The Death of an App

Late the other evening, I noticed a tweet — from a cool software co. — about a favorite app being “remaindered.”

Personally, I’m sad to lose this one, but I understand.

“Finally, in the pro/corporate universe, we were simply on the wrong end of the overall “want a status board” budget: companies would buy a $3,000 display for our $10 app.”

I was on the end of that, buying a second iPad (cheapest I could find), just to run that app, basically, and hang off to one side of my main monitor. Only monitor, really, as I’ve stayed away from a multi-screen set-up, thus far.

My sweet set-up.

What I wanted was a quick way to assess inbound e-mail, glance at weather forecast, and see any notable headlines, currently streaming — business assessments — at a glance.

Yeah, I like their software, and I wonder how much of that is corporate culture infused into the work. Not exactly swiss army knife tools, but similar, in my mind.

The company’s first software I bought was Transmit, then, a professional grade FTP (Mac only, when that mattered) program. I used it for years, and still do, as it is quickest, simplest, and most robust across all my machinery. When I popped $15 or whatever it was, back then? I felt like I was stepping up, into the real world where I was a website developer, using professional tools rather than freeware.

No more website development, but the deal is here.

I still keep a hand in the game, able to perform root level work, as need be. It’s not as interesting as it once was, but I like being able to control my own space — not held hostage by outside forces.

The Death of an App

While I’m sad to see it go, it will force me to dig back into a little web page building — using the same company’s other software Coda for heavy lifting — and pull together a page like I’ve done before, with whatever feeds I like.

Seriously, the main purpose of such a page? Monitor the website’s health. Tiny bits of code that check-in every two minutes to make sure the website‘s operating environment is operating. The biggest problem with that? I tend to learn when internet access is broken, which happens more often, instead of when the site’s offline.

Sad to see the software get canned, but then, understanding the basics of the business end? Yeah, I get that.

Previously, here.