Gregarius » Shockwaves

Shockwaves

Expanded PhysX Error list

Fetched: May 6th, 2008, 12:11pm CDT by Allen Partridge

Recent posts to the various Director mailing lists - asked the question what on earth is error -26? The error from the Ageia engine indicates that Creating a convex/concave rigidbody failed. Its thrown by the Ageia PhysX xtra - but when you look at the physics error codes - no such error is listed. So I did some digging and found that there are a handful of errors that didn't make it into the docs for D11. I'm positing them here so you all can benefit from the added insight.

These are the missing errors.
-7: These properties are not available
-10: Physics World is not valid
-13: Physics World is not valid
-26: Creating a convex/concave rigidbody failed

You'll find the other errors in the docs in D11 under the physics section. I also thought folks might find useful some notes from a recent presentation on Ageia Physics in Director. Below are images of the slides.
Director 11 Released!

Fetched: April 2nd, 2008, 4:45pm CDT by Allen Partridge

Well its been chaos for me the past couple of weeks as Director 11 hit the shelves and people finally got a chance to see the application running natively on Mactel computers and Vista. (Believe it or not I'm equally swamped with work on D-Next and have been answering literally hundreds of emails daily - working with the tech support team and continuing work on PR - so it's been a wild ride lately.)

I wanted to post tho as there have been many request for a more detailed list of the many legacy bugs that were adresseed in D11 and I wanted to share them here. Click the extended entry to see the list - enjoy!

There is a technote of these coming - and they aren't the only fixes - but i know it helps to know what got cleaned up, so here's the hot list of the biggest ones.

