Recently I’ve been working on a Flash-based game that uses XML for its level format. Because of the ease with which a swf can be decompiled and its assets extracted I made the decision to not store level data in the swf itself. Rather levels are loaded from a remote server into the [...]
I recently upgraded to Windows 7 x64 from Windows Vista x64 and I must say I’m loving it! However, much like Vista x64 before it Win7 x64 doesn’t play nice with Flex Builder. I still have issues with blank dialogs (for which I found a work around) but now I have an issue [...]
Here’s a link to a post I did over at the BKWLD blog about making AIR apps more seamless on Mac OS.
I recently wrote a post over on the Buk Life blog about creating native menus with Adobe AIR in Mac OS. The emphasis of the article is making the “application name” menu (e.g., “Safari” for the Safari browser) look like it belongs when creating customized application menus.
You can read the full article here: Creating [...]
I’ve had to reset the font size in Flex Builder a few times now and each time I forget, not because it’d been so long since I’d last changed the font size, but because the setting is buried away, hidden from view.
To change the font size in Flex Builder click Window > Preferences…. In [...]
One of the downsides to creating Rich Internet Applicationss is that they defy the standard methods for interacting with websites — the refresh, back and forward buttons have no real place in an Flex application. As a developer you probably understand that clicking refresh or back is a no-no but you users aren’t likely to [...]
When I first got my MacBook Pro one of the first things I did was…type my password incorrectly. When this happens Mac OS provides some great visual feeback with a shaking effect that simultaneously indicates something went wrong and shrugs off the password much like how dogs dry themselves off after a swim. To me, [...]
On a recent Flex project I needed a component that would allow me to move selected items in one list to another list. A Google search for “flex list to list component” turned up nothing, nor did “flex enhanced list component”. Undaunted I decided to roll my own which I am now sharing with the [...]
One of the things I really dislike about PHP is it’s reliance on spaghetti code. Every PHP developer has had to deal with <?php ?> tags strewn about HTML in a seeming mess. The worst situation is updating someone else’s code. Often it takes longer to decipher everything than it does to make the actual [...]
Recently I was charged with integrating our content management system our company is developing with MediaWiki. Specifically, we wanted the appearance of a single account for both our CMS and MediaWiki. Since our CMS is were all the action happens and MediaWiki is serving as a user manual I decided to have our CMS also handle account management for MediaWiki.