20 Must-Have Firefox Extensions

Found out that I wrote so much on Firefox add-ons that it's better to just redirect. :D

If you're still not convinced why Firefox is the better browser amongst all it's competitors, I hope this article shines more light.

It talks about the top 20 Firefox add-ons in each of the following categories.

• Tools for taming the Web
• Visual improvements
• Matters of convenience
• Information gatherers
• Web developer essential

Plenty of great things to check out, so well.. check it out! :D

Answers in Firefox

This must have been one of the coolest add-on in Firefox that I've come across. :D

Some questions:

• Do you read blogs/articles/news online?
• Do you hate to be puzzled by a word that you dint know?
• Do you go to dictionary.com, or any other online language resource reference in that matter, to check up words?
  
• Do you want to improve your vocabulary?
  

If your answer is "Yes" to any of the above questions, probably what I'm going to introduce to you might be of most helpful. :)

Firefox Answers.

Every time when I'm reading there's bound to be chances of stumbling upon difficult words, and what I would usually do will be:

• 1. Open up a new tab in Firefox.
• 2. Type "www.dictionary.com" and press Enter.
• 3. Wait for the page to load.
• 4. In the search box, type the word in query, and press Enter.
• 5. Wait for the page to load... again. :S
  
• 6. The meaning of the word appears.
  

What a hassle! I had to live with that kind of flow because I couldn't find a better one. One fine day, while reading the web, I came to know of Answers. After installing this little thing, it blew me OFF! :D

This is my new flow of finding out the new word:

• 1. Press the Alt key, and right mouse click on the word.
  

Ermz.. I'm done you know? haha.. It's just that simple! Alt-click Alt-click. The beauty of this add-on is that Answers is not limited to just words. If it detects that it's a phrase, it'll even look that up and bring the answers(well literally? hehe..) right to your web! :D

Please enjoy. I know you will. ;)

Dreamy iPhone~~

This is no new news. iPhone will be launched in US in 3 more days, 29 June 2007, and it's probably the biggest gadget bang this year. But right about a week ago, Apple announced that the dreamy iPhone has just gotten better. :O

Now check this out:

• Talk Time: 8 hours
• Standby Time: 250 hours (more than 10 days!)
• Internet Use: 6 hours
• Video Playback: 7 hours
• Audio Playback: 24 hours

See the full technical specifications.

It's astounding stats from any angle that I see. I can get a 8GB iPhone that plays my favourite songs(for even longer hours than my current ipod nano), podcasts, videocasts, while at the same time enjoying the long hours of talk time, and checking emails on any journey. Important thing is that I can finally use VelvetPuffin! :D Now how cool is that package? It's north-pole-cool. **brrr***

There's probably 2 areas that I'm very concerned about. The prone-to-scratch-glossy-surface, and that I'm a prone-to-drop-phone-person. :(

Apple addresses my first concern that "the entire top surface of iPhone.. has been upgraded from plastic to optical-quality glass to achieve a superior level of scratch resistance and optical clarity". Now how nice is that! :) I don't have to worry about scratching the surface now! **YAY!!**

BUT the glass gives me more reasons to worry than ever! I drop my phone so regulary(once a month on average), will the glass shatter? :S I mean I would rather have a scratchy phone than a phone that shatters if I do drop if you get what I mean. Furthermore, the advanced hardware that's in this baby might break after dropping once! That's why I always go for cheapskate phones(free ones especially). Not that their hardware won't break, but it's just that they're easily replaceable. sigh... :(

In an indirect way, I'm glad that the US market gets to be the first batch of guinea pigs. :P When iPhone eventually comes to Singapore, I'll most probably read up on some reviews before deciding if this is the phone for me. :)

Until then, this is just a **dream** phone. :P~~~~

Caricature and a Lobster!!

Thanks to 3D for her very nice caricature of me! Think she drew me till she nearly vomit. Not that it's hard work till vomit blood, but it's vomit cos have to keep staring at my face! wahahahaha... :D Note how much details she put into this illustration! My half open eyes (ever so tired), the flex book that I was obsessed with, the product I've been working on, velvetpuffin, and last but not least, my MBT shoes. *w00t~!*

Thanks to Arul for the damn cute red lobster you gave me! It has found itself a permanent place to stay (atop of the tissue box on my desk), and a permanent job tending to my mouse cord (look carefully at what the lobster's pincer are gripping!). :P Life at work will never be the same with the cute lobster's constant gaze at me. :D

Geek Blog Announced! Again?!