The following legacy issues were all FIXED in Director 11 Legacy Issues Fixed
FIXED ** 1 Shockwave freezes in Firefox after some operations ** FIXED
FIXED ** 2 Sound is not playing properly in some 3D games. It crashes in some instances. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 3 Projector crashes when we minimize the projector window while the dissolve pattern transition is being played. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 4 Audio compression settings not stored with the movie ** FIXED
FIXED ** 5 Cut, Copy, Paste & Undo are not working in Projector Message Window in Mac ** FIXED
FIXED ** 6 Director crashes on importing PSD file ** FIXED
FIXED ** 7 Director crashes when voiceSpeak() is used to speak out a string repeatedly for more than 255 times. It crashes exactly at 255. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 8 When we insert an animated GIF, the filename and path is not retained in the animated gif dialog. Thus when we make changes and press OK, its asking for the file again. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 9 File gets created even on cancelling export operation and also unwanted dialog box appears ** FIXED
FIXED ** 10 Exporting a movie and pressing Cancel for rewrite of original file, corrupts the same. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 11 In Mac If we publish DCR and HTML files into different folders, nothing comes in the Browser when someone plays the HTML file. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 12 Director crashes when text is entered in the paint window for larger font sizes ** FIXED
FIXED ** 13 Director crashes when we click on Options button in 'Export' dialog and change the positions of the slider for Quality ** FIXED
FIXED ** 14 Director crashes when we export any movie with linked sound file ** FIXED
FIXED ** 15 When we select a sprite on the score and use Ctrl+down/up arrow to change its position on the score, its position on the stage also changes ** FIXED
FIXED ** 16 Find is not getting enabled the first time we open the media editor by double clicking on the text cast member. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 17 Shortcut to Find again is not working when we deselect the text and try. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 18 Director crashes when we try to double click on the custom cursor created. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 19 In Mac Scroll bar for 'selected files list' is not working in choose files to update box when few movies are added for upgradation. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 20 In Mac Remove button is not working in Update box , to remove movies added to upgrade. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 21 Director Application crashes after quiting when External cast library is opened. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 22 Director crashes on the Export Dialog Box when we change format to quicktime, click on options and then click OK button ** FIXED
FIXED ** 23 Director crashes while exporting a director movie as quicktime(.mov). After the crash it does not allow us to save the movie even after it throws up a dialog box which says Save before Exit ** FIXED
FIXED ** 24 When media type AVI is on stage , moving stage's scroll bar will cause AVI member to stop while playing and there is serious redraw issue. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 25 Crash is happening while tried to change location of DVD asset to some invalid location. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 26 Shift key not working properly on Mac-Tel ** FIXED
FIXED ** 27 Director crashes on skewing paint to a large extent ** FIXED
FIXED ** 28 Director crashes on moving the text box containing long string in the paint window ** FIXED
FIXED ** 29 Director crashes on entering very long string in paint window ** FIXED
FIXED ** 30 Movie rate comes down to 20 or less fps from 30fps when inline double byte characters are being typed or deleted.The movie crashes 25 percent of the times when we keep pressing a double byte character. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 31 On MacIntel, when the External Editor feature of Director is used to edit a bitmap file on Fireworks 8 (or 9), the changes done in Fireworks does not get reflected in Director. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 32 [XDK] IMoaDrCast::DuplicateCastMem() returns incorrect value ** FIXED
FIXED ** 33 Serious redraw occurs when we close the score when in TabMax and open it when in full screen. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 34 Cuepointnames and cuepointtimes are not displayed in the PI.Only the tooltip appears. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 35 In Mac when we try to export a saved movie in any format, the name for the exported file comes as .mov or .avi. The .dir shouldn't be included. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 36 Scroll bars of 'selected files list' is not working on the import dialog box ** FIXED
FIXED ** 37 In Mac Serious redraw occurs when we maximize the cast window in the Director 8 panel set. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 38 In XDK Most of the callback interface functions are not handling NULL argument and are crashing director ** FIXED
FIXED ** 39 In Mac Text is entered in the text/field cast member added even though focus is not there ** FIXED
FIXED ** 40 line..of method is not working ** FIXED
FIXED ** 41 In Mac when the export operation is in progress (eg. export of movie as avi) clicking cancel doesn't halt the operation. Instead, it continues till completion. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 42 Exported file is not proper if you export a director file having pict,swf, psd etc files as an AVI ** FIXED
FIXED ** 43 In shockwave netStatus command is not working ** FIXED
FIXED ** 44 setposition() method of fileIO xtra is not working correctly ** FIXED
FIXED ** 45 readtoken( )' method of FileIO xtra is not working ** FIXED
FIXED ** 46 In Import dialog box, if a file name is entered in the text field and Import button is clicked, the file doesn't get imported. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 47 Director crashes when we open a movie which had a conversion of a string(length more than 256 chars) into a symbol. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 48 In Mac when we try to create any flash component on stage, they are not visible unless we click on the stage once again after they are created. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 49 Using SetVariable am not able to set the value of a global variable ** FIXED
FIXED ** 50 In Mac Real media videos have stopped working in Director. For real media sprites, we get an alert saying real player needed... ** FIXED
FIXED ** 51 Director crashes on using Newobject ** FIXED
FIXED ** 52 In Mac when RGB is selected as the color mode and we choose a palette, we find that the color palette doesn't reflect any of the changes. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 53 Lingo: List comparison causes director to crash ** FIXED
FIXED ** 54 In Mac Intel, long file names are not imported as they are. They are changed to a format where after 5 or 6 characters, the rest of the name is converted to '#' followed by 4 numbers. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 55 In Mac Director crashes on running movie with wrong script ** FIXED
FIXED ** 56 In Mac we are unable to remove files from the import list once we have done ADD ALL. ** FIXED FIXED ** 57 In Mac Director crashes on closing DVD editor window with DVD inserted ** FIXED
FIXED ** 58 Lingo command put the abbreviated date changes the windows explorer date format in WindowsXP Japanese Language ** FIXED
