brandonballentine.com

Vacation Photos

admin — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 02:44:40 +0000

A couple weeks ago my wife and I took time off from both our day jobs and consulting gigs to tour Canada and visit relatives. We went to a beautiful wedding, stocked up on maple syrup, and managed to squeeze in some time to take photographs as well. I’ve finally managed to upload some of my favorite images from the trip to my Flickr account, so take a look!

Building an iPhone Template for Expression Engine

admin — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 21:58:23 +0000

This tutorial shows how to create a quick and simple iPhone-specific template for Expression Engine using Joe Hewitt’s iUI framework. This is an introductory tutorial and only covers a fraction what’s possible using iUI. For more information, I suggest reading more at Google Code, Joe’s blog, or iPhone and iPod touch Programming (published by Wrox). I’ll also tackle some other cool tricks and techniques in future tutorials, so make sure to check back later!

You can check out this page to see what we will be building.

Click here to download the tutorial files.

This tutorial should about 30 minutes to complete.

Prerequesites

I’m going to assume that if you’re reading this tutorial, you already have a copy of Expression Engine running on a server. I’m also going to assume that you already have at least one blog created for your installation.

Download iUI

Head over to http://code.google.com/p/iui/ to download a copy of iUI. The download contains a collection of images, CSS, and Javascript files that allow you to mimic the style and functionality of Apple’s native iPhone applications. The folder also contains some nice sample pages that should help you get a handle on the framework. The page we will create in this tutorial is based on the Digg sample.

Create the Necessary Templates in EE

Create an iphone template group with three templates inside it – index, article, and a stylesheet called iui. The index page will contain a list of the ten latest blog entries along with the number of comments on each post. Clicking the title will load (through AJAX) the contents of that post from the article template. Don’t worry, iUI handles all of the hard stuff! Finally, you’ll need the iUI stylesheet and Javascript files to make everything work correctly. While I like to load my CSS files into EE, I usually prefer to simply link to javascript files. However, feel free to do whichever you prefer.

The Article Template

Let’s start with the article template. Open the article.html file from the tutorial download and copy the code to the newly created article template in your EE site. The example code above is extremely simplified and shows only the Title and Body fields from a post in the weblog named blog. If’ you’re using something besides the default weblog fields or the default weblog name, you’ll want to change these to match your field names. I’ve also added a limit-”1″ to make sure the template only shows 1 entry at a time. Go ahead and save the template when you’re finished.

Note that we’re using an HTML fragment for this templete. Because the index page will load the content of each individual post through AJAX, we don’t need to use complete HTML.

The iUI Template

Next, copy the contents of the iui.css file from the tutorial folder and paste it in the the iui CSS template in EE. I’ve already gone through the standard iui.css file and added a {site_url} tag before each of the image URLs. This makes it easy to use the stylesheet in EE even if you change the address of your site.

The index Template

Now it’s time to create the index template, which will show a list of the 10 most recent blog posts. To keep this tutorial simple, I’ve just modified the index page of the Digg sample in the iui folder you downloaded earlier and replaced the static content with a dynamic list of blog posts. Once you’ve become familiar with iUI, I recommend that you go back and try creating the page from scratch. For now, open the index file from the tutorial download, copy all of the code, and paste it into your EE template.

Make sure to change the page title to something appropriate for your site. You’ll also want to make sure that the URLs for the CSS and Javascript files in the header are correct for your site.

Most of the code is fairly self-evident, however, there are a few things worth mentioning about the template:

The viewport set in the header makes the web page fit the iPhone’s screen. This eleminates the need for the user to zoom and pan to see all of the content and makes the page feel more like a standard application.

The .toolbar class is a standard class defined in iUI and creates the standard iPhone list navigation.

There’s no need to enter anything in the H1 tag with the pageTitle ID - this wil be done automatically.

The rest of the code is mostly standard EE tags used to show the comment count of each post and create a hyperlink each article’s content. iUI automaticaly loads the content through AJAX, so we don’t have to worry about doing anything special there.

When you’re finished, save and close the template.

Upload Image and Javascript Files

You’re almost there! All that we need to do now is upload the images and the Javascript file from the iUI download to your Expression Engine site. You’ll recall that our CSS template looks for the images files in /images/iui/, so create that folder and upload the files. The address of the Javascript file is included in the heading of your index template, so make sure that you upload it to the address you specified.

Once you’ve uploaded everything, it’s time to grab your iPhone or iPod touch and test the page out! Post a comment below if you have any questions or if you’d like to share a site you’ve created.

