diamondTearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog diamondTearz- half MD- half Machine Fri, 03 Oct 2008 17:07:04 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 en Excellent SVN use tutorials http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/10/03/excellent-svn-use-tutorials/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/10/03/excellent-svn-use-tutorials/#comments Fri, 03 Oct 2008 17:07:04 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=432 A clear and concise set of Subversion articles discussing the purpose of branches and tags as well as how to make the best use of the features in SVN.  There’s also a Subversion cheat sheet on the site which saves a lot of time googling.

  1. How to structure your repository
  2. How to resolve SVN conflicts
  3. How to create and apply a patch in svn

Also if you’re using your svn from outside of flex builder like I did for years.  I have found subclipse to be very useful recently and have not had many problems with it.  This tutorial helped me get set up.

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/10/03/excellent-svn-use-tutorials/feed/ Facebook-Firefox Toolbar Plugin http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/22/facebook-firefox-toolbar-plugin/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/22/facebook-firefox-toolbar-plugin/#comments Tue, 23 Sep 2008 00:58:24 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=425 The Facebook-Firefox Toolbar plugin puts a toolbar in Firefox that allows you to search Facebook, share a page with a friend, check your messages, go straight to your profile page, and even pop open a Facebook sidebar with all of your friends’ profiles for quick access.  Although the profile sidebar is a bit crowded and I miss(or have not yet found) the chat feature,  It’s a handy tool that allows me to not have fb open in another tab.  There’s also the ability to open directly into Photos,  Profiles, Notes and Events from the toolbar.  You can even customize the contents of the toolbar.

You can download this handy tool from the developer’s site.  Let me know about your experience with the Toolbar.  The toolbar is reviewed at CNET.com here.

Another Facebook/Firefox Integration Plugin is Boost. It boasts that it “blows away the official Firefox -Facebook Toolbar”.   I haven’t tried it yet but I just installed it.  As soon as I get a chance to try it out I’ll let you know.

Just to push further substantiate the role of Firefox “Platform”  There’s a site dedicated to Facebook/Firefox Plugins

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/22/facebook-firefox-toolbar-plugin/feed/ PureMVC on RedBull–Fabrication is here http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/21/puremvc-on-redbull-fabrication-is-here/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/21/puremvc-on-redbull-fabrication-is-here/#comments Mon, 22 Sep 2008 02:22:35 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=420 I’ve spent most of the weekend refactoring a mound of PureMVC Multicore based code.  I came across several useful tutorials and tools during the project.  The most exciting of these is Fabrication.   It ’s best described as a layer of abstreaction on top of PureMVC and the Pipes Multicore utility .  It also adds other useful features such as a built in undo framework for the commands.

Here’s a quick list of the advantages of Fabrication that I’ve seen thus far:

  1. Abstraction of the facade including handling the call to the facade.start() and wiring the call to startup command.  You subclass the FabricationApplication and it handles generation of your multicore multiton keys, registers and calls your startup command.
  2. Module Integration with loading and cleanup- FabricationModule is  loaded by FabricationModuleLoader able to communicate with the application via the use of routeNotification().  Other Modules can just register their interest with the standard handleNotification() or map it to a commad.  Bye Bye writing JunctionMediator code manually translating my Module events to put ‘em through the pipes.  You can even specify the modules to receive the messsage.

What are you waiting for?  Here are the links to Fabrication so far:

I’m sure we’ll be hearing more about this utility in the near future.

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/21/puremvc-on-redbull-fabrication-is-here/feed/ If you love Xray/AdminTool You’ve gotta check out Kap Inspect http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/18/if-you-love-xrayadmintool-youve-gotta-check-out-kap-inspect/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/18/if-you-love-xrayadmintool-youve-gotta-check-out-kap-inspect/#comments Thu, 18 Sep 2008 16:31:23 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=418 I was introduced to Kap Inspect by Steve Bick at work.  It does amazing code inspection!   I plan to do a deep dive into it this evening but I’m impressed by it already.

Another tool that has been very impressive is Enterprise IDE which comes with enhanced class generation, UML Model Generation, AsDoc Generation, FlexUnit test skeleton  generation and e4x code generation as well as a ton of other features that enhance your Flexbuilder development environment.  I’m still trying to find all ways it differs from Flex Code Generator.  Clearly the toolkit for ActionScript 3 development is improving.

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/18/if-you-love-xrayadmintool-youve-gotta-check-out-kap-inspect/feed/ Flex Builder Timesaver Keyboard Shortcut http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/15/flex-builder-timesaver-keyboard-shortcut/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/15/flex-builder-timesaver-keyboard-shortcut/#comments Mon, 15 Sep 2008 14:59:22 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=415 I was tired of having to reach for the menu and came across the shortcut for switching back and forth from debugging to development perspectives .  If you Use Command + F8(Ctrl + F8 on Windows)  it’ll toggle you between the two views.

Another useful one is Ctrl + Shft + Space(On the Mac)   to get the arguments in a method.  This saves you the steps of deleting the left parenthesis to type itagain and trigger the code hinting.