FIXED ** 59 Browser dependencies movie not working in MacIntel, MacPPC, Win-Firefox - only working in windows IE. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 60 When we click on the colors in the custom color palette, its not getting reflected in the color palette of Paint. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 61 In Using ReadWord() Lingo Function- The last word in a line along with the new line character and the next word is taken as one word. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 62 _movie.puppetTransition() and puppetTransition() functions behaving inconsistently ** FIXED
FIXED ** 63 In Find cast member dialog, the cast member names and cast names are not properly demarcated. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 64 When line size is changed from the property inspector the effect is not visible on the sprite. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 65 Director crashes when modifying the castMemberList property of a cursor cast member ** FIXED
FIXED ** 66 Director hangs and crashes when we press a key while an item is hilighted on the list box flash component ** FIXED
FIXED ** 67 When we give Quicktime movie options and click on Cancel, while exporting application crashes. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 68 IE 7 crashes when we publish the bug movie as HTML and navigate between the URL'sAI ** FIXED
FIXED ** 69 Bad redraw on the stage while selecting sprites on the stage after playing the movie. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 70 Director crashes when assigning non-bitmap mask to a quicktime sprite ** FIXED
FIXED ** 71 When we publish a Windows Projector from Mac, some of the linked AVI files do not show up in the Windows projector when played on Windows. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 72 Director crashes on entering sprite name for text sprite ** FIXED
FIXED ** 73 A Quicktime movie when rotated while playing appears in 2 or more frames at the same time resulting in an incorrect behaviour. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 74 Director Crashes : Selecting a pattern for airbrush and drawing using the airbrush, results in a crash on closing the paint window and reopening it. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 75 Date Chooser- is not working properly on mac. The Properties like disabling and convertion of day from names to number is not working. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 76 External cast members are not displayed in the projector unless we create a CXT out of them and put them in the same directory as the projector. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 77 In Mac when stage and score are docked together, mouseup script(not associated with any sprite) is executed, even when we click on score ** FIXED
FIXED ** 78 On giving invalid values(eg. 1234567 for spread) to the gradient parameters(spread, angle, xoffset etc) for vector shapes, the parameters are not accepting keyboard inputs. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 79 Director crashes when a big arc is drawn in the paint window. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 80 Flash Component - Text Input Box( Can enter Text even after the field is disabled) ** FIXED
FIXED ** 96 _system.memorySize property doesn't work on macintosh ** FIXED
FIXED ** 97 TGA compressor is not available on Macintosh for QT export ** FIXED
FIXED ** 98 Exporting as PICT on macintosh is not adding correct filename extension. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 99 The cursor is causing redraw issues on the text which is made italic. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 100 'Add All' button in the Import dialog is getting enabled only after we select a file. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 101 In Mac Last row of pattern settings dialog box from Paint window is displayed as blank ** FIXED
FIXED ** 102 Preload field for a cast member is not displaying correctly under property inspector window in Mac- Intel ** FIXED
FIXED ** 103 In Mac Unable to import files from internet ** FIXED
FIXED ** 104 The import of video files(mov, avi) from internet is not happening ** FIXED
FIXED ** 105 In the browse window of Animated GIF dialog box (Insert Menu->Media Element) click cancel with the text field empty. Choose file dialog props up. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 106 In Mac when QT member is placed on stage, cmd-shift and click on sound controller pushbutton does not offer override volume range. Also option+RIGHT/Left pushbutton of controller is not working as per expected [fast forward/backward] on satge. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 107 In Mac we are not able to copy or cut QT movie by shift-select using controller bar. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 108 Lingo.ini does not get executed on MacIntel. It may or may not have unicode names.Even Placing it from Configuration folder
to Adobe Director folder does not help. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 109 memberObjRef.move() function does not move the cast member from one cast library to another ** FIXED
FIXED ** 110 3D sprites do not appear in the image file that is published through Director. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 111 Error pops up while trying to change the name of a cast member using JavaScript. This happens when the button in the movie has
more than one behaviour attached to it ** FIXED
FIXED ** 112 Export of current frame as BMP replaces wrong file ** FIXED
FIXED ** 113 In Mac tracking freebytes fails ** FIXED
FIXED ** 114 In Mac when we uncheck the show stage scrollbars in the general preferences and then go to window>Panle Sets> Default. Redraw
issue occurs with the stage. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 115 In Script and Message Windows, Lingo popdown menu (Categorized Lingo) working incorrectly for all ImageObject functions.
The code snippet is incorrect ** FIXED
FIXED ** 116 Shadow image appears in the middle of the script editor on duplicating a script using Ctrl+D ** FIXED
FIXED ** 117 Director crashes on Inserting a gif file from the Animated GIF dialog box (Insert Menu->Media Elements) ** FIXED
118 The Colors in the tool palette are not coming to the previous colors chosen, when we change the color in paint or vector and then come back to stage. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 119 In the dictionary support of script window, some example text has extra unnecessary braces. (eg. 3d Lingo/Javascript >>Member -
Sprite >> addCamera) ** FIXED
FIXED ** 120 A dependent file cannot be added by typing the file path and clicking on Add button. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 121 newColorRatio() method does not produce appropriate error messages when invalid values are passed as arguments. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 122 Execution of the lingo script castLib(1).selection = [ [ -10, 10] ] makes Director hang ** FIXED
FIXED ** 123 Tabbed view of Stage and Score is lost when publishing an image file(JPG file) ** FIXED
FIXED ** 124 In Mac Shockwave not working in Firefox ** FIXED
FIXED ** 125 Flash Component - DateChooser - monthNames property is not working ** FIXED
FIXED ** 126 Flash Component - DateChooser - dayNames property is not working ** FIXED
FIXED ** 127 DateChooser Component -- disabledDays property is not working ** FIXED
FIXED ** 129 Flash Component- Combo Box( The Visible- Invisible) Property doesnt work Properly. ** FIXED
FIXED ** 130 Remove button not highlighted when any particular file is selected in Open dialog box which appears on clicking Add Dependent files button ** FIXED
New Director Tutorials resource goes online

