APPS

Galactic Compass 2: now with new augmented reality mode

After I released version 1.0, I figured I would have to do the rotations myself. So I sat down with ChatGPT and I didn’t get it to write the code, but I got it to educate me. With a patient, interactive tutor, I was able to finally do what I hadn’t by reading books and asking mathematician friends – I learnt how to use quaternions just enough to make the app work.

So learning doesn’t stop just because I outsource a bunch of thinking to AI. It pushes me to learn more. I like that as an outcome.

It is something I’m trying to do more of.

Nothing’s new AI OS isn’t really an OS, or new by Robert Hart

Eventually — and here’s where the AI-native OS idea comes in — Pei says phones could be more proactive, changing apps’ placement, or even suggesting apps based on how we use the phone. But even then, this is not an OS. It is an interface. Pei admits as much, leaning on semantics to skirt the issue: “I guess the word or the noun ‘OS’ could be interpreted in different ways.”

It feels like Apple Shortcuts on steroids.

But the idea is exciting. The one thing this AI cycle has made possible is normal users building little tools to automatically do the arduous things they were doing manually.

Most of that has been on the desktop or the web.

This is exciting because it takes that same thing to mobile.