Inspiration comes from all places. Sitting in Ryan Stewart's presentation at 360Flex this week, I got hit with the geolocation bug again. I saw some of the demos that Ryan was doing and figured that I can take some of those a bit further. This gave me a chance to do some work with HTML 5 and AIR for Android as well.
Seeing Ryan's presentation, I took the initiative and updated one of my old samples around Yahoo! Local Search and Adobe Spry. The old version actually asked you to provide a city state pair to do the local search. After taking a look at how Serge Jespers was using an ExternalInterface call to get HTML5 geolocation data into Flash, I took the same approach to grab the latitude and longitude from the HTML5 geolocation API and pass it into the ColdFusion service that I'm using to abstract the Yahoo! API. The end result, which works in any HTML5 enabled browser looks like this:
Migrating this example to HTML5 was cool, but I felt like there was still something missing. I banged out the HTML5 version pretty quickly because I was migrating existing code. I needed a real challenge. Ryan's examples had all been based in AIR for Android. I had been signed up for the prerelease for a while, but hadn't been able to think of a compelling app to build. I decided to take the HTML5 app that I had just created and build an AIR for Android version, so I fired up IntelliJ IDEA and went for it. I figured a listing of the elements wouldn't be a good showing of what AIR for Android can do, so I decided to sexy it up a bit. I added in some nifty native geolocation functionality and some of the new uri based functionality to trigger the phone system, i.e. tel:4045551212. Since it was a Flex 4 application, I decided to use my Flex framework of choice, Swiz, to help me build the application quickly and keep my code organized. I picked up a beer from the 360Flex party on Tuesday night and then headed to my hotel room to crank out some code. The result isn't pretty, but it is pretty darn cool.
When the application starts up, it will check for the current location and center the map on that latitude and longitude. When you do a search, it will call the same ColdFusion service that the HTML5/AJAX version is using to get the local search results. It then leverages the MapQuest 6 API to plot the data. I added a double-click handler on the POIs to trigger phone calls to a given location.
Download the APK here. Warning, it's still just a POC quality, so you may need to force quit the application to keep it from eating all of your battery.
(Note: My colleague, David Tucker, has joined me in helping to author this post since we put on our Flash Camps as a collaborative effort between the two of us.)
It's come to our attention that there are a lot of people out in the community who do not know what a Flash Camp event really is all about. If they do know, it's a pre-conceived misconception that they're things like "glorified user group meetings". This couldn't be any further from the truth.
In our minds, a Flash Camp is, in essence, a mini conference. In these days of tighter budgets and the premium placed on our time, we try to make these events as time conscious and price conscious as possible. Why fly across the country to an event when we can bring something that will offer comparable content to your region? We try to keep the presentation quality of these events high so that people will want to attend and they will feel that they're getting a good value for the money.
Typically, a Flash Camp event will be one day, 9:00am to 5:00pm. We try to shoot for a Friday so that people can have a nice end to the week. We've talked about going to multiple days, but we want to make sure we've got this formula down pat first. Lunch is also included in the price of admission. If we're going to ask you to sit through a full day of content, the least we can do is feed you, right?
During the camp, you will hear from a lot of different speakers presenting (in a typical conference presentation format - these aren't 'hands-on' sessions). The speakers are diverse. This means that, yes, as it is a community event, we try to pull a good mix of local speakers and nationally recognized speakers within the Flash Platform community as a whole. This gives attendees a good motivation to attend because you will see both your peers from the local community, plus people who you know from twitter, reading blogs, etc.
Along with a diversity of speakers, we try to maintain a diversity of content as well. In Atlanta, we did an Intro To The Flash Platform session that was really rudimentary, and almost a bit of a marketing pitch. We have had topics as a advanced as "Custom Metadata Processors For Swiz", which is going to be way above an entry-level developer's head. We can't make the content too basic, or too advanced, so we try to shoot for a bit of both with the hope that everyone will take something away from the event.
Cost is always the interesting element. A lot of things go into the calculation of the cost like venue cost, catering, travel for out of town speakers, etc. Our ultimate goal is to get enough sponsorships so that we can keep the event cost to attendees below $100. We feel that that price point is a good place for a one day conference with top-notch content. Some people want it to be free, but the way I see it, you can't please everyone. Paying under $100 to have a full day of presentations from speakers that you would hear at 360Flex and Adobe Max is a bargain.
At the end of the day, Flash Camp events are catalysts for the local user community. Some areas, like San Francisco, have vibrant and highly active Flash / Flex communities. In these areas, the Flash Camp event serves as a way to reconnect with people and inspire the community to more user group meeting and such. In areas like Phoenix, where the community is not as active, the Flash Camp events serve as a way to launch the development community. It's an opportunity to get a large number of people in the room and have the user group managers pitch the user groups and their value to potential members. As these local communities grow and thrive, the Flash and Flex communities as a whole will grow and thrive. They are beneficial to the whole Flash Platform ecosystem.
