December
14, 2015
Greetings
from IT,
“The
greater our knowledge increases the more our ignorance unfolds.” John F. Kennedy
Recently
my genius son-in-law said he was thinking about creating an app, he just needed
an idea for one. I mistakenly thought he
was actually asking me for ideas and so I put my mind to it. I think I might have strained my
neo-cortex. I’m soaking it Epsom salts
right now.
For
those of you who may have been distracted by the ads for ‘Half off Apps at
Chili’s, we are not talking about appetizers, or what passes for appetizers at
Chili’s. I’m referring to the magic that
goes on when we touch our phone screen and somehow we can book air travel or
get grease stains out of carpet or find the best appetizers in Orlando. That kind of app.
My
favorite app is a map app. It tells me
where I am, and on an ambitious day, where I am going, at least in the short
term. There is something strangely
satisfying in watching the little blue dot that represents me making its way
along the perfectly paved virtual world roads, while at the same moment I am
missing my exit off the pothole trap we call expressways here in the Mitten
State.
Obviously
I want my genius son-in-law to succeed, so I did a little looking around. There
is no app-research app to so I had to actually type the words into Google,
which left me exhausted and a little nauseous, and for the record I did this with
a strained neocortex. But after waiting
an interminable .54 seconds I was able to find out that there are somewhere
north of 3 million apps available for the two major platforms.
It
seems there might be an app for everything already. Zombie apps, PacMan apps, self-surgery apps,
farming apps, legal apps, and so on …app infinitum. There is an app to block
news about Donald Trump from your phone. There is even one called ‘Plumber
Crack’, which is less helpful than it sounds.
So
the first challenge in inventing an app is to not reinvent the wheel. (Note to self for later in this essay:
‘Invent reinvent wheel app’) I think
downloading all 3 million apps as research might be too time-consuming, not to
mention expensive. Besides I don’t want
to delete any of my selfies from 2009 and the pictures of my favorite appetizers
just to make room on my phone. So maybe
the next app should be an app-search app.
In
fact I have no idea what is involved in creating an app. I know one must have an icon, preferably one
that represents whatever function the app happens to perform; the unforgettable
‘Plumber’s Crack’ comes to mind. After
that, things get murky. I think that somewhere
behind all this is some sophisticated computer code, written by someone’s
genius son-in-law. Like most magic, it’s
best for me not to think too much about it.
The
closest I will ever get to creating and app is for my genius daughter and her
genius husband were to someday have a genius baby which would grow up to create
a ‘reinvent wheel app’ and somehow my DNA might be involved, however
tangentially.
I
think if I was going to suggest an idea for an app, it would be app-writing app
that instantly creates apps on demand.
Maybe call it ‘AppappAsap’.
Hope
this finds you applying yourself,
Copyright
© 2015 David Smith
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