September 05, 2008

IDE Factory - Extend your FlexBuilder

I heard about IDE Factory via AXNA a couple of weeks back. I managed to check it out today and I must say it rocks.

If you have done Java development using Eclipse IDE, you are going to love IDE Factory. IDE Factory brings a lot of features to Flex development. Following is the list of features (brought by IDE Factory in FB3), I think would be super useful:-

  • Package Explorer, I love the SWC and Flex/Flash framework stuff
  • E4X Expression Builder
  • Format Flex Source Files - Yup, it can format all source files in the project
  • Extended Wizards for creating ActionScript class/interface and MXML components
  • Cairngorm support

Apart from these, there are some other stuff like asdoc generation, flex-unit tests generation, UML generation, etc.

I am sure, it's going to evolve to be super useful and would become must-have tool for Flex application development.

It would be great, if they can add support for other Flex frameworks (PureMVC, etc).

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 12:04 AM | Comments (1)

August 10, 2008

Adobe online store issues - Unable to buy Flexbuilder

As you know, it's impossible to buy Adobe's software from India, I mean using their website. I have raised this issue couples of times in past. Actually, there is no India store and you can't even change your country to India in Adobe account details.

Anyway, this time, I wanted to buy Adobe Flexbuilder 3 upgrade for one of my team member, I don't need it because I am very happy with VIM + Flex/AIR SDK.

I requested a friend of mine, who is in USA, to buy Flexbuilder upgrade for me, he tried many times to buy the same using his all cards and what not, no success.

This time problem is with Adobe US store application, which is done in Flex, it throws weird errors as you can see below:

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 02:44 PM | Comments (6)

August 04, 2008

Survey for Web designers/developers

I got to know (via Manish) about A List Apart's survey 2008 for people who make websites.

I took the survey, so should you

There are some interesting questions, I would wait for survey results.

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 07:05 PM | Comments (0)

August 02, 2008

Flex SEO Contest

I just read Ryan's post on Flex SEO contest. My entry for the contest is done in ten minutes. I have not used any SEO optimization technique in HTML, let's see if it gets crawled by Google or other search-engines.

Fleximagically Searchable App

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 06:47 PM | Comments (1)

August 01, 2008

Which are your favourite features in Flash Player 10?

Just curious:

Which are your favourite features in Flash Player 10?

I find new Text engine very useful in most of the application-development. Text layout engine is powerful enough to solve various use-cases, true bidirectional text support is being one of those.

I like other features too. Hopefully, I would post my views on those as well as text-layout-engine later.

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 03:04 PM | Comments (3)

July 29, 2008

Available for consultancy, training and development

I am available for consultancy, training and development services. Following is the rough list of things, I can provide consultancy, training or development services for:-

  • ActionScript 1.0, 2.0, 3.0
  • Adobe Flash/Flex
  • Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR)
  • Training on Adobe RIA technologies
  • Architecture for RIA
  • Web Application Development
    • Design and Architecture
    • Development for LAMP
    • Integration Services for Flex/AIR with existing Web Apps
  • Development Setup for small teams
    • Subversion Version Control
    • Bug Tracking System (Trac, Wiki)
    • Training on Development Life Cycle
    • Backup Strategies
    • Development Sandbox Setup for RIA development

JFYI! You can check out my linkedin profile to know more about me. I am based in India and have around ten (10) years of experience, during this period I have worked for Macromedia/Adobe, Yahoo!, Mixercast and TIS and worked as independent-consultant, freelancer, trainer and co-founder. I have been working on various technologies/platforms (some listed above).

I am a programmer who enjoys solving users' problems whatever it takes (technology is no constrain).

Having said that, I am passionate about ActionScript/Flash/Flex/AIR and Web (in general) which happen to be my core competencies.

PS: Do you think, this is a shameless sales pitch :-)

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 04:15 PM | Comments (14)

July 01, 2008

Mixercast fires people from it's team in India

I have heard that Mixercast has fired a major part of team in it's development center based in Pune, India.

I can not confirm this news, however, I can say it is from close source.

This is not unusual, I have seen some start-ups seem to be doing this. They bootstrap with a team in India, once they get funded, they start expanding in USA. Expansion is good thing but please don't disrespect the existing team by firing or not giving due credit because you got a team in USA.

That's unfair and it shows, how such start-ups treat people. Equity/rewards are at far end, I see, people are not even treated with respect. From my experience at Mixercast, perhaps this was one of things I felt and that made me move on.

I am not writing this post because of my stock-options issue, though let me take this opportunity to express my feeling, I deserved some credit and respect for what I have done at Mixercast. They couldn't reconsider my case here as I know, they allowed someone else to exercise, even when they guy was fired before vesting period.

Anyway, I don't like, if someone is not treated with respect, specially engineers from India. I know, not all of us are doing as expected but we are learning and getting better day by day. We must consider, India is huge country and thousands of engineers/developers start their career every year, I would say it's companies who need to make sure of quality and make individuals learn what is good and bad during early years of their career. Unfortunately, not all companies think that day, perhaps achieving sales target is the only thing they look at?

