Cabel Sasser’s Coda Confidential
Monday, April 7th, 2008
Lately I’ve really come to love podcasts and videocasts because I’m an extremely busy man. Nothing is as relaxing in this business after a while as not having to read. Even better is being able to absorb content while you’re actually working!
Cabel Sasser’s presentation Coda Confidential is one worth checking out. He’s a really funny guy. Seriously he could work the stand up comedy circuit if he wanted.
OK who is Cabel Sasser? You mean you don’t know. The whole point (nearly) of having a cool name is memorability - as opposed to Steven Clark which is less memorable by a mile. Cabel is a co-founder of an independent Mac development firm called Panic started way back when Apple looked like going under. They were two guys working out of an apartment and in a situation many of us can appreciate. Now they’re a little bigger and have a number of excellent applications to their credit. If you’re a Mac web developer you’ve probably heard of their kick butt application called Coda (thus the title of this presentation) which integrates applications like code editors and file transfer into a single product. I’ve only heard doting revues of Coda so for $80 you’re getting a brilliant piece of software. Give it a try.
Cabel has some great insight into growing an indie software development business and being able to roll with the punches because some applications just need to be dropped even after you’ve spent half a year building them. Let’s face it some ideas sound great for a week but turn into dogs in the accomplishment. And he’s got a lot to say about design because he’s probably one of the most respected indie Mac designers out there. I was interested to see he’s not a hands on illustrator as much as he is a perfectionist with a great design eye, too. Being a designer isn’t all about working in Photoshop or Illustrator because at the end of the day you can use the person with those skills as a tool to achieve your vision.
On a side note: as an Illustrator neanderthal I’ve been trying to improve my game in the software skills of graphic design but I have to admit my eye and palate are far and away more sophisticated than my manual abilities to create graphic excellence in software.
Probably the most interesting part of the video was Cabel’s justification of the Coda pricing and how they approach the subject of software piracy. I’ll leave it to you to hunt that one up and I agree with their perspective entirely. If you’re interested in becoming a web startup or even pushing yourself out as a designers’ designer (like Cabel) its a great video to watch.
