Currently Browsing: RIA
Dec 17th 10
Posted by Remus Stratulat in RIA, Tools
The latest version (1.2) of Adobe SiteCatalyst extension for Flash Pro was just released. The first major change that can be seen form the beginning is a new screen just after the login.
Simple Tracking
This first screen will present two options: Simple Tracking and Custom Tracking. The Custom Tracking is the previously available way to track Flash applications. This version of the extension, adds a new simpler way for those that just want to track something fast and do not need customization.
This Simple Tracking will allow for three simple tagging workflows.
1. Tagging the widget
Track widget view
Just after logging in and selecting Simple Tracking from the previous screen all that needs to be done to track every displaying of a SWF is to select the report suite you need your data to be sent and check the “Track widget views” checkbox. If you enable debugging (conveniently placed on the left bottom side of the panel) you can see the following call being made by the SWF just at the beginning.
AppMeasurement Debug: http://a……m.112.2o7.net/b/ss/acralexqe/0/FAS-3.1.2-AS3C/s31989403446204?AQB=1&ndh=1&t=17/11/2010%2011%3A36%3A55%205%20-120&ce=ASCII&ns=a……m&cdp=2&pageName=Simple%20application&g=file%3A///C%7C/demo/Simple%2520application.swf&cc=USD&s=1680×1050&AQE=1
http://a……m.112.2o7.net/b/ss/acralexqe/0/FAS-3.1.2-AS3C/s31989403446204?AQB=1
ndh=1
t=17/11/2010 11:36:55 5 -120
ce=ASCII
ns=a……m
cdp=2
pageName=Simple application
g=file:///C|/demo/Simple%20application.swf
cc=USD
s=1680×1050
AQE=1
So, this was very easy. I have now a way to be notified each time somebody views my application. And of course not only this. SiteCatalyst infers a lot of other useful information out of this request.
As it can be seen, the pageName parameter is automatically filled with the widget name.
2. Tagging a frame
Tagging a frame
Two steps are required to tag a frame view: select the frame from the timeline and click the “Add tracking” button. To have more relevant information in the SiteCatalyst reports, you can specify a label for that tag and you will know how many users reached that frame. The generated call looks like this:
AppMeasurement Debug: http://a……m.112.2o7.net/b/ss/acralexqe/0/FAS-3.1.2-AS3C/s36277548735961?AQB=1&ndh=1&t=17/11/2010%2011%3A48%3A32%205%20-120&ce=ASCII&ns=a……m&cdp=2&pageName=Simple%20application%3A%3Ashow%20model&g=file%3A///C%7C/demo/Simple%2520application.swf&cc=USD&s=1680×1050&AQE=1
http://a……m.112.2o7.net/b/ss/acralexqe/0/FAS-3.1.2-AS3C/s36277548735961?AQB=1
ndh=1
t=17/11/2010 11:48:32 5 -120
ce=ASCII
ns=a……m
cdp=2
pageName=Simple application::show model
g=file:///C|/demo/Simple%20application.swf
cc=USD
s=1680×1050
AQE=1
You may notice that the pageName parameter now contains both the widget name and the frame name.
3. Tagging and object
Tagging an object
Tagging an object is as simple as tagging a frame. There are however two differences. For an object, it’s instance name (in this case Cancel) will be used to identify the tag. Also for objects, a trigger event can be selected. By default the click event is selected.
Running the application and pressing the Cancel button that becomes visible on frame 31 will generate the following call to SiteCatalyst.
AppMeasurement Debug: http://a……m.112.2o7.net/b/ss/acralexqe/0/FAS-3.1.2-AS3C/s38168986542150?AQB=1&ndh=1&t=17/11/2010%2011%3A56%3A21%205%20-120&ce=ASCII&ns=a……m&cdp=2&pageName=Simple%20application%3A%3ACancel&cc=USD&pe=lnk_o&pev1=Simple%20application%3A%3ACancel&pev2=Simple%20application%3A%3ACancel&s=1680×1050&AQE=1
http://a……m.112.2o7.net/b/ss/acralexqe/0/FAS-3.1.2-AS3C/s38168986542150?AQB=1
ndh=1
t=17/11/2010 11:56:21 5 -120
ce=ASCII
ns=a……m
cdp=2
pageName=Simple application::Cancel
cc=USD
pe=lnk_o
pev1=Simple application::Cancel
pev2=Simple application::Cancel
s=1680×1050
AQE=1
The pageName parameter now contains a combination of the widget name and the button name. Also two other parameters are sent now: pev1 and pev2. This are the URL and the URL Name that are sent because this object related calls are sent as Custom Links.