Wow, how many days had it been since I first announced my geek blog? hahaha.. just 2 weeks? :D

Anyway, I found that while it's great to get the wordpress blog, everything seems to be so limiting. I dint like any of those. In order to have the ability to change the Cascading Style Sheets(CSS), I have to pay USD15 a year? Forget it. Even blogger gives it for free. To add to my pain, I can't add any side widgets or tools and there's no upgrades I can buy to do that(not that I will really buy if there IS really an option. :P).

I was desperate.

That naturally lead me to the thought, shouldn't I get a hosting service for myself? It's high time if you ask me. :D I had my limited website on freewebs.com for way too long. Friends recommended godaddy.com, and so after checking out and comparing a lot of other hosting services, found that godaddy.com had the best deal of all!

For 4 kick-ass years of hosting service, I only paid SGD320! Did I mention that the package gave me 100GB of space and 1TB(terabyte) of bandwidth? haha.. It was absolute awesomeness. In addition to this, I shared the hosting with 3D, which meant another ~SGD75 off the bill. :D Can't get any cooler than that. ;)

Anyway, after all that long grandmother story, here's the link to my new geek blog:
http://blog.flashmech.net

And do check out my portfolio website!
http://www.flashmech.net

PS: I just have to say this. Wordpress on wordpress hosting sucks. But wordpress on your own hosting rocks big-time. :D It's no wonder that they're the winner of the Webware 100 in the publishing category. :D

Best FTP Client for Windows

File Transfer Protocol, or better known as FTP, is used to transfer data from one computer to another over the Internet, or through a network.

I've just gotten my web hosting service recently, so in other words, there's a whole new world out there for me to explore. But first and foremost, without a FTP client, I would not be able to put anything up for the world to see!

Here's my personal view of the attributes that a good FTP Client should have:

• No Hassle
• Intuitive Interface
• Fast startup/load times
• Small size/lite weight
• Free :P

Windows Explorer 0/5


Never knew that Windows Explorer can be used as an FTP! :D It wasn't a good experience though (could be some settings that I set, not too sure on this). In fact, it was a pain to use. I mean, if I have to login EACH time to upload ONE file, that's a huge drawback! I needed to upload thousands of files, and if that's the message they're sending across, forget it.

Dreamweaver 3/5


Strictly just rating dreamweaver as an FTP client here! First, the startup was pretty slow (well of course, it's a huge software to develop websites with!). Second, it's not free! Thirdly, somehow it always throws me an error message saying that it can't connect to my site, when others could. :(

(As a side note, I must add that the power to sync with your files at your hosting server while developing in dreamweaver through the FTP is absolutely dreamy. :D)

FileZilla 4/5


Open source, ease of use, pretty intuitive UI made me love this piece. :D Overall, it performs very well, and when I'm disconnected from the server, it connects me back. No fuss, no prompts (take that windows explorer!). The only major irk will be the directory panel, as it doesn't auto refresh (took me a while to find the refresh button too).

FireFTP 4.5/5


This is my winner. :) As an extension to firefox, it basically installs itself in my browser. No additional download to install, unlike FileZilla or Dreamweaver. Simple and great UI that overlooks your local drive files and your hosting files. Unlike FileZilla, FireFTP auto refreshes! Just in case it doesn't, which I have yet to experience, there's still an additional refresh button for your "mental security". :P

Why isn't it 5/5 then? Well, two minor issues. FireFTP does not show my "desktop" in the directory listing, which means I have to navigate to C:\Documents and Settings\{owner}\Desktop. FileZilla on the other hand, does that. :)

(Updated on 20 June 2007 17:45:00 SGT: Shunjie pointed out something important that I missed. Since FireFTP installs in your Firefox browser, it may be the only effective FTP that you can use if you're working on a limited access user account.)

