Wednesday, March 21st, 2007
CMX Weekly Newsletter
Check the News!
TODCon 2007 Announced
For the few who haven't experienced it yet, TODCon is the most informative yet informal Adobe-related event you're going to find. Whether you're a seasoned veteran of Macromedia products or just starting out, you will have a great time learning a great deal from many knowledgeable speakers about CSS, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, ColdFusion, Flash, Central and even about running your business properly. Those who attend usually end up coming back every year because of the unique and informal atmosphere. You don't want to miss out on this event. This year, TODCon will take place in Las Vegas, Nevada. We predict that this year's turnout will be even bigger than last year's.
You're invited to register for this fantastic, one of a kind event. Hurry, so you can get the early bird registration fee.
Adobe Announces That There Will Be An Announcement
From our own Jim Babbage, via the Community MX blog: "According to Adobe's blog site, they will be announcing details about the launch of the new Creative Suite (CS3) on March 27. So Adobe is officially announcing they will say something in an annoucement about the new release. Seems a little Monty Python-ish, but I know I'm excited anyway. This release is said to be 'largest software release in Adobe's 25 year history.' Adobe will present details via a live web cast from New York City at 3:30 pm. More details about the webcast will follow later this week, so stay tuned and make sure to mark this one in your calendar!"
Get To Your Mac From Anywhere - For Free
MacApper.com has a mention on their website about the easy and free way you can get remote access to your Macintosh computer. Apple has its own remoting software, but at $300, it lacks that certain... freeness. This is yet another example of Community MX proving that they are the ultimate fans of a bargain.
When It's Time To Buy
Gadgets can be so tempting. They promise to make our lives easier. They're shiny and new. They keep us up with or ahead of the Joneses. But just because that new "gotta have" gadget is on the market doesn't mean you should buy it now, no matter how much you think you need it. Why? Well, read this article at RewardPrograms.com and find out if now is the best time to make that purchase. Good tips in this article, like buying in bulk, doing research and other things that could save you time and money.
What's In a Word? Plenty, And Some Of It Is Annoying.
Anyone who uses Microsoft Word, no matter what version, has probably run into those "But.. I didn't ask you to do that" moments that make you wonder if Microsoft is really on the consumer's side. LifeHacker.com has a good article on getting rid of some of those annoyances and gaining back some control that Word tries to wrestles away from you.
Satisfied Customers Speak Out!
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"Very nice of you to write back. The MX Community is an amazing source of information for someone trying to learn advanced stuff but doesn't have anyone they can ask questions of and get direct answers. Sometime books are not enough - you need someone with experience. Once in a while I still run into some walls, but with people like you all at MX, I always know where to go and look for answers! Best money I ever spent!"
CMX Subscriber Rick H., commenting on Holly Bergevin and John Gallant's tutorial "Flowing and Positioning: Two Page Models"
Whether you're just starting out or need advanced support, Community MX will give you answers and ideas to work through your tough issues. Don't miss out. Learn more about CMX or sign up for a free trial today!
Great Quotes:
"Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100 times more on R&D. It's not about money. It's about the people you have, how you're led, and how much you get it." — Steve Jobs
I Knight Thee, "Sir Butter Fingers"
Anyone in the computer field knows that a slip of the finger can cause problems with code, spelling, all kinds of things. Sometimes, it can wipe out thirty eight billion dollars worth of information. A techie at the Alaska Department of Revenue was "fixing" a hard drive when he accidentally erased information on a huge oil fund. Of course, they were smart enough to back it up to another drive, which was... accidentally reformatted. But the ADR is not stupid. They also had backup tapes, which were... unreadable. Let this be a lesson to all of us: When confronted with a computer error that could cost people millions, or even billions, either use someone else's fingers to press the "delete" key (plausible deniability), or have a standby ticket to Canada ready... More about this at MSNBC.com.
IE7 Not Playing Nice?
