Flashvista: This web site was super easy to navigate and had tons of flash resources. I checked out some great sites that were on their top lists, and went through a couple of the tutorials that were offered. There were a lot but the two I did were on 3-d rotation and loading photos dynamically. The tutorials were really easy to follow.
Flash Tutorials: This was a tutorial for building a floating menu. I personally did not like the look of this menu, but I guess that’s neither here nor there. The tutorial was really lenghty and detailed but it was really easy to follow.
SitePal-Flash Avatars: I can’t express how many times I’ve debated using an avatar on my web site. I am at the same time both fascinated and slightly creeped out by them. But I have thought several times that, particularly since I’m doing a site for a small family business, it would be nice to make it more personal. I thought one of myself or one of the other members of my family with some kind of welcome message might be nice.
Adobe Flash: So of course, like all things Adobe, the pages on their site about flash are stylish and easy to navigate. Go figure, right? If I have not already mentioned this before about the Adobe products, I like how the site tells you which features will be most useful to you depending on what yo’re using the software for. If you’re a professional web developer and want to incorporate interactivity into your sites, I guess Flash would be the thing to use, although at $699 I think it’s the most expensive offering from Adobe that I’ve seen so far. I don’t think Dreamweaver and Photoshop are that pricey, are they?
Swift: According to their logo, Swift is “modeling and animation software.” Something about this site really appeals to me. The use of the light, kind of smoky blue on the site the look of the site in general give it a sort of otherworldly look. It makes me think of extraterrestrials. Anyway, I got so into this site that I spent almost as much time giving myself a refresher course on boolean mathematics and a crash course on what “extrusion” and “lathe” meant just so I could figure out what the new features of the software were. I have a friend that used to work in modeling and simulation for the military, and I wonder if she’d ever heard of this software.
Swish: Flash animation software. This company is headquartered in Australia and it seems to be the least expensive of this type of software. There are also a substantial blog and tutorials available. The site does not have the visual appeal of Swift’s site. It’s pretty much a lot of gray and white. But it is uncluttered and easy to navigate.
HotScripts: This appears to be primarily a resource for serious programmers and upper-level IT managers. It basically has links, information, and tutorials on every type of programming language and script imaginable. I had to laugh at the fact that one of the most popular scripts right now is called “big dump.” One thing I did not like about this site were the rules for posting in their forum. The list of these rules was lenghty and really detailed and I think flies in the face of the type of open discussion one would think would be encouraged. I get that the conributors are mostly professionals and that a standard of quality would need to be maintained, but c’mon. Just enforce a few commonsense rules and enough with the micromanagement. I’d be terrified to post anything lest I capitalize something by accident and get my account deleted.
MP3S: Appears to be a bad link. http://www.soundstageav.com/mastersonaudio/200502 was not found. I tried just googling “soundstageav” and evidently the site was closed down at the end of 2009. I wasdirected to soundstagenetwork.com instead. There was a lot of information about audio/visual equipment, buying guides, etc. However, I did not really find any information about MP3s.
How to create .M3U files and streaming audio: After reading this, I don’t know why anyone would choose not to stream audio on their site if they’re going to use audio. I can’t believe how easy it is to set up an audio file to stream.
Audacity: free audio editing software, and tutorials available. There is a pretty good FAQ section. You can do a bunch of stuff with this software, including transferring audio off of tapes and records and making ringtones. My in-laws were musicians back in the 70′s and it’s pretty neat to think that I could take one of their old recordings and make it into a ringtone.
Musicovery internet radio: I’ve never been on this site, but this is pretty neat and I can see where it could get pretty addictive. You are simply prompted to enter an artist or title. I entered “Modest Mouse” (for whatever reason, one of the first bands that came to mind and hit enter and voila! Music just started playing! Prior to this lesson, the only internet radio I’d ever heard of was Pandora.
Pandora internet radio: When I say that the only other internet radio I’d ever heard of was Pandora, I literally meant I’d pretty much only heard of it. I once let someone use my laptop and was wondering what they were listening to and I saw that they had Pandora minimized at the bottom. And in the past if I got a hankering to listen to a particular song while I was working, I’d usually pull it up on youtube. Not ever again after I’ve visited this site! It appears the idea is that you enter a song or artist and only music that is similiar gets kicked out. I, with my love for music that reminds me of my early college days, entered in “Plowed” by Sponge and I immediately got Sponge, followed by Smashing Pumpkins, followed by Bush. An AWESOME mix of mid-90′s alternative. I am in love with this website. The people that created it are geniuses.