Do you have a preferred FTP client?
Do you disagree with I wrote above? Leave me a note and let me know! :D

Mouse Gestures in Firefox

I'm so happy! :D Found something that I lost for so long!

Have you heard of Mouse Gestures?

According to Wikipedia, a mouse gesture is a way of combining computer mouse movements and clicks which the software recognizes as a specific command.

I first came across mouse gestures in myIE2 (a free browser now better known as Maxthon). This technology totally changed the way I surfed the net! :D Opening a new tab was just a matter of holding down the left mouse button and clicking the right one. Closing a tab was vice versa. Back and forward had never been easier as well. Mouse gestures seems so intuitive, so natural to use. All actions are customisable according to your own liking too! ;)

myIE2 was not perfect though. It was based on the Internet Explorer(IE) browser engine, and as everyone knows, IE uses ActiveX which indirectly increases exposure to viruses. After a virus successfully attacked my computer sometime last year, I decided that it was simply not worth the risk, hence I dropped myIE2 to use Firefox.

If only I had searched earlier!! Came across this Mouse Gesture add-on for Firefox during one of my blog reads today and I immediately knew, the one thing that I so loved about a browser is now back in my hands! :D

muahahahahahaha.....

For those who have yet to try, I highly recommend it! It may change the way you browse the net. :)

Apollo For Flex Pocketguide

Seems to have found this a little too late. :D

Apollo is already Adobe AIR Beta, while Flex 2 is already Flex 3 Beta at the moment. Anyway, found this pocket guide book on these two technologies and uploaded it to my box.

Download it to get yourself some direction (if you require any).

Personally, I would think I need it. :P

Annual ICT 2007

Received a SMS yesterday night, from an unknown number. The first 2 words in the SMS probably sank my mood into the deepest realm for the year. :(

(fm MINDEF:)
Still got smiley some more. pengz..

For the uninitiated, MINDEF is Ministry of Defense (Singapore). sigh... As expected... a Call Up Notification! This is gonna be the first In Camp Training (ICT) post my army days and I must say the feeling is pretty dreadful. To break away from my job, from what I love doing is.... IS..... SIGH............................................

It's gonna be a 5 days ICT at Seletar East Camp, from Oct 15 2007 0730hrs (SO EARLY!) to Oct 19 2007 2359hrs (SO LATE!). Oh well... I know I know... being a Singaporean male , this is unavoidable. Every guy has to do up their responsibility to protect the COUNTRY!!

At least there's one good part amidst all these, and that's the *timing*. They did not take away Oct 20, which is xf's bday. :D Army still clever after all la... know it's my best friend's bday know cannot take. wahahaha...

PS: I know it's just pure conincidence. Army got nothing to do with xf's bday perfect timing and if they really wanted to call me back, they still could! :( Just glad they dint. :D

Geek Blog Announced!

The objective of this blog post is simple. I've decided for certain reasons to get another blog to satisfy my geekiness. :P

Had been a very tough decision though, as I love my current address, flashmech.blogspot.com, a lot. I wanted to change it to a more personal, lionellow.blogspot.com and make way this place free for a full geeky blog.

Thought it over, and nope, that's not gonna happen. :D Though this blog has not been established for long, I like the current way it is, and it should stay that way. I've thought about other site names on blogger and somehow, ideas along that direction were pretty lame.

Hence, it was decided that I create an account on WordPress, another popular blogging website. This new blog will be entirely use for the geeky stuff, like the latest news on the Flash Platform, my own experimentations, silly mistakes, things like that.

Still awaiting for MXNA to add my blog to be aggregated at the moment, and planning to get a Creative Commons license for it too. Still pretty much in the infancy stage, but will get it bigger I promise. :)

Here's the address for my geek blog:
http://flashmech.wordpress.com

(Updated on June 25 2007 16:40:00 SGT: Oh no! I've moved again! http://flashmech.wordpress.com is no more! Official geek blog at http://blog.flashmech.net)

Lesser Space After Uninstalling CS3 Than Before?

