by John C. Bland II | Sep 17, 2007 | Adobe AIR, Software
Multidmedia wrote an article in April of this year titled “Zinc Vs Apollo: The Good, The Bad and The Desktop”:https://www.multidmedia.com/support/developers/articles/?action=show&id=33. It is written with a bit of a defensive tone, understandably. Their whole business is Zinc. I mean, they have other products but Zinc is definitely the big one and Adobe AIR is SERIOUSLY going to cut into profits for them. It is free compared to several hundred for Zinc. Anyways…I wanted to clarify a few things from their article.
They did write this in April of this year so the info was current as of them but it isn’t now. For instance, the table at the bottom compares Zinc and AIR. This is the biggest “gripe” I have with the article.
(see the article first then the rest of this post will make sense)
(more…)
by John C. Bland II | Sep 16, 2007 | Flash Platform, RegEx
I was working on an app and needed to remove all HTML instances in a string. Well, that same functionality was needed elsewhere so…I created a class.
/**
* String Utility functions
* @author John C. Bland II
* @version 0.1
*/
package utils{
public class StringUtils {
public static function stripHTML(value:String):String{
return value.replace(/<.*?>/g, "");
}
}
} |
/**
* String Utility functions
* @author John C. Bland II
* @version 0.1
*/
package utils{
public class StringUtils {
public static function stripHTML(value:String):String{
return value.replace(/<.*?>/g, "");
}
}
}
To use it you simply:
trace(StringUtils.stripHTML("some html string")); |
trace(StringUtils.stripHTML("some html string"));
Hope this helps someone.
by John C. Bland II | Sep 15, 2007 | Adobe AIR, Ajax, Software
Ok, this is my first impression and, as with all things, I’m sure I’ll find something wrong with it but right now…NOPE…IT ROCKS!
You can build “HTML+Javascript AIR applications”:https://labs.adobe.com/technologies/air/develop_ajax.html! I love it, again…at first glance. The more I play with it I’ll expand my thoughts but at this point this is about all I can say. lol. 🙂
Oh, it is also useful for normal Javascript, Apple iPhone development, and more. Last note…it is free! 😀
by John C. Bland II | Sep 15, 2007 | Conference, Desert Code Camp
Day 1 is complete…PHEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!
My sessions were good for the most part but, for whatever reason, I kept losing track of my thoughts. It wasn’t too often but it happened more than I’d care.
As promised, I’m uploading the files from my “AS3 Command Pattern session”:https://www.johncblandii.com/uploads/AS3CommandPattern.zip. My other sessions used examples from “Adobe LiveCycle ES Edition”:https://www.adobe.com/products/livecycle/editions.html, “Adobe AIR HTML+JS”:https://labs.adobe.com/technologies/air/develop_ajax.html, and “Adobe AIR Flex and Flash”:https://labs.adobe.com/technologies/air/develop_flex.html.
Tomorrow I have a preso at 1 PM (same Bat-time…same Bat-place) title “Flex 3 Preview” which covers…ummm…Flex 3. 🙂 Come out and check out Flex 3!
Also, here in the next month or so I’m going to start creating presentations via Adobe Connect as well as writing more tutorials. I need to sharpen my preso skills again and I have a LOT to cover with all of the ColdFusion 8, ASP.NET/Silverlight, Flex 3, AIR, and Flash CS3 goodness out there right now. Oh how yummy it is to be a developer right now. 🙂
by John C. Bland II | Sep 15, 2007 | Conference, Desert Code Camp
Well, it is “Code Camp”:https://www.desertcodecamp.com time! Preso’s have begun and I’m starting my first in 2 minutes! See you there…errr…here.
by John C. Bland II | Sep 12, 2007 | ColdFusion
I’m a day late but Volume 1 was released yesterday. “Ray Camden”:https://www.coldfusionjedi.com/index.cfm/2007/9/11/CFWACK-8-Volume-1-Site-and-Forums-and-sample-chapters blogged about it so I figured I’d propagate the word.
by John C. Bland II | Sep 10, 2007 | Fantasy Football
🙂
I love to start a year off with a win. I’m not highly pleased with my teams performance but it wasn’t just terrible. My expectations were higher for Carson Palmer. I wanted to start Ben but chose not too. The way I saw it…Bengals played Baltimore so if Carson stunk it up the Ravens D would get the points: win win for me. Well…it wasn’t as great as I thought and Ben CLEANED UP yesterday.
