This Macromedia Flash color scheme matcher is very nice for determining contrasting colors for layouts. Simply insert a hex value then the results are computed on the fly. 3 color hex values from the same tint plus 2 grayscale hex color values are given to you. A must have when developing a color scheme for a site.
Zeldman presents a very entertaining video on the history of web standards and how it is revolutionizing society. He highlights four other members of A List Apart and their main contributions to the Web Standards Project.
Great article on the methodology of designing a web site. You start with pen and paper freeing yourself of technology to create a design. Next you move on to Illustrator using the ‘Gray Box Methodology”. This step allows you to create a perfect functional layout without worrying about which font works best or which color to use. You have a simply grayscale layout to look at. Then you finally move on to implementing the CSS / XHTML / FLASH / PHOTOSHOP graphics and coding at the end to produce exactly what you want without the distractions. Read the full article.
Was about my business tonight surfing and found a link to Audible.com—an Online Store for Digital Audio Books. Quite an amazing online business and very well run. Their offer (free month subscription and one free audiobook) caught my attention and I signed up. Within 10 minutes of signing up I recieved my free audiobook of my choice, The Face by Dean Koontz. You have the option to select from 4 different audio qualities to download, plus the option to stream. It took me all of 5 minutes to download the first half of the book (128 MB) at highest quality and is now transferring to my iPod. Quite impressed. Now I can finally get all the audiobooks I want on my iPod.
I opened up my mission call last night! I’m going to the Kennewick Washington Mission! I report to the MTC Jan. 26, 2005. I will be serving for 2 years teaching in english for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints! After waiting long enough I’m excited to finally have the opportunity to get out! I’m thankful that all my family and friends could be there to support me when I opened my call! I am humbled to think that I will be a representative of Christ for two years as I teach his gospel to the people in Kennewick. 9 more weeks and I will be out there!
Pics from last night:
For all mission call photos, go to my photo gallery.
Penner Tweens, created by Robert Penner, use built-in Macromedia Flash MX 2004 classes to script tweens. This is the touch of class that adds to any flash application / navigation / presentation. To set it up, you define an ease type, then apply the ease type to a Tween object.
Create a new flash document (File -> New… -> Flash Document)
Double-Click ‘Layer 2’ and label it “A” (for Actions). We will place all actionscript on this layer.
Create a new layer (Insert -> Timeline -> Layer). Double-Click ‘Layer 1’ and label it “mc” (for movieclips).
Draw a box using the Rectangle Tool (hotkey is ‘R’) near the top left of the Stage.
Double-Click on your new box. Now Right-Click on your box and select “Convert to Symbol…”.
In the ‘Name’ field put “m_box”. In the ‘Behavior’ radio button group, select “Movie clip”. Press ‘OK’.
Having your m_box on the stage still selected, in the ‘Properties’ toolbar, where there is a white field that has ” ” enter “box_mc”. Notice that the instance name on the stage is different than the instance name on the stage. We use the ”_mc” naming convention for actionscript hints in our code.
Next, select Frame ‘1’ in the ‘A’ Layer. Open up your actions panel (Window -> Development Panels -> Actions or using hotkey ‘F9’). Copy and paste this code into the ‘Actions’ panel.
var easeType = mx.transitions.easing.Regular.easeOut;
myTween = new mx.transitions.Tween(box_mc, "_y", easeType, 0, 300, 30);
Now you might be asking what this just did. Well lets take an indepth look at the code defintion of the Tween object.
(do not enter this code into your movie):
Tween(myMovie:MovieClip, myProperty:Property, easeType, startValue:Number, endValue:Number, frames(or seconds), secondsSet:Boolean);
myMovie:MovieClip—Targets the Instance of a Movieclip on the stage. myProperty:Property—Selects the property of the Movieclip on the stage to tween. (I.E. _x, _width, _alpha, etc) easeType as (Parent.Child) —Your tween definition set up as a variable. SetParent Types (Back, Bounce, Elastic, None, Regular, Strong). Child Types (easeIn, easeOut). (i.e. Bounce.easeOut). startValue:Number—Starting value of property to tween. For more advanced tweens, try (box_mc._y) to get the current starting Y position of the targeted Movie Clip. endValue:Number—Starting value of property to tween. frames(or seconds) —Number of frames to tween over, or number of seconds to tween over. secondsSet:Boolean—Optional value, defaults to false. When set to true, uses seconds instead of frames to tween over.
Save your document (File -> Save)
Test your movie (Control -> Test Movie or hotkey “Ctr-Enter”)
Your box should go from _y position 0 to 300. Now try out variations of properties and movieclips and tweens.
For smoother framerate, try changing the framerate to 31 fps. To do so, go to Modfiy -> Document… . In the Frame rate input box, type in ‘31’. Press ‘OK’. Try your movie again.
To try out my click demo, replace your current code on you “A” Layer with this code:
someListener = new Object();
someListener.onMouseDown = function () {
var easeType = mx.transitions.easing.Elastic.easeOut;
myTweenY = new mx.transitions.Tween(box_mc, "_y", easeType, box_mc._y,_root._ymouse, 60);
myTweenX = new mx.transitions.Tween(box_mc, "_x", easeType, box_mc._x, _root._xmouse, 60);
};
Mouse.addListener(someListener);
For more easing variations, view the folder on your computer >>
..Program Files/Macromedia/Flash MX 2004/en/First Run/Classes/mx/transitions
Want to enjoy yourself combating 30 others at spelling words with Refridgerator Magnets? With Flash Communication Server, FlashCom Guru made it possible.
I sit here, in bland constant pain due to my tooth, wondering why in the crap it still hurts. I’ve hit the recommended usage of ibuprofen and tylenol for the day, still wondering why I can’t close my mouth. On a happier note, I hit the Good Charlotte / Sum 41 concert at the McKay Events Center at UVSC last wednesday. It was an amazing show. Good Charlotte put up a good performance… right next to zebrahead, but still not as good. We hit IHOP afterwards and had some fun chillin there.
I sit and wait for my call, hoping it comes tomorrow. One letter will tell me where I will be serving for two years of my life, I bet you’d be nervous too.
Got out to the booth this morning on my way to work. Interesting to see how politics work and how the american society as a whole operates. Being a 19 year old going up to the booth, I was definately in the minority. Wearing my shirt from threadless.com and getting a few strange looks, I signed my name and punched the holes. My vote was equaled with anyone else in the country, including any senator or member of the house.
Can’t believe how much CBS news caught a hold of my attention tonight. Mainly from their amazing touch-screen program that displayed the spendings of each campaign on television ads in each region of every battleground state. The election night is being very well done as far as the functionality and design of the presentation. I’m quite impressed.
The race goes on… Bush is up… lets hope he stays up.
