journal

I think we need to work on usability design before we jump the gun.  What’s so crazy, is that the project I’m working on right now focuses on this very concept.  Sort of like executing a great experience, but also interacting with the user and giving them a new identity through the interactive medium while enveloping the user in the brand.  Kind of like getting into a new car for a test drive.  Its funny you see all of this happening on the internet, but no one has really taken it to the next level.  The user is always driving how he/she is perceived on myspace or digg, but you never really see sites that encourage and guide it playfully. Here’s a great blog post on it… 

So Microsoft had the Silverlight Camp back in November and had released some great videos on getting started with Silverlight.  See them here.

The latest version of the PureMVC framework distribution package for ActionScript 3 Platform is 1.7. The package is in ZIP format contains the AS3 source code, API documentation, and SWC library for use with the Flex, Flash or AIR platforms.The change is transparent, that is to say, it requires no code changes and will not affect the behavior of your application, except to fix a reported bug. For information on the changes in this version, see the version.text file inside the download, as well as this forum thread.In addition to the bug fix, (for which a new unit test was created), the Facade class and IFacade interface both received a removeCommand method. It simply passes through the request to the Controller. In practice removeCommand is rarely used, but for the sake of balance in it was added so that if you want to use it you don’t need to get the Controller singleton to do so.And in the Controller’s registerCommand method, there was a potential for a Command being registered to a previously registered Notification, the new Command could be executed twice. This was taken care of, so that the Observer is only created if there is no existing Command registered for the notification. The behavior is the same as before in that the newly registered Command is executed, only once as you would expect.

Ryan Stewart has an article on RIA predictions for 2008.  Most are pretty good, I mean, this is coming from an Adobe insider and all. I’m not to sure about the whole Apple RIA deal.  Apple needs a major overhaul of their software platform in general.  The .NET platform really blows Apple clean out of the water and its starting to show in Microsoft’s overall growth.  If Apple doesn’t pull up soon, the XBOX 360/Zune space is going to shut the door on the AppleTV/iPod, and you bet that Microsoft is on their butts big time.  And one thing is exceptionally true, Adobe is underestimating Microsoft.  I personally know Microsoft is revamping their Expression suite big time, they were pretty upset about the first version and are taking the gung ho, take no prisoners approach to the next release.  Not saying that the first version isn’t impressive, but its unusable compared to Adobe’s tools.  One thing is absolutely for sure, we’re gonna hear and see some major movement in the RIA space from Adobe and Microsoft, because after all its the future of the web. 

Google is now using Adobe’s Search Engine SDK technology.  To summarize what’s going on for developers, you can run a program called swf2html and will output all of your text in the swf’s to an html doc.  From there you can see what text Google is picking up.  For more info check out the links here…

Google reads Flash text, so optimize it
http://blogs.cnet.com/8301-13530_1-9844989-28.html

Matt Cutts on how you can help Googlebot “see” your Flash content.
http://blogs.cnet.com/8301-13530_1-9834708-28.html

Search Engine SDK FAQ
http://www.adobe.com/licensing/developer/search/faq/

Quick reminder, if you’ve been having a problem with the textfield on your custom buttons with the MOUSE_CLICK event, chances are you need to add textfieldinst.mouseEnabled = false to the textfield.

It has been announced that Microsoft will be releasing the next beta of Silverlight (2.0) in Q1 of 2008. This Beta would support a Go-Live license that would enable developers to begin building and deploying Silverlight 2.0 applications.

Some of the new .NET specific features in the next public Silverlight preview will include:

• WPF UI Framework: The current Silverlight Alpha release only includes basic controls support and a managed API for UI drawing. The next public Silverlight preview will add support for the higher level features of the WPF UI framework. These include: the extensible control framework model, layout manager support, two-way data-binding support, and control template and skinning support. The WPF UI Framework features in Silverlight will be a compatible subset of the WPF UI Framework features in last week’s .NET Framework 3.5 release.
• Rich Controls: Silverlight will deliver a rich set of controls that make building Rich Internet Applications much easier. The next Silverlight preview release will add support for core form controls (textbox, checkbox, radiobutton, etc), built-in layout management controls (StackPanel, Grid, etc), common functionality controls (TabControl, Slider, ScrollViewer, ProgressBar, etc) and data manipulation controls (DataGrid, etc).
• Rich Networking Support: Silverlight will deliver rich networking support. The next Silverlight preview release will add support for REST, POX, RSS, and WS* communication. It will also add support for cross domain network access (so that Silverlight clients can access resources and data from any trusted source on the web).
• Rich Base Class Library Support: Silverlight will include a rich .NET base class library of functionality (collections, IO, generics, threading, globalization, XML, local storage, etc). The next Silverlight preview release will also add built-in support for LINQ to XML and richer HTML DOM API integration.

So I was talking with this guy who works at a small indie label and they laid off like 50+% of the staff and the first words out of my mouth was “Seriously…find anther job…look now.” And I told him, I was thinking about it before you even said you were laying people off. And I had a couple dozen reasons, but I didn’t even know about Amie St until today. This website is absolutely awesome. They sell songs from unknown artists at variable prices. Every song starts at free, and as more downloads occur the price rises, up to a cap of $.99. I’m even seeing some smaller labels adding their music to the site. Its just starting out, but already I’m seeing some great music. Like I’m totally amazed to see South on there at an AWESOME price, like half off a regular CD. And check out Thievery Corporation, almost all of their stuff up there, some EPs for less than a buck, like $.67. Is that totally unreal or what??? So bookmark this site and checkback often, great find!

Wow, its been a couple days since I’ve last posted. I’ve been pretty busy learning some interesting stuff over the holiday break. Anyway, I hope you’ve had a great year. I know I have! I’m thankful for having probably the best job out there, a great girlfriend (and puppy), a new house, friends and family, and just life in general. What are you thankful for?!? I hope its good!!!

Happy New Year Everyone!!!