More Eclipse shortcuts here though I’m not sure which ones carry over into Flexbuilder.

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/15/flex-builder-timesaver-keyboard-shortcut/feed/ This post is simply to claim my blog on Technorati http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/03/this-post-is-simply-to-claim-my-blog-on-technorati/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/03/this-post-is-simply-to-claim-my-blog-on-technorati/#comments Thu, 04 Sep 2008 02:08:38 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=413 Sorry that ya’ll have to endure my spam.  I need to do the Technorati blog claim ritual.
Technorati Profile

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/09/03/this-post-is-simply-to-claim-my-blog-on-technorati/feed/ Things to watch for when Porting from PureMVC to PureMVC multicore http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/08/04/things-to-watch-for-when-porting-from-puremvc-to-puremvc-multicore/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/08/04/things-to-watch-for-when-porting-from-puremvc-to-puremvc-multicore/#comments Mon, 04 Aug 2008 23:28:00 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=400 So you’ve built the majority of your application in PureMVC and now you wanna lob a module or two in there.  Go ahead.  Add that excitement to your day.  I had the pleasure of doing just that when I was a few hours from milestone- or so  thought.  Here are a few of the gotchas to watch out for.

  1. You’re going to need all of your code to be coming from the same PureMVCcodebase with the path of   org.puremvc.as3.multicore.[rest of everything]  you can approach this many ways.  You can waste away your youth going through the errors in the problem view and watching your code dance back and forth between the two namespaces and the odd errors that come with that.  Try to compile,  rip out some hair, and grab the next red output.  but I recommend the following:   1.  Remove the single core version of pureMVC from your libs or externals folder depending on which approach you used. 2.  Within your source(ONLY Your code and not the library)  you want to do a find and replace of “org.puremvc.as3.“  with     “org.puremvc.as3.multicore.” .  For the sake of your sanity, please make sure that you don’t let this sneak into your externals folder if you like to code with the source instead of .swc files.  If not you will end up with a bunch of “org.puremvc.as3.multicore.multicore.“.  Just trust me on this.
  2. If you’re using the Pipess approach instead of the Modular approach(see the site for the difference) then go ahead and download the Pipes utility.
  3. The multicore Pipes approach is using a Multiton instead of a Singleton so ApplicationFacade.getInstance() now requires a parameter NAME to ID the requesting application so use ApplicationFacade.getInstance( NAME ).startup( this );
  4. The constructror of your ApplicationMediator is probably calling facade.registerMediator(new BlahMediator(…)).  This will result in Error: multitonKey for this Notifier not yet initialized! because the facade does not exist yet.  The calls to facade.[anything]() will need to take place after the initializeNotifiers() call. The reccomended place for initialization and setup stuff  is in an override of onRegister().  (see more in these two posts (post 1, post2).   I believe it’s also best practice to put your eventListeners in the onRegister() override.

Just thinking through these in my head.  I welcome any feedback or hints.  I’ll add to this as this process goes on.

update:  Just came across an excellent entry on lowpitch.com addressing the same issue.

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/08/04/things-to-watch-for-when-porting-from-puremvc-to-puremvc-multicore/feed/ Laws of Programming http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/25/laws-of-programming/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/25/laws-of-programming/#comments Wed, 25 Jun 2008 09:13:19 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=494 I hate to add a “me too” blog entry but these rules struck a chord deep within me:

http://www.flex888.com/2008/06/24/21-laws-of-programming-works-for-flex-too.html

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/25/laws-of-programming/feed/ I’m in Burbank,CA in a cubicle- holla if you are nearby http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/24/im-in-burbankca-in-a-cubicle-holla-if-you-are-nearby/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/24/im-in-burbankca-in-a-cubicle-holla-if-you-are-nearby/#comments Wed, 25 Jun 2008 00:14:26 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=492 My current project has me in California back in a cubicle.  It’s been 2 years since i sat in a sea of cubicles surrounded by the sound of programmer chatter.  It’s kind of a rush.  I miss my double-monitor monster, my custom chair and my bookshelf full of references but it’s great to be able to walk a few yards and ask some of the best coders I’ve met in my life a question if I get stuck.

I haven’t coded this intensely in at least 2 years.  Gonna need a beer when I’m done.  Let me know if you’re in town this week for a project or if you live in the valley.

M

]]> http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/24/im-in-burbankca-in-a-cubicle-holla-if-you-are-nearby/feed/ Vista Cleaning Tips From MajorGeeks http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/17/vista-cleaning-tips-from-majorgeeks/ http://diamondtearz.org/blog/2008/06/17/vista-cleaning-tips-from-majorgeeks/#comments Tue, 17 Jun 2008 17:08:05 +0000 diamondtearz http://diamondtearz.org/blog/?p=491 This article from MajorGeeks is definitely worth the read.  I often wonder how many antispyware,anti malawares,firewall,spamblocker,antivirus programs I need.  This rundown took me through a comprehensive cleanup and almost every utility found a proble that I had been wanting to fix and procrastinating.

check it out here:

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=139681

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