While it's deprecated, dreamweaver.popupCommand() is used in several places within Dreamweaver, it isn't documented as that method that is supposed to be replacing it, dreamweaver.runCommand(). In the documentation for dw.runCommand() it states that you can pass in option arguments that will be procesed by the receiveArguments() function within the called Command. dw.popupCommand() also can take optional parameters to pass on to the called Command. For example, if you wanted to pass along a first name, last name, and age of a user to a Command, you could use the following code:

dw.popupCommand('MyCoolCommand.htm','Bill', 'Horvath', 97);

Again, this method has apparently been deprecated since Dreamweaver 3, but its still around, at least through Dreamweaver MX 2004, 4 versions later.

I realize there is a new "undiagnosed malady" appearing practically every day. And yeah, some are silly. But even those that seem a bit invented have at least some basis in reality. Take, for example, Attention Deficit Trait.

Dr. Edward Hallowell noticed this disorder in adults who came to him looking for a diagnosis of ADD. But he found that many were not ADD as evidenced by the fact that when on vacation (or away from tech devices) their symptoms disappeared. With real ADD, that doesn't happen. You can read the full interview with him at News.com.

Though this may be the flavor of the month malady, I did find that much of it rang true for me -- working in a tech world. Take this quote for example,

...you've become so busy attending to so many inputs and outputs that you become increasingly distracted, irritable, impulsive, restless and, over the long term, underachieving. In other words, it costs you efficiency because you're doing so much or trying to do so much, it's as if you're juggling one more ball than you possibly can.

Does that ring true for you? What about this one relating to the symptoms?

When people find that they're not working to their full potential; when they know that they could be producing more but in fact they're producing less; when they know they're smarter than their output shows; when they start answering questions in ways that are more superficial, more hurried than they usually would; when their reservoir of new ideas starts to run dry; when they find themselves working ever-longer hours and sleeping less, exercising less, spending free time with friends less and in general putting in more hours but getting less production overall.

That also sounds similar to burn out to me ... or something that will lead to burn out anyway.

Hallowell claims that those in the tech world have a bit of an advantage, due to our sense of humor, and that's some consolation. But if we don't take control of tech, it will control us. According to Hallowell, not taking control and taking the time to stop and think can result in:

... not getting the best of your brain. What your brain is best equipped to do is to think, to analyze, to dissect and create. And if you're simply responding to bits of stimulation, you won't ever go deep.

That's downright scary since many of us depend on our creativity and ability to think through complex situations for our very livelyhood. When that ability is lessened, so is our ability to make a living. Adrenaline and coffee do not a bright, creative person make -- it only feels that way. :) In fact, the stress and fear that create the adrenaline put us into survival mode. Survival mode is monitored by the lower levels of your brain rather than the higher. Flexibility, seeing shades of gray, entertaining new ideas -- all go out the window.

So limit the number of times your email comes in per day. Only answer the phone during specific times of the day -- otherwise, make all your callbacks at once. And take time to get away -- without your cell phone, your PDA, your laptop, or any other tech device. Find some exercise you can enjoy. Hang out with your friends even when you think you don't have time. You may find yourself more productive, creative and intelligent than ever before.

Today, Community MX released the CMX Slideshow extension. This component for Flash MX 2004, pro or standard, enables you to load and display external JPEGs and SWFs in a Flash slideshow. You can specify which files to load using an array or an external XML file, and define properties such as pauseInterval and transition using the Property inspector.

Some of the cool features:

• Customizable captions (font, size, color)
• Display images at actual size, scaled to fit, centered, or padded
• Choose from 10 different transitions
• Optional slide hyperlinks
• Select your own background colors for the slideshow and captions
• Display a fallback slide if the selected JPEG or SWF cannot be found

If you like working with ActionScript, the Slideshow API supports the v2 broadcaster/listener event model. In addition, the accompanying article explains how to use the methods, properties, and events of the Slideshow class to create your own controls. The package includes two FLAs, sample media files, a sample XML file, and CMXSlideshow.mxp.

The CMX Slideshow component is completely free to CMX subscribers, so if you've been thinking about joining, this is a good excuse.

If you're a new media developer from Canada, you should be familiar with www.CBCradio3.com. For those of you who aren't, I'd love to share this awesome site dedicated to Canadian music and culture.

