I Was A Registered Alien!

Using Google Mail for Your Domain

I've just discovered that you can use Google Apps to do the mail hosting for your domain for free, for up to 100 users.  Others have already written about it - I've found an excellent guide for migrating to it from various email clients and accounts that appears to be very thorough in detail.

I'm currently paying for the hosting of email for my domain and I've got to say that this is very tempting.

After a bit of googling about the subject I found a blog post by Scott Hansleman about how he migrated a number of relatives from various email clients across to Google Apps, well worth the read: Migrating a Family to Google Apps from Gmail, Thunderbird, Outlook and others: The Definitive Guide

Authoring For AIR with Flex 3, New Adobe Article

With the recent relaunch of the Adobe Developer Connection for MAX, I'm proud to say that I've contributed an article to the new AIR Developer Center.  I created a Flickr image uploader in Flex and wrote about the application for the article - this is the second time that I've written about Flex and AIR for Adobe.

Off tomorrow - SFO ORD MAX LHR HKG

Well I'm off to the US for MAX again this year, flying out tomorrow with a couple of days in San Francisco beforehand and a few days in London afterwards.

I'm covering MAX again for Builder AU and have a few interviews lined up already.

I'm also hoping to catch up with a lot of folk that I meet online on a regular basis so please if you hear an Aussie voice at MAX there's a reasonable chance it's me as there's a very small contingent this year.

Desktop RSS with Adobe AIR

I've been writing for Builder AU again, creating a series of tutorials on authoring Adobe AIR with HTML & JavaScript (Ajax).  The first of these has just been published where we build a desktop RSS reader - the initial version is less than 40 lines of code in the application page! It's simple stuff so hang around and see how it evolves.

You can read more in the article, "Desktop RSS with Adobe AIR", from the following link: http://www.builderau.com.au/program/flash/soa/Desktop-RSS-with-Adobe-AIR/0,339028413,339281120,00.htm

I'm Still Here

I've not posted here for something like 5 weeks, I've been busy writing elsewhere. With articles for Adobe's Developer Center and for Builder AU I've been using my muse elsewhere - Twitter and more recently Pownce have also received some of my attention as well.

After the Apollo, now Adobe AIR, beginners article for Adobe Labs that I wrote for the public alpha release I was asked to contribute an article for the Adobe Developers Center on ActionScript 3 for Flash CS3. I've been impressed with how E4X can easily manipulate XML data so I've written an article on that topic, avoiding the usual RSS parser example by illustrating my ideas with an example application that utilizes a custom XML packet to deliver multi-lingual translations for a video display.

Builder AU asked me to review Adobe's Spry Ajax Framework for them which I did in the form of a "how to".  While Spry is a part of Dreamweaver CS3 I approached my writing through utilizing the Spry download with a text editor to add Ajax to traditional HTML - after having existed in Flex and Flash world for so long it was interesting to have to think about basic HTML again.

I've been enjoying the interaction with peers that Twitter has to offer - while not necessarily as intrusive as IM can tend to be Twitter has offered new opportunities for me that I've enjoyed immensely.

I've also been involved with two user groups this week.  The first was launched on Wednesday, ACUGA - The Adobe Connect User Group Asia Pacific.  While some of you may not necessarily get excited about online meetings and eLearning the ACUGA was well attended for the 10:00am time slot, the guest speaker was Adobe's Connect Evangelist, or Connectionist, Peter Ryce who presented from San Jose.  Peter's presentation was very interesting.  Preaching to the converted Peter gave an insight to the future of Connect with the next version requiring a minimum of Flash Player 8 to deliver dramatic performance increases - particularly in desktop sharing.  The second user group was QMUG who I spoke to on the same day, demonstrating Connect to them via Connect.

For further investigation:

Filtering XML data in Flash applications using ECMAScript for XML

Starting with Spry

ACUGA Archive

Your Chance to be the First San Dimas Beta User

One of the highlights of Kevin Lynch's Keynote speech at last year's MAX in Las Vegas was the eBay Apollo application. Code named San Dimas and built by the folk at effectiveUI it's a desktop application from eBay that allows you to manage your bids on eBay via the Apollo cross-operating system system runtime.

In a cleaver right to be the first San Dimas beta tester is now up for auction on eBay with the proceeds going to charity.  The successfully bidder will also receive a certificate and a T-shirt.  The auction item can be found at http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110131261193

If you're a little more patient you can apply for the beta at the Project San Dimas site: http://www.projectsandimas.com/

Learn more about Apollo at Adobe Labs: http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/apollo/

Is Silverlight Not As Sparkly As Promised?

Filed under "slight of hand" it would appear that Microsoft's promise that Silverlight will work on OS X may not be entirely true.

John Lam, the creator of RubyCLR who now is a Microsoft employee, has listed on his blog recently a number of Silverlight facts including:

"Silverlight V1.1 will only target Intel Mac OS X machines."

Microsoft's message has all along been that Silverlight will be "cross-platform" (more accurately dual platform unless they're going to surprise us all with a Linux version) with one of the big marketing messages being:

"Silverlight supports fast, cost-effective delivery of high-quality video to all major browsers running on the Mac OS or Windows."

It's interesting to see that the efforts of Microsoft's engineers has been rationalised so that version 1.1 will only support the current CPU version of the Mac hardware while Adobe is supporting all versions with the Flash Player.

You can see John's full list here: http://www.iunknown.com/2007/05/clearing_the_ai.html

On The Prowl for Interactive Designer

webqem, my employer, is on the prowl for an Interactive Designer for our office in Neutral Bay, Sydney.

We do a lot of interesting stuff for a wide range of interesting clients. If you're keen to find out more our Creative Director Steve has just blogged about it on the company blog: Are you a seriously good Interactive Designer? We want you.

Adobe Announces New Acquisition

While trawling I found an interesting announcement, Adobe have acquired Scene7 - "a technology innovator in real-time rich media delivery services".

Scene7 offers solutions that include:

• Dynamic Imaging
• eCatalogs
• Product Configurators
• Image Management

With a customer list that includes Land's End, Amazon, Harrods, Sears, JC Penny and Macys it's interesting to see where this will lead, read the announcement here:

http://www.scene7.com/news/2007/20070503.asp

Joost Invites

Like many others I have an abundance of Joost invites right now.

Thursday 8 August: I had previously offered to give those invites away but since most folk are happy to take without thanks I've decided to remove the offer.

Manners people...