2006 - Page 4 of 5 - Michael Bianco

XHTML 1.0 Transitional Compliant

This isn’t any big news for any of you non-web people, but I just finished making this site fully XHTML 1.0 Transitional compliant. In the process I’ve added some new content on some pages, and tweaked the style of some. On previous sites I’ve created I really didn’t care that much about compliancy but with the last couple sites I’ve made I found that keeping the site complaint made the development process alot easier. If you really don’t know much about XHTML I recommend reading this article; I found it very informative.

XASH 1.2

XASH 1.2 has just been released. This release has the following enhancements. Fixed a nil URL bug Added live (itunes-like) searching Some code cleanup/reorganization Added drag n’ drop for adding additional search paths Added the sparkle update framework Enjoy! If your a Cocoa developer you may want to check out XASH’s source code, it has a nice implementation of enabling a NSTableView to have a drag n’ drop capabilities while still using NSArrayController to populate the table.

XTrace: Flash Debugging Without The Flash IDE

XTrace 1.0, a replacement for the horrible trace window in the Flash IDE, was released a few days ago. Take a look at the product page for more information on how it works and how to integrate it into your flash application. This is one of the pieces to the puzzle, I’ll release the BASH script I’ve written that allows better MTASC Xcode integration as soon as possible. I need more beta testers for the new application I’m going to be releasing, email me if your interested!

TextMate: Most Advanced Editor. Ever.

If you haven’t tried out TextMate I command you to download it right now. Its the most powerful and flexible editor I have ever used, I’m having trouble understanding how everything works its complicated. The syntax coloring is amazing, its so incredibly customizable. This is the only Cocoa text-editor I’m aware of that has code-folding, which is a very cool feature. The documentation is awesome and the wiki and mailing list are awesome resources too. It has amazing integration with the command line, allowing almost endless customization!

Color Blender 1.1

I came across a couple bugs in my Color Blender application while using it to create a web-site. The hex values of the colors were always off a little bit from what they should be, and when I selected colors using the “eye dropper” tool (or “eyeglass” tool in Apple’s case) the RGB & hex values always seemed to be shifted a little too. While fixing the problem I figured I’d add a few new features…

Beta Testers Needed

You might have noticed the lack of updates on this site recently; its not just laziness (although that might be part of it :P), I’m working on releasing a new (shareware) application. I’m almost done with the application, the web-site is nearing completion also so its time to beta test it. I’m looking for a bunch of beta testers, here are the requirements: You must have OS X 10.4.x You must have an iPod 3rd generation or higher If you meet those requirements, or have an intel mac, please let me know.

Cocoa Text System

I came across an awesome article on the Cocoa Text System. If you do alot of text editing I recommend you check it out, along with the default key bindings.

Random Tid Bits

Heres some programming tid bits that really didn’t deserve their own post, so I grouped them all together into one post! 😛 else-switch We all know about the common else-if language construct that is available in almost all programming languages, but here one you might of not been aware of: the else-switch statement. [code lang=”javascript”] if(false) { } else switch(number) { case 0: //do something break; case 1: //do something else break; default: //do default action } [/code] Actually, you can follow if with any control statement. For instance, you can have an else-return or an else-break statement. This might be old news to some programmers, but I never knew you could do that!..

Learning Source Code Management

For awhile now I’ve been meaning to learn how source code management works (specifically, how Subversion works), but I never got the chance to do it. Finally the other day I set out to buy a book on SCM, luckily I was able to find a good free book on the subject. If you are interested in wrapping your mind around source code management I recommend you check out Version Control with Subversion.

Download Internet Audio Streams

Streaming Windows Media Player support on the Mac is really bad. Its slow, buggy; simply horrible. However, I really wanted to listen to a show which I could only listen to via streaming WMA format. I started searching the net for a solution and found Mplayer. It worked fairly well, but I really like the ability to skip parts of the show which isn’t possible with a streaming WMA. I kept searching for a way to download the streaming WMA and put it into a WMA file on my hard drive. Mplayer came though again, using the Mplayer command line utility you can easily download the streaming audio to your hard-drive…

Year: 2006