Rudrank Dispatch: What If?

First and foremost, I want to apologise for the accidental email sent yesterday. In a moment of confusion, I clicked the wrong button, resulting in an email-only send instead of a publish-only post.

On a brighter note, I am happy that I had a great week physically, closing out the month on a high note. I hope you all had a fantastic first half of 2024 as well!

Now, let us dive into some interesting articles from the past week:

1. Exploring Translation in SwiftUI

While the new translation APIs are designed for macOS 15+ and iOS 18+, there is good news for those working with slightly older versions. The .translationPresentation modifier in SwiftUI supports macOS 14.4 and iOS 17.4. I have written about my experience implementing this in my app:

Exploring Translation: Using translationPresentation for Translation Popover

2. WWDC24 Recap at Apple Paris

It is exciting to see Apple's commitment to the developer community through worldwide events this year for those who could not attend WWDC in person at Apple Park.

I came across this blog post about attending the WWDC24 recap at Apple Paris. It offers some good insights into these community-focused initiatives:

Attending WWDC24 recap at Apple Paris

This Wednesday morning, I had the opportunity to attend the in-person recap of this year WWDC in Paris. I’m very happy to see those events flourishing all around the world, and specifically this year as I hadn’t as much time as I’d…

3. Creating Custom SF Symbols

For those times when you need your own unique SF Symbols, I found an excellent article on creating them using Sketch. It is a good read for developers looking to expand their icon sets:

Create Custom SF Symbols in Sketch | Danijela’s blog

Symbols (or icons) are an essential part of any app. Luckily, when developing for Apple platforms, we have the amazing collection of SF symbols at our disposal. But even with over 6000 symbols already available, sometimes the one you need doesn’t exist yet. We’ll go over how to create a custom symbol in Sketch.

That's all for this week's dispatch. If you have any thoughts or questions about these topics, feel free to reach out!

Stay curious, and keep coding!

The Game of Numbers

The scale showed 95 kg.

After more than six years, I am back to ninety-five kilos, down from 106 kg at the beginning of the year.

I had anticipated this moment for years, attaching so much significance to this number that I believed reaching it would bring a surge of happiness and satisfaction.

When I finally saw that 95, something unexpected happened – or rather, did not happen. I felt... normal. There was no magical moment, no sense of achievement. It is funny how it challenged the foundation of the thoughts I had built in my imaginary castle of future happiness.

Sure, my T-shirts fit much better, the jeans now require a belt, and my blood report shows the best numbers I have seen in a decade. But the emotional payoff I had expected was just not there.

This experience reminded me of a similar situation last year with a financial milestone. I had convinced myself that hitting a certain number in my bank account would magically solve all my problems.

But when that day came, I felt... nothing.

It was just a number change in my account.

While walking and reflecting on these experiences, I pondered how I have attached my sense of self-worth to mere numbers. Living in India, a country with such a vast population, it is easy to feel like just another face in the crowd.

Another number.

No offence intended, but that is often how I feel, and when I tie my worth to these arbitrary numerical goals, it only amplifies the sensation of being just one of them.

Am I chasing the right things? Is the game of numbers—whether on a scale, in a bank account, or in followers on social media—truly representative of my worth or my happiness? The answer defintely seems to be a no when I am typing this.

What If?

I loved the Fremont Street Experience in Downtown Las Vegas. Multiple bands were playing, but a familiar tune caught my attention – Master of Puppets. Surrounded by the energy of live music, I was fully present, drinking every note. I felt like I belonged here. As the live band played and I ordered another Budweiser bottle, memories flooded.

I spent countless hours practising this song as a teenager, struggling to master its 220 BPM speed. While I never quite reached that speed, I came close.

It made me wonder: What if?

What if I had chosen to continue those practice sessions, dedicating 10-12 hours a day to perfecting my craft till my fingers bled?

What if I had started recording YouTube covers, sharing my passion with the world?

Would I be spending my days coding or writing, or would music have become my career?

It is fascinating to contemplate these alternate paths, these roads not taken.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;

While I cannot have everything in life, I can make it a part of my current journey. Maybe I am not touring with a band, but I can still pick up my guitar and feel a similar rush of joy.

Perhaps I can find more ways to blend my love for music with my current development work. The plethora of music apps that I have or worked on is a good indication of it!

What passions have you long forgotten that you might want to consider again? How do you plan to walk these interests into your current path?