Quicksilver & ifttt

Posted on October 24, 2011 by Mims H Wright

I wanted to share a couple of cool apps with you that make my life easier.

Quicksilver

It’s possible that I’ve just been living under a rock (or in Italy) but I was recently surprised when I stumbled across a blog post announcing that Quicksilver is still around. I had presumed that it was abandoned but it has just been updated for Lion! For those of you who don’t know, Quicksilver is a great little freeware utility for Mac that essentially adds a quick, text-based interface to your Mac. For example, you can type the first couple of letters of a file name, then “mv”, then “doc” to move a file to documents
or “PS + enter” to launch PhotoShop (it figures out what you’re trying to say even if you misspell something). It’s also got lots of plugins to make it even more powerful. I highly recommend it.

ifttt

This is a good opportunity to also mention a new web service that works in a very similar way. It’s called ifttt (short for “if this then that”). It essentially allows you to take events that happen with your online services (like when someone tags you in a photo on Facebook) and use them as triggers for other actions (save a copy of the photo to your Dropbox). These relationships are called “recipes” and they can be shared and customized by other users. It’s a very programmery way to work.

I recommend giving both a try.

Posted in Tips, Tricks, and Hacks | Leave a comment

Enabling the Flash Debug Player on Chrome

Posted on October 18, 2011 by Mims H Wright

After having this happen to me for the third time, I felt that it was time for me to repost this information.

The problem:

You’re positive that you just upgraded to the Debug version of the Flash Player, when you go to test it in Chrome it says that you don’t have the debug version even though it works fine in Firefox, Safari, Opera, and who cares if it’s working in IE because you would never use IE right?

The solution:

You can reinstall the player until you’re blue in the face but it won’t help. Why? Chrome manages it’s own version copy of the player so it can provide automatic updates. You’ll want to disable this version and use your default one.

Open up your Preferences in Chrome. Go to Preferences > Under the Hood > Privacy > Content Settings… > Plug-ins > Disable Individual Plugins (Or just paste chrome://plugins/ into the address bar).

You should see a plug in called Flash. If you click the Details+ button in the top right, you’ll see more info about the plug-in files themselves. You’ll probably see two versions here; one will point to the plug-in installed by Chrome

e.g. /Applications/Google Chrome.app/Contents/Versions/15.0.874.92/Google Chrome Framework.framework/Internet Plug-Ins/Flash Player Plugin for Chrome.plugin

The other points to the system folder

e.g. /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/Flash Player.plugin if you’re on a Mac

Disable the one in the Google Chrome folder and you should be good to go!

This information was originally provided to me via Arron West’s blog which has more pictures than this post if you still need help.

Posted in Flash, Tips, Tricks, and Hacks | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Flash is NOT coming to iOS!

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Mims H Wright

While we’re still hot on the subject of Flash on iOS, I would like to address the other recent news regarding Flash Media Server 4.5 and clear up some of the not-entirely-accurate statements being made.

First, let’s get one thing clear… Flash is NOT coming to iOS per se. To quote the press release from Adobe:

“With Flash Media Server 4.5, media publishers can extend their already broad mobile reach via Flash-enabled devices, with the new ability to deliver video content to Apple’s iPad and iPhone devices, enabling them to reach the widest audience possible.”

Unless I’m misreading this, it seems that this is only going to allow Flash Video to be viewed on iOS and only when streamed from the new Flash Media Server. This will be achieved by serving the video in an iOS compatible format so there’s no new player or plugin involved at all. Flash content in general (games, interactive sites, &c) will still bring up that familiar
.

This is only a little bit exciting (unless you host a lot of Flash Video). What the end user will experience is potentially more video content available on their iOS device, perhaps from sites that they couldn’t get it from before, and they may notice a performance improvement. It’s a far cry from the headlines stating things like “Adobe releases Flash player for Apple products” or “Adobe Flash coming to iOS”. Still, it’s a (small) step in the right direction.

