically cost ~$1500 USD.)

I have been to WWDC twice, once in 2004 and once in 2010. In 2004, I was attending with a co-worker who was very much a night owl. He would typically arrive at work around 11am. At WWDC I was very perplexed when he insisted we arrive at 6am for the Keynote Address on the first day that didn’t start until 10am.

When we arrived at 6am, there were already hundreds of people in line. I later realized this was most likely due to the personality cult around Steve Jobs. While I’d like to think I wasn’t susceptible to his reality distortion field, it was still pretty exciting to be in the room for his presentations.

Categories
Hobbies

Two Thumbs Up for the Lynn Loop

This morning, Steph and I snuck away for an morning hike up in Lynn Headwaters Regional Park. We’re both pretty sure neither of us had been there before, but it was splendid.

Most of the loop is two parallel trails, one that follows the Lynn Creeks east bank. The other trail is still on the east side but is further east, at a higher elevation, and almost out of ear shot of the creek.

Apparently the usual way (more interesting way?) to do the loop is to start out on the trail further away from the creek. This trail starts with a fairly steep section, but is then fairly flat up to the intersection where you can return to the parking lot via the trail running beside the creek.

The full loop that we did was listed as 8 km and recommended allowing 4 hours. We thought it was more like 9 km, and we were back in a bit under three hours. (YMMV as they say)

If you don’t feel like doing the full 8km, there is a second link between the two trails about halfway along. (This will all be obvious when you see the map.)

There are also more challenging trails heading off in a few different directions, but we didn’t investigate them. This is also a great place for dog owners, or anyone else who enjoys meeting dogs on the trail. (Dogs on hiking trails always seem to be their happy place, I reckon.)

A stump that used to be a cedar tree
Categories
Software

A SwiftUI Picker Using an Swift Enum Part 2

In Part 1, we created a basic SwiftUI Picker that was bound to an enum variable that included n possible values. When users pick a value from the picker, the app’s data model is aware of this change and the UI updates to reflect the user’s selection.

In this post we are going to extend this basic functionality.

Display Text for Sort Types

Life would be better if we could customize the display text for each of the different sort types. To do this we will add a function to our enum.

    func displayText() -> String {
        switch self {
        case .name:
            return NSLocalizedString("Name", comment: "display text for sort type: name")
        case .height:
            return NSLocalizedString("Height", comment: "display text for sort type: height")
        case .averageScore:
            return NSLocalizedString("Average Score", comment: "display text for sort type: averageScore")
        }
    }

In order to use this new function, replace rawValue calls with displayText() calls.

struct ContentView: View {
    @ObservedObject var settings = Settings.shared
    var body: some View {
        VStack {
            Picker(selection: $settings.sortType, label: Text("Sort Type")) {
                ForEach(SortType.allCases, id: \.self) { sortType in
                    Text("\(sortType.displayText())")
                }
            }
            Text("sort type is: \(settings.sortType.displayText())")
        }
    }
}

Persist Preferred Sort Type

In this section we will add code to remember a user’s previously selected sort type. So if the user closes the app and relaunches it, their preferred sort type will still be selected. To do this, we will write the sortType to UserDefaults, and then read this value when the app launches. These changes will be made in the Settings class.

class Settings: ObservableObject {
    static let shared = Settings()
    @Published var sortType: SortType {
        didSet {
            UserDefaults.standard.setValue(sortType.rawValue, forKey: "sortType")
        }
    }
    init() {
        sortType = SortType(rawValue: UserDefaults.standard.string(forKey: "sortType") ?? "name") ?? .name
    }
}

I’m mildly pained by the need to include both a fallback value for the string read from UserDefaults and also a fallback value SortType(rawValue: ) return value. I guess this is just my way to demonstrate that I don’t like forced unwraps !

Add a New Sort Type

So what happens when end requirements change and now our data can also be sorted by…. let’s say Shoe Size? What needs to change in our example? In fact, very little needs to change. Basically just add the new enum case, and add a corresponding case to the displayText function

enum SortType: String, CaseIterable {
    case name
    case height
    case averageScore
    case shoeSize
    
    func displayText() -> String {
        switch self {
        case .name:
            return NSLocalizedString("Name", comment: "display text for sort type: name")
        case .height:
            return NSLocalizedString("Height", comment: "display text for sort type: height")
        case .averageScore:
            return NSLocalizedString("Average Score", comment: "display text for sort type: averageScore")
        case .shoeSize:
            return NSLocalizedString("Shoe Size", comment: "display text for sort type: shoeSize")
        }
    }
}
Categories
Software Uncategorized

A SwiftUI Picker Using an Swift Enum

These two items (the SwiftUI Picker and a Swift enum) work really well together. Some might say they go together as well as Peanut Butter and Banana.

Requirement: Your app needs a way for a user to choose how to sort their list items. Today list items can be sorted by Name, Height and Average Score. Some time in the future, the list of sort types is expected to grow.

Eventually we are going to need some UI for this, but let’s start be defining an enum to define the sort types. Our enum needs to conform to CaseIterable because we will need to call the allCases class method. I don’t think String is required, but is helpful in the initial stage before we polish the UI.

enum SortType: String, CaseIterable {
    case name
    case height
    case averageScore
}

And also a Settings model object to store our source of truth (ie sort type) We will access the Settings singleton via the shared static variable. Settings needs to conform to ObservableObject because the Picker will bind to the sortType property.

class Settings: ObservableObject {
    static let shared = Settings()
    @Published var sortType: SortType
    init() {
        sortType = .name
    }
}

For the UI, we will use the following Picker init

    public init(selection: Binding<SelectionValue>, label: Label, @ViewBuilder content: () -> Content)

The UI content view will start with something like this:

struct ContentView: View {
    @ObservedObject var settings = Settings.shared
    var body: some View {
        VStack {
            Picker(selection: $settings.sortType, label: Text("Sort Type")) {
                ForEach(SortType.allCases, id: \.self) { sortType in
                    Text("\(sortType.rawValue)")
                }
            }
            Text("sort type is: \(settings.sortType.rawValue)")
        }
    }
}

If we run this code, we’ll see a picker above a text label. When we pick a different value in the picker, the text label updates accordingly. Woot!

