Now that I spend more of my time programming in Flash, I wish there was a code snippet library for saving actionscript. This would allow me to build a library of the common functions and classes I use over and over: an XML load and parse snippet, a NetConnection snippet, one for mic and cam settings – shared objects – sound objects – component styles etc,.

Since that day hasn’t come, I decided to build a simple database to serve the puropse.

(click image for larger view)

The database is very basic, but allows me to:

• paste code into a text field
• provide a description of the code
• add URL to the project (if relevant),
• add info related to the author of the code (if from a book or online community)
• add the date
• include the path to the file (if there is one)
• select a checkbox to help identify the code as being for Flash or Flash Server projects
• and best of all, search for and retrieve the code so that I can reuse it in other projects

The nice thing about having code in a datbase is that it will allow me to organize code centrally. This will keep me from having to search through flash projects to find that bit of code I need, or to type it – again – from scratch. I figure I’ll put the database on my thumb drive so that I can access it at work and at home.

Better idea? While I was developing the database it dawned on me that an action script wiki might be a lot more valuable. A wiki would allow the world wide flash developer community to share code and best practices for Flash and Flash server. Maybe Adobe should consider hosting something like this. Currently they have a wiki for AS 3 development, and to some extent their online integrated help system is “wiki like” in that it provides good code examples that users can comment and add their own code to, but a wiki may get more input from the community at large?

I am always on the look out for easy to use apps that students can use to create and publish narrated presentations/slideshows to use in online courses. I recently come across a good one. It’s called Bubbleshare and though it wasn’t designed with this in mind, turns out to be a very powerful online slideshow (presentation) builder.

Currently online students have been developing narrated powerpoints using the built in narration feature that is part of PowerPoint. The problem with this is that the resulting file size is huge, and without students being able to compress and publish to the web themseleves, the whole process becomes burdensome: Student A has to upload to the course and then download student B’s,C’sD’s etc,.so that they can review and comment. Even with broadband it’s a pain..

What CyberCampus has been doing to help alleviate this for students is to have them send their presentation to us using “Yousendit.com.” We then use Impaticato to publish the file to their course (it encodes it to a java player file). You can imagine how this will not scale, even at our sized University.

The nice thing about Bubbleshare is that it will allow students to do everything themself. Bubbleshare allows a student to upload (in batch) images. This means that a student can export their PowerPoint and then upload them to Bubbleshare. After they are uploaded a student can add narration and captions, and then publish and share the presentation as a slideshow. What’s also nice is that you can rearrange the order that the slides play by dragging the slide to a new position within the sequence (yes through the wonders of AJAX).

It’s in beta (no suprise there) and, it’s free (also no suprise ), but it’s definately worth checking out especially if you have students in online courses that you want to be able to produce presentations.
About it being free: The hesitation I always have with free services is that I’m never too sure if I should build interest with students and faculty in using the service. Will it be around for long? Will the URL persist (if it’s a a graded presentation this becomes important). For the most part, I tend to express to the instructors I support that apps and tools will come and go, and the more you accept this as the norm, the less you will be dissapointed.

If interested, here’s an example of a Bubbleshare presentation I made from a PowerPoint. An upcoming Workshop

All that I did was to export the PowerPoint slides as .jpg’s – uploaded the directory of images and then add the narration and a few balloons. Online Audio recording is powered by Flash Server. Of course I am happy about this since I have been waiting for Flash COm to catch on in this way for years. It works well and fits the online application model.

About:
Unyte is a skype enabled plugin that allows anyone to share their computer screen, or open application, with up to four guests. What makes it unique is that guests don’t have to install it, nor download any plugin to participate. Infact, they don’t even have to have skype installed. You just send guest(s) a URL and password (these are automatically generated). They use these to initiate the session via a secure website, provided by WebDialogs.

Why I was drawn to it:
When I first read about it, two services at work came to mind immediately that might benefit from it; The online writing owl (OWL), and The Math Online Tutoring Help (MOTH). These online tutoring services are currently asynchronous, but this may partly be as a result of there not being aware of free synchronous solutions that can augment the current model; a scheduled time where online students can meet with a tutor “live” to get help. The fact that it’s free and that participants just need Explorer, Firefox, and Safari and the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) makes it open to almost everyone.

Other features that makes it cool is that the “presenter” can yield control of their desktop, or application to guests so that they can interact with what’s being shared. In this way it could be used by students as a way to collaboratively edit Word documents or build group presentations. Since it ties into skype the process is further enabled by being able to send files during the share. In a team work scenario, one student could send an image using file sharing that gets placed into a PowerPoint. At the same time, the PowerPoint could be edited by a third person in real-time. The final file could then be emailed to the team member who couldn’t join because they were at work whose responsible for performing final edits and posting to the course website.

For a good overview look at the help pages:

To continue with Skype, tomorrow I’ll discuss my experience using Verosee (beta) which is a skype-centric collaboration app that allows for fileVersioning, offlineSynch and DesktopSharing. No Tags]]> http://www.radiojames.com/jblog/2006/01/skype-kodak-kodak-photo-voice/feed/ 6