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Newsletter Issues

May 06 LiveWire (5/22/2006)

In this month's issue:

  • IUMMUG Happenings: This Flash thing must be catching on...
  • Industry News: Adobe Developers Week, Apple's Boot Camp, Google Notebook and Sitemaps, Browser Wars, Running out of IP addresses
  • Flash Facts & Figures: Interesting tidbits about Flash, ActionScript and the Flash Community
  • A Word from (some of) Our Sponsors: News from the publishers
  • Reviews: Flash is a popular topic with the publishers and the reviewers!
  • Tips & Tricks: Use ActionScript to control variable requirements in Flash form validation
  • Resources: CSS tips and best practices, AJAX resources, Ride with Ruby on Rails
  • Monthly Challenge: Zen-diana Design Challenge wraps up. Challenge goes on vacation.
  • Free Stuff: Stacks of Flash books to be given away at monthly meeting!
  • Get Involved: We needs book reviewers, CF programmers, Web designer, raffle coodinator

IUMMUG Happenings

I don't know if I could get the mayor to declair this Flash month in Bloomington, but it certainly is Flash month at IUMMUG. Whether you are experienced with Flash or a total newbie, you can get something this month to feed your interest. If you are not currently interested in Flash, you might just find something that interests you enough to take a closer look.

  • First and foremost we have this week's Flash meeting on data connections with Flash ActionScript (details).
  • A groundswell of interest has us moving ever closer to the official launch of the Indiana University Flash User Group (stay tuned).
  • We have 9 new reviews of Flash books from the membership (list).
  • The publshers have responded kindly to our interst and we have a PILE of Flash books to give away at the meeting (list).

~Bob Flynn, IUMMUG manager

Industry News

  • Adobe Developer Week: A free, week-long event features live, online sessions presented by Adobe technology experts covering Flex, LifeCycle, ActionScript 3.0, AJAX and other topics.
  • Verizon Wireless to Develop Flash Mobile Ecosystem in North America: On April 5, 2006 Adobe Systems Incorporated announced a strategic alliance with Verizon Wireless to start a mobile ecosystem built around Flash technology that will allow developers to create new interactive mobile content experiences for Verizon Wireless customers. Through this agreement, Verizon Wireless is expected to become the first wireless operator in North America to introduce Flash enabled handsets that use the technology to deliver a customized user experience. Developers will be able to create and offer new rich content, applications and data services based on Flash and targeted at these handsets.
  • Google Sitemaps provides better, fresher crawls of Web pages (by Mike Heck): Currently in beta, Google Sitemaps allows you submit URLs to the Google index and inform Google when these pages change. Certainly, having Google index deep pages benefits many organizations; e-tailers, for example, could increase revenue because potential buyers find items that might ordinarily fall into an indexing crevasse.
  • Perpendicular Hard Drive Recording Technology: How can a 3.5-inch standard hard disk drive (HDD) possibly hold a terabyte of information? As manufacturers reached the limits of hard drive capacity, consumer demand for even higher capacity drives did not diminish. A relatively new recording technology called perpendicular recording, is being deployed to further increase hard drive storage capacities.
  • Flex 2 Beta 3 Available: The third and possibly last beta of Flex 2 was released on the Adobe Labs site earlier this month. An exciting technology for building Rich Internet Applications will finally be accessible to all developers with this release.
  • We're Running Out of IP Addresses (by Andy Patrizio): Just what we needed, another technology limitation about to put the squeeze on everyone. And we don't mean the Unix date bug. The growing popularity of smartphones and other gadgets with Internet connectivity is sucking up all of the available IP addresses, and it's beginning to impede emerging Internet markets around the world.
  • Apple Boot Camp
    • Boot Camp: Public Beta: Boot Camp lets you install Windows XP without moving your Mac data, though you will need to bring your own copy to the table, as Apple Computer does not sell or support Microsoft Windows.
    • Windows on Mac, simultaneously (by Pete Mortensen): Apple Computer's surprise software release allowing the company's newest Intel-based Macs to run Windows has put "virtualization" – an alternative, and arguably superior, method of achieving the same result – in the spotlight.
    • Mac Boot Camp: Follow the Money (by David Morgenstern): Apple's support of multiple booting on its Intel Macs is a play to the purchasing department-Boot Camp Assistant may be the magic the Mac needs to overcome longstanding barriers in the education and government segments.
    • Mac's Boot Camp spawns security worries: Having caught wide attention through the public beta release of its Boot Camp software, which allows users to install and run Windows XP on its current Intel-based computers, the firm has also been placed under the expectation of supporting Microsoft's operating system in addition to its own Mac OS X operating system software.
    • Mac Boot Camp: Catching a Falling Knife (by Alec Saunders: Strategically, is this a good move or a bad move for Apple? I've been wondering that for the last couple of days. Historically, there have been examples of Dual OS systems that have fared very badly, such as OS/2. Will Apple do better?
    • Mac Boot Camp book already on shelf (by John Fontana): It's just a mere beta utility, but there is already a book on how to turn your Mac into a dual-booting powerhouse. O'Reilly Media has published "Running Boot Camp" by Chuck Toporek, an author and senior editor with O'Reilly Media. O'Reilly boasts the book is the first step-by-step install guide for the Boot Camp utility that helps users install and run Windows XP and Mac OS X on the same machine.
    • Ebook review: Running Boot Camp: A Step-by-Step Guide to a Pitfall-Free Installation of Windows XP on a Mac (reviewed by IUMMUG member Thomas G. Harris)
    • CNET editors' take for Apple Boot Camp (beta) (review by Matthew Elliot; edited by Rich Brown)
  • Browser News

