senocular.com

egoldy from the kirupaforums posted a link to http://www.flashblog.org that offers a free download of an open source Flash blog (currently in beta 0.2) complete with Flash and PHP files. The site is in spanish so you may want to freshen up on your espanol.

There's a new Flash optimizer in town, Ariaware's Ariaware Optimizer. It boasts optimization for Flash movies and Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) that result up to 70% smaller file sizes. The best part? It's from Aral Balkan, Peter Hall and Burak Kalayci; well known members of the Flash community.

via eMediaWire article.

News has been a little slow and work on senoculog has been even slower so here is a new set of Fireworks commands. These are for general selections. Read about them and download them here.

Also, I've added a new command to the Path Commands collection. This command is the Invert command. I remember writing it a while ago but couldn't seem to find it when I gathered up the commands to be posted here so I rewrote it this morning (hopefully without error).

Eweek is reporting that Laszlo Systems has open-sourced their rich internet application platform. Laszlo Systems is a direct competitor with Macromedia who, too, have been pushing rich internet applications, or RIAs, for the web recently. Both provide Flash-based web solutions. From the article:

Lazslo President and CEO Steve Ciesinski said Laszlo decided to open-source its platform "to establish a free and open platform for rich client application development and deployment. As a result, we expect to accelerate the adoption of rich client applications on the open Web, as well as enhance the quality, performance and feature set of the Laszlo platform. Laszlo Systems will continue to develop the open-source platform, along with providing commercial application modules, support and education programs for customers."

Could Macromedia's decision to provide a free license for Flex be a direct result of this?

Macromedia Flex can now be used free of charge thanks to the Macromedia(R) Flex(TM) non-commercial deployment licensing program. From BusinessWire:

The Macromedia Flex non-commercial/non-institutional deployment licensing program is free, but requires qualified participants to pay $8.99 to cover shipping and handling. The software for this program is expected to be available in November. An application for interested individuals will be available on macromedia.com in the coming weeks. In the meantime, email FlexLicense@macromedia.com to be notified when the application is available.

Definitely would be something I'd like to play with... if I ran my own server.

Macromedia's second annual MAX conference is being held in New Orleans this year (from November 1-4).

The conference will address the increasing need for businesses to differentiate products and services in this expanding digital world and will emphasize the powerful role great experiences play on the Internet. Designers and developers can sharpen their skills, learn techniques from industry experts, and get up to date on the latest technologies.

Read more from the press release.

I love the idea for MAX - and I'd love to attend. But, much like with Captivate, it's just too rich for my blood. I can't afford to pay the standard registration fee of $1095 US to loaf around New Orleans for a couple of days to listen to banter about the direction of the industry (as much as I would like to).

Macromedia has a new piece of software out called Captivate which is what RoboDemo has matured into becoming. RoboDemo, a screen capture and training application which supported the Flash file format, was aquired by Macromedia last year. See the press release for Captivate here.

I'm all for what Captivate can do, however, at $500 US for a copy, it just doesn't seem worth it. Let them look at stills (and let them eat cake!).

And here are my Mask Commands. Descriptions of those commands are accessible in the link provided.

This will probably be the last collection of commands I release any time soon. There are a few more floating around on my hard drives but these past few sets were the bulk of them. Next I plan to put more focus on finishing up senoculog and getting that installed and running.

Packaged up some more commands collections. These include Path Points, Create, & View commands. Like the other collections, nothing too special. Just added basic functionality. See each for more details of the commands included.

Here is a collection of my File commands. Most are pretty basic - things you would have expected to be in Fireworks to begin with such as save all and close all. Nonetheless, all helpfull (well they have been for me). See a full listing of those commands available by checking it out.