In Part 2, we will:

  1. Improve the UI by adding display names for the sort types
  2. Use UserDefaults to persist and recall the selected sort type
  3. Add another sort type
Categories
Uncategorized

Orca Overwhelms Otherwise Ordinary Outing

So yea, I saw an Orca this morning while biking along the sea wall in Stanley Park. It was quite a wonderful moment. I was clipping along with the wind at my back when I saw a black dorsal fin break the surface of the water under Lions Gate Bridge. Immediately and inelegantly, I stopped and got off my bike. Without consciously deciding, I just started walking back the direction I’d come from, to try and keep up with this whale. I was barely even aware of the fact that I was wearing my dorky bike shoes that are nearly impossible to walk in.

After walking alongside the whale for…. I don’t know how far exactly… maybe 60 metres, this lovely creature dove deeper and disappeared. A woman who had the presence of mind to record a video, said ‘He must be going to get some breakfast.’

As I clip clop walked back toward my bike, I was thinking about this happy connected feeling, and how it was strange that I felt so connected to this creature that I’m pretty sure had no idea I was appreciating it.

It was quite the magic moment.

On Orca just east of Lions Gate Bridge, heading into the inner harbour.

Update (9 June 2021): I reported my sighting to Ocean Wise Research, and they put a detailed post on Instagram.

Categories
Family

A Trip to Visit My Great Grandparents

I learned recently that my great grandparents were buried in a cemetery above West Vancouver (CapilanoView) But like any fact gleaned from the internet I felt I needed to see it to believe it.

So today, I struck out by bike, over Lions Gate Bridge to see if this was true. The ride was easier and shorter than I’d expected, although it felt like the last leg was straight up hill.

When I arrived at the cemetery, I was struck by feelings of calm and tranquility. I headed to the office, and was initially dismayed to see a ‘Office Closed due to Covid’ sign out front. After a moment of imagining myself searching through the many rows of headstones, I realized there were people in the office and the office phone number was included on the ‘Closed’ sign.

As I began fumbling to take out my phone, an employee came out of the office with a smile and said ‘Let me save you a phone call.’ I laughed a grateful laugh, and then told him ‘I think my great grandparents are buried here’. He took down their names and went back into the office. Before disappearing into the office, he asked me my name, and told me his was Clayton.

Moments later, he came back out with a clip board and said ‘Good news, your relatives are resting here.’

I liked his choice of word (resting) more than my crude choice. (buried)

He showed me the sheet on his clipboard that seemed to be a grid of random numbers. They weren’t in any discernible order, but he put his finger on the square marked ’25’.

He explained each square represented 4 (or was it 8?) plots and so we first needed to go 8 rows in. I didn’t really understand, but followed him as he started walking across the grass covered in orderly rows of head stones. I was momentarily mortified as I’d always thought you were not supposed to walk on graves. But if Clayton could do it so could I. Onwards!

After getting to the 8th row, Clayton again consulted his grid of random squares and appeared ready to start the next phase of the search. ‘Now it should be somewhere in this row…oh it’s right here.’

Sure enough right at our feet was the head stone of Thomas and Catherine R. Deas. It included the requisite dates, as well as their respective places of birth. Also, bookending the family name Deas, at the top of the stone were two Scottish thistles. I immediately thought of my grandfather Jack (their eldest son) and his favourite mock admonishment. ‘You’re being a bit of a thistle!’

At this point I wasn’t sure what to do. Clayton had left me. I first brushed a few pieces of grass from the headstone. I then ran through an internal slide show of the various pictures I’d seen of these two people. I then thought of all the wonderful people I knew who had descended from them. In the end, I felt grateful to be part of the tree of descendants of these two people.

Most of the Deas family and an unknown guest. From left to right, Catherine, Mystery Woman, Margaret, Catherine, Tom. I suspect this picture was taken by Jack Deas. I have no idea where this picture was taken. I further suspect it would have been taken in the early 1930’s.
The aforementioned headstone.
Irises @ Capilano View Cemetery
Categories
Software

Zentangle App

I’ve already mentioned my affinity for making zentangles however I often struggle with choosing which tangles to include. I always fear I’ll get in a rut and repeatedly pick the same tangles, and miss out on others that would feel good to draw. However the only thing worse than inadvertently ignoring an old favourite would be spending a lot of time and energy diligently making sure my picking was fair.

To this end, I want to build an app that will keep track of all the tangles, and which ones I’ve used most, and also allow me to pick some of my favourites. Also (not sure how useful this will be) it’d be nice to present a set of suggestions that include different types of patterns.

All this to say, I’ve been working on an app that uses the CloudKit framework to store both the immutable and the mutable tangle details. I’ve come across a few interesting technical challenges along the way. My plan is to create some posts to describe some of these challenges and things I’ve learned about CloudKit.

possible topics:

  • turning a swiftUI Image into a Navigation Link and it turns blue
  • connecting an enum to a swiftUI Picker
  • the value of being able to set recordId’s (and don’t forget to include the prefix)
  • challenges I’ve found when using iCloud dashboard (save needs to be clicked twice, adding index loses recent edits)
  • SettingsView, userDefaults
  • tabBar via model
  • navViews in a tabBar seem to reset (or get confused if you switch tabs and come back