Now that fatherhood is just about to happen, I find myself looking at life completely differently. Like, last night was the last figure drawing session that I went to before I’m a dad. Monday was the last meeting with my team at work that I’ll have before I’m a dad. Last Thursday was probably the last burrito that I’ll have before I’m a dad… Okay, now it’s just getting silly.

But it does make me wonder when I’ll ever have time to do some of these kinds of things again. I keep on hearing all these horror stories about how new parents’ entire existences are devoted to serving the new food-to-poop converter that has entered into their lives. Then my friends with kids assure me that this phase of parenthood is only temporary … it just feels like forever.

I started playing around with the iPad simulator that comes with the 3.2 version of the iPhone SDK. I haven’t done a lot with it but I did get Mach Dice to show up, which was pretty neat. All I needed to do was recompile it. I like the idea of seeing it in double size, which helps when rolling a hundred dice at once. I still need to do some work to really take advantage of the big new screen. But I’m pleased at how easy it is to get something working for the iPad. And if it’s this easy for me to do, then there’s hundreds of thousands of other developers who are eagerly doing the same thing. And that means thousands of new iPad-dedicated apps available just when it launches.

I’m going to go a bit out on a limb here, but I don’t think Apple’s going to have any problems selling these things.

Dear Mach,

How do I create a custom ringtone for my iPhone?

Raring for Ringtones

Dear Raring,

Ah, finally, an iPhone related question. Well, there are already a few good guides out there to do this and here is the basic process:

• create a sound file
• export it from iTunes as an “.m4a” file (AAC Encoder)
• delete the sound file from iTunes
• rename the exported file’s extension to “.m4r”
• double-click the “.m4r” file to bring it into iTunes
• sync your iPhone

The one detail that you might need is that if you don’t see a “Create AAC Version” item when you right-click on the original sound file, that means you have to set your preferences. Go to “iTunes -> Preferences …” and in the “General” tab, look for the “Import Settings…” button. Then set “Import Using:” to “AAC Encoder”.

Just for fun, here’s a ringtone of me saying, “Ring Ring”. Enjoy!

When I first started thinking about the iPad (as it’s now known to be called, despite earlier speculation), I had no idea what people would do with one. But now that it’s been officially announced and more details have come out, I have a better idea.

The most significant feature is that it’s only $499. At that price, it’s not much more than a Kindle but it can also do color, browse the web, run apps, and play movies. Granted, the Kindle is a better platform for just pure reading of text with its higher DPI and passive e-ink. But if I were heading off to college and had the choice of a Kindle or an iPad to take with me, that’d be a no-brainer. In fact, an iPad can even replace a notebook in a lot of cases.

Another important feature is that it runs iPhone apps. Now, you might think that iPhone apps won’t look great just running twice the size and you’d be right. But it’s a start. Right from the start, iPads are going to have a huge library of apps to choose from. One of the things plaguing Apple computers is the lack of software but that situation has reversed for the iPhone when compared to its smart phone competitors. And while the iPad still won’t have as much software available for it as most Windows netbooks, it certainly has more than comparable e-book readers.

But as a developer, the most exciting feature is that it’s a device the size of a piece of paper that multiple people can interact with. Sure, two people can touch an iPhone at once, but it gets awfully crowded in there with two fingers. But the iPad? It’s like the Wii. It’s the first consumer device that multiple people can touch and play with like that. There are going to be games on there that you just can’t do on any other device. Can you imagine all the possibilities? I can’t. But I’m excited to find out…

I was chatting with a friend the other day about the popularity of the movie, Avatar, and she chalked it up to the fact the movie really appeals to guys. The conversation went something like this:

“When you get right down to it, most guys aren’t much different from 12-year old boys and boys like explosions.”

“Yeah, most women aren’t much different from 12-year old girls, either. But the main difference is that 12-year old girls are just way more mature than 12-year old boys.”

My brother-in-law, Chris Hughes, is the Chef de Cuisine at a restaurant called Tre Amici in Dallas, Texas. He recently made an appearance on TV! Check it out:

My friend, Webb, has an interesting theory:

Ok, so I’ll indulge in a bit of reading the tea leaves on the eve of Apple’s tablet announcement: the rumored apple tablet will be called the ‘iBook‘.

• Jobs is reportedly quoted as saying, “This will be the most important thing I’ve ever done.”  I’d rank re-inventing the book as a far grander undertaking than re-inventing the phone.
• The iBooks were re-named MacBooks back in 2006.  ‘Mac’ is associated with computers (Mac Pro, MacBook) and ‘i’ is assciated with devices (iPod, iPhone, and now iBook).  Granted, ‘iMac’ does not fit into the devices classification.
• Fits with all the rumors of the return of publishing.   “Apple has just re-invented the book.  Meet the iBook.”  Cue the demo of full screen NYT app followed by National Geographic then a stack of textbooks.
• Finally, I like ‘iBook’ far more than ‘iPad’ or ‘iSlate’ (the current front runners for the name).  it just rolls off the tongue and is simple and evocative of the product.

“But books don’t show video,” you argue.  They do now.

I like the name “iBook” as well. I would note that Apple actually had a product called the iBook back in 1999. On the one hand, it means that the name is not new. But on the other, it means that Apple already owns the name and it really fits well this time.

We had a baby shower over the weekend and one of our friends suggested that we get a bunch of plain white infant body suits and fabric markers to have guests draw on them. It was a great suggestion and I’d highly recommended it as a baby shower activity. Whether or not your friends are artists, it’s lots of fun seeing what they come up with. Of course, it doesn’t hurt if some of your friends happen to draw cartoons for a living…

I’ve been playing a lot of word games on my iPhone lately so I thought I’d share the ones I like: Word Fu, Scramble 2, and Words with Friends. I’m partial to Word Fu because it uses Mach Dice code for the dice physics but it’s also a great single player game. Scramble 2 is sort of like Boggle and the best part about it is that you get to see all the possible words at the end of the game, including many that you’ve never heard before (“merocrine” is a word?!). And Words with Friends is a great multi-player only version of Scrabble. Right now, I’m mostly playing with my cousins and they’re kicking my butt (“strow” is a word?!).

There’s been a lot of speculation about what an Apple Tablet and it seems like almost a certainty that it’ll be officially announced on January 27. I don’t have any rumors to contribute, but I am kinda curious about one thing: What would you do with one?

If I had one, I’d want to develop some sort of simple multi-player touch based game, maybe something like Warlords back on the Atari 2600. Ultimately, I’d love to make some sort of interactive board game or role playing game on a giant table sized version of the tablet. I know about the Microsoft Surface, which is exactly what I want, except that it costs $10,000!

But if I wasn’t a developer, I’m not sure what I’d do with an Apple Tablet. I mean, it’s too big to fit in my pocket and if I’m not carrying it around all the time, why wouldn’t I just use my laptop? So I’m curious what other people might use it for.