So, over the winter I had been working on a portfolio website redesign for a 3D artist in Toronto. The project was mostly php/mysql based which was a welcome change from all the flash work I had been doing earlier that year. The website includes an inline CMS (meaning that after you login, you just navigate around and edit whatever items you want to). It turned out a lot better than I thought it would and uses a lot of ajax for a lot of the cms updates. My buddy Ian McFadyen did all the design work and did an amazing job to boot. I handled all of the development work.
After learning about the project I realized I should probably get my hands on a PHP based framework to base everything off of. I found out that so many frameworks are way too convoluted with things I would never use. Along my google journey I ran accross something called Simple PHP Framework. I downloaded it and ran some tests with it. It comes with some very nice utility functions and classes including user authorization classes and database access classes. It had pretty much everything I was looking for.
Anyways, I’m just sending out much love to the guys involved with the framework for saving me many hours of tearing my hair out figuring a lot of this stuff out myself. I’ve also since implemented it on http://www.freeshipping.org and the admin for my first iPhone app’s webservice at http://www.couponsherpa.com.
For the past couple months I had decided to take a break from Flash development and try something completely foreign to me; iPhone App development. The language is completely different than Actionscript, however it comes Model-View-Controller based, so that was my only comfort.
My brother and I came up with an idea to put coupons on the iPhone, something that hadn’t been done yet, or at least hadn’t been done very well yet. The idea, I would develop it, he would design it and get the coupons in it. Read the rest of this entry »
I hate coding things twice and every once in a while I seem to need something that automatically clears the default value in an input text field for a form. So I decided to write a javascript object that would make life incredibly easy for me. And now its all yours if you have a need for something like this. Here is an example of what I’m talking about. You will notice that when you click in the text field it clears the default text, and if you click away from the text field it will return the default text only if you haven’t entered anything. it’s pretty basic but annoying to always have to code again and again so I have added it to my utils.js file that I use throughout my projects. Here’s the code… Read the rest of this entry »
I have written previously about the free shipping website that my brother created. To help merchants and shoppers he’s created a new shopping day. It’s called Free Shipping Day and it is today. Over 250 participating merchants will be offering free shipping with delivery by Christmas. Luke says that merchants really like the idea of this holiday and some very big brands have contacting him to let him know that they will be participating. You can find a list of all the merchants that will be taking part in the first Free Shipping Day at his website.
As for every other day of the year you can find coupon codes for free shipping at FreeShipping.org. Some of the new merchants that are on the website include Victoria’s Secret, J Crew, Saks Fifth Avenue and Crutchfield.
This will likely be of interest to most Flash Developers fortunate enough to be working on a Mac.
Since I recently stopped using Firefox due to its ever increasing size and annoyance of download requests every time I opened it, I chose to switch over to a much slimmer Safari. The only thing I really missed with Firefox was the Flash Tracer extension, which allowed me to see what was going on in the flash files loaded into Safari. So why not come up with a widget to make that happen. So I decided to download the new xcode development tools provided by Apple. It comes with a handy graphical tool for making osx dashboard widgets. After a few evenings of tinkering with the program I came up with my first widget, it is similar to Firefox’s Flash Tracer extension but will allow you to use any browser you want and has a few more features. It uses Ajax to load the flashlog.txt file generated by the flash player (debug version) and parses the data for displaying properly. Pretty strait forward but very useful for any flash developer I would think. All I do is hit the corner hot-spot that loads my dashboard and the flash tracer widget appears showing me all the guts of my flash files that are running in my browser. Read the rest of this entry »
I am happy to announce that our company Kinoli just launched Free Shipping.org. The web site is an online shopping resource with a list of over 600 stores with free shipping coupons and promotion codes. By the end of 2008, we expect to have over 1000 free shipping coupons on the site. The site also has a list of last minute shipping dates for many of the most popular stores.
Some of the featured deals will get you Target free shipping , or free shipping at Kohls, Macys, Sierra Trading Post, Dell, Shutterfly, Snapfish, Lands End or JCPenney free shipping. You can shop by brand or category. The toys free shipping category is one of the most popular on the site.
Anyways, we hope you can get some use out of it this holiday season.
We’re super excited about FreeShiping.org and would love your feedback.
London that is. So I finished my trip in London for a few days. It was there I had met up with the friend (Kim) that passed on the earlier part of my journey but she finally came to her sences and joined my in London. The first thing I noticed about the big city is that it was real busy with people and vehicles, it seems to never sleep. However I could at least understand everyone; that was a huge plus, believe me, it got frustrating at times in the other countries when I couldn’t read any of the signs and had to keep asking people if they spoke english before I could find my way.
My second and final day in Munich was one to remember. I had met a few interesting people the night before and decided to stick it out just a little longer in the land of the Third Reich. That final day I ended up going on 3 tours. A city sight seeing tour which was very informative on how the city and its rulers were formed and basically covered all of Bavaria. A Third-Reich tour which was the best tour of them all, I saw where the Nazi party was formed, where they held there meetings and even some of the buildings they had built during their reign. Munich bore the official title, Hauptstadt der Bewegung, the Capital of the Nazi Movement, and I learned all about the buildings that carry the secrets of a dark past. A Beer and Food tour which was actually somewhat boring but involved some beer tasting and some eating, so that made it all the better. I also hung out in the evening with some of the friends I had met there and did some of the Octoberfest stuff.
Duh, I should have known. So the plan was to go to Freiburg, Germany today. Not knowing theirs also a Fribourg, Switzerland, I purchased a ticket from Bern to Friburg, about half an hour later I realized I was still in Switzerland. Doh! So I had to rail back to Bern then through Basel and now I’m in Freiburg Germany. Other than that things have been fairly uneventful for the past couple of days. Except for the extreme pain my legs are feeling right now due to the excess walking I do everyday, all is well. I sure wish I brought my bike along. I would be able to see more things and wear out my shoe’s/body a little less in the process.
My 8 hour flight to paris was quit booring and uneventful as to be expected. Since I saw Paris on my last trip to Europe, I didn.t think it would be the highlight of the trip and just wanted to catch the main sights before pushing on, which I did. I saw the Louvre Museum, Iffel Tower, Arch de Triumph, Versaille Palace and a lot of other old stuff. It was all neet to see but to be honest I felt Paris was somewhat of a dirty place and very fast pased. It was also over saturated with tourists, which I was one of I know, but still, I.m talking, lines worse than Canadian Passport lines around Christmas time. So I pushed on to Bern after a day and a half in the French capital.
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