It's weird, but I need confirmation. Solutions are more than welcome. :)

I've installed and uninstalled Adobe CS3 Design Premium roughly twice, and with each uninstall, the size on my hard disk seems to have gone down quite a bit (~600mb). I can't confirm the actual size because in between the installation I've been adding some files on my computer but definitely not ~1.2gb worth.

After each uninstall, I'll be emptying whatever contents (if any) in my recycle bin, cleaning up the temporary internet folders, and even defragmenting my registry and doing disk clean up. Tried to look into the Program Files folder to find any repository of temporary installation files that might have facilitated the installation, but to no avail. All that couldn't get me back my lost space.

Anyone experienced this as well?

History Panel in Flash IDE

Ever tried the History Panel in Flash IDE? :)

Even though the history panel made it's way into Flash since the MX 2004 days, I couldn't find a good reason to use it. I mean, why would I need an extra panel to clutter up my screen estate when it's already tough to juggle between the designer and developer related panels? I could easily do a Ctrl-Z(Undo) and Ctrl-Y(Redo) at any time that I want~

Well, time has changed. :D Since I've started messing around with JSFL, the history Panel becomes the basic tool to learn JSFL commands. Don't believe me? Follow me through then. ;)

1. In Flash IDE, go to Window --> Other Panels --> History (Ctrl-F10)


2. Click on the options button , under View, you should see a menu as follows:


The Default view that you see, shows the commands in normal layman English that everyone will understand. I have still yet to find any purpose with the Arguments in Panel view, so I'm gonna skip that. The JavaScript in Panel view is what we're interested with.

3. Here's the JavaScript in Panel view.


Did you notice the lines and lines of codes in the history panel now? Well those are JSFL codes! If there's something that you wish to create for Flash IDE, and have no slightest idea where to begin, yet you know that there's something similar been done already, you now know where to look!


Further Reads:
Using History and Flash Panels for Faster Development

New toy: JSFL

I first came across JSFL when I tried to compile a Flash file through FlashDevelop. That was the time when I saw in Flash IDE's Output panel, some error message about a particular JSFL file failing to execute (I can't remember what's the exact error message, as it's so random and I never really take note).

Of course at that time, I had no clues about what JSFL was and I'm not bothered to find out what it might do. I'm more pressed with the concern that my Flash file is failing on me. :D (The dateline was so tight, JSFL don't blame me. :P)

Recently, while reading Grant Skinner's blog, I stumbled upon his gAlign extension tool for Flash IDE. In that blog post, he mentioned about using "custom JSFL calls" to accomplish his stuff. Seeing how JSFL is able to manipulate Flash IDE's content, that got me seriously curious about the technology behind it.

Googled for JSFL as I had absolutely no idea where to start from, and found this introductory article by Guy Watson. In the article, he establishes facts about JSFL and where did it came from. Unfortunately, it didn't seems to be what I'm looking for.

How can one ever forget about Flash Help? :D I did a search in there and found exactly what I needed. All the treasures and secrets about JSFL were all lying in the book Extending Flash, waiting for me to uncover them. hehe..

So now, I'm getting all excited about this new discovered "power" (of course the power itself is not new, and existent for a pretty long while. it's just my ignorance. :D but no more!). Got some opinions from friends about what should I develop as an extension for flash, and Arul in particular gave an interesting one.

My first JSFL project will hence be,




*drum roll*




*drum roll*




*drum roll*








an Arrow Drawing Tool!







Stay tuned!

The World's Fastest Indian

This movie managed to moved me even though I'm not a lover of motorcycles. Can't imagine if someone like Arul watches this movie. :P

Burt Munro, an ordinary man with extraordinary determination, had an ambition to set the land-speed world record using his 1920 Indian motorcycle. His passion overcame all difficulties, obstacles, barriers, and even to the brink of risking death.

In 1967, he finally sets the under-1000 cc world motorcycle land speed record, which still stands today, at Bonneville Salt Flats with his self-modified Indian motorcycle that originally could only run at a top speed of 86.90 km/h (54 mph). His official record?

295.44 km/h
~183.58 mph

Burt Munro
If you don't follow through on your dreams, you might as well be a vegetable (not your regular cabbage kind of veg! :D).

Burt Munro took 25 years to realise his dream.

How far are you willing to go for yours? :)