Apple Magic Mouse

Apple recently relesased a whole wack of new products; new iMac, iPad among the big highlights. Lost in the hysteria is the new Apple Magic Mouse. All right, I don’t usually go promoting things unless I have actually tried them and honestly found them to be of benefit to me. Sometimes, the simplest things just make life better. I dig wireless mice to begin with, because of the uncluttered look of my workspace and flexibility. So a wireless mouse is kind of a must for me to begin with. I have been using the Mighty Mouse from apple for a while now and was pretty happy with it. Then I stumbled upon this new Magic Mouse… and had to give it a go. I have to say without question this is the best mouse I have ever used.

In HCI (Human Computer Interaction) we study the full range of interfacing between man and machine. This covers everything from online shopping cart design, to voice recognition software. Even the simplest things, like the icon on a button can be critical to user satisfaction. Heck, even the material a button is made with is perceived at some level by the user interacting with it. Apple seems to get this arguably better than almost any company right now. So when they release something new, be it the new iPad or something as small as a new mouse, we pay attention. To be honest considering how much I interact with my machines each day, my keyboard and mouse are as important as anything else to me.

So, what’s so cool about this mouse anyway you ask? Well first off, it feels good. It’s a nice shape and works well in my hand. It also looks hot. Which is pretty cool for a mouse It is highly repsonsive, which is a must for a mouse, if you’re pushing pixels all day. Coolest though, it has a surface made up of sensors that actually detect your finger position and “gestures”. Yeah, cool is right. It can therefore transform from a single button mouse, to a two-button, it can detect scrolling in any direction. It can even zoom the screen with a hold of ctrl and “scrolling” Did I mention scrolling with no stupid mouse scroller or ball to move. That means nothing gumming up the thing. Trust me, if you use your apple mouse a lot you’ve had the damn ball get gummed up with dirt and god knows what and tried a hundred tricks for cleaning it out.

So, it may not change the world, but it changed my working hours, making things just run a little smoother. Meaning a liitle bit more energy in those long days of creating wild 3D presntations, new apps and games. Peace.

I was recently contracted to develop a new PaperVision3D project for Display Objects Inc. It’s a cool new page flip engine, much like the multitude  of flip engines already out there, but this time in 3D. The first thing I learned is that while many of these engines say they are 3D almost none actually are. So that didn’t help much when I was looking for ideas on how to go about doing this. Thankfully I had developed a couple similar models when building some new portfolio tools, so I was able to leverage much of that. The only visual question was how to get that nice bending effect on the planes when flipping. That’s where AS3DMod came in, which is a handy helper for doing things like twisting and bending 3d objects. It is open source and really  must have for your papervsion library.

I added a lot of nice features into this product, including making all copy searchable, and highlighting the results. I added a nice zoom slider bar, to let users set their own zoom level when reading. The whole thing is Search Engine Optimized so the contents of the “book” are searchable on Google. Still working away on features, but have a look at PageFlip3D™; if you want to learn more.

I started in the early days of Flash, where coding was really an afterthought and mainly to make buttons work and add links. Everything was done in the timeline including the code. Yes, I admit it, my first AS3 Flash projects were gigantic unwieldy beasts with many heads all crammed roughly into a single giant class.

1. Buy a white board. I need to get away from sitting in front of the computer as often as I can, this is a huge gift for me. I can doodle, map out diagrams, and erase and move things around. (much neater than a chalk board )
2. Learn to do good analysis before even thinking of coding. This took a lot of self-control. I love to test things out and experiment, but this lead to me always cutting and pasting my experimental code into my production, which led down the path to the dark-side. Really learn to invest in analysis first before even writing any code.
3. Invest in the Design phase. Yes, again before you start coding, have a clear map of where you are going. The light really turned on for me, when I realized I could have a big part of my app laid out and it didn’t matter what language I would be using to build it. If my analysis was solid and my design followed logically, the code almost became filling in the blanks.
4. Don’t be afraid to go back to the white board and improve the design. Just because you are on to the implementation phase, doesn’t mean you can’t go back and make improvements. Just remember to document those changes. I am such a geek, I even take pictures of my white board to save versions of  my models in case I forget or go off on a tangent. I really love that damn board.

So, I wanted to mention a few resources that I have found invaluable in the process of developing my understanding of OOP for Flash. First there are some excellent books, Essential ActionScript 3.0 , by Colin Moock, which is an excellent introduction to the language as well as understanding OOP as it applies to Flash. The killer book for me though is, Advanced ActionScript 3 with Design Patterns , by Joey Lott and Dann Patterson. It not only outlines design patterns for AS3, but gives great direction on the process of deciding which patterns to use. It also gave me great ideas as to how to go about the initial Analysis and Design phases. Lastly, I would recommend exploring the PaperVision3D code. The library of classes are filled with excellent techniques and creative solutions. The intuition and expertise of the core team is a blessing for those seeking models for their own work.

There are many great books, teachers and resources out there on the subject, but these are just a few that really helped me on the journey. If you are not thinking of everything in the world in terms of classes and OOP, don’t worry. Soon, all will be clear. Until then, don’t give up, enlightenment is just beyond the horizon.