A complete online Flash magazine, it's one of Canada's top sites. CBC Radio3 has produced 105 issues, won awards and has influenced a small generation of new media developers in the Great White North. Streaming audio, online photo essays, music reviews, alternative lifestyles and newsletters, this online zine has it all. It's a piece of Canadian and Canadian New Media culture.

Unfortunatley due budget cut-backs at the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation), CBC Radio3 has posted its final online issue. Everyone with a love for design, music, Flash and indi-style mags should check out this site before it's gone for ever.

The site mentioned in this post has now been replaced by the new site. You can still get your Canadiana here, just not in the nice, unqiue format it once was. 

www.CBCradio3.com

If you want to show a button on a toolbar, the Dreamweaver docs tell you that you can use the showif attribute to determine when to show a particular icon. For example, the Live Preview button on the Document toolbar is only shown when you are working with a document type that is one of the dynamic pages, such as ASP or ColdFusion. If you wanted something similar for a menu item, then just reading the docs, you'd think that wasn't possible.

Fortunately, you can show a menu item if the condition in the showif attribute of that menu item returns true. Take the following example that shows the File > New menu item only when the Shift key is held down (added code highlighted):

<menuitem id="DWMenu_File_New" showif="dreamweaver.getKeyState('Shift')" name="_New..." key="Cmd+N" enabled="true" command="dw.newDocument()" domRequired="false" />

If you haven't noticed, Google Desktop quietly came out of beta a couple weeks ago. I didn't install the beta because there was no support for Firefox, but Google Desktop now supports Firefox, Mozilla, and Internet Explorer, as well as Thunderbird, Netscape Mail, and Outlook.

I just installed it last week and it's truly astonishing - not to mention a bit creepy - to find every file, every Word doc, every image, every email, and every newsgroup post that contains the word you're searching. Even conversations you don't remember having! Surprisingly, it doesn't search your Gmail account, but maybe that option will be added to a future version.

Like other Google inventions, Google Desktop changes the way you think of personal computing. For example, you can install Larry's Any Text File Indexer plug-in and use it to search your ActionScript files. You can use the Developer Search API to generate a slideshow or an MP3 playlist from a query. What about using GDS to maintain a personal journal? Just send an email to your Gmail account every day and you'll have a threaded, searchable diary.

If you're thinking of installing Google Desktop, check out these terrific tips. I used this tip to move the index file from my C (6 GB free) to my E drive (80 GB free). Unfortunately, Google Desktop didn't index some folders on my E drive, so I'm going to use this tip to force a re-index.

Here's another tip. If you want to search Google Desktop from Firefox, Mozilla, or Netscape, download our free Community MX Sidebar. This Flash-based extension (requires FP7) adds a tabbed sidebar that displays the latest CMX articles, and enables you to create and save custom searches. Once the extension is installed, here's how you add Google Desktop to your list of search engines:

1. Select the Search tab on the CMX Sidebar.
2. Click the down arrow next to Go to reveal the search editor.
3. Click the Plus (+) button to add a new search.
4. Enter "Google Desktop" in the first text box.
5. Enter your GDS URL in the second text box.
6. Click Test Search.

What is your GDS URL? When you conduct a Google Desktop search, you'll notice it has the following format:

http://localhost:4664/search&s=[Security token]?q=cmx&btnG=Search+Desktop

The easiest way to add this URL to the CMX Sidebar is to search a word with Google Desktop, copy the URL from your browser's address bar, and paste it into the second text box. Remember to replace the search term - cmx in the example above - with %s. The revised URL looks like this:

http://localhost:4664/search&s=[Security token]?q=%s&btnG=Search+Desktop

When you're finished, simply select Google Desktop from the combo box, type your query, and press Enter. The results of your GDS search are displayed in the main browser window. You can also search Google Desktop by creating a bookmark keyword, or by installing this free search plugin for Firefox.

I've mentioned how you can store commonly used strings for use in your extensions, but that only does you so much good, especially if you need to have "dynamic" error messages such as those that tell the user which form field they didn't fill in, or perhaps that a named element on the user's page is no longer present. If you do run into a position that you have a commonly used string but you need to make it dynamic, that is, has certain parts of it be changeable depending on input either from the user, or based upon the current page, then you have to work things out a tiny bit differently.

