Wednesday, October 5th, 2005
CMX Weekly Newsletter
Check the News!
Changing of the Guard in The Works at Adobe, Macromedia
Although Adobe's acquisition of Macromedia is not yet final, management changes are already planned. Three executives from Adobe will be walking while five Macromedia executives will be setting up new offices at Adobe. The most significant change will be Steven Elop, CEO of Macromedia, leaving to head up Adobe's worldwide field operations. See this Etrade.com article for more.
Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Hate Greed When It's Someone Else's
Who knew that two of the most powerful men in the computer world were against greed? Specifically, both seem to feel that the record labels want too much for the privilege of digital song downloads. Steve Jobs, in this Reuters.co.uk article, says "If they want to raise the prices, it means that they are getting greedy." Meanwhile, talks between Microsoft and the major record labels fell apart. Microsoft was reportedly seeking a deal for their own digital download service. According to this News.com article, "negotiations broke down Friday over what Microsoft considered high royalty rates sought by EMI Group, Warner Music Group, Vivendi Universal's Universal Music Group and Sony, a joint venture of Sony and Bertelsmann"
Speaking of Downloading Music
Whether you already download music online , or have been thinking about subscribing to an online service, you may want to read this article from DesignTechnica.com. It reviews the most popular music download services, discusses the pros and cons of each, and provides a quick rundown of their prices. And if you don't like music at all, we can only assume that your 8-track of "Afternoon Delight" got stuck on "repeat" when you were a child.
RIAA Lawsuits Take an Interesting Turn
The Recording Industry Association of America has filed lawsuits against over 13,000 file swappers, but the tactics they're using to do so are coming under scrutiny. Tanya Andersen, a forty one-year old single mother of an eight-year old girl is being sued by the RIAA for downloading among other things, gangster rap. Andersen is countersuing, saying that she has never downloaded music and that the tactics used by the RIAA to collect money from her are illegal. Check out the RecordingIndustryVsPeople blog for more information.
Hiding From Google
While companies frantically try to get listed by Google, there are many people working hard not to get listed by Google. One of the Google-avoiders mentioned in this Wired.com article believes that there is already too much private information on the internet that shouldn't be there. Others are afraid they could fall victim to identity theft, and do not want to make it easier on thieves. Check the link to get more opinions on why it's not always great to show up on Google.
Satisfied Customers Speak Out!
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"Danny, Thanks for this article. I wanted to use XML for a Flash config file, but was somewhat dreading the learning curve that I thought would be involved as I have never worked with XML before. However, the classes and examples you provided in this article probably just saved me days of research and development of my own home-grown method. Thanks a million!!!"
- JayDee, CMX Subscriber, commenting on Danny Patterson's article, "Creating an XML Configuration File for your Flash Application" .
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:
"I just wish my mouth had a backspace key." — Unknown
Video iPod Being Announced Next Week?
According to this story at engadget.com, Apple has a big event planned for next week. Rumors are flying that we'll get an announcement of a new iPod that supports video playback. This photo at engadget may or may not be that iPod. To us it looks a bit like an iPod if you squint really hard and stand back ten feet from the monitor. A better photo of a possible new video iPod can be seen at Dapreview.net. Read more about this story that may or may not be a story at engadget.com. Eager to be in on the action, we found others are reporting the possibility of the Video iPod as well, like Yahoo!, MSNBC.com and others.
Fantastic Use of Flash
There are many impressive Flash websites out there, but sometimes you see something that is so unique, and you want to tell everyone about it. Thankfully, John Dowdell from Macromedia put a link in his blog to a great online Samsung commercial that uses two windows to get its message across. You can reach the commercial through this link at Digg.com. Make sure your browser will accept the popup that you'll get when you click the "Coolest Flash and Javascript I've seen In a While" link.
Arnold Tries His Hand At Terminating Spam
California has become the first state to pass an anti-phishing law. Introduced by State Senator Kevin Murray and signed by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Anti-Phishing Act states that any attempt "to solicit, request or take any action to induce another person to divulge personal information on the Internet via a Web page, electronic mail message or any other electronic means while representing oneself as a business without the permission or authority of that business is a civil violation." Security analysts don't have very high hopes for the bill, saying that it will probably go the way of the mostly ineffective Can-Spam act. Read more about it at TopTechNews.com.
Great Idea, Really Unfortunate Name
Serious audiophiles really enjoy their mp3 players and taking their music with them wherever they go. But stereo sound is so limiting... Left and right? Not enough. Now you can get 3-D surround-sound audio from your mp3 player thanks to the uh... Boostaroo. The Boostaroo amplifies your audio player's signal and splits it to enhance and enrich its sound. Your headphones get plugged into the Boostaroo, which in turn plugs into your mp3 player. It really sounds like a good product, but why didn't they just name it Goofy McStupid and get it over with?
New Ways To Mess With Your Gmail Account
If you've got a Gmail account (and by now, who doesn't?), you may not know all the neat tricks you can do with it. For instance, keyboard shortcuts are available to make simple tasks more efficient, and you can do some extreme boolean searches when trying to pinpoint a particular email. There's a lot more you can do as well. Enough that ExtrmeTech.com wrote a book about it called "Hacking Gmail." They've got a chapter from the book available on their website.
CMX Extra Buttons Dreamweaver Toolbar Extension
- Sometimes, just making things more accessible makes a program easier to use. That's the thinking behind CMX Extra Buttons. Many applications have a Print button, and a Spell Check button on their toolbars, however, Dreamweaver does not. This extension adds these buttons to the Standard toolbar. You may work with various versions of a file whether to just to test out an idea that came up, or see if the client's request will take 30 minutes, or 30 hours. For situations such as this, a Save As and Save Copy As buttons are also part of CMX Extra Buttons.