Flash Facts & Figures

The famous "Flash Player is everywhere" statistics

A December 2005 survey conducted by NPD Research determined:
  • "97.7% of web users can experience Macromedia Flash content [published for v.5 or below] without having to download and install a player."
  • This is larger than the number of users who can access Adobe Acrobat Reader, Java, Windows Media Player, or QuickTime content (among others).
  • 45.2% of web users in the US (larger in Canada and Europe) had Flash Player 8 (keep in mind this was just 3 months after Flash Player 8 was released and is by far the quickest uptake of Flash Player yet).
Other related thoughts:
  • Historically it has taken 1 year to reach 85% penetration for a Flash Player version (predictions for Flash Player 8 are that this milestone will be reached around 9 months after release).
  • Windows XP SP2 had 220 million downloads in 15 months; Firefox had 100 million downloads in one year; Flash Player 8 had 100 million downloads within the first month of availability.
  • Flash Player since version 6 is able to play FLV video; version 8 added the On2 VP6 codec for higher quality and reduced file size.
  • Coincidentally, if someone has player version 6 or newer, a web site can semi-automatically update the user's player, and Adobe can also trigger an automatic player update.
  • Google Video, launched in September 2006, uses Flash Player/Flash Video for distribution. ABC and NBC's recent (May 2006) forays into providing TV episodes on the web both chose Flash Player/Flash Video as the player format. In May 2006 AOL also launced a new video service using Flash Player, requiring Flash Player 8 as the minimum player version.
Sources:

ActionScript timeline

  • 1998: Flash 4 is released; it is the first version to include programming capabilities (there was no name given to the "language" used for programming in Flash 4; code consisted of lists of commands added from a menu)
  • 2000: Flash 5 is released, including a new programming language named ActionScript. The language is based on EcmaScript (as is JavaScript).
  • 2002: Flash MX (6) is released, with new objects and the capability of creating "components".
  • 2003: Flash MX 2004 (7) is released, including a new version of ActionScript named ActionScript 2.0. Major changes in AS2 included strong typing of variables, compile-time type checking, the ability to define classes using a new syntax similar to Java/C++, and a new set of components (the "Version 2" components). (Note, however, that ActionScript 2.0 is really a compile-time feature only; the code is converted to ActionScript 1 code when it's compiled
  • 2004-5: MTASC, a free, open-source ActionScript 2.0 compiler is released to the public, allowing the creation of entirely code-only SWF files and no need for the Flash authoring tool.
  • 2005: Flash 8 is released. ActionScript changes include several new objects providing graphic effects and low-level bitmap manipulation, file upload and download capabilities, and improved text rendering.
  • 2005-6: Flash Player 9 is released in alpha and beta in conjunction with Flex 2, boasting 10x performance improvements over (MX 2004) ActionScript 2.0 due primarily to runtime data typing, JIT compilation to native code, and garbage collection improvements. The new ActionScript 3.0 language is released along with the player, including a near-complete redesign of the built-in types, a new model for displaying objects on screen, a new event model built into the language, strong typing and errors at runtime, and new functionality such as regular expressions and E4X (a powerful, straightforward XML manipulation technique). The Flex 2 SDK, including the compiler for creating Flex or ActionScript-only SWF projects, will be released free-of-charge.

The "Unofficial" Flash Community

  • OSFlash (Open Source Flash) is an online community providing open-source, no-cost tools for ActionScript development, ActionScript code editors, ActionScript code libraries, and ActionScript documentation generators, server interaction products and more.

A Word from (some of) Our Sponsors

  • We've had a number of reviews of friends of Ed books by IUMMUG members. They have some great titles on the creative tools and technologies. Get a hefty 50% discount on lots of great Apress and friends of ED books through Bookpool. Hurry! The sale lasts through May 31, 2006. http://www.bookpool.com/ct/208?cid=565
  • Going to Tech Ed 2006 in June? If so, O'Reilly wants to make a special offer to you. Email iummug @ indiana.edu and we'll hook you up.
  • Calling all digital photographers! Win some great prizes (and learn new tricks) in the 2006 O'Reilly Photoshop Cook-Off.