Sure, you could always use the stringVar.replace(pattern, newValue) method to insert the dynamic part(s) into the generic message, but you might end up repeating that bit of code into every page. Dreamweaver has built in JavaScript library files offer a way in which you can keep your loaded strings and still be able to have them be dynamic. Within /Shared/Common/Scripts/dwscripts.js is a method of the dwscripts object sprintf().

By way of example, if you had this string definition within the /Strings folder:

<string id="cmx/MyLayerMessage" value="The %s with an id of %s is no longer present on the page." />

And you'd use it with code similar to the following:

var errMsg = dwscripts.sprintf(dw.loadString('cmx/MyLayerMessage'), 'DIV', 'myDiv');
alert(errMsg);

And you'd get an alert with the following message:

The DIV with an id of myDiv is no longer present on the page.

You can have as many areas to replace within your string as you want (the %s items), and the sprintf() method will take as many string parameters as you want to throw at it. Of course you'll want to make sure that you match up the number of %s with the strings being passed in.

Last night I posted a little verbal ditty at my BrainFrieze blog about the connection between standardized testing and kids coming out of school unprepared for high-tech jobs. The connection might be a little convoluted for non-educators, but my premise is this. The more we focus on standardized testing and the crieria that are used to judge the effectiveness of schools, the less time we have to spend on courses that promote the higher-order thinking skills that kids need in high-tech jobs. Our curriculum and schedule and spending is all aligned here in Florida to producing good test results. If that hasn't happened in you state, it's just a matter of time until it does.

From a practial standpoint this means the loss of lots of elective classes. In cases where things like band and art and web and graphic design are still being offered either the classes are huge or the kids who want to take the classes are being turned away. If you can't quantify the results a course achieves through testing, then it's going to be tough to get it funded in the current climate.

There are far-reaching implications to the loss of these classes, and I hope folks in the industry will focus on what's going on in education here in the US. If those "soft" courses--ones where their results can't be easily quantified--are not kept in the mix of courses we offer kids, we lose an important element of their total education.

Music is a great example of the connection between an elective class and high-tech skills. Do a little poll where you work. How many of your programmers are also musicians? How many of them had their first chance to play an instrument in a public school? I think you'll find the numbers to be significant. I know here at Community MX the programmers among us almost to a man and woman play some sort of musical instrument. There is an incredibly strong connection in the part of the brain that allows a person to understand how to play a complicated set of chords and also do multiple joins in several relational databases. Or appreciate the elegance of good scripting.

Developing that part of the brain starts early, and it needs to be supported while young. Public schools have traditionally done the most to support that kind of learning and development, but with the current emphasis on testing over teaching, we're facing huge losses of teachers and classes in the arts. Fewer kids will be helped to discover their potential, and less of them will be prepared for the type of work that they might be asked to do.

It will take a little higher-order thinking on the part of people in the industry, government, and education if we're to stop this trend before more damage is done. There has to be a better mixture of accountability and teaching and higher-order learning in our schools if the US is to maintain a competitive workforce. Yes, keeping arts in education is that important.

Many users have problems with rogue extensions, bad extensions, or extensions that have been uninstalled improperly. Dreamweaver's Extension Manager is not entirely reliable when installing/uninstalling extensions. This is because of the way that modern operating systems work with multiple users, and because Macromedia, like other software companies are forced to comply with a multi-user configuration. When you run Dreamweaver, you can be logged onto the operating system as yourself, the computer Administrator, or another user. When you install an extension, the files are not installed to the main program directory, as they were in the past with Dreamweaver 4 and earlier. They are installed in the local user directory, or in the All Users directory. Danilo posted about the Dreamweaver configuration folder locations in a previous entry at CMXtraneous.

One of the major problems that has plagued extension developers from the beginning is when a rogue extension developer overwrites a Dreamweaver system file, or any Dreamweaver Configuration folder file. For example, some extension developers try to add additional functionality to the Dreamweaver Recordset. Instead of creating their own version of the Recordset files (such as Recordset.htm and Recordset.js), they modify the existing Dreamweaver files. That works great if this is the only extension the user will ever install. If the user wants to install an extension from another developer, however, this could severely break the way that Dreamweaver works, because expected functionality might not be there or might act differently. Additionally, if two rogue extension developers overwrite the same file, one of them is out of luck because the second extension overwrites the first extension.