Repost: Mobile Productivity

admin — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 02:11:41 +0000

A few days ago I wrote a post on my four favorite mobile tools for UTFCU-Rocks, the student site for UT Federal Credit Union. The post might be useful for anyone with an on-the-go lifestyle so I’ve decided to repost it here as well.

This digital lifestyle post is all about staying productive while you’re on the go. Whether it’s using Google’s text message service to get directions or using rememberthemilk.com to manage your to-to list, these free tools will help you manage your hectic life! Check out some of our favorite services below.

GOOG-411 for your phone
Google makes it easy to find any business for free using your mobile phone. Next time you’re driving and need to call in a takeout order or check to see if your favorite video rental store has the movie you’re looking for, try calling 1-800-GOOG-4411 (1-800-466-4411). Once connected, just say the name of the business you’re looking for and you will be connected automatically or say “text message” and receive the address and telephone number sent to you via SMS. Click here for more information.

Google SMS
Life without Google wouldn’t be worth living. Ok, perhaps that was a little dramatic, but it certainly wouldn’t be as easy! Did you know that you can harness the power of Google search through your mobile phone using SMS (text messages)? Simply send a text message to 466453 with your search terms as the body of the message and you’ll get a text message response in a few seconds. View the demo or check out some of the supported searches by clicking here.

Jott.com
I see people texting and driving all the time (they’re usually swerving into my lane). What always amazes me is that more people aren’t using Jott instead of typing everything by hand. After you’re registered for a free account and setup your profile, sending messages to your friends or composing a quick reminder for yourself using Jott is as simple as calling a telephone number and speaking. If you’ve got voice dialing on your mobile phone, setup Jott as a contact and you don’t even have to dial the number! If you’re a regular text message/email machine during your daily commute, go ahead and give Jott a try.

Remember the Milk
There are tons of ways to manage to-do lists online, but my favorite one happens to be Remember The Milk. With RTM, you can add items to your lists in a number of ways including Twitter and email. RTM makes it easy to stay up to date by scheduling reminders through email, SMS, or instant messenger. There are too many cool features to mention here, but you can learn about all of them by going to the website and signing up for a free account.

Do you use a free tool that’s not listed here? I’m always looking for new stuff to check out. Share your tips with us and other readers by adding a comment either here or at utfcu-rocks.com!

Fellow Tip

admin — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 02:35:42 +0000

Founded by local photographer/blogger Eric McCarty, FellowTip is a new site that makes it easy to ask questions and share information on specific topics. What makes this site different from a typical discussion forum, however, is that users are encouraged to provide monetary tips for useful information. According to the site’s home page, “FellowTip is the internet’s first topic-based community where folks can tip each other with real money (patent pending) for sharing information!”

The company plans to “establish a nexus of activity here in East Tennessee and see it branch our from there.” I love the idea behind the site and hope to see it really take off in the future. It looks like it’s off to a great start already.

www.fellowtip.com

10 Link Tuesday

admin — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 02:13:45 +0000

http://tools.dynamicdrive.com/favicon/
A handy little tool for making favicons. I have previously used a free Photoshop plugin to create favicons, but this site makes the process even easier!

http://fluidapp.com/
This free application for Mac OS X is used to make site specific browsers. Don’t know what a SSL is? Here’s a demo video using Fluid to create a Muxtape application.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuGaqLT-gO4
I found this video a while back on the 37 signals blog. The more I watch it, the more amazed I am by it.

http://www.cushycms.com/
Although I don’t think I would use it for a major project, this content management system looks like it could be great for smaller projects or individual pages that you might want to allow clients to edit.

http://www.screensteps.com/
I read a post about this application at the Unofficial Apple Weblog a few weeks ago, but didn’t have a chance to actually use it until recently. If you spend any time writing tutorials (either online or for print), you might want to check this out.

http://www.jingproject.com/
TechSmith’s Snagit and Camtasia Studio are some of the few things I actually miss after switching from PC to Mac. Luckily, their Jing project is available for both Mac and PC. Until they release a Mac version of SnagIt, Jing may be the easiest way to grab and share quick screenshots and screencasts.

http://www.varasoftware.com/
If you need to make videos of your Mac desktop for tutorials, there’s no better tool out there than ScreenFlow by Vara Software.

http://skitch.com/
I’ve had a blast using Skitch along with Screen Steps to create quick software tutorials. I planned on writing a post on using the two tools together for quite a while now but still haven’t managed to get around to it.

http://www.aiso.net/
My recent experiences with Globat has led me to look for new cheap (and hopefully more reliable) web hosting. This company offers green hosting and powers all of their servers from solar panels.

http://www.activatethespace.com/Activate_The_Space/_sedna_.html
I’ve been waiting for a Mac-based application to manage digital signage for a while now. Although Sedna Presenter will not be released until July 11, the company has recently released a demo video that looks quite promising.