This simple way of tagging a SWF will be most of the time sufficient. If this is not the case, you can always go to the Custom Tracking to benefit from the full power of SiteCatalyst customizations.
Aug 11th 10
Posted by Remus Stratulat in RIA, Tools
I have written lately only about SiteCatalyst and Test&Target, specifically about the extensions created to help a Flash Pro user to easily instrument a Flash project.
There is another project that is kind of related to these ones, but is all about data: Adobe SiteCatalyst NetAverages.
SiteCatalyst NetAverages
So, what is this good for?
First of all, in my opinion, you can use it to optimize your web site or web application to have a best look on the most popular browsers or platforms. It’s a 20-80 kind of thing. Use 20% of your energy to support 80% of your market. And what better way to know what are your 80′s?
NetAverages offers a wide range of properties you can drill down into, like: JavaScript version, screen resolution, operating system or flash player version. It has properties for both the desktop world and mobile.
However, by far the coolest feature for me is the ability to set up alerts. Do you what to know when Google Chrome reaches 10% of the market? It’s just one click away:
Setting up an alert in NetAverages
Jun 4th 10
Posted by Remus Stratulat in Programming, RIA
Returning to my previous post, I have promised to continue talking about these extensions. The first one is Omniture Test&Target for Flash Professional CS5. As a picture is a thousand words, this article is a very long one 
.
For this demo I will use a simple add that shows an image, some text and a button to click on. My goal is to have two variations for this add, both in the same SWF and the targeting for this ad to be done using Test&Target.
Create campaign and flashbox
As you can see in the image, I am already logged in and I can choose to work on an existing campaign or to create a new one. I will create a new one.
Create campaign and flashbox
After creating the campaign I will create two experiences that will hold the two variations I want for this ad.
Create experiences
So, one variation is exactly what the ad is showing right now and I’ve called it “Local Picks”. The other variation called “Subscription” will use the same ad as a template (design and animation) but will have a different image, text and button label. The first thing I will change is the text. The text is a symbol in this case so I will go inside the symbol and using the Include button I will include the text into the Test&Target workflow, making it part of both experiences.
Add text to experiences
To have variations between the two experiences I will select the Subscription experience from the Test&Target panel, go inside the text symbol and change the text to “Subscribe to our magazine”
Change the text
I will do the same thing with the buttons’s label and with the image.
Add image to experience
When adding an image to the Test&Target workflow, the image is transformed into a symbol and a labeled keyframe is created on that symbol timeline for each experience present into the panel. To change the image for the Subscription experience I will go inside the symbol and for the second keyframe I will swap the image with a different one from the Library panel.
Swap the image
Swap the image
After this, I sync my work with the Test&Target server. By doing so, all the information necessary to present the two variations for this ad are saved on the Test&Target server.
My campaign and flashbox on the Test&Target server.
On the server, I can still edit the text present in the ad WITHOUT the need to recompile the SWF. I can create new experiences if I want to test different tag lines also WITHOUT recompiling the SWF. The only limitation is that I can not select for these experiences images that are not already embedded in the SWF, at least not in the way I have created this demo. This is possible if a Loader object is used and the experiences will hold the URL to a remote image.
I will create some very simple targeting rules for my ad: I want my site to show the Local Picks experience for all the new users arriving on it and to show the Subscription experience for all the returning ones.
Add targeting rules
All I need to do now is approve the campaign and I’m set.
Belorussian provided by PC
Apr 30th 10
Posted by Remus Stratulat in Programming, RIA
We’ve been working hard for the last couple of months, after the Omniture was acquired by Adobe, to create an integration between Omniture products and Adobe products. The result was the Omniture SiteCatalyst and Test&Target extensions.
First, a short description taken from the release notes:
- Omniture SiteCatalyst extension for Adobe Flash Professional CS5 – Visually add tracking to Flash content, directly from the creative workflow, without manually tagging each piece of content. This will dramatically shorten analytics implementation times, allowing you to focus on the impact of your creative work.
- Omniture Test&Target extension for Adobe Flash Professional CS5 – Easily create and manage Flash content variations for online marketing campaigns directly from your creative workflow, without duplicating effort or writing ActionScript code.
- Omniture Test&Target extension for Adobe Dreamweaver CS5 - Visually create and manage HTML content for online marketing campaigns, without having to write HTML code.