When Firefox started really taking off, early last year, it brought with it a bunch of rendering advantages that were missing from IE5. Once IE7 was announced, it was assumed that Microsoft would at least catch up to Firefox. In some ways they really have, but in other ways, they're still sorely lacking. In his blog at DevThought.com, Guillermo Rauch outlines some of the ways that IE7 needs to improve before it can start to be considered second place to Firefox.
Fox, NBC Challenge YouTube's Business Model
Google is the place to go when it comes to online video. At least for now... NBC and Fox are preparing to combine forces and offer free video comprised of television shows and movies. Content will range from "Saturday Night Live" to the movie "Borat." Of course, they could never replace YouTube's main draw, which is the ability of users to upload and share their own video. But this article at MSNBC.com mentions NBC's plan to integrate that type of functionality into NBC.com.
Fun Things To Do If You're Rich
Paul McCartney can afford to do pretty much anything he wants to do. So if he wanted to, for example, ditch the record company he's been with for forty-plus years in favor of signing with a coffee company, why not go for it? McCartney has signed to Starbuck's new "Hear" label, with a deal to distribute all of his new music through the coffee giant. Apparently, he is looking forward to "reaching people around the world in a new way." It's difficult to say what McCartney's motivation is, but we're assuming it's either a lot of money, or a profound love of coffee... Read more about it at Adage.com.
AND He's Better Looking Too!
Ever done a vanity search? That's when you go to Google or another search engine just to look up your own name to see what comes up. For instance, I've done a search on "Bill Horvath" and I see that Community MX is the first link that comes up. But other folks end up finding other people with their name who have a bigger presence on the internet than they do. This sometimes results in people getting jealous of... themselves, or their "Google Twin" as some folks call them. Lisa Heyamoto has an interesting article on this Google Twin phenomenon at Chron.com.
CMX AJAX Loader Extension
- The CMX AJAX Loader behavior allows you to dynamically load new XHTML/XML from your web server and insert it into any element on the current page without requiring the user to perform a full refresh. By eliminating full page refreshes you can improve both the performance of your site and the end user's experience. Now you can start enjoying the benefits of AJAX technology without having to worry about the complicated scripting that makes it work!
Check out the Extension by CMX Partner Rob Williams
Fun and Freebies
For Desktop Background Junkies
If you're looking for desktop backgrounds that are out of the norm, check out Desktopography.net where they've got dozens of beautifully done backgrounds for free.
Don't Copy That Floppy!
These days you've got to be careful of copyright infringement and what you're copying - as well as what you're copying to. Some things never change. Even back in the day when the floppy was our media storage unit of choice, it was a big deal. Don't believe me? Check out ZeroDay.com and watch the "Don't Copy That Floppy" video.
Starve a Cold, Feed a Fever, and Burn The Daylights Out of a Sore Throat
Who knew that cayenne peppers could do wonders for a sore throat? Well, this guy at MyFinancialJourney.com swears by it, and gives you his special recipe for keeping your sore throat at bay.
Flash Video Deployment: A Case Study with TEACHnow.org, Part 1: Video Requirements
- Since the release of Flash Player 8, a lot of buzz has been generating about the new and improved quality of Flash Video, thanks to the On2 VP6 codec that is part of the Flash Player 8 plug-in. In Part 1 of this series, the process of deploying a 35-minute documentary with Flash Video is examined.
This free article by CMX Partner Robert Reinhardt can be found here.
Weekly Content Listing
Flowing Text Around an Object in Fireworks by Using Freehand and Fireworks
If there is one weak area in Fireworks, it's in the text handling. I've seen many posts on the user groups asking how to flow text around an object in Fireworks. Attaching text on a path won't do the trick. The only way to do this in FW is through a tedious manual process of either creating multiple text objects, or using the space bar to customize the indenting of each line. The functionality is just not in Fireworks at this time. But it is in Freehand. Freehand allows you to flow text inside a path, or around a path or a bitmap object.
You can't do this easily in Fireworks:
But Freehand makes this type of thing simple to do.