I am sure everyone from Mixercast Pune development center would do good, I know them personally and I can say they all are rockstars. Mixercast had 0% attrition rate for first year or more, very rare to see in India.

I am sure none of these events would make them feel low. I wish them all the best.

Update (July 2, 2008): I am not sure whether Mixercast allowed someone to exercise the options before vesting, I was wrong and I should have not posted that particular line without confirmation. I have heard it from very close and reliable source within company, however, I am not sure. I didn't mean to offend anyone hence I have struck that line (sentence) and please accept my apologies for that, hope I don't repeat it. BTW! As someone pointed, I should have proof while ranting, he is right, please accept my apologies again and I didn't mean to offend. My mistake.

Another source says, people are not exactly fired, they have been asked to find a new job because there is not much of work left for them. All these people would get everything (options, etc) - That's great.

Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 08:47 PM | Comments (5)

June 28, 2008

l10n and i18n with Yahoo! R3 project

I came to know about Yahoo! R3 project (tools), which helps building localized and internationalized websites. The templating system used in R3 is not run-time, it's rather static (compile-time) which means pages for different locale and intls are generated during build process.

It's simple to install using PEAR and requires PHP5+. I like the command-line interface of R3, though it's easier to use it's web-based GUI, as shown in documentation. I couldn't get R3 GUI running, but it seems sometime is wrong, I am not able to get it running on my Mac OSX (Leopard) with Apache HTTP 2.2.x.

Something similar is used with-in Yahoo!, I would not go in detail rather let you explore R3, which is indeed an exciting project. I am, hopefully, going to use in some project, if I do that, I would post more about my experience with R3.

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 04:23 PM | Comments (0)

June 25, 2008

Development Setup

I have been thinking a lot about a good and scalable development setup for small teams.That means, as team size grows, things don't have to be changed.

Server machine(s):-

I am planning to have all of these one server machine (IBM) in virtualized environment. Subversion and Trac can go in one VM, perhaps under Apache. Second VM can have Apache for web-apps, third VM can have mysql, fourth VM can have MailServer and ActiveDirectory/LDAP?

Do you think above makes sense?

Developer/Designer workstations:-

Though there should not be any restrictions on using a development IDE of choice, but I have realized if entire team uses same IDE things get far easier. The development workflow is easy, knowledge sharing and management is easy. Eclipse, which Aptana is based on, can be used for variety of projects.

Ubuntu is good operating system, I have been using for over one year, not regularly but quite often. There might be Windows/OSX boxes for designers.

Why do we need Apache and MySQL on each workstation?

I think, developers are more effective if they have their own sandbox. They can play with code freely, take certain risks and innovate. There is no harm done. We do face issues, when it comes to sync mysql data into local mysql instances, I think it can be done via some scripts.

Virtualization can be done on client and I am thinking to do it, specially for folks who are not comfortable with Linux, so they can be on Windows while they also have access to Linux VM, they are encouraged to use Linux VM. They can use Windows box (Host), if something is messed up in Linux VM and there is strict timeline that doesn't allow to fix VM.

Over the period, these developers would be comfortable with Linux and that is the time they can start using real Linux box :-)

These are some thoughts, I might be missing something here. I hope, I would write more in another post.

As you know, I have been on break and been thinking on all these things. BTW! I don't work with Yahoo! anymore, once I am done with break I have to figure out what to do. Perhaps, time to be in my own city and do something my own (consultancy, startup or something like that). Heh, that's news, if you have read so far :-)

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 03:06 AM | Comments (10)

June 16, 2008

iDesktop.tv

What is iDesktop.tv?

iDesktop.tv is an incredibly cool dynamic web 2.0 application, with a terrific modern design, that brings you a better way to search and watch YouTube videos. Not only but you can download YouTube videos!
This is basically adding functionality and experience to what "should be" there. The possibilities of the site reach far beyond that. It gives you the chance to create your own environment for watching video clips, saving them and sharing them with friends.

I liked the neat and clean interface, which is mostly done in AJAX (=DHTML), Flash Player is used to play videos from YouTube. Entire experience blends well and user-interface is pretty intuitive.

Features like video downloads in various formats (wmv, mov, mp4, zip, exe, etc) and smart/intelligent playlist creation are cool.

iDesktop.tv increases the quality of user-experience, makes it easier to navigate, personalize, share and store the videos.

I thought to spread some words about iDesktop.tv, which is no doubt one of the coolest web-app, done on top of YouTube's platform and blurs the line between AJAX and Flash, as an user I didn't notice any difference when AJAX or Flash was in action.

BTW! This web application is created by the guys behind flashjester, if you are Flash vetran (like me ;-) ), you know what flashjester meant to us in those days, still means a lot to many today.

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Posted by Abdul Qabiz at 11:20 PM | Comments (0)