Reviews

Flash is in the air (and on the page). We have a raft of Flash reviews, include ActionScript, XML and components this month. Check out the May Reivews.

Tips & Tricks

IUMMUG member Renee Le Beau shows a quick example of how to write a function in ActionScript that will make required fields contingent upon other form choices. Full Story

Resources Worth a Look

We all pick up cool sites and cool tools during the course of our personal or professional browsing. Each month we share links collected and submitted by IUMMUG members. This month's resource section covers the spectrum from How-tos to How-they-do-thats? We have so many things it might evolve into its own newsletter. Until that time, enjoy what we have to share with you.

Remember if you run across a link that you found helpful, interesting or even just plain wacky, send it along to iummug @ indiana.edu. If you don't send them, we can't share them!

  • Design
    • How to Design for Different Browsers (Excerpted from Web Design in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition by Jennifer Niederst Robbins): Most web authors agree that the biggest challenge (and headache) in web design is dealing with a multitude of browsers and their varying support of web standards. Does a page that is designed to be functional on all browsers necessarily need to be boring? Is it possible to please everyone? And if not, where do you draw the line? How many past browser versions do you need to cater to with your designs?
    • Best Practices of CSS Cascading style sheets are the best practice for the layout and styling of web page content. Using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) simplifies site design and maintenance. When style information for an entire site is captured as CSS, changes that are made to the style sheet will immediately appear in all pages that use that style sheet. CSS allows a designer to tailor the way a page looks depending on how the user views the page. Specific style sheets can be created for screen, handheld devices or print to insure that design will render appropriately regardless of where it is viewed.
    • CSS Overlays: Using CSS Positioning to Overlay Web Objects: Learn how to create an eye-catching overlay with CSS positioning. This CSS-layout technique is faster than image slicing requiring fewer HTTP requests.
    • Styling Forms with CSS - Part 1: Accessibility and Form Element Styles (by Adrian Senior): Forms are the lifeblood of the Internet and the websites we build. Forms and their elements provide us with the ability to bring our websites to life. From simple contact forms for generating e-mail data to billing information forms in shopping carts to content management system (CMS) forms for making content changes to websites, forms lie at the heart of most of the interaction we see on today's websites.
    • Create a "Burn-In" Effect with Filters and Masking (by Frank Rue) A tutorial that teaches you how to combine the masking feature in Flash with a new filter available in Flash 8 to create a glow around an object.
    • Making Accurate Color Adjustments in Photoshop: Instead of wasting time going back and forth with the Eyedropper to get color readouts, ensure your color adjustments are accurate with the Color Sampler tool.
    • Using Custom Symbols and 3D Effects in Illustrator: Author Scott Weichert uses customized swatches and symbols to quickly illustrate repeating objects in Illustrator, then added panache with 3D effects.
    • Microsoft Releases Expression Web Designer Preview: Microsoft has released the first preview version of its much-anticipated Microsoft Expression Web Designer product.
  • Development
    • Introducing the Spry framework for Ajax (by Paul Gubbay): Over the past six months, our product design and development teams have been out on the road talking to developers about the prospect of using Ajax to build more engaging and interactive web pages and applications. During the course of these conversations, we heard concerns about how to get started and how to learn and integrate new proprietary frameworks into existing workflows.
    • Web Design with Ajax: Webreference.com excerpts Head Rush Ajax by Brett McLaughlin.
    • Ride the Web Application Express with Ruby on Rails: Looking for productivity improvements in your Web application development? Take a look at a Web application framework that takes fewer lines of code than words in this sentence to have your first application up and running.
    • Receiving an Email When Database Data is Changed: If you have a website with low database traffic or perhaps a single table you want to track changes on, you might want to get an email notification when changes are made. 4 Guys from Rolla show you how.
  • Miscellaneous
    • Website Spell Checking Service: Make Your Site Error-Free. With the rate content is increasing on the Web, typos are bound appear on your site. See a sample report of a spell-checked WhiteHouse.gov site.
    • Make an "Earth Sandwich" with Google Maps! (among other entries) "..If you put a piece of bread on the ground, and somebody exactly opposite you (on the other side of the world) put a piece of bread on the ground, you would have an Earth sandwich!"
    • If you like flickr, you'll love fastr Fastr is a game that uses flickr images. It loads ten images that all share a common tag, one by one, and you guess what the tag is. When you guess right, the tag will turn blue, and you'll get points. The faster you guess, the more points you get. The points are reset every six minutes. You'll need to choose a player name before you can play. You can play using tags for multiple languages and for specific flickr groups.
    • Google Products & Services: A Quick Reference to Google's Consumer Products. In 1996, Google started out as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two Ph.D. students at Stanford University. In 1998, Page and Brin - while continuing to perfect their technology - bought a terabyte of disks at bargain prices and built their own computer housings in Page's dorm room, which became Google's first data center. In 1999, the beta logo came off the Google Web site. Since then Google has expanded its search technology into blogging, mapping, shopping, research and more. In fact, Google now has so many services it's hard to keep them straight. To help you get a grip on Google, our Google Services Quick Reference will highlight the many Google-branded services and provide links and references for each.