This article will how you how to create the wrapped text in Freehand and then how to bring the result over to Fireworks. We'll also look at the limitations of this technique.
Coloring Your World - Part 2: Two Worlds of Color - Digital vs. Print
In my last article on color, we talked about the hexadecimal and RGB color models and how to interpret colors in your code. Now we will talk about what happens when you will be asked to work from printed material and turn it into an online color palette that looks consistent and will please your clients.
The Coloring Your World Series
Coloring Your World - Part 1: Color Basics
Coloring Your World - Part 2: Two Worlds of Color - Digital vs Print
Coloring Your World - Part 3: Color Trends and Possibilities Coming Soon
Methods for Testing in Multiple Versions of IE - **Updated** [FREE]
Internet Explorer 7 (IE), released in October 2006, greatly improves its CSS rendering capabilities. However, it's only available for Windows XP and Vista, so we still have to support IE 6 — and possibly IE 5.5 and 5.0, depending on your site's audience — for some time to come. Unfortunately, the integration of IE into the Windows operating system, and Microsoft's refusal to allow multiple versions of it to run at the same time, have made testing web sites in various versions of the ubiquitous browser difficult. There are, however, ways it can be done, and the advent of IE 7 has brought some new methods out for our consideration.
In this article I'll provide an overview of the current methods available for testing multiple versions of Windows IE and provide the pros and cons of each method so you can decide which suits you best.
Note: This article was originally written in late November 2006. Right after it was written, Microsoft released a free virtual machine image for Virtual PC, making it easier for developers to use the software. Thus, the section on Microsoft Virtual PC has been revised from the original, with other small changes throughout. My recommendations remain virtually (no pun intended) the same. You can view the original article here.
Dude, Where Do I Put My Code? - Part 2
Beginners to Flash programming often find themselves asking a fundamental question: "Dude, where do I put my code?" A quick sweep of the 100s of Community MX Flash tutorials, as well as other code repositories on the Web, reveals quite a few choices. You can put ActionScript into keyframes; attach it directly to objects, such as buttons; put it into external text files; and even write a special kind of external file called a class. So, which approach is best? Are some better than others?
To arrive at an answer, this series takes a stroll among the various techniques mentioned. This is not an article on ActionScript syntax or how to program, but rather, an overview of approaches you might take while getting your feet wet. In Part 1, we looked at code attached to timeline keyframes. Here in Part 2, we'll see how things differ when code is directly attached to objects. Part 3 will conclude the discussion with a brief look at code in external files.
The Dude Where Do I Put My Code Series:
Dude, Where Do I Put My Code? - Part 1
Dude, Where Do I Put My Code? - Part 2
Dude, Where Do I Put My Code? - Part 3 Coming Soon
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Eight - Making Allowances for IE6
In this last part of our series, we see what can be done to alter the code of our fixed positioning demo for IE6 and make that browser render our fixed popup in a way that it can handle, allowing a user to actually use the page and its contents.
We'll also wrap a few loose odds and ends while we're at it, and put a tail on this wild and crazy CSS fixed positioning series. Let's go!
The Fixed Position in IE7 Series:
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part One
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Two
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Three: Fixed Position and Older IE Versions
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Four: Fixed Popups!
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Five: Fixed Popups from Flowed Elements
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Six: Tricky Popups!
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Seven: A Hovered Fallback
Fixed Position in IE7 - Part Eight: Making Allowances for IE6
InDesign Text Wraps
InDesign is a great application when working with large amounts of text. When working on a layout with a lot of text I typically use a drawing or page layout application such as Freehand, Illustrator or InDesign. However from time to time I may end up working with text in an image editing application like Photoshop. Recently I read Jim Babbage's article about creating a text wrap for use in Fireworks and at first was surprised that Fireworks did not have a text wrap feature but on second thought why would it? Fireworks first job is as an image editing application, it does handle text quite well but is really not meant for large amounts of text. Another application similar to this is Photoshop, the last few versions of Photoshop have vastly improved its text handling abilities but it too can not do text wraps. Jim's article demonstrated how you can use Freehand to create a text wrap and bring it into Fireworks so I thought now would be a good time to also demonstrate InDesign's text wrapping abilities.
