H1DD3N.R350URC3 » Rant

Apple’s Developer Membership Order System is broken!

sascha — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 15:31:03 +0000

Apple, you really know how to piss off developers! First you want me to pay 99$ just to be able to actually test my iPhone apps on the device then your Shop Order Form does not allow me to set it to English if I’m not living in the US/UK and to top it all your Order system is broken and thanks to that I’m now stuck at a “Thank you for your enrollment!” page without ever having enrolled into anything nor having bought the membership. Worse, you don’t allow me to re-apply the product to the shopping basket so that I might actually be able to buy it!

That’s right, I cannot buy the dev membership now because Apple’s site is obviously broken and thinks I’ve already bought the membership. An advice: DON’T leave the address fill-out page or empty your shopping cart! You will not have a chance later to come back and reach the page that puts the product into your cart.

But enough rant for today! I think I go and write some ActionScript … which is much more fun … and it’s FREE!

The Confusion about ‘this’

sascha — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 05:01:39 +0000

I often browse through code libraries written by others and can’t deny noticing that so many developers are making exaggerated use of the ‘this’ keyword in their code. Today I came across CASAlib an otherwise very neat and certainly helpful library and after roaming through some of the code base it turns out that in most classes they’ve put ‘this’ in front of every single class property.

It seems that many newcomers to ActionScript still don’t understand the use of ‘this’ and that it’s only really necessary in rare cases, for example if a method parameter has the same name like it’s relative class property or in a few scope-related situations. It’s also good to have ‘this’ at hand if a dynamic property of a class needs to be accessed (this["foo"]) but other than that please do all a favor and throw out those unnecessary ‘this’! Ban it, lock it in your basement and don’t let it out unless there’s really a need for it!

10 Days …

sascha — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 04:40:53 +0000

… until the president election! Do the world a favor and vote for the right guys. And by that I mean not for THEM! People with at least a tad of intelligence now that Barack dances better anyway.

Aw Snap! This site is not meant for you!

sascha — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 05:22:12 +0000

Chrome, the new snazzy browser from Google is currently in everyone’s mouth and most people who had a look at it seem to be impressed so I decided to give it a go, after all it can’t be so bad, right?

Chrome installs right onto your system from the website and then takes over (or if you are cynical: steals) all the bookmarks, history, passwords etc. from Firefox (to make your life easier). It then opens with a slick and slender window that lacks all the tackiness of a plugin-convoluted Firefox. When opening a new tab it shows a neat history list with thumbnails of your most recent visited websites. Chrome starts up as fast as a finger snap! Maybe even faster! Can it get any better?

>> Continue reading "Aw Snap! This site is not meant for you!"

Container bug in Flex3 beta2

sascha — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 06:32:30 +0000

Update: This bug has long been fixed by Adobe. Please ignore this post, Flex 3 is wonderful!

Makes me wonder why nobody else has yet written anything about this bug … when using any container component like for example a Panel or TitleWindow with a different borderStyle than the default, e.g. borderStyle: solid all your contents of that container reach into the the chrome of the Panel/Window/etc. pretty much messing up your layout. How could this escape the eyes of Adobe’s Flex devs? Here’s the thread at Adobe’s Flex forum. This is bad because it sort of prevents me from writing any Flex/AIR applications until this issue has been fixed, I’m using a custom theme for all my projects that use a solid borderStyle (similar to the one used in the Flex Style Explorer). The marvels of open beta software pushed by corporations for mere publicity purpose!

Need more reason to NOT use Vista?

sascha — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 03:41:07 +0000

… If you use a Logitech mouse you already got it! The company now officially made it clear on their support forums that there will be no support for Mouseware for Windows Vista. Instead they point their customers to use the generic mouse driver that ships with Vista. But have they told you that the mouse movement is much slower with that one, even on highest speed? Or that the middle mouse button will not work? I like my MX310 and don’t plan to buy a new one just for Vista because this mouse fits like a glove. The same goes for my soundcard. M-Audio hasn’t made any official statement about a Vista driver so far.
One might thank Microsoft for this mess because of their ridicolous protection mechanisms but then again companies like Wacom prove that developing Vista drivers for existing hardware isn’t impossible. Seems like Logitech jumped onto the ‘all new and shiny’ banwagon by presenting their newest Vista supporting products instead of writing some drivers for their existing customers! Oh right! I forgot to tell them that some customers like me are left handers and don’t want to use an ergonimic right hander mouse!
No Vista for me until this driver mess has seriously improved, and definitely no Logitech products for me for a while, thanks!