Fetched: February 26th, 2008, 11:17pm CST by Allen Partridge

I just heard from Dean Utian who has launched a new website [deansdirectortutorials.com] The site leverages years of Dean's collected knowledge on Director and features a host of very valuable tutorials along with really useful links from around the web. Dean has collected an amazing array of information that Director/Shockwave developers from beginning to advanced will find terrifically useful.

It's a definite first stop when you're looking for anything from a how-to tutorial to that link you can't remember how to find. Extremely well organized and thorough, it is a great collection of all things Director and sure to be a hit. Thanks Dean as always, your contributions to the community are worthy of praise indeed.
GDC and the Director Announcement

Fetched: February 26th, 2008, 8:12pm CST by Allen Partridge

Well it's official, on Tuesday, Feb. 19 at GDC, Director 11 was announced. The announcement featured a demo of a really unbelievably cool game by Lucas Meijer and the Artplant team that features BMX Bike racing across a series of terrains. The new physics look good and the graphics in the game are especially nice.

The news was pretty extensively covered. I've included links to the various articles and blogs below.

Press
AFP, February 19, 2008
Adobe takes aim at video game market
[afp.google.com]
(Also printed at Physorg.com)

CNET February 18, 2008
Adobe goes after game developers with 3D engine in Director 11
[news.com]
(Also printed at Webware.com)

Digital Arts Online, February 19, 2008
Adobe finally upgrades Director to version 11
[digitalartsonline.co.uk]

Macworld, February 19, 2008
Adobe Introduces Director 11
[macworld.com]

Macworld UK, February 19, 2008
Adobe Director 11 ships March '08
[macworld.co.uk]

PCMagazine, February 19, 2008
Adobe’s New Director Takes Game Physics to Web
[pcmag.com]
(Also printed at ExtremeTech.com)