On May 7th, Flash Camp Seattle will be held in the Adobe offices in Seattle. One of the sessions we are working out for that event will be a panel discussing where Flash and HTML5 will both fit within the future of the web. It's not going to be a "bash-fest" either way, but a frank, open discussion with representatives from both sides. Tickets are going fast, and registering via this link will save you 50% off the ticket price.
I think that all of the content we have put together for this make for the deepest and most interesting speaker lineup any FlashCamp has yet seen. Go register today and join us for what surely will be a great day of content around the Flash Platform and the future of Flash.
If you're an Atlanta area (or even Macon / Augusta / Chattanooga area) developer and want to learn more about how a developer sees user experience design, make sure you come to the Atlanta Flex User Group meeting tomorrow. I will be giving my presentation:
It's guaranteed to make you laugh, cry, or angry. I'd like to say it's entertaining, but that's just a bit more shameless self-promotion than I'm willing to do (at this time). I think that this presentation is well suited to any type of developer (not just Flex) that wants to learn more about what exactly user experience design is. I've heard, even Sledge Hammer! might be making an appearance.
We're just over a week away from Flash Camp Phoenix and tickets are almost sold out. If you're interested in going, but have been on the fence, all the sessions are posted here.
This past Friday, I gave a presentation, "UX For The Development-Minded" at RIA Unleashed. It went really well, but I have to admit, the audience got short-changed. I actually cut a lot of content out, about one third, because it was orginally written to be a longer form presnetation for 360|Flex. Well, I'm happy to say that you can see the entire presentation, unabridged, at 360|Flex San Jose in March of 2010 because I just got notice that I will be giving the full presentation. Let's call this version the "director's cut."
Time to digest another CFUnited. I didn't go last year because I was not too happy with the event after 2007. It had gotten too kitschy and too, for lack of a better term, silly. This year though, it seems things have turned around. I think we have to attribute that to the conference being under Stellr's guidance.
Overall, I'm very happy with how the flex tracks turned out. Great speakers, great content. The venue was good and it was a bit spread out, but that's how it is. The content in all the sessions was very strong. That's something that has been lacking in years past; the content was too rudimentary. This year, however, it's come back around. I think that competition from 360|Conferences and cf.Objective() has been taken to account and the content has been upped, in concequence.
The high point, for me, was the end of the demo mania when Doug McCune brought the house down. Now, note the irony here, one of the biggest names in the flex community brought the house down to close the show at CFUnited.
If you missed Doug's video (a mashup of the Adobe OSMF and FlexLingo), here it is:
A few days ago, we were having some internal discussions about Flash Camp Atlanta. We had gotten a couple of topics in, and oddly enough, they all had a common theme. So, through part of our discussions, we decided that we were going to have a theme for Flash Camp Atlanta. The first theme we came up with, "80's day", had been done before and was a bit tired. The second idea we had was much better: "Enabling The Convergence of Art & Design With The Flash Platform".
A couple of things inspired this theme. Firstly, this document, by Christian Saylor, has been a huge inspiration in everything we do at Universal Mind. Go ahead, take a minute or two and read it; this post will still be here for you to read. Second, Ben Stucki submitted a topic along these same lines (session descriptions are coming soon). So what does this mean? It means that we are going to strive to have all of our topics tie into this common thread through the day. We've got a great littany of speakers lined up and it's an event that you won't want to miss.
I'm also working on lining up a great venue (not Stats, it's been played out) for the community get together the night before. Also, Delta Airlines announced a slew of cheap fares (as low as $80 roundtrip from Charlotte, NC) today that are valid for the dates of Flash Camp Atlanta.
Flash Camp Atlanta is a full-day event featuring some top industry
experts on the Adobe Flash Platform from both inside and outside Adobe.
Come advance your Flex and Flash skills, meet members of the Adobe team
and network with local companies and fellow developers. Sessions will
be geared towards developers and designers with little to advanced
level of experience with Flex and/or ActionScript. There will be plenty
of giveaways, raffles and swag (and lunch).
In addition to a great Main Session (9am-5pm) there will also be a special Introductory Session (8-9am)
for developers who are new to the Adobe Flash Platform. This special
session only costs an additional $15 (until July 30th and $25
thereafter). This session will get these developers up to speed
aspects of the Flash Platform like Adobe Flex, AIR, and Flash Builder.
This friday, Flash Camp Orlando will be one of two launch events for Adobe. There will be big news regarding the Flash Platform announced at the event as well as free software including CS4 Master Collection and FlexBuilder. If you're interested in attending, head over to www.flashcamporlando.com and sign up today.
In addition to the Adobe announcements there will be great sessions on AIR, Flex, and UX.
You can walk in to the event, but if you sign up today, your seat will be guaranteed!
She's Not There
Bad Things
Seed