Windows Vista the Protection Monster … and at which costs!

sascha — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 03:30:36 +0000

Still think Windows Vista is a great OS? It might look great but whats going on under it’s shiny surface? Peter Gutmann has written an extensive article about Vista’s underlying content protection systems. If you plan to use Vista, read it! And then think again!

Quote: “The only reason I can imagine why Microsoft would put its programmers, device vendors, third-party developers, and ultimately its customers, through this much pain is because once this copy protection is entrenched, Microsoft will completely own the distribution channel.”

Using Vista is like walking on thin ice … Vista’s EULA product activation worries

sascha — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 17:51:41 +0000

“…Once you activate the product, then you would assume that you are golden to go ahead and use the product, right? Wrong.

You see, even after you activate the software it will, according to
the EULA, “from time to time validate the software, update or require
download of the validation feature of the software”. It will once again
“send information about the…version and product key of the software,
and the internet protocol address of the device”.

Here’s where it gets hairy again. If for some reason the software
“phones home” back to Redmond, Washington, and gets or gives the wrong
answer – irrespective of the reason – it will automatically disable
itself. That’s like saying definitively, “I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I
can’t do that…”

… So basically add some regular activation annoyances to your almost weekly Windows security updates to keep you from working on the PC!
Read more here … Vista’s EULA product activation worries | The Register

Need more reasons to switch to Mac or Linux?!

Vista and the missing compatible Software

sascha — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 06:06:16 +0000

I’ve made a partition with Windows Vista RC a while back to check out how well my used Software will run. First off I like Vista, I really do! It’s polished Aero Look is reason enough for me to switch from the vomit-colored Windows XP. But I soon realized that something important is currently missing … compatible Software! That means compatible drivers in first line. Ok, it’s still about two months away until Vista will be in the shelves for anyone (with license volume release at the end of this month) but Vista has been how long on public beta? One year? Two years?
Checking the Logitech website for a driver for my beloved MX310 mouse … nowhere to be found! Not even a working 32bit driver! Not even a word mentioned about a future driver release! How about sound? I check M-Audio’s website to get a driver for my Delta Audiophile; Their 32bit WinXP driver doesn’t install while their 64bit Beta driver installs but Vista gives me an error afterwards that it wont accept unsigned drivers! There’s a ton of other Peripherals that I’m using for which I’m sure no compatible drivers are available so I don’t even bother searching for them now.

How about applications? Flash runs fine, though it’s tool windows look a bit odd with thin borders/corners around it. Photoshop runs smooth as if it never did anything else while ImageReady’s tool palettes seem to be not style conform anymore. Illustrator then goes completely bonkers with Molasses style window-dragging and tool palettes that sometimes have round corners and sometimes not. At least Eclipse runs fine! Well, on 32bit that is! On 64bit it will spit out an error about an incompatible DLL.

That said my Vista Experience went a bit limiting so far! Dynamic Font Management is a foreign word for Microsoft too! It seems nothing has changed about how Fonts are handled! They are either installed or not. I guess I hang a little longer with MainType! Let’s hope other companies aren’t sleeping and have drivers ready until release, even if they don’t loose one word about it. It would suck otherwise!

ePaper – When is it feasable?

sascha — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 10:51:50 +0000

I’m really missing one great invention that has yet to come for global consumption … books made of electronic paper! I’m not talking about these LCD display-like books or these foil-like papers that are already used for some advertising purposes. What I’d love to see available is a pocket notebook made of finely woven ePaper that I can plug via USB to my PC and load documents on it, which then are displayed on the paper and can be read just like a normal paper book. I prefer reading long texts on paper rather than on the screen!
I often find texts on the web, tutorials or other interesting information that I could read while on one of these long Tokyo subway rides or simply while hanging out in the living room but it would be too elaborate to print them out and fold them into my Hobonichi Techo.
One could argue that I could need a notebook PC but that would be too much, all I’m asking for is a book for reading. Hey it would be cool if it also uses Solar cells so it doesn’t need to be recharged and while we are at it the pages could glow so it can be read in the dark too … oh well, one can dream, but this definitely doesn’t sound like a far away utopia!