Make no mistake, when a Dreamweaver configuration file is overwritten by an extension developer, it is the equivalent of a virus, a spyware, or other intrusive worm. The installation is now corrupt.

Additionally, some extension developers are including a directive in the .mxi file that creates the extension package, putting a systemfile="true" directive for each system file that they overwrite. This causes problems as well, because when you uninstall the rogue extension, the bad system file is left in your Dreamweaver installation. The effect of this is that your Dreamweaver installation is corrupted. Dreamweaver is using the corrupted file rather than the file that Macromedia created.

Another problem exists: when Macromedia comes out with new versions of Dreamweaver, these rogue extensions are still being distributed, and are being used by users. Let's say, for example, that a new version of Dreamweaver has to change the Recordset.js file in order to work with some new functionality. A user installs an extension that overwrites this file using a version from the last version of Dreamweaver. The program is now broken with no way to recover other than deleting the local All Users or the local user folder, or just making it easy on yourself and reinstalling Dreamweaver.

More problems: If a Dreamweaver user decides he wants to modify a file in the Configuration folder, if the file has been overwritten by an extension developer, the user's changes are not respected.

An additional note: when I say that the file is "overwritten", it's not entirely accurate. In a modern operating system, the files are not overwritten in the main Program Files directory (Application directory on the Mac). The files stored in the All Users supercede the files stored in the Program Files directory. In other words, if Dreamweaver requires a Recordset.js file to run, the file will remain untouched in the Program Files directory, but a new version of the file is stored by the Extension Manager in All Users. However, to the uninformed user, this is the equivalent of a corrupt installation. The typical user does not know that there is a special hidden directory that contains rogue extension files.

What to do about this? Well, the first and most important step is to convince these rogue extension developers that what they are doing is harming the community. In their overzealous approach to adding functionality to Dreamweaver, they are basically spoiling the program for other extension developers, and setting the average Dreamweaver user up for a corrupted installation full of JavaScript errors every time they want to open a file. Secondly, Macromedia should step up to the plate and disallow extensions to be downloadable from the Exchange if the extension modifies core Dreamweaver configuration files. Lastly, users should write to extension developers that do this and demand that they stop.

It is a political issue, unfortunately. The extension developers who do this (I'm not naming names) insist they are trying to make Dreamweaver better. Some of us extension developers who have been around a while have always made an effort to extend Dreamweaver without ruining it for the next guy, though. Sadly, if it keeps up, more extension developers will do it and before you know it every extension you install will overwrite some other guy's file, and no extensions will work. What a mess that will be. . . .

I issue a challenge to all Dreamweaver extension developers to stop this practice. It's already late, but we can minimize the damage going into the future. Extension development has come a long way since the early days of Dreamweaver, but if we can't develop extensions in a responsible way, it is going to impact the way that Dreamweaver users view extensions.

What to do if you have a corrupt installation? The first thing you should try is uninstalling the extension. Of course, that doesn't work always because of reasons I've stated. If it doesn't work, find the local Configuration folders mentioned above (not the main Program Files directory) and rename them or delete them. This will completely remove all extensions so that your Dreamweaver installation will be fresh again. Alternatively, reinstalling Dreamweaver should do this as well.

Cross-posted at Tom-Muck.com

It seems like I've been in a ton of meetings lately--some related to the day job, and others that cover some of my outside interests. Nothing unusual about any of that, but what I have been paying attention to is the dynamics of these meetings where what people say is vastly different from what I know they're thinking. Here are some examples:

What they say: That's a very interesting observation.
What they mean: Is this twit paying attention to any of this?

What they say: Yes, we've discussed that issue on our team.
What they mean: God, please don't bring that up. Do you know how many hours we've already devoted to that kind of trivia? I've got to shut this guy up or we'll be mired in minutia for the next hour.

What they say: That's an excellent question.
What they mean: Has this idiot been listening at all? For God's sake! We just now covered that. There's goes another 10 minutes of my life that I won't be able to get back. Grrrrrrrrrrrr.

