
Wednesday, April 5th, 2006
CMX Weekly Newsletter News Fun and Freebies Recent CMX Content Tips, Tricks and Dirty Cheats Check the News! TODcon 2006 in Orlando - Getting Closer Every Day For the few who haven't experienced it yet, TODCon is the most informative yet informal Macromedia/Adobe-related event you're going to find. Whether you're a seasoned veteran of Macromedia or Adobe products or you're just starting out, you will have a great time learning a great deal from many knowledgeable speakers about CSS, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, ColdFusion, Flash, Central and even about running your business properly. Those who attend usually end up coming back every year because of the unique and informal atmosphere. You don't want to miss out on this event. This year, TODcon will take place in beautiful Orlando, Florida, just a hop, skip and jump from Disney World. Your registration (with the rooming option) includes three nights (May 18th, 19th and 20th) at the Wyndham plus a 3-day trolley pass that covers transportation throughout the International Drive attractions area. You're invited to register for this fantastic, one-of-a-kind event. Do it quick, while the early bird pricing is still effect. Macintosh Goes To Boot Camp It looks like Apple is welcoming a dual boot Mac with open arms, and they seem pretty eager to get you to install Windows on their new Intel-based Macs. The next version of OS X, Leopard, will have a program called BootCamp on it that will help you install and run Windows on your Mac. But you don't have to wait for the next OS release. You can download a beta version of Bootcamp right now from Apple's website. We'll be eager to hear the buzz this week and find out how people like their WintelTosh machines. Apple vs Apple Apple Corps., the record label started by The Beatles, is suing Apple (you know, the one we jabber about in these newsletters). The suit revolves around a visual of an apple with a bite taken out of it that Apple is using for their iTunes music store. Apple Corps. says that the apple graphic violates an agreement reached by both Apples back in 1991. Apple Corps. promises to sue Apple eight days a week until they comply. Apple could end up having quite a hard day's night. Read more at CIO.com. Microsoft: It's Not All About The Profits Microsoft is giving away its Virtual Server 2005 Enterprise Edition for free. Grab it at Microsoft.com. Previous to April 3rd, Virtual Server 2005 would run you $199. Before anyone starts thinking that Microsoft has become the Crazy Eddie of virtual servers, we should mention that VMWare, MS' prime competitor in the Virtual Server market, will probably take a huge hit in the face of this announcement. To broaden their scope even more, MS announced that they will provide 24-hour technical support for Linux guest operating systems running on Virtual Server 2005 R2. More on this at RedmondMag.com. Record Companies: It's All About The Profits File sharing is being blamed for a record losses in revenue experienced by the record labels in the past few years. With legitimate music download services like iTunes popping everywhere, the music companies are finally getting some cash in again. But that's not apparently not good enough. According to Apple, the record labels aren't satisified with their seventy percent chunk of the iTunes download cash, and are reportedly pressuring Apple to up their prices so that everyone can get a bigger slice of the pie. Steve Jobs attributes it to simple greed on the part of the labels, and he makes several other valid points at sdfdsf.com.
Satisfied Customers Speak Out! "This was an excellent tutorial. I work with under and over-exposed images all the time and only knew to use Levels before. I can't wait to try these new techniques, thank you." CMX Subscriber Margi P., commenting on Knut Kubenz's tutorial "New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 2" Whether you're just starting out or need advanced support, Community MX will give you answers and ideas to work through your tough issues. Don't miss out. Learn more about CMX or sign up for a free trial today!
Great Quotes: "He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils; for time is the greatest innovator." — Francis Bacon As Long As It's Just Violent, and Not Sexy... A Michigan law that imposed fines and penalties for anyone distributing violent video games to minors has been overturned. The ruling indicates that video games are protected under the First and Fourteenth Amendments, heretofore known as the "Grand Theft Auto" amendments. Federal District Judge George Caram Steeh, the judge who delivered the latest ruling, said that there is no hard evidence that kids are corrupted by violence in video games. On the good side, kids might start getting into the law more quickly now that they understand it can protect their right to get to level 10 in their favorite 1st person shooter game. More on this at Reuters.com. DVDs? That's So Yesterday... After-Theater movie distribution is taking an interesting turn, thanks to Movielink.com and CinemaNow.com. While downloading movies from the internet isn't a new thing, these are movies that can be downloaded at the same