Take a look at this extension by CMX Partner Danilo Celic
Fun and Freebies!
The Reason Technology Exists
Technology has made a huge impact in how we communicate. It has helped bring people together, and made life easier for us in so many ways we couldn't name them all. And now, it gets us our beer faster. Matthias Hahnen and Robert Doerr from Saarland University in Saarbruecken, Southwest Germany, have created the Smart Beer Mat, which alerts your barkeeper if your beverage is almost empty. Using sensor chips, their specially crafted mugs weigh the glass with beer and without so that it can tell when you're about to run dry. Check it out at CNN.com.
OK, Hold That Pose!
Martin Waugh likes to create "liquid sculptures", which are really not sculptures at all, but drops of liquid caught with a camera lens at just the right time. Martin will pour a drop of liquid into a glass and capture the impact on film, effectively freezing that millisecond of time for everyone to see. It's actually a beautiful effect. See for yourself at Martin's website, LiquidSculpture.com .
Smack a Penguin For Points
Community MX does not condone cruelty to animals. But when a penguin made of pixels is whacked by some type of Yeti for points, we're there. The Penguin Smack game at GopherGas.com can be addicting. None of us here at CMX were able to get over 593.5, so if you beat that, please don't tell us.
Getting Started With Flash Lite (Free Article)
- Flash Lite is the version of the Macromedia Flash Player that has been specifically designed for use on mobile phones. This article aims to give you an introduction to developing content for mobile devices and the tools you need to start building applications using Flash Lite.
This free article by guest author Paul Wilson can be found here.
Weekly Content Listing
Designing with Gradients and Glows
In this tutorial we will look at how we can use gradients and drop shadows to create a nice back drop to our designs. The technique is a simple one, but it is also one that is very easy to get wrong.
To create this type of design it is very important that you get the planning stages correct, right down to setting the margin values in Fireworks. When using a gradient for a background image and incorporating a drop shadow on your wrapper div it is very important that the structure is defined exactly as you envisage your finished design, once your design leaves Fireworks you will have very little room for error; if any at all.
Working with Dates - Part 1
In Part 1 of this series, you'll learn how to use the methods of the built-in Date class to create and manipulate date objects in Flash. You'll also learn how to display dates in a more readable format in your applications.
The Working with Dates Series:
Working with Dates - Part 1
Working with Dates - Part 2 Coming Soon
Using the Scale 9 Feature in Flash 8
Scale 9 is a new feature of Flash 8 that allows you to specify how you want a MovieClip to scale. A great example of how you can use this is to preserve the rounded corners of a box. In this tutorial, we will examine two ways of using scale 9 in your projects.
Add a Perspective Shadow to Text
Drop shadows are a common effect used to draw extra attention to text. In this tutorial we will create a real shadow with perspective. Using Freehand's perspective grid we will create a perspective shadow for text. This effect can be applied to text or any other object in Freehand. It can also be combined with Freehand's fills and live raster effects to create some interesting and realistic shadows.
How Inline Elements Work - Part Five
In Part Five of our series we'll cover the often misunderstood text-align property, as well as the letter-spacing and word-spacing properties. We'll look at what each property is supposed to do, the values available, browser support, and some of the things to watch out for if you choose to use one or more of these properties. Come along and learn about some very interesting properties!
The Inline Elements Series:
How Inline Elements Work - Part One
How Inline Elements Work - Part Two
How Inline Elements Work - Part Three
How Inline Elements Work - Part Four
How Inline Elements Work - Part Five
Quick and Slick: Some Speedy (and Capable) Web Dev Alternatives
We all have favorite programs for day-to-day web development work. But when speed counts most, the fast and capable replacement apps described in this review (examples are provided for all platforms) can make a real difference.
Loading Database Tables Into a Query Dynamically
In this tutorial we will look at how we can query a database to discover the names of the tables it contains. Once we have gleaned that information we'll loop through the tables and extract the ones that we need to include in our search facility.
Better Coder Tools in Dreamweaver 8
As an ASP.NET developer, one of my pet peeves with Dreamweaver MX 2004 (and earlier) was lack of a great code editor. Dreamweaver 8 goes a long way towards rectifying that deficiency. In this article, we'll explore some of the enhancements that are going to make your (coding) life easier.
The best part (in my opinion) is the code collapsing/expansion functionality in the Coder toolbar. Read on to learn about more handy improvements.
SWF Metadata in Flash 8 [FREE]
Starting with Flash 8, you can now include metadata within your Flash movies (SWF files). By adding a title and description to your Flash document, search engines have the potential to index more of your Flash content on the web.
Random Queries (recordsets) For ASP, ColdFusion and PHP
While most data displays on web sites are in some predetermined, or even user specified order, such as search results of a products table in product name order, it can be quite beneficial to display data randomly, such as random banners, or even random on sale products on the home page. This article will discuss how you can use ASP VBScript with Access and MS SQL Server; PHP with MySQL; and ColdFusion with Access, MS SQL Server and MySQL to generate random results, be it a single random banner from your advertisers, or five random products that are currently on sale.
Get That Code Into The Database Where It Belongs
- This article will show how you can take some complex scripting logic out of your web pages, and put it into the database. Why would you want to do this? There are several advantages: the code will usually execute faster, the page code will be easier to read and maintain, and there will be a clearer separation between business logic and presentation logic. The concepts in the article will apply equally to all types of server languages.
Check out the Article by CMX Partner Tom Muck
Tips, Tricks and Dirty Cheats!
This week's Tip, Trick or Dirty Cheat is courtesy of Kim Cavanaugh , CMX Partner.
Flash Video Tip
When designing compositions that include a video player in Flash I like to take a screenshot of the player in a browser window. I can then use that bitmap image in a guide layer to help in designing the rest of the interface and for making decisions on skinning the player.
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!