I often heard disappointment and despair in regards to creating a website entirely based in Adobe Flash CS3.  One of the strongest opposition points to such a website were based on the inability to bookmark specific "locations" within such a Flash site. So i set out to figure out how to wipe away that stigma.

When it was all said and done, it was quite easy... it just took some intense pre-planning. The premise is simple:

• Import a sitemap
• Import any content relative to the pages
• Use Flash to DOM calls to control URL management
• Redirect incoming URLs to correct Flash content

As for the code and the specifics, I can't yet convince myself to pass it out to the masses. If you are nice and would like to ask for it, though, I may be willing to trade :)

For an example of Flash Bookmarking in action, visit the new Red Red Design studio website portfolio.

One of my current projects is redesigning Parkstreet Brethren's website.  This will be an interesting project, because I am also becoming more involved in this church's ministry.  In an effort to make everyone's life easier, I will be attempting to integrate some handy technology into their site.

Cell phones are even used by church-goers during the service, so I am working on an idea to allow texting of prayer requests during the service.  Maybe this will make all their playing worth while, and it will also serve as a new way to continually keep people connected.  The prayer requests will be accessible as an XML news feed, which will be useful not only during the service, but also on the site and on any potential prayer screens we may have located around the church campus.

In addition to receiving text messages, I also hope to make information and announcements on the website more accessible through RSS news feeds of all updates and enhanced mass mailers/texters.

Also, I thought I would throw in "Fuel" in the title.  One of my coworkers and I are thinking about ways to take the 710 house off the electric grid and make it run on alternative energy.  For starters, we will be playing with pedal bikes that will run or monitors.  We hope to make them from old bikes and other junk that people have.  After that we hope to implement methods by which to actually power the whole house, including Veggie oil.  Yes, we both have been watching Invention Nation on the Science channel.

... so says a recent press release sent out by Ashland University...

"This year’s card featuring an interactive tour of ornaments adorning a Christmas tree was designed by Red Red Design’s Steve Knowlton, a 2007 AU graduate. “He’s a very bright, talented designer,” Box said."

Read the whole article here:
Ashland University Ecard Press Release

I was finishing a site today for a client, and questions arose regarding the impending year change.  I was asked how to update the copyright to have the current year.  It really wasn't too hard once I dug into it a little... I'm not sure why it isn't just included in the WEC typo3 install that I was using.  I also threw in some fun newsfeed stuff:

## This shows how to automatically update the copyright year
lib.copyright = TEXT
lib.copyright.data = date:U
lib.copyright.strftime = %Y
lib.copyright.wrap = © | {$constant.siteName}

####################################

### Put the Latest News in the left column on certain pages
[PIDinRootline = 100,102]
lib.latestNews < plugin.tt_news
lib.latestNews {        

code >        
code = LATEST        
pid_list >        
pid_list = 31 # the folder where news are stored        
catImageMode = 0        
catTextMode = 0 

}
lib.leftSide < lib.latestNews
[else] # Put something else in the lib.leftSide
temp.leftSide = TEXT
temp.leftSide.value = Hello
lib.leftSide < temp.leftSide

This year Christmas cards are huge for us.  After having to turn so many people away last year, we got on the ball this year and started making cards this summer.  Honestly, I am having a great time with all of this.  All of the cards are published out of Macromedia Flash CS3, but are published back a few versions so that the maximum amount of people are able to get ahold of these cards and view them.

We did two options this year, allowing people to purchase either the custom cards or the "personalizable" cards. The custom ones are built from the ground up, such as the 2007 Ashland University card, the 2007 EMI Music Publishing card, and the 2007 Student Loans Express card. Over previous years, we have also made the 2004 Ashland University card, which has over 7 MILLION VIEWS, and is getting about 500,000 hits a day right now.  Last year we sent out our 2006 Red Red Design card, and that is still going crazy on the hits.