time they hit the DVD shelves. In effect, you don't have to run to your video store to watch that just-released DVD anymore. You can download the movie and watch it at your convenience. To keep the movie studios happy, you won't be able to burn the movies to CD, but the prices are competitive with regular dvd rental and purchase prices, which could make this type of service very popular. Read more about it at BusinessWeek.com. In Computing We Trust "Trusted Computing" has a nice ring to it. It makes you think you can trust your computer to keep you safe. It's a warm fuzzy feeling. What is Trusted Computing? According to Wikipedia, it's an initiative headed up by AMD, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Infineon, Intel, Lenovo, Microsoft, and Sun Microsystems to keep your computer running as the manufacturer intended, and keep it safe from malicious outside forces. That sounds great, but it's a somewhat controversial initiative. Opponents of Trusted Computing believe it puts too much power in the hands of computer manufacturers and stifles innovation. YouTube.com has a short film on Trusted Computing by a group that uh... seems to be against it. What's our opinion? We haven't trusted our computers since they had a party while we were on vacation. We're still cleaning up the mess. Communication May Cease To Exist Dictionary.com defines a patent as "A grant made by a government that confers upon the creator of an invention the sole right to make, use, and sell that invention for a set period of time." We hate to be the bearer of bad news, but if you see your kids talking to one another by using two tin cans connected by a string, they may be violating a patent held by "Kupperman , et al", since 1980. Sounds like a late April Fools Day joke, but it's mind-numbingly true. Read about it at RealTechNews.com. Computer or Paint Brush? It's a Draw. Are aspiring artists going the way of the Dodo? Probably not, according to this article at CNN.com. Where young artists were happy using pen and paper to achieve works of art in the past, a lot of them are much happier to throw their imaginations into programs like Maya or 3D Studio Max. But people like John Woodbridge, director of the School of Computer Arts-New Media in San Francisco, believe that in order to be proficient in graphic design, it's extremely important to be able to express yourself on canvas, even if you're just using a pencil and paper. A lot of good information on this at CNN.com.
JavaScript Evaluation Extension for Dreamweaver Frequently when you are building web pages, you need to test out little pieces of JavaScript. This extension installs in Dreamweaver and runs as a floating panel so that you can copy/paste code from Dreamweaver into the panel and execute it. It also works well for extension developers because you have access to the DW API and any shared script functions that are in memory. Check out the Extension by CMX Partner Tom Muck
Fun and Freebies Coke Takes a Hit And Amish Using an Amish drag race to pitch any kind of product has got our vote. We're sorry if that offends any Amish out there, but seriously, if you're Amish and you're reading this... you're in trouble. In any case, Coke ran an ad involving an Amish drag race, where the horse carrying the most bales of hay loses. Coke uses the race to illustrate that Gatorade has 50 calories, while their product, PowerAde, only has 10 calories, so it doesn't weigh athletes down. Pepsi took issue with with that. They said in order to have any "get up and go", an energy drink would have to have more calories, not less, and sued Coke to make their point. Coke saw the point apparently, and settled out of court. Read about the lawsuit and see the commercial at Slate.com. Excuses? We've Got Plenty of Them! Late with a project? If you can't dazzle your boss with punctual brilliance, just make up an excuse. If you're afraid he'll see right through it, go to Red-Gate.com's Excuse Generator, and generate an excuse so lengthy and confusing, the boss will be so baffled, it won't matter when you finally get that project done. We're Not Sure, But... We're nearly positive that this video at YouTube.com is the first song dedicated to Bittorrents.
The Many Uses of Fireworks - Part 2 - PowerPoint Backgrounds As we learned in Part 1, Fireworks is not just for web graphics. I think of FW as a screen graphics app. It lends itself well to almost any production flow that needs screen quality images, such as Captivate, PowerPoint, Flash, Director and even the desktop. In Part 1, we looked at how to make promotional wallpaper for your site's visitors, including ways to batch process your files at various pixel dimensions. In Part 2, we will explore Fireworks' capability as a graphics editor/creator for PowerPoint and Captivate. For good or ill, PowerPoint has become the de facto standard for many types of corporate presentations. Product launches, sales meetings, conferences, and the list goes on. It's easy enough to build a presentation using only the design templates that come with PowerPoint, but your presentation might look very much like someone else's. Also, the stock designs may not utilize a given company's corporate colors. And in many cases, the person creating the presentation may not have the skills, software or time to put together a custom look. This is where you and Fireworks come in to save the day. Creating custom backgrounds and navigation art — even if it's just optimizing the images that exist in a current presentation — can mean another revenue source for you. And if you're like me — an independent contractor — having your fingers in several pies helps smooth out the highs and lows of project work. This free article by CMX Partner Jim Babbage can be found here.
