Jen deHaan

Notes taken at the MAX 2005 general session/keynote.

Please excuse the rough/unedited nature of these notes!

Continue reading…

The individual product pages just launched with new information. If you want more info about each individual product, or links to evaluate the software (see the comments here for more info: http://weblogs.macromedia.com/dehaan/archives/2005/09/studio_8_is_now.cfm), head to the individual product pages for all the info you need. That includes product tours, videos, links, etc etc.

http://www.macromedia.com/software/studio/
http://www.macromedia.com/software/flash/flashpro/
http://www.macromedia.com/software/dreamweaver/

–

Find the Flash documentation center here — all new format, and a bunch of downloads:

http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flash/

http://www.macromedia.com/go/flash_samples/

—
OK, now I’m sure you guys get the idea…. I’ll shut up now… oh – the new technotes are coming out too – be sure to check those OFTEN for common gotchas and workarounds.

STUDIO 8 is now available – on the main MM site, not just DevNet! Run to the Macromedia store now!

http://www.macromedia.com/store

That’s right folks, non-DevNet subscribers can now get Studio 8 too!

“With latest releases of Dreamweaver, Flash Professional, Fireworks, Contribute and FlashPaper, Studio 8 offers web designers and developers a new level of efficiency, expressiveness and simplified workflow to create websites, interactive experiences and mobile content.”

You can try out Studio 8 for free, and download it RIGHT NOW.

Get the Trial for 30 days!
http://www.macromedia.com/go/trystudio (available shortly… the store is up, but this isn’t quite yet at time of blogging).

Or perhaps you want to read more about it, see it in action, and so on.

See Studio 8 in Action
Studio 8 Feature Tour: http://www.macromedia.com/software/studio/productinfo/features/

Check out the datasheet for more info:

http://www.macromedia.com/software/studio/productinfo/datasheet/

**==**
FORUMS FOR FLASH 8
go to:

http://www.flash8forums.com

**==**

Special Offer – Limited Time
Buy today, and enter to win a plasma TV (1 winner), camcorder (5 winners), or iPod mini (50 winners!)

See this for more info: http://www.macromedia.com/software/studio/sweepstakes/index.html

Purchase any of the Macromedia Studio 8 products below by September 30, 2005. Register your purchase by October 17. You will be automatically entered in a random drawing for the prizes above. Eligible products include:

Studio 8
Dreamweaver 8
Flash Professional 8
Fireworks 8

The contest ends 9/30.
=====

I hope you have already clicked away from this blog to go and download it right now! Or go to the Flash 8 Forums here:

http://www.flash8forums.com

Heh – it’s only in the store and not even on the front of the site yet

The latest edition of the EDGE (Macromedia newsletter) is out, featuring an interesting article on protecting FLV streams. I’ve had a couple people email me about setting up sites where users pay to watch FLV videos. Often, when you’re selling your content, you don’t want other people to rip it off. The service discussed in this article solves that problem. This article is by Tarun Bangari and Chris Hock.

For the latest EDGE, click here: www.macromedia.com/newsletters/edge/may2005/index.html. The Macromedia user group managers are well represented this month!

…especially Alan Musselman. The news here being this support guru just started a Macromedia weblog at this fine location:

http://weblogs.macromedia.com/amusselman/

Alan, now a member of team deseloper, is a big Fireworks nut, and also knows a whole lot about a wide range of products, including Flash. You have to be impressed by these multi-talented (and cool) guys in support (I sure am) – and it’s always good news when they start blogs.

But who cares what I think — stop reading my junk and go bookmark/aggregate/read his site!

Another MacroChat to consider:

Macromedia Support Engineer Larry Gonzales will lead this live product discussion on navigation bars in Dreamweaver. He will present several techniques available in Dreamweaver that allows developers to easily add JavaScript and CSS based Navigation bars to a web site. Larry will also discuss details and considerations about the different kinds of navbars that can be incorporated in a website.

What You Will Learn

* Brief overview of Navigation Bar types
* How to create a Navigation Bar Object in Dreamweaver
* Using an unordered list and CSS to create a Navbar in Dreamweaver
* Look at the features Fireworks MX 2004 affords Dreamweaver MX 2004 users for Navbars

Register here: www.macromedia.com/cfusion/event/index.cfm?event=detail&id=223265&loc=en_us

If you have any questions, please use the email address on the registration page (linked above). Enjoy!