What they say: We'll have to review that internally and come back with some answers to that question.
What they mean: Nooooooo! It's all laid out in the documents. Any 3rd grader would understand what we're talking about here. I'm not reviewing anything. Why did I say that? Oh yeah, to get him to SHUT UP!

What they say: We've had a great deal of internal debate over that issue.
What they mean: Please don't get started on that topic. Otherwise Jeffrey over there is going to go off on one of his usual side trips to hell. Thank God there are no weapons allowed here at work, otherwise one of these weenies would die. I wonder how I'd look being hauled from the building in handcuffs? Is this the right outfit for going to jail? Wonder what they're serving for dinner in Cellblock C tonight? OK, OK, stay focused. God here comes another idiotic question.

What they say: I believe we discussed this just a few minutes ago, but let's review so everyone is clear on the issues.
What they mean: Would it be manslaughter or murder if I jump from my chair, sit on his chest, and strangle him with that awful tie he's wearing today? It would have to be manslaughter right? I'm not doing anything premeditated. Not planning to watch him die a horrible death. It would be different if I sprinkled arsenic in that ugly-ass coffee mug of his one morning and then danced in my cubicle while he choked and gagged, knowing that the paramedics will never get here in time. Hahahahahahahaha! God that would be sweet!

What they say: We feel strongly about the recommendations we've made here today.
What they mean: If this isn't a slam dunk I don't know what is. Please, please, please, can we just make a decision already? This could go on for months at this rate. Why do these people come to these meetings anyway? We've got to stop serving danish at these things. YOU sure don't need to eat anymore Mr. Lardass. Hey, maybe the cholesterol will get this guy and I won't have to do a thing. Here you go Mr. Lardass, have one of these cream-filled donuts. Hee hee! Note to self: Stop at Krispy Kreme before the next team meeting.

What they say: Thanks so much for attending. You've provided valuable feedback.
What they mean: What were those lines in that Monty Python skit? Oh yeah, thanks for coming, you vacuous, toffee-nosed, malodorous pervert. You're such a valuable member of the team, Mr. Snotty-faced Heap of Parrot Droppings. We're not nearly as impressed with you as you are with yourself, but golly it's been good to see you. Now if you'd kindly rot in hell while I go about the business of undoing all the damage you've caused my project in the last hour, it would be much appreciated. Thanks oh so much. Really.

As some of you may know, I live in the Washington DC area and this year, all of us in this area will be celebrating something we have waited 35 years for: Opening day of the Major League Baseball Season IN Washington DC. Yes, it's true folks! Washington DC finally has a baseball team.

And even though the Washington Nationals already won their first Spring Training game a week or so ago and opening day is still a few weeks away - and since the Academy Awards recently ended - I thought it might be fun to make a "best of" and "worst of" baseball movie list. Before I do that though, I have to admit, even though I am a huge baseball junkie and movie fan, even I haven't seen every baseball movie ever made. Because of that, you'll notice that most of the movies listed below are fairly recent or modern and there's really a very specific reason for that.

For me, a "good" baseball movie can't just make it on drama or acting alone. The baseball skills have to be at least somewhat believable. And, as any serious baseball AND movie buff will tell you... Hollywood used to have a terrible track record when it came to finding a nice medium between the two. You either had an athlete that couldn't act or you had great actors that obviously never played baseball beyond Little League. A prime example of one of the best acted but poorly played baseball movies of all time was the remake of "Bang the drum slowly" with Robert De Niro and Michael Moriarty. It's a great movie to watch EXCEPT when the movie revolves around watching those actors try to act like ballplayers - then it's absolutely atrocious.

In any case, here are some of MY favorite baseball movies ranked in order from top to bottom:

1) Bull Durham
You will never be able to convince me Tim Robbins had EVER pitched a baseball in his life but thankfully, whatever baseball skills Tim Robbins lacked, the surrounding cast made up for. In fact, many of the Bull Durham infielders were ex-minor league ball players themselves. The most famous being Danny Gaines - who is one of the most popular Las Vegas performers today (for all the people getting ready to go to TODCon this year).

2) Field of Dreams
Still a movie I think EVERY father and son should see together. That's how powerful this movie is.