Weekly Content Listing Creating a ZIP File Backup of Your Website in ASP.NET Heidi Bautista This tutorial will show you how to backup a web site by creating a zip file that contains all files in the site. This task is made considerably simpler because of a cool, open source library available from ICSharpCode called #ziplib (pronounced sharp zip lib). I originally used this library to automate the backup for a bank site but there are endless possibilities when you stop to consider that this library allows you to create and add to an archive, as well as unpack the archive. This tutorial creates a ZIP file, but the library supports other formats, too, including GZip, Tar and BZip2. The sample application automatically creates the zip file such that it contains every file in the website. In this tutorial, you'll learn how to use the DirectoryInfo and FileInfo classes to recurse through the site and then use the #ZipLib classes to add the files to zip archive. Creating Wet Paint Effects in Fireworks Kim Cavanaugh It's easy to get in the habit of going back to the same tools over and over once you become reasonably comfortable with an application. The problem with this all-too-human behavior is that we often overlook tools that can be used for special purposes or to create something new and unique. Fireworks has a number of little-used tools that allow you to achieve some great effects if you just know where to look. One such tool is the Reshape Area tool. With this fun little device you can push and pull vector objects around your canvas for either minor edits, or to do something a little more drastic and creative. As I rediscoverd the last time I sat down just to play around with Fireworks, you can use this tool to get some pretty interesting effects that simulate the look of wet paint. And while you may not need to create a Wet Paint sign for a web site anytime soon, working through the steps in the tutorial may help you to come to a better understanding of what the Reshape Area tool can do and perhaps open your eyes to other creative uses of this little-used tool. In this tutorial, which includes four Captivate video demonstrations, you'll learn how to put the Reshape Area tool to good use and get some more practice in working with vector objects in Fireworks. Approximate download size: 2.2MB Build a Dashboard Widget Thomas Pletcher Widgets and the new Dashboard feature introduced some serious eye candy with the debut of Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" last year. But widgets can be seriously useful, too — not to mention great fun. This tutorial walks you through a fully functional CMX RSS feed reader widget created for Tiger. You'll see how it works...and how you can modify it to create your own Dashboard widget. Approximate download size: 552k New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 2 Knut Kubenz Images often need brightness adjustments. Often Levels and Curves are used to do these enhancements but Levels and Curves are not the only way to fix image brightness issues. In this tutorial I will demonstrate a different method that is not complicated or technical. Instead of using Levels and Curves I will use the Layers mode functions. The Layers mode functions can be used with the History Brush to do almost the same work. This quick and easy technique allows you to make adjustments to specific areas in an image and will likely have you reaching for the History Brush much more often The History Brush and Layers Palette Series: New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 1 New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 2 Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 3: ActionScript Development [FREE] Paul Newman, Michelle Kempner In Part 3 of this series, you'll learn how to install the ASDT plugin for Eclipse and set up your environment for ActionScript development. You will also learn how to compile SWFs using MTASC and enable trace statements with Flashout. The Getting Started with Eclipse Series: Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 1 Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 2 Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 3 Bitmaps Without Backgrounds - Using Clipping Paths in Photoshop Kim Dudley Have you ever wanted to import a bitmap into a layout without the surrounding rectangle? Bitmap images are always rectangular. Even if you erase or remove the background in a photo editing application you still get a white rectangle that will cover other elements in your layout. If you want to see only part of the image you import, you must crop or mask it, if possible, within the layout application. You can also