UTFCU in Knox News Sentinel and CU Journal

admin — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 00:37:30 +0000

My social media projects at UTFCU have gained some attention this month. A couple of weeks ago, the Credit Union Journal ran a feature on UTFCU’s use of Twitter as a communication tool. And in this Sunday’s News Sentinel, business writer Carly Harrington wrote a story on social media in business. I was interviewed for both these pieces and even managed to get my picture in the in the paper. I hope my mom saved a copy!

The Credit Union Journal requires membership to view the article, so drop me an email (using the contact form) if you want to see it.

UTFCU Student Site Redesign (2008)

admin — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 00:12:49 +0000

After several weeks of planning and development, I was able to launch the newly revised www.utfcu-rocks.com yesterday. UTFCU Rocks is the student-centered micro site for UT Federal Credit Union and features a blog, video contests, polls, events calendar, and all sorts of social media integration. I created the graphics and design of the site along with much of the content. The site is powered by Expression Engine, a blogging/CMS platform that I find myself liking more and more each day!

The site is one part of a future back-to-school marketing campaign that is shaping up to be quite a bit of fun! We’re using Twitter and a shared short code to get the word out on all types of events and promotions – from Guitar Hero contests to tailgate parties. More updates to come . . .

Painting the Rock

admin — Wed, 28 May 2008 01:46:00 +0000

At UTFCU, we’re getting ready to launch a new marketing campaign and website geared specifically for students. While we’re still a few days away from the official unveiling of the new site at www.utfcu-rocks.com, we decided to start building momentum by taking part in an old tradition at UTK—painting the rock! If you’ve been to this blog before, you may already know that I enjoy photographing street art and have even started creating my own pieces (on canvas and plywood); however, this was the first time I’ve painted anything in public and certainly the first time graffiti has been part of my “work day.”

We began, in typical banker fashion, with a quick recognizance mission to measure the rock and then it was off to Jerry’s Art-a-rama to buy some Montana spray paint and other supplies. Then, I created the stencil design in Photoshop and used an LCD projector to create a paper version. After we finished cutting the stencils, we drove to the rock to prime the rock, then paint the graphic. We chose to paint the new utfcu-rocks logo, which my wife helped design, along with a reference to our newly purchased shared short code. I’ll write a separate post later on about our short code usage and some of the other interesting things featured in the new student campaign. I recorded the whole process with a Flip video camera and uploaded it to the credit union’s YouTube account today.

Check out the final product and the making of video below!

UT Federal Credit Union Tweeting it Up!

admin — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 03:23:00 +0000

It seems like the corporate world is finally taking notice of Twitter. Lately, I’ve seen several local companies as well as some larger organizations using Twitter and doing some pretty cool things with the technology. This afternoon, several fellow Knoxville Twitterers were talking about Zappos, an online shoe store, and taking notice of how the company’s CEO interacts with followers.

The March of Dimes, on the other hand, uses Twitter primarily to transmit daily pregnancy tips to its followers and focuses more on the dissemination of information than facilitating conversation.I established UT Federal Credit Union’s Twitter account about 6 months ago and have been trying to decide which approach I wanted to take since then. After some though, I settled on a compromise between the two approaches and finally placed a banner advertisement and news item on the credit union’s home page. In addition, I created a simple You Tube video explaining how to create a Twitter account and follow the credit union.

I plan on using Twitter send credit union news, financial tips, and rate changes to members. Later this summer, Twitter will play an important role in our student back-to-school campaign and may even be used to give clues in a scavenger hunt and award prizes to contestants. I will provide updates in a few weeks! In the mean time, feel free to follow utfcu.How-to VideoWeb Banner

Forget Jakob Nielsen and the W3C - Mo Serious Knows All!

admin — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 00:40:47 +0000

Thanks to the Diggnation podcast, I’ve been enjoying listening to Mo Serious rap about web usability, social media, search engine optimization, and web design this evening. This guy’s stuff is awesome. To top it off, I see that he’s following Chuck Norris on Twitter - perfect!