Three new MacroChats announced. Sign up using the links below! (Links only active before the event – after the event is over, these links 404).

Team Macromedia member, Matt Woodward will lead this live discussion
on how Macromedia Flex offers ColdFusion developers an incredibly
powerful and easy way to build Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) by
combining their existing ColdFusion skills with the new capabilities
of Flex. Matt will discuss how an existing ColdFusion application can
be given a completely new RIA interface with surprisingly little code.
Matt will also illustrate some of the fantastic data presentation
capabilities of Flex and how ColdFusion developers can give their
users a better experience with RIAs built in Flex.

What You Will Learn
- A brief overview of what Flex is and how it works
- Why you should care about Flex and RIAs
- What applications are well-suited to be built as RIAs
- How to use ColdFusion and Flex to build RIAs

Register here:
www.macromedia.com/cfusion/event/index.cfm?event=detail&id=190116&loc=en_us

Introduction to the onTap Framework for ColdFusion
Wednesday, May 18, 2005 6:00 PM – 7:00 PM US/Eastern

Team Macromedia member Isaac Dealey will provide an introduction to
the onTap framework, a robust framework for ColdFusion application
development available under the terms of the Lesser-GPL open-source
license. The framework’s features include platform independent
database management, i18n internationalization, a wealth of form
tools, modular / reuseable display and AJAX-like interface tools.

What You Will Learn
- What is a framework?
- What is the onTap framework?
- How to display content
- How to create and populate forms
- How to validate a form
- How to create and populate forms

Register here:
www.macromedia.com/cfusion/event/index.cfm?event=detail&id=201473&loc=en_us

Applications for Mobile Devices using Flash Lite
Thursday, May 26, 2005 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM US/Eastern

This live Macrochat features Macromedia User Group Manager, Giorgio
Natili discussing Macromedia Flash Lite and the basic knowledge to
build a successful application for mobile devices. During the session
Giorgio will focus on the building blocks and usability aspects of
mobile applications.

Giorgio is the Manager of ActionScript.it – MMUG and his passion for
Flash drives him to write tutorials for Italian web sites dealing with
Flash and ActionScript and to be a large presence on
macromedia.general.italy (Italian Macromedia Forums) in order to help
the Italian Flashers and explain the right use of Flash to build Rich
Internet Applications. Giorgio is a freelance Flash developer who
works on mobile projects in Rome, Italy.

What You Will Learn
- Devices and OS
- Using Flash MX 2004 to develop mobile applications
- Macromedia Flash Lite
- Application design and development processes
- Mobile applications usability

Register for this event at:
www.macromedia.com/cfusion/event/index.cfm?event=detail&id=217788&loc=en_us

The following USA Today article by Jefferson Graham is about Macromedia and mobile technology. Some interesting tidbits about the growth of Flash in this area – great for developers and designers alike.

www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/2005-04-12-macromedia-usat_x.htm

Older but related news is the Nokia deal that was signed earlier this year:

www.macromedia.com/macromedia/proom/pr/2005/nokia_flashtechnology.html

And the developer release of Flash Lite, so you can start developing mobile phone apps right now (if you have one of the phones in the list…):

http://www.flash-mx.com/news/archives/000367.cfm

Macromedia MAX 2005!

October 16-19, 2005
Anaheim Convention Center
Anaheim, CA

We are pleased to announce MAX 2005 taking place October 16-19, in Anaheim, California. Program information, registration pricing, and more details will be available soon. Check back often for the most recent MAX information.
We look forward to seeing you in Anaheim.
To be placed on the MAX mailing list and receive e-mail updates, please send a message to conference@macromedia.com and include “subscribe to MAX list” in the subject line.

From: http://www.macromedia.com/macromedia/events/max/

Stood in line at 8am at the local Best Buy to get the new Sony PSP. I got it set up on the short drive to work (as passenger!) and managed a quick game of Wipeout. This thing absolutely rules – graphics, design, features, games, things it comes with. Absolutely blows the DS out of the water. There are already 13 games out (according to EB), and the Best Buy dude said another 30 by the end of the month.

Highly recommended. If you’re in 601, come check it out