use Photoshop to create a clipping path that surrounds the part of the image you want to see. The rest of the image becomes transparent when imported into another application, creating a similar effect as a mask created in an Illustration program like Fireworks or Photoshop. Depending on the applications you are using may allow different methods be used to accomplish this effect. In this tutorial we will use Photoshop to create a clipping path around an object in a photo. We will then import that photo into a layout application. Approximate download size: 3MB Mixed Thoughts on Microsoft Mix 06 [FREE] Robert Reinhardt From March 20th to 22nd, the Microsoft Mix 06 conference was held in Las Vegas. The forthcoming Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and WinFX application layer were widely touted as the enablers for the next generation experience of Windows Vista, the successor to the Windows XP operating system. Making Full Use of Bindings Tom Muck The Dreamweaver bindings panel has a lot of uses beyond a place to build recordsets and stored procedures. Many people don't realize that when you add session, request, and application variables to the panel manually, you get some visual advantages — the ability to drag items to the page into design view, the ability to use variables as filters, and the ability to add formatting functions to design view. This article will explore the bindings panel and its advantages. Because we are discussing core Dreamweaver functionality, the article will apply equally to all server models in Dreamweaver, although some server models have better bindings panel support than others. Changing Continents and Layouts - Modifying the Paris Jumpstart to Make Playacar, Mexico Jim Babbage Community MX is pleased to announce the release of a modified Paris CMX JumpStarts. Based on Web standards, these versatile layouts employ valid CSS2 and XHTML 1.0 Transitional markup and pass WAI and 508 accessibility checkpoints. This makes it easy for you to quickly create new sites that work on a variety of browsers and platforms. You are only a few simple edits away from your own look and feel. This article covers the following: A list of what is included in the CMX JumpStarts: Playacar download A list of the bundled tutorials that teach the theory behind the layout Directions for creating the effects in the Fireworks PNGs Demos of live pages Approximate download size: 9.3MB Introducing CMX JumpStart Modifications [FREE] Sheri German With our growing repertoire of JumpStarts, there are now layouts to fit a wide range of design requirements. Still, sometimes a particular JumpStart is just what you are looking for - if only you could fix one or two little details. If only the navigation had been on the right instead of left. Or what if that left DIV had been floated rather than set to position absolute? And what if instead of a fixed-width, centered layout, the JumpStart had been fluid? We often see such sentiments on the forums, and thought it might be helpful to respond with articles that show how to modify some of our existing JumpStarts to give you a wider variety of options without having to go in and code the tweaks yourself. Towards that end, we give you CMX JumpStart Playacar, Mexico.
Matching Numbers in an Online PDF and its Printed Counterpart When someone looking at a printed book speaks to someone looking at an online PDF of that same book and tells them to delete the last paragraph on Page 19, they may both be looking at Page 19 but actually be seeing different pages. In this tutorial we will look at how PDF page numbers differ from printed page numbers, and follow along with the sample files to learn how to reconcile them. Check out the Article by guest author Les Greenberg
Tips, Tricks and Dirty Cheats! This week's Tip, Trick or Dirty Cheat is courtesy of CMX Associate Stephanie Sullivan Using Snippets to Speed up CSS Development One of the easiest ways to speed up your CSS development in Dreamweaver is through the use of your own custom snippets. They also get you around a little short-coming in Dreamweaver whereby you can only create a new CSS rule using the CSS dialog. Sometimes I simply want to add a property/value pair using the Properties pane of the CSS Styles panel. Due to the numerous coding jobs I do for other web development companies, I've created my snippets in a couple different manners. I divided them into folders -- XHTML snippets and CSS snippets. For the XHTML, I created a two-column and three-column version. They're simply empty divs with the basic structure of the page using my naming conventions. For the CSS, I have one set with empty rules which allows me to access them from the Properties panel. The other set has basic properties and styling so that I can modify them to create a custom page. I also created starter snippets for both horizontal and vertical menus, float/clear classes, form styling, special footers used by some clients, etc. And of course, I have the CMX CSS hacks snippets installed to use when necessary. Snippets can be your very best friend. Would you like your tip published? Submit it to tips@communitymx.com. That's it for this week. Stay tuned for the next CMX newsletter!

