I started on the presentation at the May meeting, but never completed because we were running out of time. This time I finished the presentation, and we discussed the details of using ASIHTTPRequest and json-framework to build a dynamic iPhone app that displays data on a UITableView.

You can go to the slideshare page for extra options, or you can browse through the presentation below:

I’m looking forward to see the reception it gets after all the hard work I put into it.

I have to give it to Simon Oliver, the guy behind this game. It’s an unbelievably well done game, starting with the beautiful (and playful) graphics and in-game story, all the way to the innovations in game control that allow for a great user interaction experience. The sound effects and music for the game are also top notch. I mean, I’m now at a point where I open the game and load a specific level of the game and just listen to the soundtrack.

This game is now the standard bearer for iPhone games, it’s just that good. The $9.99 price is completely deserved, and I recommend it to anyone.

Video trailers and screenshots are available from the Rolando website.

The bad:

• Battery life is terrible. I mean, I understand the usual fanboy tactics of saying that the iPhone 3G still has the best battery life among 3G phones, but who the hell cares? It still sucks, I still have to charge the damn thing at least two times a day.
• It crashes a lot. I mean a lot lot.
• No idea why, but deleting emails from a specific IMAP account that I have, completely disables the Mail app against any other account. I have to restart the whole phone to be able to use that app again.
• Every so often iTunes does a backup of the phone, and it is now taking a LOT of time. I remember it taking around 1 hour for the first time. I believe it takes that long when you install new applications on the phone, but it makes no sense to me to take that much time.
• The contacts app takes a lot of time to open now. I’m assuming this has to do with a new architecture that allows one to search the database, but damn. 4-5 seconds to load a contact database of 73 contacts? Come on.
• The App store needs to review new applications / updates to existing apps more quickly.
• The store should restrict app reviews to users that actually purchased the app.
• A small thing, but it’s quite common for the phone to stop doing the “unlock” sound. You know, the one that is triggered when you unlock the phone with a sliding motion. The “lock” sound still works, but the “unlock” one doesn’t. I need to restart the machine to make it work again.

The good:

• The App store is so very cool. Lots of cool apps available, and I’m sure many more will come in the future.
• Exchange support is very useful. I can finally sync with my work’s email account with ease, without doing a lot of IMAP/procmail hacks.
• The new “tap at the top of the screen” to scroll to the top of the list of email messages is awesome, something I wanted for a long time.
• Same feature is now available in the contacts app.
• Being able to delete multiple messages is also invaluable. I can’t believe how much time I wasted in the past deleting a whole bunch of spam.
• The sound quality seems much better. The speakers are much better as well.
• The ability to save images into your photo folders is awesome.

I built a small web application specifically for the iPhone last year to search the availability of a book in bookstores. I think I came up with the idea for it when I was at a local Barnes & Noble store, couldn’t find what I was looking for, and wondered if another store close by had it in stock.

The application works by allowing the user to search for a nearby Barnes & Noble store based on a zip code, and also allows you to search the stock of those nearby bookstores for a book, given its ISBN.

Try it out now and let me know what you think.