Activating IIS

Just some directions I found on the Internet...but I'm storing it here, so I can find it again:

1. Installing Internet Information Service (IIS)
   
2. Insert your Windows XP Professional CD-Rom into the disc drive.
   
3. Go to Add or Remove Programs: Start > Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs
   
4. Click on the Add/Remove Windows Components button on the left hand side of the window.
   
5. The Windows Components Wizard will then appear. Scroll down to Internet Information Service (IIS) tick the check box and click next.
   
6. If you do not have Windows XP Professional in your disc drive you will be asked to insert it at this point.
   
7. The installation should now begin, you will be prompted once the installation is complete, then click finish.
   
8. You will now be able to view your home page in a web browser by typing http://localhost into the address bar.
   
9. You should now be looking at the IIS documentation.
   

Using IIS

Your default web directory for your website files is C:\Inetpub\wwwroot you can set up your own virtual directory through the Internet Information Services Window:

1. Go to Administration Tools: Start > Control Panel > Administration Tools
   
2. Double-click on the Internet Information Services icon.
   
3. To add a new virtual directory, expand the Web sites folder in the left pane of the window and right click on Default Web Site. Select New from the pop up menu followed by Virtual Directory.
   
4. The Virtual Directory Creation Wizard should appear, click next.
   
5. You will then be prompted to give your virtual directory an Alias to access it from your web browser (this is the name you will type into your web browser after localhost/ to view any web pages you place in the directory).
   
6. Click Browse to assign the directory location of server files then click next.
   
7. Lastly you will see a series of boxes, this is for security. If you are not worried about security select them all and click next.
   
8. Once the virtual directory is created you can view the web pages in the folder by typing http://localhost/alias into the address bar of your web browser

Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar Beta 3

Fishman was just showing me a great HTML utility: the Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar.

“The Microsoft Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar provides a variety of tools for quickly creating, understanding, and troubleshooting Web pages. This version is a preview release and behavior may change in the final release.”

Here’s a snapshot of IE7 perusing Adobe’s site with the toolbar turned on.



It’s pretty neat. You can download it here.

YouTube Rival?

Have you already heard about the YouTube competitor being created by NBC Universal and News Corp? A few excerpts:

“NEW YORK - NBC Universal and News Corp. joined forces with several Internet companies Thursday to distribute TV shows online in an effort to better control their programming and stave off competition from YouTube.”

And

“Programs owned by NBC and News Corp. such as "Heroes," "24," and "House" will appear on the network, supported by advertising, and distributed through Yahoo, Time Warner Inc.'s AOL unit, Microsoft Corp.'s MSN site, and MySpace, which is owned by News Corp.”

GrandCentral

Another cool one from E:

The Web 2.0 Address Book May Have Arrived

[GrandCentral's] motto, "One number for life," pretty much says it all. At GrandCentral.com, you choose a new, single, unified phone number (more on this in a moment). You hand it out to everyone you know, instructing them to delete all your old numbers from their Rolodexes.
From now on, whenever somebody dials your new uninumber, all of your phones ring simultaneously, like something out of "The Lawnmower Man."

No longer will anyone have to track you down by dialing each of your numbers in turn. No longer does it matter if you're home, at work or on the road. Your new GrandCentral phone number will find you.

Why Cisco Bought WebEx

E passed along this interesting article on Why Cisco Bought WebEx:

Connecting The Dots has a very interesting analysis of why Cisco bought WebEx.

FavIcon from Pics

Here is a free Web-based application that can convert a graphic to an .ico file.
http://www.html-kit.com/favicon/

This file type allows you to create a “favorites” icon for a website.

(Note: there’s also a Photoshop plug-in that allows you to create the .ico format directly.)

oasim karmieh

This guy is really talented:
http://www.oasim.com/

Lorem Ipsum Generator

Need dummy text for a print or Web project? Check out the Lipsum generator. A neat fact on lipsum (And Wikipedia) is that it’s actually not random text:

“Contrary to popular belief, Lorem Ipsum is not simply random text…Lorem Ipsum comes from sections 1.10.32 and 1.10.33 of "de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum" (The Extremes of Good and Evil) by Cicero, written in 45 BC. This book is a treatise on the theory of ethics, very popular during the Renaissance.”

Photoshop CS3 Extended

It sounds like there are going to be two versions of Photoshop available in the coming months. Photoshop CS3 and PhotoshopCS3 Extended.

New to the Photoshop family, Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended delivers everything in Photoshop CS3 and more. Render and incorporate 3D images into your 2D composites. Stop time with easy editing of motion graphics on video layers. And probe your images with measurement, analysis, and visualization tools.