Oh well, the week was a success. I’ll make my adjustments for next week and see if I can come out on top again. The results shown below:
View Results Image
by John C. Bland II | Sep 10, 2007 | ColdFusion
“Sarge posted this”:https://www.sargeway.com/blog/index.cfm/2007/9/10/ColdFusion-CF8-CHF1-and-CFMX702-CHF3-released earlier so I thought I’d help spread the word.
I love how Adobe took notice and immediately posted an update. That kind of makes me feel even better about the future of CF.
by John C. Bland II | Sep 9, 2007 | Adobe MAX, Conference
I am officially registered for “Max 2007”:https://www.adobemax2007.com! Yay! 🙂
This year will be different though. I’m going as an attendee (“Katapult”:https://www.katapultmedia.com employee) ANDDDDDD I’ll be a TA (teacher assistant) for several “Flex”:https://www.adobe.com/go/flex and “ColdFusion”:https://www.adobe.com/go/coldfusion hands-on training sessions on Sunday as well as a few during the week. This is going to be pretty cool.
I’ll be at the “Palmer House Hiton”:https://www1.hilton.com/en_US/hi/hotel/CHIPHHH-The-Palmer-House-Hilton-Illinois/index.do and will probably be in the lobby geeking out a bit (maybe in the room; lol). Hopefully I can meet up with some more geeks and business folks.
Special thanks to “Michael Hagel”:https://www.michaelhagel.com/…you know why. 😀
Sarge…appreciate the **strong** nudge to go. lol.
by John C. Bland II | Sep 8, 2007 | General
“Jason Delmore”:https://www.cfinsider.com, ColdFusion Product Manager, is “giving away 5 licenses of ColdFusion 8 and 5 licenses of Flex Builder to **non-profits**”:https://www.cfinsider.com/index.cfm/2007/9/4/Are-you-a-nonprofit-that-is-using-or-wants-to-use-ColdFusion-or-Flex#comments. This is an amazing move! Wait…not by Adobe…no, he’s doing this out of his own pocket!!!
bq. I am planning on buying up to five (5) ColdFusion 8 Standard licenses and up to five (5) Flex Builder licenses and donating them to good causes (on my own dime… not as a corporate donation.) Do you work for a worthy non-profit starting a new web project? Do you want the UI to be slick and the back-end to be world-class? Then I have the deal for you!
“Read more here”:https://www.cfinsider.com/index.cfm/2007/9/4/Are-you-a-nonprofit-that-is-using-or-wants-to-use-ColdFusion-or-Flex
Solid Jason!
by John C. Bland II | Sep 8, 2007 | General
“Robert Hoekman”https://www.rhjr.net is the original founder of Flash and Multimedia Users Group of Arizona (FMUG.az; now know as “Arizona Flash Platform User Group”:https://www.gotoandstop.org). I’ve known him for a few years now and when we discussed him turning over the group to me he made a comment about how much he has gotten out of being a Adobe user group manager. Most of the things he said I would experience…I have (articles, books, rubbing elbows with industry pros, etc).
What is amazing is how much Robert has done since then. He has really made a name for himself and has done a great job in his writings (“here”:https://www.rhjr.net/dto; new one on the way). Last year he spoke at Adobe Max (2006; which I thought was big for him since he had a book signing too) and now he’s speaking at “Voices That Matter: Web Design”:https://www.voicesthatmatter.com/webdesign2007/ with “some of the biggest names in web usability”:https://www.voicesthatmatter.com/webdesign2007/wdspeakers.html.
For more on what Robert will be doing, what he is doing now, etc you can listen to an “interview with Robert”:https://www.voicesthatmatter.com/webdesign2007/podcasts/Robert_FINAL.mp3 (linked from “conference homepage”:https://www.voicesthatmatter.com/webdesign2007) by the conference folks.
Congrats Robert! Keep up the great work.
