December 4, 2003

1. "Mourner-in-Chief?"

The President-as-Pinata crowd barely took time out for a turkey sandwich before they ramped up the Maureen Dowdian concept of Mourner-in-Chief. It would seem that Bush is now to be despised because he isn't going to any funerals.

There are those who say Mr. Bush should have emulated Rudy Giuliani's empathetic leadership after 9/11, or Dad's in the first gulf war, and attended some of the funerals of the 379 Americans killed in Iraq. -- Death Be Not Loud
Pundits and provocateurs have been all over this meme, but nobody that I'm aware of has said the obvious.

The obvious is, briefly put, that everyone in America who is indeed still an American, should be down on their knees thanking God and the President that this is still a war in which it is even conceivable that a President could attend the funerals of those killed in action.

Yes, we need to give thanks that our losses are still on a level where they remain in the double digits for a month. Quite unlike the battles of the World Wars, Korea, or even Vietnam where the deaths were such that one could barely count them, much less attend the funerals.

This fact alone is a testament to the success, so far, of the Bush policy in the War on Terrorism. Not a Tarawa of American Deaths, not an Okinawa of American Deaths, but a death toll to date in Iraq somewhere south of those taken by traffic over, say, a long Thanksgiving holiday in the days before Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

I have no way of knowing how many funerals Ms. Dowd of the Times went to in the wake of September 11th, but I went to 14 funerals in the months that came after that. I originally promised myself that I would, as a vigil, attend all the funerals of the firemen and policemen lost on that day. It was a promise I couldn't keep. The emotional drain was simply more than I could stand.

To propose that the President begin making the rounds of our tragic losses in Iraq in order to see if he could weep strikes me as the worst sort of cynicism. It is, dare I say it, utterly Clintonian in its cynicism. But it is a cynicism we have, sadly come to expect from the likes of Maureen Dowd. Low and vile, but then again, being low and vile is her job and she is inordinately good at it.

In a just world with a responsible media, vile "writers" such as Ms. Dowd would be sent to dig a few plastic wrapped corpses out of the Iraqi sands with a spoon and a toothbrush. Instead, she gets to stay in the US, hit the dinner party circuit, cash the check, and spend her off-hours just lying back and lubing her Pulitzer.

Posted by Vanderleun at December 4, 2003 7:29 PM
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Due to the positioning of the Dock, remember that when you build an application, you have to be sure that new document window sizes and positions do not violate the Dock's space. Dock is temperamental and Dock loves his space. If you default to a window size that expands behind the dock, users will have a difficult time reaching the navigation and resize areas at the bottom of the screen. I can personally say that more than once I have been rather peeved that I couldn't get to an area of the window to resize because the default window settings always pop up behind the Dock. In addition, the new Dock in 10.1 will allow users to position their Dock location on either side of the screen as well.

Posted by: Isaac at January 13, 2004 4:10 AM

At WWDC, I listened to Apple representatives make some excellent points about taking the time to build a 100%-compliant Aqua application, and I think all developers need to look beyond the code and listen to what the folks at Apple have to say

Posted by: Ottewell at January 13, 2004 4:11 AM

Adhere to Window Models. Document windows, Utility windows, Click-through, Layering, Drawers, Controls. How do users open windows, how do you properly title windows?

Posted by: Francisca at January 13, 2004 4:12 AM

By building an application that takes advantage of Aqua's many facets, you help ensure that your application will not only look good, but have a chance of becoming a raging success. After a new user clicks on the icon of your program, the first thing he or she sees is the application interface. I know that when I review a product, I am very critical of its visual design. I usually have a short time to learn the new software, so design and ease of use are very important. Aside from those who marvel at the beauty of the command line, most users tend to react the same way.

Posted by: Zachary at January 13, 2004 4:12 AM

Other examples of these animations might be to show the status of an FTP transfer, the progress of media being digitized, or an updated time signature. And don't forget that users may want to have some control over this, so give them plenty of options, including the ability to turn these functions off.

Posted by: Reginald at January 13, 2004 4:12 AM

So far in these articles, I have only dipped a toe or two into Aqua's pool. I have covered basic aspects of building an Aqua-compliant application, including the building of photo-illustrative/3D application icons. Now it's time to address other components of our Mac OS X application.

Posted by: Etheldreda at January 13, 2004 4:13 AM

Adhere to System Appearance. Does your application use all the sweetly colored buttons, delightfully shaded windows, and all the other "bells and whistles?"

Posted by: Cadwallader at January 13, 2004 4:13 AM

Adhere to Layout Guidelines. Did you leave 12 pixels between your push buttons? Does the positioning of your pop-up menus make sense, and when do you use a pop-up versus a scrolling list? Are you using the right types of buttons for the proper functions?

Posted by: Jocosa at January 13, 2004 4:14 AM

You Must Promise. To call your mother, to help old ladies cross the road, and to turn your cell phone off at the movies.

Posted by: Theodosius at January 13, 2004 4:14 AM

So far in these articles, I have only dipped a toe or two into Aqua's pool. I have covered basic aspects of building an Aqua-compliant application, including the building of photo-illustrative/3D application icons. Now it's time to address other components of our Mac OS X application.

Posted by: Margaret at January 13, 2004 4:15 AM