In this tutorial we will:
- Look at InDesign's Text Wrap palette
- Learn how to wrap text around vector and bitmap objects
- Use Photoshop clipping paths to wrap text around elements in a photo
- Control text block settings in regards to text wraps
- Look at how the resulting artwork can be used in a Fireworks or Photoshop layout
Approximate download size: 1.1MB
Instant Infrared From Your Color Images
The magic of infrared film and their prints can produce hauntingly beautiful images far surpassing the ordinary. The world takes on this moonlit quality, with dark skies, fluffy white clouds and green foliage taking on a brilliant luminosity. These results are generally produced by using a deep red filter over the lens of a camera loaded with infrared black and white film.
In this tutorial I'll show you a way you can simulate these results in Photoshop using three simple tools: the Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer, the Channel Mixer Adjustment Layer and the Noise Filter.
The AS3 Event System - Part 2: Timer Class
In the second installment of the AS3 Event System series, we'll be covering the procedure for implementing a commonly-used utility, the Timer class.
The AS3 Events System Series:
The AS3 Event System - Part 1: The Basics
The AS3 Event System - Part 2: Timer Class
Using Your iPod with Your Digital Camera [FREE]
As you may have noticed in some of my blogs, I've pretty much become an iPod junkie. From tunes, to Podcasts, to adding photos from my computer, I'm having a blast. Recently, I've found even more reasons to love my iPod. The iPod Camera Connector for the video iPod.
This little accessory has opened up even more flexibility for my digital photography needs. As long as I have my iPod with me (and enough space on it) I no longer have to worry about switching memory cards in my camera. I just connect the camera's USB cable to the connector, and I can import files directly from the camera to my iPod. It's fast and easy, especially with JPEG files.
FusionDebug 2.0 - Setting Breakpoints
In this article we will take a look at how to set a breakpoint within FusionDebug 2.0, an interactive ColdFusion debugger by Fusion-Reactor. Breakpoints allow us to stop code execution at a predetermined location within our ColdFusion template, CFC (ColdFusion Component) or custom tag. This is a big plus over having to use <cfdump> to output variables to our page, in that we don't have to allow code execution to complete or unnecessarily abort our template. Once we have our code paused, so to speak, we can inspect all variables of various scope at that particular moment and then let our code finish processing.
The FusionDebug Series
FusionDebug 2.0 - Configurations
FusionDebug 2.0 - Setting Breakpoints
Text On a Path in Fireworks 8
- The release of Fireworks 8 brought with it many enhancements from both creative and production perspectives. This article focuses on one of the old FW features that was revamped for Fireworks 8 — editing text on a path. Adding text to a path breaks you out of the rigid formality of text blocks and gives you the freedom to make the text fit into your design in an almost organic fashion. In the old days, changing the shape of a path that was attached to text was a multiple step process, and not a very intuitive one. In order to edit the path, you had to detach the text, change the path and then re-attach the text. Very much a trial and error process. In FW 8, it's just as easy to edit the path shape as it is to add text to a path. This makes it easier — and more fun — to create what you want. Control like this has been asked for many times in Fireworks, I'm happy to say it's finally arrived.
Check out the Article by CMX author Jim Babbage
Tips, Tricks and Dirty Cheats!
This week's Tip, Trick or Dirty Cheat is courtesy of CMX Associate Chris Flick
Bring Your Text To The Front In Fireworks
If you want a simple way to bring your text (or anything other FW selection) to the very front of your document (and the top of your layers), just copy and paste that selection. That selection will then go to the top of whatever you're working on... Say, for example, a gradient box.
Would you like your tip published? Submit it to tips@communitymx.com.
That's it for this week. Stay tuned for the next CMX newsletter!