Use the link below to buy his book. He makes a TON of sense in it (especially regarding “poka-yoke devices”:https://rhjr.net/theblog/category/kaizen/). I learned a few good points and only made it part of the way through the book (like I do all books).
by John C. Bland II | Sep 8, 2007 | Flash Platform
I signed up for “Google Analytics”:https://www.google.com/analytics/ the other day just to try it out. They take roughly 24 hours to retrieve data about your site but once you do the dogs are let loose and you get a ton of stats (very useful too). So this morning I decide to look at the stats, thinking it would be a normal stat viewing site, but I ran into some pure sweetness.
I won’t go into every detail of the site (sign up or view the demo to see for yourself) just so I can stay on topic here but I will say…the Dashboard is sweet! You can add, from what I’ve seen, any report to the dashboard AND you can organize the reports in terms of position on the dashboard…NICE. The best part of the dashboard is the use of Flash.
Several of Google sites use Flash (best so far: “Google Finance”:https://finance.google.com/) and I can never easily tell when Flash is being used until I mouse over. The widgets gel with the page so the only way to tell is the interactivity, which some **could** be ajax [isn’t but it could], or the right click menu. Their implementation of Flash is simply smooth, useful, and done right. You should seriously check the Analytics dashboard.
Bravo Google!
by John C. Bland II | Sep 7, 2007 | Golf
“Cody”:https://blog.xyzpdq.org works for “Last Minute Golfer”:https://www.lastminutegolfer.com and he was tasked with the responsibility of building a “Facebook”:https://www.facebook.com app (built with .NET). Well, they did and have well over 20,000 users in less than a month!! Whoa!
The app is “Golf Buds”:https://apps.facebook.com/golfbuds (login required). Check it out and start posting scores! Add me to your friends so I can see how well you’ve been hittin’em. 🙂
**Golf Buds**
Hand-pick your favorite Golf Buds and showcase them on your profile. Who is shortest off the tee? Who has the best foot wedge? Who is most likely to wear plaid? Talk some smack and track your Golf Buds rounds!
by John C. Bland II | Sep 6, 2007 | Ajax
Yes, I’m trying to make a lil’ money off this blog (golf can get expensive; lol) so I went to setup AdSense and noticed something simple but sweet.
I clicked on the zip code textfield and voila…I get that popup. I thought it was general but then I noticed it actually showed potential/legit information about Arizona. 🙂
Bravo Google…nice feature.
by John C. Bland II | Sep 6, 2007 | Flash Platform
“Adobe announced some of the new features in Flash Media Server 3”:https://www.adobe.com/aboutadobe/pressroom/pressreleases/200709/090607FMS.html and one of them is regarding the integration with Flash Lite 3.
bq. Adobe Flash Media Server 3 will also support live and recorded streaming to Adobe Flash® Lite™ 3, Adobe’s award-winning Flash Player runtime specifically designed for mobile phones. Adobe Flash Lite 3 will bring the Adobe Flash Player video format from the desktop to mobile handsets and devices, enabling operators, handset manufacturers and developers alike to deliver more engaging experiences to mobile users. Adobe expects the first Flash Lite 3 enabled devices to be available by the end of the year.
Here are some of highlights that are most interesting to me. Read the first link above for all of them.
bq. **Integrated Content Protection**
Adobe Flash Media Server 3 will offer a new encrypted protocol to help protect streamed content and provide support for the upcoming Adobe Media Player.
bq. **Major Performance Gains**
Streaming performance almost doubles in Adobe Flash Media Server 3, allowing more streams and more users per server, helping to lower overall deployment costs. Building on the recently announced support for H.264 video codec and High Efficiency AAC+ (HE-AAC) audio, Adobe Flash Media Server 3 customers can now leverage most of their existing MPEG content directly without having to re-encode, helping reduce the cost of distributing via Adobe Flash Player compatible video. Users can enjoy higher-quality video experiences in the ubiquitous Adobe Flash Player, which is currently installed on 98 percent of internet-enabled desktops worldwide.
bq. **Availability**
Adobe Flash Media Server 3 is expected to be available as a service through select partners in the fourth quarter of 2007 and for sale worldwide in the first quarter of 2008. For more information about Adobe Flash Media Server, please visit www.adobe.com/go/fms3_faq .
Good stuf Adobe! I’ve heard some really good things about FMS3 and I can’t wait to use it, especially with Flash Lite 3.
**Update**
I just found “this PDF”:https://www.adobe.com/aboutadobe/pressroom/pdfs/FMS3FAQ.pdf from some blog somewhere and it details a lot more updates.
