project development underway

Over the course of the last few weeks a number of attempts have been made to actually start the actual writing of our ’software’. I use the word software quite loosely as what it is that we are hoping to develop a portal written in flash.

There are a number of reasons why we have chosen flash to write this. The front end of this portal needs to be easy on the eye and the graphic nature of flash allows us to develop and position this just the way we want it. Earlier experiments with a html file proved very difficult to manipulate. The second reason flash proved to be the answer is that the majority of data used in this would need to be dynamically generated. We want the end user to be able to update the display without having to take the page off line or have to change anything within the flash file. This should ideally keep program related errors to a minimum. A function that flash handles very quickly and easily is dynamic text updates.

I have decided to go and spent some time at my parents house over the easter break with the primary goal to make a decent headway with my dissertation work. This has put a temporary hold on the whole project. As i brought my laptop with me i have been able to make a slow start on piecing some of the parts together but progress has been limited. In earlier attempts it was our goal to test various bits of code and see how well they perform. Current progress is being made in piecing them together and checking that they would well in conjunction with each other.

I have posted a screen grab of the progress made so far.

Having been so excited by this project just before easter it was a shame to have to put it on hold for a couple of weeks. That said, i think it will serve to further distill the ideas. Having a much smaller window of opportunity for completing our dissertations i predict that there will be a further couple of weeks of very slow progress whilst we concentrate on our written work. Having already come to a point of completion in terms of the project concept all is currently needed is a period of fairly intensive software development in order to prove our concept.

Richard

Meeting and New Ideas

After meeting with Andrew Eglinton last week I know it inspired both myself and Richard to take the project on further than we had originally planned. Some of the ideas we talked about in regard to logging the content and taking the idea of building a community around an event are certinly ones that excite me and will try and implement in the project.

It was fantastic to speak to some (especially at the college) that had such passion and knowledge about a subject that I too am passionate about. The conversation was really an eye opener, in that I didn’t know such people were involved with the college and shared the same thoughts as myself on the use of the internet.
What really inspired me personally about the conversation was the chance/opportunity of developing the ideas of blogging, online videos etc and really developing the college’s web profile (outside of the official web site) to those within the college and specifically to those looking to come to the college. The idea of technological evangelism on the subject of social networks, blogging and communication really lit a spark for me.
The conversation was great on another level in that it was actually happening at college. By this I mean, these are the sort of conversations that should be happening, to work out how these tool can be used at college. So it was great to see the conversation actually happening and even better to be a part of it. Let’s hope this is not the last and some real world progress gets made in this area.

 

Going back to the elective, when we got home from the meeting we immediatly started formulating ideas and working on ways to implement what we had spoken to Andrew about.
We came up with a slightly revised design and came up with a list of the areas that still needed attention.

Over Easter we are going to take some time out to write our dissertations and go home for a few days but we will return after the break and continue our work.

Andy

Welcome to Visualise

The best place to start would be to explain what it is Visiualise is, why we are doing it and what it is were are doing with this blog.

Visualise is the brainchild of Rich Porter and Andy Hicks who are using their elective as an opportunity to develop a piece of software which can be used to display information on screens during an event. The information that the screen handles can be broken down into 3 main elements.

The first and possibly most useful element is the ability to display rolling event information, including location, time and a brief synopsis. The information that is delivered is time sensitive, meaning once an event has finished it will not appear on the screen. Similarly if an event is starting shortly its information will be displayed prominently.

The second element is media that can be displayed on the screen, this includes pictures in a rolling sideshow which is updated constantly throughout the day. On a larger event we would also be able to place a live feed of an seminar onto the screen if it was over subscribed or if the organisers deemed it appropriate.

The final element is the user generated content. This covers the ability for visitors to the event to send text messages and emails into the screen to be displayed. They are also able to send pictures from their email account to the screen which will appear in the photo slide show.
We are also looking into the possibility of getting pictures sent in via MMS from mobile phones appearing on the screen.

We are using Flash to construct the interface for the information and to handle all of the scripting for the project.

The aim of this blog is to document the process of making this application and record our progress and thoughts along the way. We will be going into more details in some areas which should hopefully enable a better understanding of what it is we are doing and why certain choices are made.

Over the last few days we have been working on the code to display dynamically updateable areas of text to use in the event information section and text message and email section. We are also looking at the best way for the sideshow to look and work.
At the moment we are gathering together all the code we need and making sure it works in the way we want it to, before finally compiling it and making it work together in the final application.

We are hoping to post some pictures and screen shots up here to document our progress along the way.