December 2005

I’ll keep this short and sweet: Merry Christmas!

I’ve finally finished the IPD attachments system (which will likely come to IPB 3.0 along with the new RTE) and I’m pretty pleased with it.

I’ve spent a lot of time on the interface to allow one to make multiple uploads without leaving or refreshing the current page. I finally went with a scripted solution that manages an iFrame. It’s at this point that someone (yes, you Dean) says “Hey, why not use AJAX?”. Well, for one - there wasn’t the need to do so. An iFrame suits this job perfectly and degrades nicely when javascript is disabled. If I wrote an AJAX engine for the attachment system, I’d have either had to accept that non-AJAX equipped browsers (admittedly very few) couldn’t upload files or create an iFrame alternative. Secondly, lets only use AJAX when we need to, OK?

As you can see from the movie below, the result is pretty seamless and - paradoxically - you wouldn’t know that it was an iFrame unless you read this blog. The first one to comment “or read the HTML” gets a slap.

The attachments system in IPD is another little framework that accepts ‘plugin’ modules to the main attachment class to generate permissions / file size restrictions. This means that I can quickly add the attachments system to any area of IPD just by adding a bit of HTML mark-up (and the relevant JS loader) and a little plugin class. The rest is handled by the attachments framework.

There’s a bit of tidy up to do. I’m thinking of changing the colour of the status bar if an error is reported and adding the number of stored attachments to the drop down box title: “Manage Current Attachments (4)” to make it obvious that the page / article / whatever already has attachments.

IPD Attachments (3.1mb Quicktime .mov)

So, during the middle of last week Billy told me I should register at last.fm so he could see what manly music I listen to.

Since then, I’ve become a little obsessed with it. For those who don’t know, it’s a website that allows one to download an application that runs in the background which grabs the tracks playing on your media player (iTunes, etc) and sends the information to your account on the last.fm website.

When I first registered and installed the software I was in an acoustic mood. My iTunes custom playlist contained music from Stephen Duffy and the Lilac Time, Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill Acoustic re-release and Stephen Fretwell. I watched in amusement and then horror as my playlist filled up with songs that would be at home on an aging hippy’s iPod.

After a moment’s soul-searching, I decided that I should really show what a cool eclectic individual I am and started listening to my ‘Radiohead unreleased and B-side’ playlist. I wasn’t really in the mood to listen to those tracks but I felt forced to do so by internet peer pressure.

I then decided that was an altogether silly motive for my listening choices and made a new Smart playlist with a broader selection of artists. I usually listen to a track over and over if the fancy takes me, but I’ve resisted the urge to do that as I might come across as ever-so-slightly OCD. I also check the last.fm website constantly to make sure that the tracks are showing, which proves that I’m ever-so-slightly OCD.

My last.fm charts

Oh, and Nizlopi’s JCB made it to number 1 this week, which is great news. Naturally, X Factor’s Shayne will top the christmas chart, but it’s still a result for the little guy(s).

Every now and again something really odd appears on the TV that doesn’t suck.

Debbie and I were surfing the music channels over the weekend and this video started, called “JCB” by a band called “Nizlopi”. It’s a catchy song with a great video - and despite the unorthadox lyrics, it’s really quite beautiful.

Apparently, it was originally released in June this year before an internet campaign kick started a word-of-mouth buzz that has seen the video become the bookies favourite for this year’s Christmas number one.

Excellent stuff, very original and a great nostalgiac trip. Buy it when it comes out. If you don’t, we’ll have either Girls Aloud or Westlife topping the charts this Christmas.

The JCB Song Video

I’ve been fighting with IE over the past three days to complete the new IPS rich text editor.

I’ve decided to merge the two editors into one OOP JS file which has a lot more code re-use and is much more efficient. The new RTE loads almost instantly compared to the current IPB one which takes a few seconds to initialize.

I won’t bore you to death why it took three days to write (not least because of irritiating differences between IE and FF which mean you’re effectively writing two editors) and I won’t blather on about the cool new features which include the floating palettes and extensibility.

Instead, I’ll show you a movie.

(Note, there is no AJAX in the RTE currently. The little palettes are DOM styled and wrapped iFrames. I could have used AJAX, but the iFrames are more suitable for this application. I prefer to use the right tool for the job. After all, just because we’ve bought a new hammer, it doesn’t mean we have to use it to bash screws into the wall).

IPD New RTE ( 2.3mb Quicktime .mov )