3) A league of their own
It should be noted how terrific some of the baseball skills in this movie are - I think this movie could be directly responsible for the women's pro baseball team - The Silver Bullets - coming into existence. It completely honored the Women's Professional Baseball League. And proved once again that there's "no crying in baseball".

4) The Natural
I keep trying to remember to buy the book because, from what I understand, the ending is much sadder (and truer) then the movie. And for all of us who have played baseball will tell you - one of the things that makes this game so addicting is the tragedy, disappointment and frustration that's involved. It's like a really great Shakespeare tragedy - the drama just keeps pulling you back in again and again...

5) Bad News Bears
The ode to Little League.

6) Eight Men Out
Fantastic history lesson. For all of you that don't understand the significance or controversy surrounding Pete Rose's Hall of Fame situation, rent this movie and it will give you a better perspective on what's involved. Again, tragedy and baseball walking down the wedding aisle.

7) For the love of the game
Finally, a movie that gives insight about what goes on during the "slowness" of the game and what a player can sometimes be thinking about even at the most important and most critical points in a game.

8) Major League
Again, the significance of this is that you believed all of these actors COULD play the game. Corben Benson played college ball - just as Kevin Costner did. That makes a difference in a baseball movie. It really does.

9) The Rookie
The "Rocky" of baseball movies.

10) The Sandlot
When my dad was stationed in Germany during the early 1970's, all the military brats had their OWN Sandlot. And we played baseball from the morning to dinner time so this movie holds a special "sentimental" value for me.

11) Mr. Baseball
Even at an early age, I knew some American players went to Japan to play baseball but I never knew about the cultural differences. This movie at least gave you that perspective.

Best HBO Baseball movies
1) Soul of the Game
This is one of the best movies about the Negro Leagues - barring any documentaries, of course. It shines a whole new light on Josh Gibbons, Satchel Paige and even Jackie Robinson.

2) 61*
With all the controversy surrounding steroids in baseball, this is a nice homage to Roger Maris - especially considering the director, Billy Crystal, has always admitted to being a huge Mickey Mantle fan.

3) Cobb
A fascinating look at one of the "bad guys" of baseball. I wonder if someday we might see a movie titled "Rose"?

4) Long Gone
Not many people have seen this movie but is starred William Patterson (CSI fame now). Again, baseball, tears and laughter all mixed together.

5) Talent for the game
The forgotten "grunt" of major league baseball is the talent scout. This movie gives you an idea of the tireless (and thankless) work they go through as well as the politics of baseball as well.

Next:
My all time WORST baseball movies...

Many times you'll need access to similar messages that you present to the user, whether in alerts for errors, or in notes on dialogs in a Dreamweaver extension. You could include the same text over and over again, in all of the extensions you have as part of your project, or you could write your own custom file manipulation functions that would share a common file to store your common text. Well, the great folks that bring you Dreamweaver also thought of this second method, they just happened to not document it just yet, and it's called dreamweaver.loadString().

Essentially, the loadString method takes as a parameter, an identifying ID that identifies the particular string that you're trying to use within your extension. Well, what does that mean? Ok, here's a code snippet to test out using Tom's JavaScript Eval panel:

alert(dw.loadString('General/docEncoding'));

On my system, I get alerted: iso-8859-1

So, where, and how do you store your strings so that that you can load them when needed?

As usual, you need to get into the Dreamweaver configuration folder. Go to the Configuration/Strings/ folder. You store your data in a specially formatted XML file. See the following code for an example of the format:

<strings>
  <string id="uniqueIdentifier" value="string to store">
</strings>

You can have multiple <string> tags within the parent <strings> tag.

Make sure that you uniquely identify your strings, preferably by "scoping" the strings by including your company name, or your initials, and also save your strings XML file with a unique name inside the Strings folder. All this is to avoid any naming conflict with other developers, or with built in stings, and strings XML files.

It occurred to me that we have nothing in the way of Macromedia user groups in the North of England, which is a shame. We have a lot of talented folks up here in the north and I thought it would be a great idea if we could perhaps look at getting a Macromedia User Group - MMUG - up and running.

So, if you are in the North of England and fancy getting involved or have an interest in attending MMUG events, such as presentations and good fun evenings out where we can discuss all things web related let me know. You can mail me at adrian at webade dot co dot uk and if we generate enough interest then I'll see what we can do about starting up a group for "us northern folks"!