Personal Computer World, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11
[pcw.co.uk]
(Also printed at computeractive.co.uk)

RTT News, February 19, 2008 (Press Release)
Adobe Systems Launches Adobe Director 11 Software
http://www.rttnews.com/sp/breakingnews.asp?date=02/19/2008&item=11&vid=0

TechConnect Magazine, February 19, 2008
Adobe announces Director 11 authoring software
[tcmagazine.com]

InfoWorld, February 19, 2008
Adobe upgrades Director
[weblog.infoworld.com]

Campus Technology, February 19, 2008
Director 11 Coming in March
[campustechnology.com]
(Also picked up in T.H.E Journal)

ChannelWeb, February 19, 2008
Adobe Upgrades Multimedia Authoring Tool
[crn.com]

Gaming Today, February 19, 2008
GDC 2008: Adobe 'Director 11' Coming in March
[news.filefront.com]

Computer Business Review UK, February 20, 2008
Adobe Offers Multimedia Authoring Tool
[cbronline.com]

TechNews Daily, February 19, 2008
Adobe Director 11
[technologynewsdaily.com]

Reuters, February 19, 2008
Analysts flag unusual buying in Adobe upside calls
[reuters.com]
(Also picked up in MSNMoney.com, EarthTimes UK, and U.S. Daily)

Blogs

Director Podcast, February 18, 2008
The NEW Director is finally here
[magicgate.com]

Impact, February 19, 2008
Adobe Rolls Out Director 11
[blog.inm.com]

Yourmaclifeshow.com, February 19, 2008
Adobe to Launch Director 11 by March 2008
[yourmaclifeshow.com]

G4 TV blog, February 19, 2008
Adobe Hopes to Corner Gaming
http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/682949/Adobe_Hopes_To_Corner_Gaming.html?utm_source=g4tv&utm_medium=rssfeeds&utm_campaign=TheFeed

MacUser, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11
[macuser.com]

arstechnica, February 19, 2008
Adobe releases first update to Director in four years
[arstechnica.com]

Digg, February 19, 2008
Adobe announces Director 11 authoring software
[digg.com]
(Linked to TechConnect Magazine article)

Director @ Night, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11
[directoratnight.com]

Developer Dispatch, February 19, 2008
Director 11 to Ship in March
[developerdispatch.com]

GeekGlue, February 18, 2008
Director 11: Coming Soon
[geekglue.blogspot.com]

Infoworld, February 19, 2008
Adobe upgrades Director
[weblog.infoworld.com]

MacMinute, February 19, 2008
Adobe to Launch Director 11 by March 2008
[macminute.com]

Teachable Moment, February 19, 2008
Adobe Introduces Director 11
[teachable.org]

Ubergizmo, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11!
[ubergizmo.com]

So what's in it? Well the biggest thing is runtime support for MacPPC, Mac Tiger and Mac Leopard. Also runtimes on Windows platforms including Vista. That means that it will be a huge relief for continuing users. The 3D engine has added 3D save both in authoring and runtime, and the physics has shifted to Ageia. With Ageia physics comes, built in raycasting (which is much, much, much faster) and terrain / height maps. Also new is DirectX 9 support.

Also new is unicode support. Users can now easily port to other languages taking advantage of the integrated support for the extended character set used by many languages. In addition, text rendering is now unhinged from the operating system - allowing users to customize the antialiasing. Filters have also been added, including the usual array of drop shadows and other filters.
GDC and the Director Announcement

Fetched: February 26th, 2008, 12:40am CST by Allen Partridge

Well it's official, on Tuesday, Feb. 19 at GDC, Director 11 was announced. The announcement featured a demo of a really unbelievably cool game by Lucas Meijer and the Artplant team that features BMX Bike racing across a series of terrains. The new physics look good and the graphics in the game are especially nice.

The news was pretty extensively covered. I've included links to the various articles and blogs below.

