Today’s Chores
Today I've got a few things going on:
1. Adding a few teacher-requested features to the working build of Showing Evidence
They're simple changes on the surface, but involve a lot of conditional checking to enable certain features in certain modes. This part of the codebase is relatively fragile; next time I would think about implementing some kind of mode manager tied into some kind of distributed event management class so these kind of changes are trivial. Right now, they're not. At the time we started, the modes themselves were not known, so I shouldn't beat myself up too much about it.
2. Show intern Jason how to convert his Actionscript 1.0 project to clean 2.0 code
I had him start in AS 1.0 with basic movieclip manipulation so he could just get used to MovieClips and events in Flash. At the time we began I figured that since he didn't have much OOP experience out of school, it might make sense for him to program using procedural methods so I could see how he thought in code. After that, I would know how to present the OOP material as it pertains to Flash. One unfortunate side effect: I had forgotten how lame the compiler is about error checking in AS1.0, and I didn't force Jason to strictly type (as in variable typing). And it's funny to see how silly the MovieClip class and hierarchy is as you're explaining it...thank goodness for Moock's Essential Actionscript. Today we'll be porting Jason's code into a class framework, and then I think he'll really be able to take off.
3. Meet up with Eric in Manchester
It's been happening more frequently: I'm meeting like-minded people through this blog. Meeting up at noon to meet, because it seems like the thing to do.
On the Backburner
- Quickbooks Setup (I've been putting this off for months)
- Reviewing the dozen or so job-related boards for usefulness in establishing a project pipeline
- Ramping up on the architectural outline for an upcomining Flash creative website project. Not a lot of money, but a good creative opportunity.
- Putting together a plan for implementing a very small-scale WordPress 1.5 based hosting service for clients. I have hit critical mass on requests for this, and if I can make it work monetarily I think this is something worth doing.
- Taxes Taxes Taxes