Fixing other people’s code

sascha — Fri, 22 Sep 2006 04:44:14 +0000

I just had to refuse the second job offer this year where I would have to fix somebody else’s written ActionScript 1 spagetti code! I don’t know what is the reason for agencies trying to give such jobs but it’s save to say that the troubles of digging through the messy and often timeline-spread code is enough to justify an estimate that sounds too high for the client.

The question comes up why they don’t just ask the person who originally wrote the code! That could have many reasons but if a client comes back to me and asks me to fix something in a years old project then I’ll do it for a measly payment simply because I know my source code. It’s a total different thing to fix somebody’s code, especially if it’s pre-AS2.
I always feel uncomfortable rejecting jobs, even such ones so I would be interested how others handle this situation! Do you usually reject such jobs or do you accept them?

The Crappiest Corporate Site of the Week

sascha — Mon, 24 Jul 2006 12:06:23 +0000

The “Crappiest Corporate Site of the Week” Award goes to Dell Japan for not being able to have a Shop website that runs on current Browsers! When I try to get onto their XPS 700 Customization page I get a simple Access Denied, telling me that I need to use Internet Explorer 4.0 or Netscape 4.6! The site doesn’t work on FireFox and not on MSIE 6 and neither on Netscape 8! Congratulations Dell! You suck immensely!
I’m actually wondering how do you sell your PCs in Japan!

So when do you think native graphics acceleration is due for Flash?

sascha — Wed, 05 Jul 2006 07:15:16 +0000

ActionScript 3.0 and Flash Player 9.0 brought a big leap of speed and all kinds of changes and optimizations with it. But these mainly happen under the hood only. While Flash 8 came up with the bitmap level manipulation stuff, Flash 9 doesn’t come with any groundbreaking new features that are visible to the surface (except for the speed improvement).

Yesterday on a meeting I was asked if I could use a rotatable 3D mesh in Flash for the clients presentation project and I could only tell them that the lack of native 3D support is the big weakness of Flash. Eventually we will end up with a single frame animation to fake the rotation. However this was one example that there must be quite a demand for 3D support in Flash, not only for experimentation but even more for commercial use. In fact native 3D is already overdue since a while but I accept that implementing such a thing is not an easy challange.

So native graphics acceleration for Flash has to come one way or the other, not only because everybody wants it but also for Flash to stay competitive (think about WinFX). There is still Director one could argue. But somehow I get the feeling that Director will either continue it’s shadow existence or it will disappear sooner or later. 3D for Flash has to come, there is no way or excuse around it! Maybe the next version? Too early! Maybe Flash 10? Who knows! We might however see some sweet audio improvements in a near future!

MXNA doesn’t like me!

sascha — Sat, 13 May 2006 15:14:19 +0000

I’m chased by bad luck since a while when it comes to getting this blog onto the Macromedia XML News Aggregator! First when I used Nucleus CMS it stopped fetching my feeds automatically after a while. Nobody, not me and not the admin at MXNA had any clue what was the cause. Now I’ve switched to Word Press in the hope that this would change but it now seems that I’m stuck forever with this problem. The feed URL for Word Press is very different and there seems to be no working redirection plugin for Word Press 2+. Also I cannot re-subscribe at MXNA with the same domain and any mail to the admin so far stood unanswered. Only workaround would be to change to another sub domain but I don’t want to go that far!

The Joys of Public Beta

sascha — Wed, 10 May 2006 06:38:42 +0000

Flex 2 public beta3 was just released and already all formerly written Flex2 beta2 apps started to fail working in the newest Flash Player! Seems like Adobe is making critical changes to the framework faster than we can change our pants!
This somehow spoils it for me to write more stuff with Flex until the very final release is published because I’m pretty sure it will fail working in a soon cooming beta4!
Yes, there’s a big and fat beta glued on it so it’s clear that changes are ahead and former stuff might fail but it’s all public and it’s obvious that Adobe isn’t only making it a public beta for testing but also for propaganda! My written SWNameGenerator doesn’t work anymore, giving me a nicely red flooded Eclipse editor full of errors!