The roof..the roof..the roof is on firuh!
Wednesday, February 10th, 2010 | teh internets | No Comments
Dont get too comfortable with social media, it has an expiration date.
…so what the !@#$ is that supposed to mean?
What made the Internet great will be back in full force. Anonymity. Yeah all these social media dirt bags are preaching the social web is here to stay, but its slowly affecting your livelihood. Employers are checking your blogs, Lenders are checking your Facebook, law enforcement is checking your tweets…hell, criminals are checking your Google latitude!
‘So what?’ you say? Ha. Think you can complain about your slow RoadRunner service or that bad experience at the local pub? Enter ‘Defamation of Character’ and strongly worded letters from lawyers.
Its just a matter of time.
I am the Architect. I created the Matrix. I’ve been waiting for you.
Monday, January 25th, 2010 | Keith Morgan's Blog, teh internets | No Comments
As cloud computing become more & more popular, mom & pop development shops are beefing up staff to go enterprise. With it comes the glamorous role of Software Architect and Product Manager. These are much needed roles, crucial to any company looking to compete for a market share. But all to often, the occupants of these roles tank companies…
…so what the !@#$ is that supposed to mean?
Its not their fault. Its the job of the software architect to create great software. All to often, product vision is dumped on their shoulders, which most take way too far. Clean code doesn’t win the race and as one of my former managers once said to me, “No one cares how the sausage is made”. Brilliant code doesn’t translate into market dominance. Do you get where I’m going here? Using the hottest language may not even be a viable solution (Flex vs AJAX)
Now, you could argue that its the job of the Product Manager to make sure the product can compete in the marketplace, But most companies hire project managers for this role, when clearly someone with trends analysis skills is needed. Again, its not the Product Managers fault, but its their job.
So the missing link in this situation is what I like to call the rare “Constructus Productis”, aka the Product Architect. This would be the person guiding the product based on market conditions and trends. I’m not really sure why this position goes unwanted in growing companies since this position usually exists in the form of the entrepreneurial CEO, who’s heavy handed overseeing of initial product offerings goes thankless. But I appreciate you Mr Start up CEO. Someone has to have the vision.
Forward……maaaaaach.
Thursday, July 16th, 2009 | Keith Morgan's Blog, teh internets | No Comments
More Flash video player PDL code. This time, Fast forward and reverse. Basically you set a timer that counts for you.
private const PLAYHEAD_UPDATE_INTERVAL_MS:uint = 10;
public var rewFF:Timer = new Timer(PLAYHEAD_UPDATE_INTERVAL_MS);
public function ffcontroller():void {
< button >.removeEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, ffcontroller);
video.pause();
rewFF.start();
rewFF.addEventListener(TimerEvent.TIMER, ffmotioncontroller);
this.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, ffstopcontroller);
}
public function ffstopcontroller(pEvent:MouseEvent):void {
rewFF.stop();
rewFF.removeEventListener(TimerEvent.TIMER, ffmotioncontroller);
rewFF.reset();
video.play();
ffBtn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, ffcontroller);
}
public function ffmotioncontroller(event:TimerEvent):void {
elapsedTime = (time_elapsed + rewFF.currentCount);
video.seek(Number(elapsedTime.toFixed(1)));
}
…for reverse, just subtract the time_elapsed from the current count. You will also need a good number of frames embedded in your video for this to look cool.
Enjoy!
zoom zoom….
Thursday, July 16th, 2009 | Keith Morgan's Blog, teh internets | No Comments
Cleaning out some of my flash video player junk and ran across a basic zoom in/out function for progressive download players. Assuming your video object is the child of a sprite (videoSprite):
public function zoomincontroller(pEvent:MouseEvent):void {
//move and scale sprite
videoSprite.x -=
videoSprite.y -=
videoSprite.width += (
videoSprite.height += (
}
public function zoomoutcontroller(pEvent:MouseEvent):void {
//reset sprite
videoSprite.x = 0;
videoSprite.y = 0;
videoSprite.width = stage.stageWidth;
videoSprite.height = stage.stageHeight;
}
….never really got around to retooling it. The basic concept is that you scale and reposition the Sprite the video is in. Obviously you will need a high-res video for this to look like anything…
Enjoy!
Who can em-bed now..who can it, who can it
Tuesday, June 9th, 2009 | Keith Morgan's Blog, teh internets | No Comments
Embedded players are in season again. Everyone wants to save their bandwidth and suck up yours. But who’s got your player? Well, I had this problem at GameVee and lemme be the first to formally tell you….the Flash runtime is stupid (on purpose though, its been crippled).
Anyway, how do you know what domain your player is being viewed at? Simple huh? just get the old Application.application.url, huh? Well…correct. This will show you where the swf lives, but not where it is….so, looks like you sux.
..so what the !@#$ is that supposed to mean?
when you call the play function in your player just add a line:
var testString:String = ExternalInterface.call(“function() { return document.location.href; }”);
then use a sendToURL() to post the data.
Honestly, I keep forgetting this stuff, so maybe you don’t sux that much. 