CMX Weekly Newsletter

News
Fun and Freebies
Recent CMX Content
Tips, Tricks and Dirty Cheats

Check the News!

TODcon 2006 in Orlando - Getting Closer Every Day

For the few who haven't experienced it yet, TODCon is the most informative yet informal Macromedia/Adobe-related event you're going to find. Whether you're a seasoned veteran of Macromedia or Adobe products or you're just starting out, you will have a great time learning a great deal from many knowledgeable speakers about CSS, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, ColdFusion, Flash, Central and even about running your business properly. Those who attend usually end up coming back every year because of the unique and informal atmosphere. You don't want to miss out on this event. This year, TODcon will take place in beautiful Orlando, Florida, just a hop, skip and jump from Disney World. Your registration (with the rooming option) includes three nights (May 18th, 19th and 20th) at the Wyndham plus a 3-day trolley pass that covers transportation throughout the International Drive attractions area.

You're invited to register for this fantastic, one-of-a-kind event. Do it quick, while the early bird pricing is still effect.

Macintosh Goes To Boot Camp

It looks like Apple is welcoming a dual boot Mac with open arms, and they seem pretty eager to get you to install Windows on their new Intel-based Macs. The next version of OS X, Leopard, will have a program called BootCamp on it that will help you install and run Windows on your Mac. But you don't have to wait for the next OS release. You can download a beta version of Bootcamp right now from Apple's website. We'll be eager to hear the buzz this week and find out how people like their WintelTosh machines.

Apple vs Apple

Apple Corps., the record label started by The Beatles, is suing Apple (you know, the one we jabber about in these newsletters). The suit revolves around a visual of an apple with a bite taken out of it that Apple is using for their iTunes music store. Apple Corps. says that the apple graphic violates an agreement reached by both Apples back in 1991. Apple Corps. promises to sue Apple eight days a week until they comply. Apple could end up having quite a hard day's night. Read more at CIO.com.

Microsoft: It's Not All About The Profits

Microsoft is giving away its Virtual Server 2005 Enterprise Edition for free. Grab it at Microsoft.com. Previous to April 3rd, Virtual Server 2005 would run you $199. Before anyone starts thinking that Microsoft has become the Crazy Eddie of virtual servers, we should mention that VMWare, MS' prime competitor in the Virtual Server market, will probably take a huge hit in the face of this announcement. To broaden their scope even more, MS announced that they will provide 24-hour technical support for Linux guest operating systems running on Virtual Server 2005 R2. More on this at RedmondMag.com.

Record Companies: It's All About The Profits

File sharing is being blamed for a record losses in revenue experienced by the record labels in the past few years. With legitimate music download services like iTunes popping everywhere, the music companies are finally getting some cash in again. But that's not apparently not good enough. According to Apple, the record labels aren't satisified with their seventy percent chunk of the iTunes download cash, and are reportedly pressuring Apple to up their prices so that everyone can get a bigger slice of the pie. Steve Jobs attributes it to simple greed on the part of the labels, and he makes several other valid points at sdfdsf.com.

Satisfied Customers Speak Out!

"This was an excellent tutorial. I work with under and over-exposed images all the time and only knew to use Levels before. I can't wait to try these new techniques, thank you."

CMX Subscriber Margi P., commenting on Knut Kubenz's tutorial "New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 2"

Whether you're just starting out or need advanced support, Community MX will give you answers and ideas to work through your tough issues. Don't miss out. Learn more about CMX or sign up for a free trial today!

Great Quotes:

"He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils; for time is the greatest innovator." — Francis Bacon

As Long As It's Just Violent, and Not Sexy...

A Michigan law that imposed fines and penalties for anyone distributing violent video games to minors has been overturned. The ruling indicates that video games are protected under the First and Fourteenth Amendments, heretofore known as the "Grand Theft Auto" amendments. Federal District Judge George Caram Steeh, the judge who delivered the latest ruling, said that there is no hard evidence that kids are corrupted by violence in video games. On the good side, kids might start getting into the law more quickly now that they understand it can protect their right to get to level 10 in their favorite 1st person shooter game. More on this at Reuters.com.

DVDs? That's So Yesterday...