And now, lets present the Flash Pro extensions using some images:
login
call to action
working environment
Soon I will start to create some small demos to showcase how to work with this extensions on a real working scenario. Stay tuned..
Feb 8th 10
Posted by Remus Stratulat in RIA
Ted Patrick has this post about Flash 10.1 and AIR 2.0. http://onflash.org/ted/2010/02/improve-flash-101-and-air-20.php
These platforms are in beta and our support is needed to use them in the real world and report any problems we may find.
Jan 22nd 10
Posted by Remus Stratulat in RIA
Today I got an email from my bank. I thought it to be one of the usual emails telling me about new services that they have, credit cards or security threats that I should be aware.
Today thou I got a surprise: agendaBT. An AIR application that is a very nice agenda application. You can take notes per days using different colors, highlight what you have written or just draw. And while this is not particularly exciting by itself, the design is impressive, I really like it. You can see for yourself:
agendaBT
Jun 1st 09
Posted by Remus Stratulat in Flex, RIA, Tools
Flash Platform tooling beta launch is now live. Adobe rolled out a lot of content on the labs and devnet. Get the latest Flash Builder 4 (ex. Flex Builder) and Flash Catalyst to play with them.
- Labs content
- Devnet articles
- Press release http://www.adobe.com/aboutadobe/pressroom/pressreleases/200906/060109NewFlashPlatformTools.html
May 8th 09
Posted by Remus Stratulat in RIA
I just found out from a Tweet post about this tool and I rushed to install it.
Polaris - Adobe AIR desktop reporing for Google Analytics
It is simple to use and free to manage one website profile. It has nice charts and visual transitions. I would love to have this tool for WordPress stats also
Apr 13th 09
Posted by Remus Stratulat in Programming, RIA
Adobe Romania is organizing a developer day in Bucharest on 19th May. More information can be found on Adobe Romania site. It is about Flex, Flash, AIR, web technologies, RIA, ColdFusion and a lot more.
You will have the chance to meet with Ben Forta – Senior Evangelist, Digby Horner – SVP Emerging Markets and lots of Adobe Romania people.
Nov 27th 08
Posted by Remus Stratulat in Programming, RIA
I have written before about Spaz – the Twitter client I use.
Because it is written in AIR and because is open source and AIR 1.5 just got out with new interesting features, I thought, why not “bend” a little Spaz, just for fun.
I say just for fun because it was not something done after a careful consideration of the usefulness of adding this effect in Spaz.
I have used as a starting point the BlaskBookSafe application described in my previous post. The changes made in Spaz were as follows:
- I have updated spaz/assets/air/AIRAliases.js with the last one provided by Adobe AIR SDK 1.5
- I have copied the bender folder from BlackBookSafe into spaz
- I have copied BenderEffect.js and Tween.js from BBS to spaz/assets/lib folder
- I have added some small pieces of code in spaz/index.html and spaz/assets/assets/spaz.prefs.js
The added code in index.html was of course importing those two scripts added in the lib folder. We need them in order to create the effect and also to “tween” it, to transform the bend into an animation.
The code from spaz.prefs.js is a little more complicated and it creates the bend effect and starts the tween:
1: 'window-alpha': {
2: setUI: function(value) {
3: $('#window-alpha').val(parseInt(value));
4: },
5: onChange: function(value) {
6: //alert(percentage+"%");
7: percentage = parseInt(value);
8: if (isNaN(percentage)) {
9: percentage = 100;
10: }
11: if (percentage < 25) {
12: percentage = 25;
13: }
14: var val = parseInt(percentage) / 100;
15: if (isNaN(val)) {
16: val = 1;
17: } else if (val >= 1) {
18: val = 1;
19: } else if (val <= 0) {
20: val = 1;
21: }
22:
23: /* the bending code */
24: BlenderEffect.get('app:/bender/page.pbj', function(shader){
25: var tween = BlenderEffect.createShaderTransition(window.htmlLoader,
26: shader , 1200, Tween.effects.elasticEase);
27: tween.hideOnFinish = false;
28: tween.start(true);
29: });
30:
31: window.htmlLoader.alpha = val;
32: },
33: check: function() {
34: .....
35: }
The addition was inside the onChange method for the window-alpha setting.
The reason I choose this method was to have a visual indication for changing the alpha setting from preferences. With all this in place, when changing the alpha setting for Spaz a nice effect will warp a little bit the window. I will let you to discover this as an image will not do it.
In the mean time I will send an email to Funkatron, maybe they will be interested in incorporating this in a more useful way .