Thanks to Erick Carballo, Bob Flynn, Ed Sullivan and Lee Underwood (of WebReference Newsletter) for this month's contributions.

Monthly Challenge

For the past three months IUMMUG has run the Zen-diana Design Challenge. See the contest page for the results of the various rounds as well as the final design.

We've had design challenges for the past several months so it is time for a programming challenge. I know we have all levels of programmers out there just like all levels of designers. While trying to come up with a programming challenge it struck me that what might seem routine to one programmer would be a challenge for another. I would like to ask that those who consider themselves novice programmers to write iummug @ indiana.edu and let us know what you would like to see the programmers tackle. With the upcoming summer break the challenge, much like Click & Clack's puzzler will take a hiatus. Send us your suggestions for when we resume in the fall.

Free Stuff

Perfectly matching with this month's group meeting on Flash ActionScript, we have books on Flash to give away! So join our group meeting, and win a book on Flash!

  • Win Over $2000 Worth of Software!
    • We are still giving raffle chances to each person attending the monthly meeting. The prize is the winner's choice of Adobe/Macromedia software (either a single application or bundled suite) up to a value of $2,100! Just show up at this month's meeting for a chance to win!
  • May Meeting Give-Aways Include
    • Flash 8: Projects for Learning Animation and Interactivity by Rich Shupe, Robert Hoekman, Jr. (First Edition March 2006) ISBN: 0596102232 – Intended for beginning Flash users, this book teaches design using Flash rather than providing an exhaustive list of the ins and outs of the Flash Program.
    • Flash Anthology: Cool Effects and Practical ActionScript by Steven Grosvenor (First Edition July 2004) SitePoint ISBN: 095792187X – If you are looking for practical techniques, solutions and cool effects to instantly use on your Website or project, this book gives you over 60 of them!
    • Essential ActionScript 2.0 by Colin Moock (First Edition June 2004) ISBN: 0596006527 – Big on ActionScript? Or just a fresh hand? No matter. This book has it all!
    • Flash 8 Cookbook by Joey Lott (April 2006) ISBN: 0596102402 – Just as its name suggests, this book provides the reader with recipe style solutions to problems and issues that Flash developers encounter in their daily work. A good book for intermediate and advanced Flash users!
    • Flash 8 The Missing Manual by E. A. Vander Veer (March 2006) ISBN: 0596101376 – So where is the missing manual of Flash?! Well here is. Featuring hands-on practices, this book is a great resource for non-developers who just want to learn Flash design.
    • ActionScript for Flash MX: The Definitive Guide by Colin Moock (2nd Edition, December 2002) ISBN: 059600396X – Another Flash ActionScript book by the award winning author, you'll find hundreds of code examples here.
    • ActionScript 2.0 Garage by Dan Livingston (February 2005) ISBN: 0131484753 – Dan Livingston gives you the nuts and bolts of Flash ActionScript here, illustrated with real-world examples, and fully downloadable.
    • Macromedia Flash Advanced for Windows & Macintosh by Russell Chun and H. Paul Robertson (December 2005) ISBN: 0321349644 – Our very own Paul Robertson (also speaker of this month's group meeting) as one of the authors of the book, you can trust that this advanced book on Flash will meet your expectations - and in the popular Visual QuickStart format!

There are MANY ways to get free stuff through your participation in the IUMMUG. Writing book reviews, submitting code challenges, answering code challenges, contributing monthly tips, writing articles for the newsletters and of course, attending meetings! In order for us to share the free stuff among as many people as possible, each person may win the Monthly Challenge once every quarter. But remember, there is no limit to the free stuff you can get by attending monthly meetings!

Get Involved

IUMMUG has periodic and ongoing opportunities to get more involved. If any of these activities interest you, contact iummug @ indiana.edu. Current opportunities include:

  • Web Designer (ongoing): We would like to redesign our website. Creative ideas and energy are needed.
  • Coldfusion Programmer (ongoing): We would like to redesign our website. There are some fundamental changes that need to be made. ColdFusion programmers, from novice to experienced, with the time and desire to contribute are welcome.
  • Book Reviewer (ongoing): We are always looking for those interested in reviewing books from our publishing partners. If you find a book that looks interesting, drop us a line and we'll get it for you. Review the book and keep it when you are done!



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