Press
AFP, February 19, 2008
Adobe takes aim at video game market
[afp.google.com]
(Also printed at Physorg.com)

CNET February 18, 2008
Adobe goes after game developers with 3D engine in Director 11
[news.com]
(Also printed at Webware.com)

Digital Arts Online, February 19, 2008
Adobe finally upgrades Director to version 11
[digitalartsonline.co.uk]

Macworld, February 19, 2008
Adobe Introduces Director 11
[macworld.com]

Macworld UK, February 19, 2008
Adobe Director 11 ships March '08
[macworld.co.uk]

PCMagazine, February 19, 2008
Adobe’s New Director Takes Game Physics to Web
[pcmag.com]
(Also printed at ExtremeTech.com)

Personal Computer World, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11
[pcw.co.uk]
(Also printed at computeractive.co.uk)

RTT News, February 19, 2008 (Press Release)
Adobe Systems Launches Adobe Director 11 Software
http://www.rttnews.com/sp/breakingnews.asp?date=02/19/2008&item=11&vid=0

TechConnect Magazine, February 19, 2008
Adobe announces Director 11 authoring software
[tcmagazine.com]

InfoWorld, February 19, 2008
Adobe upgrades Director
[weblog.infoworld.com]

Campus Technology, February 19, 2008
Director 11 Coming in March
[campustechnology.com]
(Also picked up in T.H.E Journal)

ChannelWeb, February 19, 2008
Adobe Upgrades Multimedia Authoring Tool
[crn.com]

Gaming Today, February 19, 2008
GDC 2008: Adobe 'Director 11' Coming in March
[news.filefront.com]

Computer Business Review UK, February 20, 2008
Adobe Offers Multimedia Authoring Tool
[cbronline.com]

TechNews Daily, February 19, 2008
Adobe Director 11
[technologynewsdaily.com]

Reuters, February 19, 2008
Analysts flag unusual buying in Adobe upside calls
[reuters.com]
(Also picked up in MSNMoney.com, EarthTimes UK, and U.S. Daily)

Blogs

Director Podcast, February 18, 2008
The NEW Director is finally here
[magicgate.com]

Impact, February 19, 2008
Adobe Rolls Out Director 11
[blog.inm.com]

Yourmaclifeshow.com, February 19, 2008
Adobe to Launch Director 11 by March 2008
[yourmaclifeshow.com]

G4 TV blog, February 19, 2008
Adobe Hopes to Corner Gaming
http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/682949/Adobe_Hopes_To_Corner_Gaming.html?utm_source=g4tv&utm_medium=rssfeeds&utm_campaign=TheFeed

MacUser, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11
[macuser.com]

arstechnica, February 19, 2008
Adobe releases first update to Director in four years
[arstechnica.com]

Digg, February 19, 2008
Adobe announces Director 11 authoring software
[digg.com]
(Linked to TechConnect Magazine article)

Director @ Night, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11
[directoratnight.com]

Developer Dispatch, February 19, 2008
Director 11 to Ship in March
[developerdispatch.com]

GeekGlue, February 18, 2008
Director 11: Coming Soon
[geekglue.blogspot.com]

Infoworld, February 19, 2008
Adobe upgrades Director
[weblog.infoworld.com]

MacMinute, February 19, 2008
Adobe to Launch Director 11 by March 2008
[macminute.com]

Teachable Moment, February 19, 2008
Adobe Introduces Director 11
[teachable.org]

Ubergizmo, February 19, 2008
Adobe Launches Director 11!
[ubergizmo.com]

So what's in it? Well the biggest thing is runtime support for MacPPC, Mac Tiger and Mac Leopard. Also runtimes on Windows platforms including Vista. That means that it will be a huge relief for continuing users. The 3D engine has added 3D save both in authoring and runtime, and the physics has shifted to Ageia. With Ageia physics comes, built in raycasting (which is much, much, much faster) and terrain / height maps. Also new is DirectX 9 support.