Autobuilds…rollout!
Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009 | Keith Morgan's Blog, teh internets | No Comments
The art of auto building flash is a lost art. Recently, I had to publish 19 Flash CS4 video players quickly and we weren’t prepared to port anything over to Flex. I was pretty much screwed.
..so what the !#@$ is that supposed to mean?
After about 4 days of manual builds. I’d had enough. I searched the interwebs for any signs of auto building Flash found out JSFL (JavaScriptFlash) for MX2004. Well..Apparently its still supported in CS4 and I was able to piece together a jsfl file from examples from the web:
Create a new text document named “publish.jsfl” and add the following:
fl.openDocument(“file:///<path-to>.fla”);
curr_doc = fl.getDocumentDOM();
curr_doc.publish();
curr_doc.close();
fl.quit(true);
Save and simply run, assuming you’re in the same directory as the publish.jsfl file.
C:/Program Files/Adobe/Adobe Flash CS4/Flash.exe publish.jsfl
Well, once the build process was down to a few exe commands, I created a batch file (win32) to execute the exe’s. But since we (and most people who have never used Windows before Win2000) use ant, I converted the build process:
<property name=”publish.jsfl” value=”publish.jsfl”/>
<property name=”flash” value=”C:/Program Files/Adobe/Adobe Flash CS4/Flash.exe”/>
<exec executable=”${flash}”>
<arg line=”‘${publish.jsfl}’” />
</exec>
Be warned. using multiple jsfl files will open/close the application and may cause corruption in the swf’s.
teh internets. teh nw bizness world
Tuesday, March 10th, 2009 | teh internets | No Comments
More and more I see businesses try to apply brick and mortar methods to new business realm. Traditionally, online business has been considered a subset of the total business and pretty much treated as the red-headed stepchild. Well, with the emergence of web2.0 and a totally different audience, businesses are failing. They’re not the inexperienced web surfer of yesteryear.
The most obvious issues are integration and advertising. Its pretty hard to integrate a 2.0 website into a 1.0 business model….especially if your business is a service. Chances are you’re getting creamed by a website that offers that service for free. How can you compete with that?
..so what the !@#$ is that supposed to mean?
Wake up! Change your model. Offer some features for free but use your brand and additional services to propel your business. I believe its called the Red Hat Model?
As far as advertising, the so-called business staple of the internet, you need to accumulate numbers. Banner ads don’t work. Get your numbers up and the advertisers will come and pay top dollar. No more click-thrus!
..but you do what you want…its your site…on f@ckedcompany F@ckedStartup.
just got owned or is it pwned? or is it p@wned?…
Tuesday, March 10th, 2009 | personal vendettas, teh internets | No Comments
So did I get owned or pawned? I mean, I’ve played chess. In chess, my pawns are expandable.
This gamer lingo, which I like to dub as l33t 2.0, is pretty confusing…I mean, apparently, you’d rather pwn someone rather than own..but its pronounced the same…as some have graciously told me along with being a noob and the situation being an epic fail.
..so what the !@#$ is that supposed to mean?
These terms get to be confusing to pronounce. Havent had this much trouble since ‘daemon’, which I like to pronounce ‘day-mon’ and not ‘dee-mon’.
I hate the internet.
Dude!?!?!…..Who are you?!?!?!….No I dont want to be your friend!!!!
Wednesday, January 14th, 2009 | personal vendettas, teh internets | No Comments
So I’m being bombarded by requests for FaceBook, twitter, Linked-In, blip.fm…..’So what’ you say? Well…(using twitter as an example) it seems that if I don’t get to those requests, the friend decides to stop following me. If I do happen to get to the approval, I get DM’s saying to follow them on FriendFeed or FaceBook.
Personally, I like to wait a few days to make sure its not a bot.
Anyway…I’m seeing the ‘MySpace Friend’ disease spread all over established social sites. I mean, Linked-In? WTF?…Isn’t that supposed to be professional connections and references?
..so what the !@#$ is that supposed to mean?
FaceBook clobbered MySpace. How? By keeping it exclusive. Sign in to view…Only add REAL friends…Only use real names….The safe feeling you got encouraged you to invite your friends, post pics, etc…
But, it seems that those days are over with people trying to become the next Tila Tequilla and try to get to 10,000 twitter followers or 10,000 FaceBook friends. Twitter is already doomed, but Facebook has a chance if they start enforcing those rules that made them the leaders of the industry to begin with.
…..but keep your friend requests coming….I still approve them.
Software Engineer, 9/2008 – present
Sunday, November 16th, 2008 | Professional Experience | Comments Off
Digitalsmiths
5001 Hospitality Court, Suite 100, RTP, NC 27560
www.digitalsmiths.com
- Helped skin and maintain flash & flex players, playlists, ratings, library components for TMZ, Telepictures, theWB, and iTv
- Created a python based MRSS feed generator using Pylons MVC for tmz.com and essence.com (Telepictures) for 3rd party vendors including Truveo/AOL, Quattro and Rhythm New Media
Find
Currently
There are no events to show at this time.