Wickr Blog

Wickr 1.50

2006-11-29T08:36:00.000+08:00

Wickr 1.50 is out of beta and is available for download. Download it! This is a big update, so it'll be a while before the next update comes.

Wickr v 1.5 Beta!

2006-11-14T10:26:00.000+08:00

It's here.. come and get it while it's hot. Mind you, this is still a beta, but an almost complete beta. I plan to release the real thing this weekend. The download link for the beta is here.

New Site For Wickr

2006-11-10T05:32:00.000+08:00

The old host for the Wickr website, Zeeblo is dead for good. Hey, I can't complain since it was free. But since Wickr has grown a lot, I figured it's time I found something more reliable. Got a new host, plus my very own domain name (ooooh). I'm very excited since this is my very first domain name. I tried getting wickr.com, but it was already taken, so I decided to go with a domain name that can cater to Wickr, plus all other internetty ventures I may take on in the future. Behold:

shirazlabs.com

If you go there now, all you'll see is 1 line of text. So, wait a bit until it's up and running. But the Wickr page at shirazlabs.com/wickr, as ready for action. Alternatively, you can also get there through wickr.shirazlabs.com.

On the Wickr development progress, all the slideshow modes are done, just need to add the speed control for the slideshows. There's also some more graphics that need to be done, like the new Wickr logo.

Website Down

2006-11-02T21:46:00.000+08:00

The host of the Wickr homepage, Zeeblo, is down for the moment. It has been down for a few days already. However, they claim they'll get things back running by this weekend. I hope so. If not, I'll switch to a paid hosting service. Meanwhile, there the Wiki available if you want information on Wickr, and to download it, you can get it here.

Speaking of download sites, Wickr has been submitted on software download sites. There are currently 4 sites that I know of (not including the Yahoo! Widgets Gallery). Here they are:

Softpedia has certified that Wickr is 100% free of spyware & adware & viruses. Not that I'm suprised, but it gives the users a piece of mind that it's certified by a credible source.

So there you have it. 4 mirrors to download Wickr, and the website is down. I'm still working on the new features. A new version will be out soon. How soon? I don't know.

Add comments and add notes complete.

2006-10-05T06:38:00.000+08:00

The core structure of posting comments and notes is done. Though the U.I. in the add comment window needs some improvement. There's also the bug where users should not be able to view and add notes when viewing square thumbnails images. One nifty feature is that notes can be added even in the larger sized versions of the photo, so, the notes can really be accurate. Next in line is the add tag feature. The U.I. for the add tag window should be what the add comment window is supposed to look like.

Mosaic slideshow mode complete.

2006-09-26T00:24:00.000+08:00

I've just completed the Mosaic slideshow mode. So now there are 3 slideshow modes available, normal, badge and mosaic. There 's one more mode I'm working on, after that I think I'll pulbically release a beta. The transition between different modes aren't that smooth. I think I'll forgo it and make the slideshow restart when the mode is changed.

Deleting the global variables really made a big difference on how much memry the widget is occupying after exiting the slideshow mode. It reduced about 20MB of memry space. I'm wodering whether I should do the same for the photo window. Viewing a photo is a regular activity when using Wickr, so I'm not sure it will have much of an impact.

Wickr now dual platform

2006-09-06T10:10:00.000+08:00

Wickr version 0.99 has just been released in the Yahoo! Widget Gallery, and guess what... it's now dual platform. (Yessss!!!) At first, I was like, WTF is going on here. Maybe they messed up during the approval process or something. So I hit the Konfabulator forums and made a post asking people with Macs to try out Wickr on their machines. Minutes later, the gallery head honcho himself, Ricky Romero replied that he tested it personally, and it realy works on both platforms. I was like w00t!

I was planning to work on the dual platform compatibility after I've finished the new slideshow features. I guess I don't have to anymore. If I knew the version 0.99 release is going to be dual platform, I would've versioned it as 1.0. Yeah, it's 0.1 of a difference, but it makes all the difference. Oh well, back to the slideshows then.

Async and buffer settled, Next: next page and close()

2006-09-05T10:20:00.000+08:00

The async and buffer took more time than I expected. I had to reorganize the functions so that it's more understandable.

Next thing to do is handle the get next page. In slideshow mode, I have set the number of images to fetch perpage to 500 (the max amount allowed perpage by flickr). Before this, once the slideshow has reached 500, it goes back to one. I figured that nobody leaves their slideshow on for more than 4 hours (the normal slideshow mode's smallest interval is 30 seconds, 30 seconds times 500 = 4 hours+). But with the badge mode, the interval is much smaller, around 4 seconds. So it very likely the user will manage to get through all the 500 images in the page.

Since I began making the badge mode, I've created a lot of new global variables and images. All these things take up memory, and I need the destroy them when the user exits the slideshow.

To do:

Next page in slideshow
Clean up variables on close()

New Blog for Wickr

2006-09-03T12:35:00.000+08:00

I've decided to keep a journal on my development of Wickr. Not in the mood to edit the template right now. Just finished the core of the badge mode of the slideshow. Using fetch() for now. Need to change to fetchAsync() later. There's a problem where the main window can't load the thumbnails while the badge is running. I don't know why it's like that, but I may need to disable the ability to view the main window while the badge is running. Plus, there's the image buffer thing to look into after this.

To do:

Async.
Image buffer.

TEstinggggg

2006-09-02T06:20:00.000+08:00

testinggggggggggg