Also new is unicode support. Users can now easily port to other languages taking advantage of the integrated support for the extended character set used by many languages. In addition, text rendering is now unhinged from the operating system - allowing users to customize the antialiasing. Filters have also been added, including the usual array of drop shadows and other filters.
The Director Podcast, iPhones, and Air

Fetched: February 8th, 2008, 6:28pm CST by Allen Partridge

I'm back in San Francisco, and thrilled to find that the Director Podcast is in fact back. Skip emailed me to tell me that there had been over 1400 downloads in the first 24 hours. Honestly, how many software packages have theme songs and podcasts?

http://www.magicgate.com/podcast/director/

Rumors are swimming about Director. I heard whispers all over the plane. One kid ran up to me pointing and shouting 'Look mommy its that Director Preacher!' Needless to say I was totally flattered. After I slipped the kid a 20 I sat down to watch Wired Science on my iPhone. That's right, I did it. I bought the iPhone. I hate to admit it, but I haven't been happier with a tech-purchase since my blue clamshell ibook. Man I loved that thing. That was the first Mac I ran D8.5 on. You may bow your head in reverence when I mention 8.5.

So needless to say, when I saw the ads for the new MacBook Air... I drooled. I played the videos. I read the tech sheets. My eyes glistened over and I made wild suggestions to my wife that I should definitely get one. I even contacted Apple via the online chat to see how low end the video card would actually be. (They told me to buy a macBook Pro. It may have something to do with me telling them I generally use my laptop for 3D modeling, animation and game development.)

But after hauling my 22 lb (okay maybe not 22) Dell XPS Gen 2 Laptop halfway across the planet, my back wants a 3 lb laptop with screaming fast graphics performance and the sleekest look since my beloved clamshell. Okay maybe its unreasonable to ask for a 512 mb graphics card in the worlds thinnest computer, but a boy can dream can't he? Can't he?
How many is half a billion

Fetched: January 27th, 2008, 6:21pm CST by Allen Partridge

Did you know that there are half a billion people (or perhaps more accurately computers) on this planet with Shockwave installed? Really, the current Shockwave user base is larger than 500 million and growing. It got me thinking about the size of that number. Its one of those too large to visualize numbers.

If each one paid you 2$ US you'd be a billionaire. There are approximately one and two thirds players installed for every person in North America. There are about enough for every two persons in India to share one. In fact, there are about enough for every 12 people on the planet to share 1. That means there are so many installed copies of Shockwave, that there is essentially 1 for every 12 people.

I wonder how that compares to televisions? Other software applications? It would make a fascinating graph wouldn't it? I'd like to see it done in Shockwave - perhaps Shockwave 3D. In fact, I'd be happy to give the first person to send me one ... lol (nah, I'm not promising any more beers.)

;)
My Beer Debts May Be Coming Due

Fetched: January 24th, 2008, 7:28pm CST by Allen Partridge

I realized today that at long last all of my promises to buy beer, may finally be collected upon. I have been actively developing software and participating in the Director community for more than 15 years and in all that time I have eagerly thanked fellow developers - with the idle expression - "Hey - when i meet you, I owe you a beer!" I have been graciously invited to speak at this years Game Developers Conference (GDC) and now that the appointment approaches - I realize that the beers I owe far outweigh those that I may have earned.

So I'm clearly thinking a lot now about beer. Where in San Francisco will I find cheap beer? How cheap can it be without causing further offense? How much beer can we 40 something developers really drink? And a host of other beer related nonsense.

A friend heard my concerns over beer and offered me a recipe - for beer bread. I don't really cook, so i have no idea what beer bread is exactly. But i can presume that making beer bread might be both an amusing pastime and a potentially addictive micro-game. So I thought i could at least spread the recipe for beer bread. The tax for sharing said beer-bread batter recipe? A beer of course.

