Well that took entirely too long

Yeah, I know I promised it long ago, but I finally got around to moving all of my old diary entries to this new format. That means that I've now got developer diary entries stretching back to March of 1998.

That also means I can finally mercy-kill the old diary entries. Say goodbye to 'em because they're gone!

Good tutorial

Saw this on somebody's web-log. It's a tutorial on how to make a tile-based world in a game.

The author also has a temporary test-game. It's just using temporary Sonic graphics, but it's a pretty phenomenal example of what you can do with a Flash tile engine.

Things that matter and things that do not

Just saw a press-release for version 2 of Flash Studio Pro, created a scant 2 months after I purchased version 1 thank you very much. One thing that makes me happy is that they're getting rid of the old OCX requirement, which is a plus.

You see, there are two ways to create a standalone .EXE out of Flash:

1. Use the publish feature from Flash itself, which creates 100% standalone runtime-free app. . .with "Macromedia Flash" in the titlebar, has a toolbar with Flash presentation options (rewind movie, etc), has a default Flash icon, and has no ability to deal with things outside of the Flash "sandbox", like write to files, save settings to the registry, etc.

2. Use one of several commedcial SWF->EXE conversion tools (like Flash Studio Pro) that get around the aforementioned limitations, but have one serious problem that they require Macromedia's runtime Flash OCX, which can cause version number problems between machines that already have the OCX installed, which come to over 90% of the Windows machines out there.

It looks like FSP version 2 is going to be the best of both worlds. You'll end up with a standalone runtime-free app that has the ability to do stuff outside the Flash sandbox.

Commercial Duck Tiles here I come :)

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Since I posted something above that likely has no bearing on your life, I decided to post a list of things that have no bearing at all on my life. . .

Ben Affleck

Jennifer Lopez

Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez' wedding or lack of wedding

The final episode of "Friends"

Any other episide of "Friends"

Reality shows other than "Cops"

Cool and free. Can't beat that.

Found this very cool game at http://www.freshsensation.com/samorost.swf

It's basically an interactive Roger Dean album cover with an odd sci-fi story. I like how it's pretty-much completely text-free, and it'd easily be playable in any language.

It's also got that Myst-feel, in which you don't really have any instructions to start, but you really don't need 'em.

Give it a try.

Good find

One of the handier tools I use in my Flash development toolkit is the eHelp RoboFlash toolkit. It's got the following tools. . .

1. Convertor for PowerPoint, which is a rather rudimentary utility that can convert PowerPoint presentations into Flash movies.

2. Extractor, which can disassemble a Flash movie into all of its component graphics, sounds, and code. Very useful to show you how insecure your Flash app is :)

3. Printer, which is a fake printer-driver (like Acrobat) that converts printed output into an embed-able Flash movie.

4. Protector, which obfuscates your Flash code, protecting it from sneaky disassemblers (like the aforementioned Extractor).

5. ScreenSaver, which'll convert a Flash movie into a Windows .SCR file.

6. Splicer, which can chain together finished Flash movies.

7. TextAnimator, the gem of the set. It's a wizard-based gizmo that does all kinds of attractive animations with text.

It was a nice set and I emphasize "was" because it was inexplicably discontinued shortly after it was released. All of the tools except Protector still work with the new Flash MX 2004, so I'm not too distraught about it, but it was a nice set and I never understood why it suddenly disappeared, especially given eHelp's purchase by Macromedia. Some or all of these tools would certainly be worth selling by the home office.

This morning, though, I did find that three of the tools have been resurrected by the original developer, Goldshell Digital Media. TextAnimator exists as "Flax", Splicer is called "Clipyard", and Screensaver is "FlashForge". I'd love to find updated versions of Extractor and Protector, but I have no idea who the original developers of those tools are. There are other Flash disassemblers and obfuscators out there, so it's not a big loss that I can't find updates.

Even if you don't write stuff in Flash, the Flax Text Effects Demo Page is fun to look at.