I’m giving some quick love to Daisy (she doesn’t get a lot of alone time these days with Honey around 😏): letting her know how much I love her and that if it wasn’t for her, we wouldn’t even have Honey. That she’s the OD (original Doodle). Thanking her for her patience and for giving Honey a chance and teaching her the ropes. For sharing her space and her family (and often her food).

Just having this really nice moment.

Next second, Honey bounces over and butts right in, licking Daisy’s ears (and my freshly cleaned glasses), nipping at her collar and demanding attention. I’m thinking, “Classic Honey, the annoying little sister 😂.” But as usual, Daisy simply took it all in with a grin 😄, steadfast and in complete control.

That’s life; the obstacle is the way and the only thing we control is how we choose to react.

Originally published at jordanborth.micro.blog on January 30, 2018.

I joined Square as a product designer three and a half months ago. Last week I made the decision to move on.

I’ve always thought that the hardest decisions to make are the right ones. Leaving Saltspring, my partner, our dog and our families to head down from the West Coast of BC to join Square in San Francisco was that decision. Now, deciding to move on and go back home is that decision.

My years of freelancing remotely from a small island, with small teams, on niche design tools had left me curious about new challenges and opportunities. When the chance to join Square arose, it felt like the right opportunity, in the right place at the right time: working in Silicon Valley, with a big company that genuinely cares about its customers, on business tools and products with a broader scope; to pass it up would have left me wondering if I had made the right choice for the rest of my life.

Three months in, when I took a step back to assess things, I knew in my gut that it wasn’t the right fit. I strive to live honestly and transparently and at that point it didn’t seem fair to Square, or myself, to continue on when my mind was constantly drifting.

The simple fact is that I love my small, quiet island life, I love building niche design tools and my heart was back home with Kristi, Daisy and our family. Family and quality of life are what I value most and aligning my actions with these values is my top priority.

I try to stay conscious of how privileged I am to be able to make these decisions and I will be forever grateful to Square for the experience. Companies are representations of the people within them and Square has a reputation for being one of the best for a good reason. Regardless of the amount of time I spent there, the people I met and the camaraderie among colleagues will be my fondest memories.

I’ll be taking a short break, camping in Tofino for a few days with Kristi and Daisy and then getting back to what I enjoy most, building design tools from the comforts of home.

This is life and it’s awesome.

After years in the making, Things 3 is out for Mac, iPad and iPhone +  Watch.

It’s a phenomenal product built and tailored for each platform, and you should check out everything that’s new. With that said, I’m most impressed with the Mac app, of which this post is focused.

Meet the All-New Things - Things Blog - Cultured Code

I love the Mac. And I love the independent companies making apps that take full advantage of everything the platform has to offer.

For lots of reasons, we don’t see many great, native Mac apps these days (although lately we’ve been spoiled). That’s why Things 3 has me excited. I’m a super nerd 🤓 for this kind of stuff (if you can’t tell) and the attention to detail, level of polish and nuanced animation/behaviour/interaction has me drooling on a daily basis:

Jordan Borth on Twitter

🤤 👆 Me, every time I open Things 3 // @culturedcode

Delightful details can be found everywhere you look:

• The rubberbanding effect when attempting to resize windows and panels past their limits (in hindsight this seems so obvious and makes the default system resizing behaviour feel static and abrupt).

• The improved Help Tags that animate in, provide feedback and context and display keyboard shortcuts.

• The smooth animation accompanying the drag flocking behaviour when reordering multiple to-dos.

• The simple, intuitive and efficient Keyboard Shortcut UI in the Tags panel (that makes other implementations look and feel 🤢).

These are small details. In fact, they’re all simply improvements to standard system implementations and behaviours. But it’s this trait, of questioning even the smallest details and then making them better, that gives me such admiration for the team at Cultured Code.

Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you and you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.

—Steve Jobs

To say that Cultured Code influenced my approach to designing software and the work I do now is an understatement.

It was through Cultured Code that I was originally attracted to UI design and the indie Mac scene. They instilled the concept that software could be enjoyable and fun to use. That it should have character and be opinionated about about the workflow, features and user experience (this was 2008 and we’re talking about personal task management software).

It’s refreshing to see a small company stick to their values, charge real money and continue to build sustainable, independent software. I’m convinced that small teams of passionate, like minded people build the best products. I can only hope to follow suit in my own endeavours.

You can purchase Things 3 on the respective App Stores:

• Mac
• iPhone +  Watch
• iPad

Major props, Cultured Code 👊

Update, January 28, 2017—I seem to uncover more details of Things’ superb UI frequently and figured I might as well up date this post to include them.

Custom Sheet UI

To better harmonize with the custom title bar, Things implements a custom sheet UI, with rounded corners (that are consistent with all the other menus—of course) and a soft shadow. I had noticed this before but it just blends in so well I didn’t even think about it (the epitome of good design):

Compare and contrast with some other apps that use custom toolbars:

These are all good apps, but the fact that Cultured Code goes to these lengths (I’m sure it takes a ton of work and time to customize such a fundamental piece of AppKit—otherwise why isn’t everyone doing it?) is evidence of their craftmanship mentality towards software: that every detail matters.

If you’re curious about the silky animated GIFs, I use another great indie Mac app, Claquette from Thomas Zoechling. Find it on the Mac App Store.

In the sake of full transparency, the App Store links used are affiliate links. I am not sponsored or endorsed by either of these products, however if you purchase them using the links in this post, I get a small kickback.

Foursquare was originally published in It’s all in the details on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Twitter #Music was originally published in It’s all in the details on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.