4 cups flour

2 tbsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1/4 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 HALF can of beer
*Beware the forward slash ;)
Mix ingredients, pour into a greased loaf pan. Bake at 375 for 70 minutes. Remove and cool.

I asked my friend if the bread was any good and he claimed it was 'yummy.' Apparently more so if you use a dark beer. In fact, recent studies suggest that beer is quite good for you. Though I'm not sure that substantial quantities of beer are recommended.

When I was in Bangalore, my friend Vivek Pai introduced me to Kingfisher Beer. I was immediately in love with the brew and knew that I would now be forced to find a US distributor for this wonderful fluid. A little web search and voilà - i was able to order a case. But I have no plans to bring it with me to GDC. ;)
Phoenix Rising: The Director Podcast is coming back baby!

Fetched: January 22nd, 2008, 9:23pm CST by Allen Partridge

If you haven't gotten down to that funky beat you haven't really celebrated the magic which is the Director Podcast. MagicGate's Director Podcast is a celebration of all things Director. The entire community mourned when the podcast stopped appearing at the start of 2007 and one of the first things on my mind when I started serving as Director Evangelist was getting Skip Kimpel to re-establish the coolest Podcast in his arsenal.

I'm thrilled to report that Skip confirmed today that the Director Podcast will return to service in a matter of days. Its the perfect chance to download any back issues you may have missed and get caught up as Skip revamps the format and preps the podcast for its reintroduction to the community.

Skip said that he is still inundated with constant requests for new editions of the podcast every week and that he's thrilled to be able to roll the production back into action in celebration of the upcoming release of Director's new version from Adobe. As most folks know the Director / Shockwave FAQ is reporting that the announcement will come next month - which means the launch must be soon thereafter.

I'm personally thrilled to see this Podcast returning to service, yet another sign of Director's growing momentum as we build toward the launch of the next version. Adobe Director users have often been working with this amazing engine for nearly 20 years and they are generally very excited that Adobe is releasing a new version of Director. The release couldn't come soon enough for hungry developers and authors anxious to port projects to the rumoured new operating systems.

So welcome back Skip! We've all missed you. I can't wait to see what mysteries you have in store for us.
Director for Casual Games

Fetched: January 22nd, 2008, 4:44am CST by Allen Partridge

I ran across a blog by Hanford Leemore about using Director for casual games [blog.hanfordlemoore.com] and i couldn't agree more with the sentiment. Give Hanford's blog on the subject a look, its a very well reasoned argument.

As you may know I recently authored a book "Creating Casual Games for Fun and Profit" published by Charles River Media (I know the title is ... ugh ... but they never let me choose titles.) Nonetheless it's reallly the first and I think still the only serious investigation of the topic. I surveyed the active casual game community and came to simlar conclusions. Given the incredibly short development cycles for casual games today and the need to deliver online and offline solutions, Director is the obvious choice.

There's an excerpt from my book online here if you're in a reading mood.

I found while writing the book that in fact a good number of todays casual games are developed with Director. You see casual games operate on razor thin margins and are generally not expected to make a serious profit. They are very much a blockbuster publishing industry - with developers and publishers depending on the mega-hits to generate profits sufficient to cover all of their expenses for dozens, even hundreds of other titles.

People love to play thes online gems, but are considerably more hesitant to buy them. A great turnover in the industry is about 2% purchases on downloads. You can imagine how frustrating it must be for game developers to see their games played tens of thousands of times and never realize any significant profit from them. The exception however is the lure in this booming industry. One serious hit casual game will generate millions in profits.

The industry is also taking a substantial turn as more and more industry portals (the primary distribution mechanism for casual games) turn to advertising revenue sharing models - passing some of their substantial ad revenue down to the developer and lending a little equity to the system - suggesting that the paradigm might have some longevity. Growth rates in this industry are nothing short of mind-blowing. Its worth giving the industry a serious look and Director is a great candidate to facilitate the rapid application development that is expected in this booming industry.