Custom Flex WordPress Frontend
Creating a front-end for wordpress is incredibly easy and great for making weird and unnecessary versions of the site with UI swoops and swishes. Continue Reading →
Flex 3: LocalConnection fails for no reason
I have had more problems than worth mentioning with the LocalConnection API, but felt compelled to write about it after finally getting everything up and running. Continue Reading →
Flex 3: Detecting Network Status
There are a number of methods to detect network connectivity, all of which can be read about here, here, here and here. Continue Reading →
Downloading Large Files using Flex/AIR
During my download manager development I tried a number of different methods to download files. This article was invaluable, as it explains how to download in 50k chunks rather than buffering much larger amounts. Continue Reading →
Set-top Box with Flash Lite 3.1 for the Digital Home
There seems to be a general obsession with getting flash onto mobile devices of all kinds, but little documentation around running it from a set-top box. Given this is what I want to do, I thought I would write about some of the considerations, given there appears to be little else written about this other than some high-level points and brief tutorials on the Adobe site. Apologies in advance to anyone else stumbling across this article…it provides no answers, but perhaps some helpful sole will comment. Continue Reading →
Flex 3: 40k argument limit for LocalConnection
Using either the arguments field when launching an AIR app from a browser or initiating a local connection between AIR apps or Flex apps and the browser is a great way to pass data and create a better integrated user experience. However, there are some serious flaws. The documented limit for passing data between flex application using LocalConnection is 40Kb. This is easily enough for a few IDs, but not a sizable XML document. Continue Reading →
Flex 3: Image Caching/404 Handling
Sometimes it may be useful to cache images locally or provide default alternatives in situations where an AIR application is used offline. Continue Reading →
Flex 3: Anti-aliasing on buttons, tabs & other labels
Over on the Adobe live docs page on embedding fonts and anti-aliasing there is plenty of help on how to go about getting elements looking good. Continue Reading →
Flex 3: Messages between multiple browsers and AIR
Sending messages from the browser and AIR using the Flex localConnection class is fairly well documented. I recently needed to extend this to support multiple instances of the same browser flex application talking to a single AIR app. (Cheers to Dave for this trick!) Continue Reading →
Flex 3: Detecting hard disk space
Flex does not appear to have a library that deals very well running out of disk space, and this was a key part of the recent work I did on a download manager. Continue Reading →
Passing XML to AIR app via a Browser
In my recent efforts to create an MP3 downloader application I have been extensively investigating the Adobe Flex browser API to pass through download URLs and other meta data through to my app. Continue Reading →
Adobe AIR Downloader app
Since designing and estimating the work on this downloader app, the time has come to actually build the thing. Continue Reading →
Agile Methodology: misconceptions
Working to some kind of Agile methodology can be a great way to deliver web development projects but it can also be a complete nightmare if not done properly. Continue Reading →
iGoogle Mobile iPhone Rummaging
It appears that Google have changed their mobile iGoogle experience yet again. Continue Reading →
Adobe AIR Download Manager using Flex
I have been investigating and designing an MP3 download manager built using Flex and delivered as an Adobe AIR app. Continue Reading →
Outlook HTML Email Renders Poorly
I was working on creating an HTML email today and found that it was next to impossible to achieve compatibility between Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007. Continue Reading →
SEO & URL Ambiguity
I have been looking at URLs a lot recently and trying to work out how much they really matter. The quality of URLs is one of many parts to the whole SEO debate that is difficult to negotiate because of so many different views on topic, all with different levels of authority. I have no authority at all really so am keen to investigate using sources that do. Continue Reading →
ClickHeat Randomness
ClickHeat is an interesting open source script that can be used to track users clicks on your website. Continue Reading →
How much is a spot on Google’s Official Analytics Blog worth?
So having assumed my little baking stunt was a one-off foray into the world of SEM and blog popularity I was pleasantly surprised this morning to find my cake atop Google’s official analytics blog. Continue Reading →
Twitter / Google PageRank Absurdity
I have only been tapping out rambling nonsense on Twitter for a matter of weeks and only with any real regularity over the past few days, but already I seem to be appearing fairly prominently in Google. Clever me. Continue Reading →