The personalizable cards allow users to submit a message, greeting, logo and links that we incorporate into the card.  No, this is better than a Hallmark eCard, and we have put many hours in here to make them look very good.  Check them out here:

2007 - Bermuda Hospital

2007 - Allegany College

2007 - Nyack College of NYC

Captcha, the Image Generating Anti-Spam Powerhouse of the internet is now taking a beating from strippers.  Well, not actual strippers, but rather a new Windows virus that prompts users to aide the spammers by bypassing Captcha security to get entry into secured logins.  So lusty losers will be helping spammers fill your forums with bogus posts and choke your blogs with enhancement advertisements.

Here's how it works.  CAPTCHA generally makes a little image with scrambled letters an shows it on a login form or the like.  You have to type that in so the site knows you are not a robot :). But these guys are beating that by having some real human type that in for the online spam bots.

I think this is really smart, smart enough that they could get a real job that is not in their mother's basement.  But they are probably too ugly to be seen in the light of day.

Read More: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,307396,00.html

We are currently revamping our online buying here at work, and basic PayPal prompts one too many times for users to log in, even if they don't have to.

Finally, after much whining, I got some pretty URLs on my site.  As you can see, if you go to other pages, the URLs actually can make some sense.  Instead of "/index.php?id=32&type=0", it may now say "/about". I think search engines are supposed to like it too!  It wasn't too bad to do either. 

TYPO3, the CMS that I use, includes a .htaccess file in it's root.  It it make to use mod_rewrite and an extension called RealURL, which takes the pretty URLs people type and turn them into relevant links for the server. Until now, though, I've never realized I actually had to go edit the darn thing to make it relevant to my installation.  All that meant was editing some paths in it.  The only problems I had were a result of having my install in some sub-folders on my GoDaddy server. I had to go in and change the line that reads " RewriteRule .* index.php [L] " to " RewriteRule .* /index.php [L] ".  I also had to comment out the " RewriteBase / " line.

So if anyone wonders how to make lovely little URLs, its not too hard to do once you figure out how it works.

Many would say the days of profit and innovation on the web are dead. The nineties brought product information and business communication to the home office. The turn of the century saw a rise in online purchases and a globalizing effect on product marketing. While both of these periods offered abundant success, it was more often met with uncertainty and inconsistency. As such, company websites have stagnated and online sales have fell into the control of several predominant vendors. These recent trends would lead one to believe that now is not the time to invest resources into a burnt out market, but in fact, now is a better time that ever to begin development for the coming wave of ecommerce.

Within a cooperative work environment, there exists a set of norms for communication and accountability. Whether members are working in a large team or in a pair, there are roles and tasks which different members will fulfill. More specifically, the communication and cooperation of a pair of peers directly influences the success of their production (Ellis & Taggar, 2007). While much is understood about the influence of collaboration and accountability in relation to the performance of individuals, the field of collaboration through technological communication devices and digital media is a rapidly growing field, and is yet not fully understood. Through examining traditional norms of peer accountability, one can examine the influence that newer methods of digital communication and simulated intelligence have on performance.

Ok, so I admit that some may find this entirely geeky, but my latest personal knowledge pursuit is endeavoring to merge typo3 and Flash.  Before I get too excited, let me fill you in on what that exactly means.

Typo3 is a content management system, and a rockin one at that.  A fellow in Europe, let's call King Kasper, sat down and wrote this unbelievable CMS.  Now I cannot claim that the coding he did was revolutionary, but the organization and structure of the system is really off the charts.  On, and Flash is what make those little games and banners on the internet.

SO a while ago, in the midst of my independent studies in university, I got bored and started mixing the two.  The real benefit to doing this is that flash looks sweet for interactive and motion websites, but it is not really very cool when it comes to updating content, especially if you are the customer.  Now I am in the midst of using Kasper's typo3 backend to organize content and generate XML feeds for site content.

THIS MEANS that I will soon be able to crank out sites that have very dynamic structure while still maintaining the super sweetness of flash interactivity.  TO see the start of the efforts, head on over to Red Red Design to see it in it's ever increasing Typo3+Flash greatness.

TTFN my BFF
Sir Knowlton