Don't forget I will need a mail address to keep you informed of developments, sending that to the webade address would be great, cheers.

Last night was week 8 of the Fireworks course I teach at our local community college, and as usual the subject was automated and workflow features found in Fireworks. As I like to tell my students, I think of Fireworks not as a graphics editor, but more a graphics production tool. The ability to get great looking images put together in a production environment is part and parcel of what makes Fireworks such a top notch application.

As we explored different ways of cutting down on the time required to get those images together we explored Fireworks Styles, and after showing them how to make their own we went on a little web expedition to find free Styles that they could download. I want to mention two here that are far and away some of the best.

First stop is Richard (aka RichieB.) Blenkinsopp's site, where you can find some really tasty Styles in flavors from candy-coated to metallic. Richie has added a bunch of new ones since the last time I dropped in, and they look awesome. You also might want to check out his Fireworks sample files for some great designs that are available in their original PNG format.

Our second stop was Macromedia's DevNet Center where we took a look at Linda Rathgeber's sample files and Styles. Good to see that this has been moved to the front page of DevNet to make it easier to find. Is there anyone who's done more to promote the creative uses of Fireworks than Linda? I don't think so. Her offerings here are a testament to her talent as well as a great resource for those of you who want to see how things are done in Fireworks.

Thanks Richie! Thanks Linda! Great stuff all the way around.

It's good for search engines and it's good for accessible beauty. If you're bored with the same old fonts, be sure to give sIFR a whirl. Mike Industries has released Release Candidate 4 -- it's getting closer to final all the time due to Mark Wubben's (yes, he's about 18) tireless work on tweaking the javascript. This time, they've disabled IE Mac (since it's so quirky) and given instructions on reenabling if you desire. There's better transparency and selector support in this version as well. They've also given us access to some cool add-ons like, preference manager and rollback (for style switchers). More info is available in The sIFR wiki. The wiki has lots of other good info, so use it or the new forums to stay apprised of the newest info.

So hurry over and download sIFR today. :)

Steve Fossett is now passing to the north of Hawaii, and is only a few hours away from landfall on the continental US. Then it's just an "easy" 1000 miles or so to where he took off, over 50 hours ago.

Okay, so this attempt ultimately means nothing, and yes it may be a "guy thing." I just admire any human being who prefers spending three days without much sleep (if any) in a tiny, lonely cabin, for the purpose of doing what has never been done, rather than enjoying that chateau in the south of France. Steve knows that creature comforts are for creatures, and a thinking human wants a little more.

Sure, Steve is a bit mad, but it's a divine madness, one that no single "record" can ever satisfy. He is doomed to press against barriers, one after another, until circumstance or old age finally defeat him. He will never surrender though.

Our dreams always exceed our reach; That is what makes us human. When one of us cheats the odds even a little, many feel that tingle of hope we need to keep going. Thanks Steve.

As these words are being written, Steve Fossett, the man who would break all avation records, is crossing India, and is approaching Calcutta at 300 knots. Altitude is 46,801 feet, and just now the crawl announced that Steve has reached the halfway point in his quest to fly 'round the world in 80 hours, alone.

I'm following along, courtesy of the world wide web:

http://www.virginatlanticglobalflyer.com/MissionControl/Tracking/

I grew up on science fiction many many moons ago, but I never dreamed the future would be this cool! The same people who made Steve's airplane are currently taking reservations for the first sub-orbital tourist trips. They have over 100 customers already lined up. Good luck getting insurance, guys!

By the time you read this, Steve may be far out over the Pacific Ocean, feeling pretty groggy no doubt. Still, it's a heck of a lot faster than his balloon circumnavigation, even if that ended up only 19,000 miles long. Hard to steer those balloons, y'know.

It's noon in India right now, so at his altitude the Himalayan wall, 300 miles to the north, must be clearly visible above the horizon as a pure white jagged line. The intense flat green of the lower Ganges is spread before him, and soon he will cross southeast Asia, heading for Japan. Ah, I see he has now reached Calcutta. (slow typist)

I live in Arizona, which could easily fall under Steve's flight path. Perhaps sometime Thursday afternoon, I will spot a tiny contrail high up in a clear blue Arizona sky. Sure hope so.