strayorange

When I released ImageTweak 0.19 I wrote in the changelog that the main change was the support for proper image drag&drop.

It actually works correctly but this change had the side effect of changing the normal mouse pointer used by ImageTweak to indicate that you’re moving an image around the window. I noticed this before releasing the update, but it seemed like a minor annoyance worth the additional functionality. I actually tried to fix it but found no way, and since there were a lot of people writing negative reviews on AMO for the lack of drag&drop support I decided to release it without fixing it.

Fast forward some weeks, and it turns out that actually the new behaviour is quite confusing and many are complaining about the mouse pointer showing the “forbidden” shape while moving the image. Fewer than they were complaining before about the lack of drag&drop, but still…

So I set out to find a solution for this problem but apparently there’s no way to freely control the mouse pointer shape during a drap&drop operation. The only thing that comes closer is setting the mozCursor property of the DOMDataTransfer interface to “default”, but that works only on win32 and simply switch the cursor from “forbidden” to the default arrow.

I’m therefore pretty much stuck in a fix: I have to fix this problem but I have no idea of how. If you know how to do this, or know somebody that might help me in fixing this, please let me know.

I’m working on pervasive games for my master thesis and I have to ask you a little favour.
Can you please tell me which is your favourite game and why?
Doesn’t matter if it’s a computer game, a card game, fight with your bigger brother or whatelse. Just write a short comment to explain why do you like it.
Thanks in advance for your help!

p.s. For the people that are wondering why am I working on pervasive games for my master thesis or what is the relation with my studies, I’ll answer that is a good way for working and having fun together!

After a month or so in the AMO review queue, ImageTweak 0.19 is finally available. Current users should be notified of the update soon.

To learn what’s new in 0.19, read this post. To download the latest version please head over to AMO.

Today I saw the following videos and now I’m wondering how can we do normal things with more fun?

Have fun!

While waiting for the review process for the 0.19 update to end (apparently the queue is a few weeks long – damn you Mozilla) I got bored and decided to create the ImageTweak page on Facebook.

Go spread the word!

Having recently bought a netbook (MSI U123) I had to readjust my browsing habits since normally I work on a 24″ Dell 2407WFP with a resolution of 1920×1200, whereas the MSI has a meager 10.1″ at 1024×600.

As a result I had to tweak my browser of choice to be able to work nicely on such a small screen. Fortunately enough, Firefox allows you to tailor almost exactly as you want, and to reclaim much of the needed vertical screen space.

So, let’s get started. read more »

Hello everybody, this is my first post on this blog. Actually I think it’s my first serious post on a blog.

During the last months I had to do with context-aware applications, social networks, user experience and this kind of stuff for my master thesis in Media engineering. I still haven’t choose any project to work on but I came out with some considerations on the actual social networks.

At the moment Facebook seems to be the best network for number of users, features and API. Google Friend has much less users but gives useful informations about the friends geolocation. Is this so revolutionary? Is this all we could ever have?

For sure I’m able to find my old schoolmates, to keep in contact with some friends living far away, to write my short notes on Twitter and to recall the face of the girl I met last night. But I think we could have much more!

Imagine a service that could manage the relations between people. A service that let the user control his personal data and choose who have the permit to see these data. I’m not thinking about an ethical Facebook but an innovative platform that could be used as the base layer to build applications like Facebook, a pervasive game, a restaurant app that consider my friends preferences to give better suggestions, a tool for keeping my contact list always updated and much more.

Imagine a social network open, free and distributed.

I’d like to know what you think about this idea.

A few months and a complete change of location (I’m in Helsinki right now!) later, ImageTweak is going to reach version 0.19.

I had to scrape all the work I already did for 0.19 because I hit a few roadblocks, and so I had to start over with a minor but longstanding bug: proper drag&drop support. What it means is that you won’t have to hold CTRL anymore when performing drag&drop. The price is that I had to drop support for firefox 2.x and 3.0.x.

I just added it on AMO. As soon as it gets reviewed it will be available for download.

p.s. I also enabled donations on AMO, so if you feel like it please support the development of ImageTweak.

One of the most exciting upcoming features of HTML5 is the ability to open persistent bidirectional sockets to a remote host.

As far as I know, one of the early proposals was about allowing web applications almost complete control over sockets, including the ability to create raw sockets and to listen for incoming connections exactly like a typical network daemon/server, but this proposal was later scraped because of security implications.

Fast forward to today and the Web Sockets API, even if still under development, are starting to get a stable shape and they will probably be implemented soon by the most forward-looking browser vendors.

The problem is, though, that the original proposal got crampled along the way and therefore there won’t be any means to create peer-to-peer connections between users, something that could enable all kinds of cool distributed systems.

That is, unless someone does something: what I’m thinking about right now is a kind of wrapper/extension around the Web Sockets API that does simply a few things:

1. allows a web application to register for incoming connections
2. opens up the required ports on the firewall/NAT
3. when a connection arrives, perform the handshaking required by the ws:// protocol and forwards a WebSocket object representing the connection to the application

Talking IDL, that would mean (the WebSocket interface is the current WHATWG proposal, while WebSocketListener is my addition):

[Constructor(in DOMString url, optional in DOMString protocol)]
interface WebSocket {
  readonly attribute DOMString URL;

  // ready state
  const unsigned short CONNECTING = 0;
  const unsigned short OPEN = 1;
  const unsigned short CLOSED = 2;
  readonly attribute unsigned short readyState;
  readonly attribute unsigned long bufferedAmount;

  // networking
           attribute Function onopen;
           attribute Function onmessage;
           attribute Function onclose;
  boolean send(in DOMString data);
  void close();
};

[Constructor(optional in short port, optional in DOMString protocol)]
interface WebSocketListener {
  readonly attribute short port;

  // ready state
  const unsigned short OPENING = 0;
  const unsigned short LISTENING = 1;
  const unsigned short CLOSED = 2;
  readonly attribute unsigned short readyState;

  // networking
           attribute Function onconnection;
  void close();
};

Talking about the Mozilla platform, points 1 and 3 are straightforward (once the Web Sockets API has been implemented), whereas point 2 will be platform-dependent and, therefore, trickier. Nevertheless, I think that all of this can be handled (with some work) by a Firefox extension.

Once Firefox will gain Web Sockets support I’ll definitely try to see if it is possible to add it.

Yep, I finally managed to reach Helsinki after 10 days spent wandering about Europe by train… we’ve seen Mainz (Germany), Amsterdam (Netherlands), Copenaghen (Denmark) and Bergen (Norway).

From there I reached Stockholm and, by overnight ferry, Helsinki.

Right now I’m busy trying to arrange all the paperwork and finding some basic furniture for my room… I don’t even have a bed right now! (apparently Finns don’t provide beds in their student dormitories)

Lessons are bound to start in 5 days time, so I’ll need to have everything fixed by then. We’ll see.