Frustratingly, most of the articles I’ve seen are tinged with insinuations that this is some sort of surrender, for example, “Apple did not fold, Adobe did.” Really? Are we still acting like these two companies are having a little schoolyard rivalry? Nobody folded or cried “Uncle”. A company just found a solution to a technology problem. As I said in my last post, this sort of talk creates an artificial sense of certain technologies being inherently “good” or “bad”. It misinforms the general public and turns the choice of platform for a project into an emotional or political battle.

On the other hand, as much as I want people to get the story straight, this is more good news for Flash developers. If the general consensus is that Flash will run on iOS then our clients will perceive it as less “bad” and more “good”. So I guess this is bad reporting of so-so news that will make very good PR for Adobe.

Posted in Flash, iphone, News | 6 Comments

Air on iOS vindicated by Machinarium

Posted on September 12, 2011 by Mims H Wright

If you haven’t heard, Machinarium has recently become a top selling iPad app in the iTunes store, and it was created using FlashBuilder 4.5 and Air for iOS. For now, let’s forget that it’s been a big success on multiple platforms including Steam for PC and Mac, well-recognized as a superlative indie game, and included in the Humble Indie Bundle; this game coming out on iPad is actually a really big deal.

Why?

I have always felt that it is our duty as technology experts to help our clients chose the best platforms for their products. And sometimes the best platform is the one that lets the developers do their work the fastest. Flash has always been great at adding a lot of character, subtlety, and interactive flair much faster than other platforms.

Unfortunately, due to recent high-profile skirmishes between Apple and Adobe, most clients currently think that “Flash is Bad.” They don’t understand that Job’s argument is full of half-truths and non-truths and most probably don’t realize that Flash code can now be run on an iDevice and more importantly sold for $$$. While Flash certainly ins’t the best in every situation, it’s actually a fantastic choice for a lot of applications and the programmers who have been using it for a long time who have honed their skills as interactive developers can add a lot intrinsically to their work. To say that it is “Bad” is to ignore much of the bigger picture.

Having a solid example to point to makes the case for using Air for iOS so much easier. And despite our cries, clients don’t really care about technical reasons… they DO care about top-selling apps that look beautiful! So next time you’re faced with a client who’s using some overhyped article from 2010 about Flash not performing well on mobile, you now have one more weapon in your arsenal. The more tools we have to deliver great experiences for our clients, the more everyone wins.

Also, I’ve heard this is a pretty good game!

Posted in Flash, iphone | 2 Comments

What’s next for dispatchEvent() Blog?

Posted on September 11, 2011 by Mims H Wright

Dear readers,

First, I’d like to say thanks to all of you who have read and commented and shared this blog over the past 6 years or so. Despite the infrequent posts, it’s been a huge source of pleasure for all of us to be able to share helpful info (and a few personal rants) with the flash community.

For a while now we’ve been living in a world where a lot of what we cover on a blog like this is competing with Twitter, Google+, StackExchange, screencasts, Tumblr, Facebook, &c. for the reader’s attention. I often wonder if blogs are even relevant anymore. I certainly struggle to keep up with everything and blogs are usually at the bottom of the list.

Furthermore, the three of us, Mims, Roger, and Caleb have changed a lot in the last couple of years. For example, only one of us lives in NYC, and none of us work exclusively on the flash platform anymore.

We’re not necessarily going to stop posting, however, it may be time to change up the format. I would really appreciate some feedback on what and how you’d like to hear from us in the future. If you’ve got a blog or twitter account that you think is reaching people, tell us how! Comment, email, tweet me, or whatever.

Some things I’ve been thinking about…

  • Should we keep blogging or spend that time being more active on Twitter? How do Twitter and blogs work together?
  • How do we keep it fun and frequent?
  • What posts do people like the best? Who’s visiting the site?
  • Should we stay Flash-focused or go more broad with programming and interactive design in general?
  • Does it work better having multiple authors or is it confusing? Maybe three more specialized blogs would be better.

Thank you!

Posted in Discussion | 4 Comments