After-Theater movie distribution is taking an interesting turn, thanks to Movielink.com and CinemaNow.com. While downloading movies from the internet isn't a new thing, these are movies that can be downloaded at the same time they hit the DVD shelves. In effect, you don't have to run to your video store to watch that just-released DVD anymore. You can download the movie and watch it at your convenience. To keep the movie studios happy, you won't be able to burn the movies to CD, but the prices are competitive with regular dvd rental and purchase prices, which could make this type of service very popular. Read more about it at BusinessWeek.com.

In Computing We Trust

"Trusted Computing" has a nice ring to it. It makes you think you can trust your computer to keep you safe. It's a warm fuzzy feeling. What is Trusted Computing? According to Wikipedia, it's an initiative headed up by AMD, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Infineon, Intel, Lenovo, Microsoft, and Sun Microsystems to keep your computer running as the manufacturer intended, and keep it safe from malicious outside forces. That sounds great, but it's a somewhat controversial initiative. Opponents of Trusted Computing believe it puts too much power in the hands of computer manufacturers and stifles innovation. YouTube.com has a short film on Trusted Computing by a group that uh... seems to be against it. What's our opinion? We haven't trusted our computers since they had a party while we were on vacation. We're still cleaning up the mess.

Communication May Cease To Exist

Dictionary.com defines a patent as "A grant made by a government that confers upon the creator of an invention the sole right to make, use, and sell that invention for a set period of time." We hate to be the bearer of bad news, but if you see your kids talking to one another by using two tin cans connected by a string, they may be violating a patent held by "Kupperman , et al", since 1980. Sounds like a late April Fools Day joke, but it's mind-numbingly true. Read about it at RealTechNews.com.

Computer or Paint Brush? It's a Draw.

Are aspiring artists going the way of the Dodo? Probably not, according to this article at CNN.com. Where young artists were happy using pen and paper to achieve works of art in the past, a lot of them are much happier to throw their imaginations into programs like Maya or 3D Studio Max. But people like John Woodbridge, director of the School of Computer Arts-New Media in San Francisco, believe that in order to be proficient in graphic design, it's extremely important to be able to express yourself on canvas, even if you're just using a pencil and paper. A lot of good information on this at CNN.com.

JavaScript Evaluation Extension for Dreamweaver

Frequently when you are building web pages, you need to test out little pieces of JavaScript. This extension installs in Dreamweaver and runs as a floating panel so that you can copy/paste code from Dreamweaver into the panel and execute it. It also works well for extension developers because you have access to the DW API and any shared script functions that are in memory.

Check out the Extension by CMX Partner Tom Muck

Fun and Freebies

Coke Takes a Hit And Amish

Using an Amish drag race to pitch any kind of product has got our vote. We're sorry if that offends any Amish out there, but seriously, if you're Amish and you're reading this... you're in trouble. In any case, Coke ran an ad involving an Amish drag race, where the horse carrying the most bales of hay loses. Coke uses the race to illustrate that Gatorade has 50 calories, while their product, PowerAde, only has 10 calories, so it doesn't weigh athletes down. Pepsi took issue with with that. They said in order to have any "get up and go", an energy drink would have to have more calories, not less, and sued Coke to make their point. Coke saw the point apparently, and settled out of court. Read about the lawsuit and see the commercial at Slate.com.

Excuses? We've Got Plenty of Them!

Late with a project? If you can't dazzle your boss with punctual brilliance, just make up an excuse. If you're afraid he'll see right through it, go to Red-Gate.com's Excuse Generator, and generate an excuse so lengthy and confusing, the boss will be so baffled, it won't matter when you finally get that project done.

We're Not Sure, But...

We're nearly positive that this video at YouTube.com is the first song dedicated to Bittorrents.

The Many Uses of Fireworks - Part 2 - PowerPoint Backgrounds

As we learned in Part 1, Fireworks is not just for web graphics. I think of FW as a screen graphics app. It lends itself well to almost any production flow that needs screen quality images, such as Captivate, PowerPoint, Flash, Director and even the desktop.
In Part 1, we looked at how to make promotional wallpaper for your site's visitors, including ways to batch process your files at various pixel dimensions. In Part 2, we will explore Fireworks' capability as a graphics editor/creator for PowerPoint and Captivate.
For good or ill, PowerPoint has become the de facto standard for many types of corporate presentations. Product launches, sales meetings, conferences, and the list goes on. It's easy enough to build a presentation using only the design templates that come with PowerPoint, but your presentation might look very much like someone else's. Also, the stock designs may not utilize a given company's corporate colors. And in many cases, the person creating the presentation may not have the skills, software or time to put together a custom look.
This is where you and Fireworks come in to save the day. Creating custom backgrounds and navigation art — even if it's just optimizing the images that exist in a current presentation — can mean another revenue source for you. And if you're like me — an independent contractor — having your fingers in several pies helps smooth out the highs and lows of project work.

