Something More Than a Machine
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I've been somewhat fixated on Adobe's Flex product in my development pursuits as of late. I think Adobe really nailed it on the head this time with MXML and ActionScript 3.0. I recognize it's somewhat bloated, but what you trade in footprint, you get back in agility. The timing is interesting, to say the least. I've been working on my own web development framework, which ultimately will follow the same MXML-like model.
So much of what I do should not be about writing code. Establishing a UI is about coming to a consensus among you as the developer and your users, in providing a common ground for interaction with your product. XML is perfect for this scenario as you move from a code-centric mindset to a document-centric mindset. When collaborating with others, I find it much easier to work with a document, than working with the distractions of idiosyncratic code-writing.
It appears Microsoft also has been enlightened to this idea with their Windows Presentation Foundation (part of .Net, Vista?). It will be interesting to see where XAML will lead developers.
The other question is where's Apple in this? For once, it seems both Adobe (and thanks in large part due to the acquisition of Macromedia) and Microsoft beat Apple to the punch. What will Leopard bring that we haven't already seen?
This new series looks at contemporary American culture through the austere lens of statistics. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on. My hope is that images representing these quantities might have a different effect than the raw numbers alone, such as we find daily in articles and books. Statistics tend to feel abstract and anesthetizing, making it difficult to connect with and make meaning of 3.6 million SUV sales in one year, for example, or 2.3 million Americans in prison, or $12.5 million spent every hour on the Iraq war. This project visually examines these vast and bizarre measures of our society, in large intricately detailed prints assembled from thousands of smaller photographs.For when you want to put things into perspective regarding American consumption.
I put together a simple example using Flex to tie into the Twitter API.
Source Code: twitter.tar.bz2, twitter.zip
And someone said: “Yeah, they wouldn’t let you.”
People have said little things like that all my life. But who’s “they”? I’ve given nobody the authority over me to say I can’t do anything — I can do anything I want or can achieve. I don’t ask permission. I might ask forgiveness, but I won’t ask permission. There is no “they”.
...what would be ideal is to select a block of text, hit a keystroke, and have it be automagically converted to its result. If that doesn’t scream Mac OS X service, I don’t know what does. So I present exactly such a service... ...select some editable text and press ⌘=. Voilà!Excellent!
3. Scroll areas on trackpads? Ew. Those get in the way unless you stare at your trackpad as you use it. That's why Apple's laptops scroll when you drag two fingers, no matter where on the trackpad you are.Apparently, it doesn't even seem to matter if one finger is moving and the other isn't. So long as there are two contact points it seems to just figure every thing out. Nifty.
It seems to me that if The Gap really cared about stopping HIV/AIDS in Africa, they would just donate the $7.8 million they spend on (RED) advertising to the Clinton Foundation. If Discover really cared about saving you money, they'd lower their APR to prime + 1.Can you say hallelujah?
If only I could be there. They even provide a nifty calendar management tool. Subscribe
With Picnik you can quickly edit all your online photos from one place. It's the easiest way on the Web to fix underexposed photos, remove red-eye, or apply effects to your photos.It's really just a flash application, but useful nonetheless.
swfIR (swf Image Replacement) gives you the ability to apply an assortment of visual effects to any or all images on your website.
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