Tesseract

A friend of mine, MC, who is rather mathematically inclined sent me this picture of a rotating tesseract.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d7/8-cell.gif

Note from Wikipedia: "In geometry, the tesseract, also called 8-cell or octachoron, is the four-dimensional analog of the (three-dimensional) cube, where motion along the fourth dimension is often a representation for bounded transformations of the cube through time."

Web 2.0 Validator: We're the dot in Web 2.0

Funny and a rather interesting set of criteria for what makes a site "Web 2.0"

Google Maps on Windows Mobile(tm) devices

Sweet!

“Those of you with Windows Mobile(tm) devices can now search for local businesses and get real-time traffic reports using Google Maps. This edition also includes some custom features: contacts integration, GPS support, draggable maps, and tap and hold menus. And since Google Maps for mobile is available on more than 300 phone models, chances are good everyone can download the application and always know where they are when they're on the go.”

http://www.google.com/gmm

Wireless Broadband Internet Service Provider

Kinda interesting -- AK was pointing out this company to me.

Animator vs animation

A classic!

HTML DOM Favorites

None of these are revolutionary, and all of them arbitrary, but I find myself looking these items up all the time and thus add them here for posterity:

Is a checkbox checked?
If (document.formname.checkboxname.checked == false)

Show/hide DIV
document.getElementById(‘divname’).style.display='none';
document.getElementById('divname').style.display='block';

Show/hide parent DIV from iframe

parent.document.getElementById("divname").style.display = "none";
parent.document.getElementById("divname").style.display = "block";

Show/hide iframe DIV from parent
document.iframename.document.getElementById("divname").style.display = "none";
document.iframename.document.getElementById("divname").style.display = "block";

SharePoint: displaying a user's logon name

This article explains how to use the Data View Web Part to display a user’s logon name.

Photoshop TV

Here’s another place for free Photoshop tutorials: www.photoshoptv.com.

“Watch each week as “The Photoshop Guys” (Dave Cross, Matt Kloskowski, and Scott Kelby) from the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) share the hottest Adobe Photoshop tutorials, the latest insider tricks, and the coolest timesaving, job-saving shortcuts to make your time in Photoshop more productive, more efficient, and more fun.”

The tutorials can be viewed in your browser in Flash player, or downloaded as a podcast to your video-capable iPod.

Art = mood + philosophy?

A few interesting tidbits from Communication Arts.
Mood altering high-definition video from Concrete Pictures is now available as part of its Mobius Collection at www.mobiusmedia.tv. Produced and mastered in full 1,080i high-definition video, over 135 hours of original motion art is now archived and ready to screen. Billing its offerings as ambient motion art video, Mobius is looking to partner with creatives working in the field of motion graphics, animation, video and film. Over the last two years, Mobius has worked with over 100 artists from around the world to produce the largest collection of motion video art in existence. Samples are available for viewing on the Web site, and production deals will make available Mobius content for home viewing as DivX DVDs in standard and high-definition formats. Mobius promises to deliver any mood, anywhere, on any screen. Finally, something worth watching on your cell phone.

Are you beyond graphic? This is the first of many questions that arise when visiting www.beyondgraphic.org. This Web site encourages debate and review of the title “graphic designer,” which leads to soul-searching questions. With categories like Identity, Value, Respect, Ability, Evolution and Action—this site puts forth the argument that a change to the title could better reflect what it is that “graphic designers” do. In any case, it is sure to spawn intriguing discourse. Check it out.

LaCie Brick Desktop Hard Drive

I want one! :)

Stock film footage

Clips from the cutting room floor live on at a new library of film footage launched jointly by Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) and Thought Equity.

CS3 Unveiled March 27!

Check it out.

It was originally announced in an company blog posting:

The wait is nearly over! We can now confirm that Adobe Creative Suite 3 will be announced March 27, 2007. The company is celebrating the launch at an event in New York City that will be webcast live at 3:30pm ET. During the webcast, Adobe will reveal the features and suite configurations that make this the largest software release in Adobe's 25 year history.

Create and view color harmonies online with kuler

Check out kuler, an online tool to create color harmonies. I was just reading a Communication Arts article that summed it up this way:

“Adobe Labs, formerly Macromedia Labs, is dedicated to implementing and exploring new technologies. One of these new developing technologies, called kuler (rhymes with ruler), is a Color Harmonies Web site powered by Flash and ActionScript 3 that allows users to create interactive color sets (harmonies) based on several color models including: Analogous, Monochromatic, Triad, Complementary, Compound, Shades and Custom. There are five user-definable color swatches that when edited modify the relationship of the other four colors. Online interactive color models let you intuitively mix an unlimited number of colors or specify colors in HSV, RGB, CMYK, HEX, LAB. Users can post their own color sets which are rated by the number of views. Owners of Adobe Creative Suite 2 can create Swatch Exchange files that can be used in many CS2 products. The site is free, fun and surprisingly useful.”

Adobe has a nice summary of it, too.