This free article by CMX Partner Jim Babbage can be found here.

Weekly Content Listing

Creating a ZIP File Backup of Your Website in ASP.NET

Heidi Bautista

This tutorial will show you how to backup a web site by creating a zip file that contains all files in the site. This task is made considerably simpler because of a cool, open source library available from ICSharpCode called #ziplib (pronounced sharp zip lib). I originally used this library to automate the backup for a bank site but there are endless possibilities when you stop to consider that this library allows you to create and add to an archive, as well as unpack the archive. This tutorial creates a ZIP file, but the library supports other formats, too, including GZip, Tar and BZip2.

The sample application automatically creates the zip file such that it contains every file in the website. In this tutorial, you'll learn how to use the DirectoryInfo and FileInfo classes to recurse through the site and then use the #ZipLib classes to add the files to zip archive.

Creating Wet Paint Effects in Fireworks

Kim Cavanaugh

It's easy to get in the habit of going back to the same tools over and over once you become reasonably comfortable with an application. The problem with this all-too-human behavior is that we often overlook tools that can be used for special purposes or to create something new and unique. Fireworks has a number of little-used tools that allow you to achieve some great effects if you just know where to look.

One such tool is the Reshape Area tool. With this fun little device you can push and pull vector objects around your canvas for either minor edits, or to do something a little more drastic and creative. As I rediscoverd the last time I sat down just to play around with Fireworks, you can use this tool to get some pretty interesting effects that simulate the look of wet paint. And while you may not need to create a Wet Paint sign for a web site anytime soon, working through the steps in the tutorial may help you to come to a better understanding of what the Reshape Area tool can do and perhaps open your eyes to other creative uses of this little-used tool.

In this tutorial, which includes four Captivate video demonstrations, you'll learn how to put the Reshape Area tool to good use and get some more practice in working with vector objects in Fireworks.

Approximate download size: 2.2MB

Build a Dashboard Widget

Thomas Pletcher

Widgets and the new Dashboard feature introduced some serious eye candy with the debut of Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" last year. But widgets can be seriously useful, too — not to mention great fun. This tutorial walks you through a fully functional CMX RSS feed reader widget created for Tiger. You'll see how it works...and how you can modify it to create your own Dashboard widget.

Approximate download size: 552k

New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 2

Knut Kubenz

Images often need brightness adjustments. Often Levels and Curves are used to do these enhancements but Levels and Curves are not the only way to fix image brightness issues.

In this tutorial I will demonstrate a different method that is not complicated or technical. Instead of using Levels and Curves I will use the Layers mode functions. The Layers mode functions can be used with the History Brush to do almost the same work. This quick and easy technique allows you to make adjustments to specific areas in an image and will likely have you reaching for the History Brush much more often

The History Brush and Layers Palette Series:
New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 1
New Uses for the History Brush and the Layers Palette: Part 2

Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 3: ActionScript Development [FREE]

Paul Newman, Michelle Kempner

In Part 3 of this series, you'll learn how to install the ASDT plugin for Eclipse and set up your environment for ActionScript development. You will also learn how to compile SWFs using MTASC and enable trace statements with Flashout.

The Getting Started with Eclipse Series:
Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 1
Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 2
Getting Started with Eclipse - Part 3

Bitmaps Without Backgrounds - Using Clipping Paths in Photoshop

Kim Dudley

Have you ever wanted to import a bitmap into a layout without the surrounding rectangle? Bitmap images are always rectangular. Even if you erase or remove the background in a photo editing application you still get a white rectangle that will cover other elements in your layout. If you want to see only part of the image you import, you must crop or mask it, if possible, within the layout application. You can also use Photoshop to create a clipping path that surrounds the part of the image you want to see. The rest of the image becomes transparent when imported into another application, creating a similar effect as a mask created in an Illustration program like Fireworks or Photoshop.

