I just added batch file uploading to Slideroll. FileReference and FileReferenceList are great classes, and very easy to work with. With good event-handling you can create a very usable interface for uploading photos. The best thing about FileReference is the onProgress event, which allows you to track how many bytes of the file have uploaded – great for making progress bars.
FileReferenceList is simply a container for an array of FileReferences, so you can cycle through each one and upload it one at a time. It’s a really nice feature to be able to upload only one file at a time. That way, you can track the status of each file, and not worry about overloading your script on the other end with too many or too large of a file upload. Read more...
Joey Lott at Person13 has a great article on how to create custom components using Actionscript 2.0. I’m glad to see there’s a code-only solution to component parameters using the [Inspectable] metatag. I was always curious how that was done.
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Running a site where I syndicate content using the Flash player, I’ve often thought about how one could harness the computing power of all of the computers viewing the content. Obviously there are ethical issues, but putting those aside for a second, it’s fun to consider the possibilities. Especially with the new Flash Player 9 and increased performance, it’s possible to concieve of a project like BOINC (see also Seti@Home) using Flash as an alternate platform. They could even have an API and a library of user-submitted alternative visualizations. Read more...
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It always takes me a while to wrangle up enough energy to try out a new IDE. There’s a lot of inertia there… I build up habits, and muscle memory as it were, as I get used to a certain way of doing things. So, following the recommendations of my respected colleagues, I decided to give FlashDevelop a spin.
At first, I was a little confused as to the best way to bring my existing project in. It has a Wizard, but, as I’m not as up to speed on the proper Actionscript 2.0 way to set up projects as most, so I wasn’t quite sure which template to choose. I chose ‘Empty Project’, and then chose the directory of my existing project. Read more...
I’ve been wanting to be able to create slideshows in Quicktime format on Slideroll for a long time. It isn’t easy because it would involve creating Quicktime files dynamically with a server-side script. I was looking around for a human-readable format that Quicktime understands when I encountered SMIL.
SMIL stands for Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language, and it is a format for describing time-based audiovisual presentations. The specification is up to version 2.1, but has very very limited support. Realplayer has SMIL 2.0 support, and Quicktime has had SMIL 1.0 support since version 4.1, released in early 2000. Strangely, Quicktime has never offered any further upgrades to its SMIL support. Read more...
