23.04h PDT - Tosj | Stevenote Day! The alarm goes off at 7.00h PDT and after a quick refreshment we are on our way to the Moscone Center again. At about 8 o'clock we arrive and the place seems already completely crowded, but once we are inside it turns out that people have nicely ordered themselves in a long row along the outside of the central hall. In the hall are 2 more cars on display, a BMW Z4 and Mini Cooper convertible. We are not allowed to go upstairs to level 2 till about 8.15h, after which the ritual of lining up is repeated and the floor is filled with people sitting down, taking out their laptops or meeting old friends.
Around 9.30h 2 police officers take the escalators followed by the rest of the crowd. The officers instruct the people not to run, but to take it easy, there is plenty of space. We enter The Presidio within the first 25% of the crowd and are able to sit down about ten seats behind the VIP section. Everybody is still using laptops, but Apple has made sure that there is only an iChat network available. Around 10.00h we have to shut off all cell phones and computer equipment. I won't speak about the Keynote itself, plenty of information about that can be found on other websites. It was a slick show with beautiful new possibilities, especially for developers I think. After the Keynote we had lunch time until 14.00h. People leaving the Keynote were able to get a poster of the new 30 inch cinema display on a 1:1 scale. On the 2nd level we were able to get a close look and touch the new displays. We were asked by an Apple staff member wether we had questions, we said no, we were stunned... At the groundfloor we got the developer preview DVD and again a t-shirt, this time a black one with the Tiger DVD and the text 'Introducing Longhorn' printed on it. It seems strange to me as a dutchman that the companies are allowed to do these kind of things to each other, but here in the US it all seems normal and Steve Jobs mentioned in the end of the keynote that it is more a little bit of teasing each other than a real commercial.
One of the strange things here is that although it is a kind of walhalla for Mac Fans, it is a mens world and one of the first places I have visited with longer rows in front of the mens rooms than in front of the women's (there goes the walhalla idea). At 14.00 h we start again and a new feature on the ID tags of the attendees is catching the eye: a hole in the card, indicating that the person is now the proud owner of the Tiger preview DVD. All cards I had a look at had the hole...
Information about the sessions itself will be given below by Mek, although we are not allowed to speak about all the features that were in the sessions. At the end of the afternoon we find ourselves back in the Golden Gate Hall in the student lounge and with snacks walking through the Exhibit Fair. With a technical problem we end up at the ADC stand were we are informed by Anne and Mike that indeed there were some technical problems, but after we talk a little further and are asked to explain more about our programs, the problems are solved. We thank them for their help and finish the day by leaving the Moscone center, to update the site.
Tomorrow at 19.30h the ceremony for the Design Awards will start... more about that in tomorrows update.
22.15h PDT - Mek | The reality distortion field. We experienced it a bit already at Steve's keynote address in Paris last september, but this was the real thing, and boy do I feel sorry for the poor Micro$oft guys in Redmond. To begin with "The Presidio", the hall where the keynote took place, one word: HUGE! After everyone sat down, Steve started with the usual recap of iTunes, the Apple Store etc. But then the new displays, stunning design, and of course the 30 inch one, wow that one is big! Then quickly to Tiger, Apple's new update to MacOSX. This leaves Micro$oft completely in the dust, which Steve didn't forget to stress of course ;-), something that we had already seen in the hall where huge posters with texts as "Redmond start your photocopiers" and "Redmond we have a problem" were displayed. The new features that Tiger brings are stunning, and to many to mention. Amazing, the possibilities for us developers are so many that it's starts to dazzle.
Afterwards we went down to see the new displays in reality (they're even bigger then you can imagine) and of course down to the registration to get our Tiger Preview DVD. In the afternoon we went to MacOSX State of the Union where Bertrand Serlet, a funny Frenchman, told us everything about the new stuff available to developers in Tiger. Unfortunately, we are not allowed to tell any details, but all the new stuff is most certainly impressive, and I can't wait to implement them in our programs. One nice thing that Tiger brings is Dashboard, a way to display frequently used small tools like calculators, stickies, and a worldclock. Bertrand challenged us to make such a widget before thursday at noon, and the best entries in this competition win a PowerBook or iPod, so I guess we will install Tiger and have look ;-)
After the state of the union, we learned everything about the new stuff in the Apple Development tools, which have improved dramatically, and will make the further development of our programs even better. The last talk of the day was on the new stuff in Quartz, the drawing environment of OSX, boy this is revolutionary, wait till the first apps come out that really leverage these technologies! It was a terrific day, so much new stuff, nice people and a terrific atmosphere. It's surreal, the reality distorted. Can't wait 'till tomorrow!