Depending on the applications you are using may allow different methods be used to accomplish this effect. In this tutorial we will use Photoshop to create a clipping path around an object in a photo. We will then import that photo into a layout application.

Approximate download size: 3MB

Mixed Thoughts on Microsoft Mix 06 [FREE]

Robert Reinhardt

From March 20th to 22nd, the Microsoft Mix 06 conference was held in Las Vegas. The forthcoming Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and WinFX application layer were widely touted as the enablers for the next generation experience of Windows Vista, the successor to the Windows XP operating system.

Making Full Use of Bindings

Tom Muck

The Dreamweaver bindings panel has a lot of uses beyond a place to build recordsets and stored procedures. Many people don't realize that when you add session, request, and application variables to the panel manually, you get some visual advantages — the ability to drag items to the page into design view, the ability to use variables as filters, and the ability to add formatting functions to design view.

This article will explore the bindings panel and its advantages. Because we are discussing core Dreamweaver functionality, the article will apply equally to all server models in Dreamweaver, although some server models have better bindings panel support than others.

Changing Continents and Layouts - Modifying the Paris Jumpstart to Make Playacar, Mexico

Jim Babbage

Community MX is pleased to announce the release of a modified Paris CMX JumpStarts. Based on Web standards, these versatile layouts employ valid CSS2 and XHTML 1.0 Transitional markup and pass WAI and 508 accessibility checkpoints. This makes it easy for you to quickly create new sites that work on a variety of browsers and platforms. You are only a few simple edits away from your own look and feel.

This article covers the following:

A list of what is included in the CMX JumpStarts: Playacar download
A list of the bundled tutorials that teach the theory behind the layout
Directions for creating the effects in the Fireworks PNGs
Demos of live pages

Approximate download size: 9.3MB

Introducing CMX JumpStart Modifications [FREE]

Sheri German

With our growing repertoire of JumpStarts, there are now layouts to fit a wide range of design requirements. Still, sometimes a particular JumpStart is just what you are looking for - if only you could fix one or two little details. If only the navigation had been on the right instead of left. Or what if that left DIV had been floated rather than set to position absolute? And what if instead of a fixed-width, centered layout, the JumpStart had been fluid?

We often see such sentiments on the forums, and thought it might be helpful to respond with articles that show how to modify some of our existing JumpStarts to give you a wider variety of options without having to go in and code the tweaks yourself. Towards that end, we give you CMX JumpStart Playacar, Mexico.

Matching Numbers in an Online PDF and its Printed Counterpart

When someone looking at a printed book speaks to someone looking at an online PDF of that same book and tells them to delete the last paragraph on Page 19, they may both be looking at Page 19 but actually be seeing different pages. In this tutorial we will look at how PDF page numbers differ from printed page numbers, and follow along with the sample files to learn how to reconcile them.

Check out the Article by guest author Les Greenberg

Tips, Tricks and Dirty Cheats!

This week's Tip, Trick or Dirty Cheat is courtesy of CMX Associate Stephanie Sullivan

Using Snippets to Speed up CSS Development

One of the easiest ways to speed up your CSS development in Dreamweaver is through the use of your own custom snippets. They also get you around a little short-coming in Dreamweaver whereby you can only create a new CSS rule using the CSS dialog. Sometimes I simply want to add a property/value pair using the Properties pane of the CSS Styles panel.

Due to the numerous coding jobs I do for other web development companies, I've created my snippets in a couple different manners. I divided them into folders -- XHTML snippets and CSS snippets. For the XHTML, I created a two-column and three-column version. They're simply empty divs with the basic structure of the page using my naming conventions. For the CSS, I have one set with empty rules which allows me to access them from the Properties panel. The other set has basic properties and styling so that I can modify them to create a custom page.

I also created starter snippets for both horizontal and vertical menus, float/clear classes, form styling, special footers used by some clients, etc. And of course, I have the CMX CSS hacks snippets installed to use when necessary. Snippets can be your very best friend.

Would you like your tip published? Submit it to tips@communitymx.com.

That's it for this week. Stay tuned for the next CMX newsletter!